Tag: jews

What Jews and Christians Agree on That is Wrong for Both

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How many of you have heard someone say “Jews have the Torah and Christians have the Blood of Christ” when talking about the commandments in the Torah and who is supposed to obey them? I know I have, and the general understanding is that Jews and Christians are separated by this idea that Jews need to obey the Torah but Christians don’t because Jesus died for their sins.

Both sides seem to agree to this: Jews say the New Covenant is only for Christians and Christians say the Old Covenant is only for Jews.

Jews use only the Tanakh and Christians reference the Tanakh, sometimes, but generally stay only within the New Covenant. In fact, I believe the vast majority of Christians who have been taught from the Gospels and the Epistles don’t even realize that the writers of those books and letters are all quoting from the Tanakh.

So if both Jews and Christians feel “their” Bible is only for them, why is this wrong?

Well, I’ll tell you why- because the Torah is for everyone and Yeshua died for everyone. Yeshua taught the Torah and the Apostles taught the Torah: that was the only “Bible” around. The New Covenant letters and Gospels were being written as early as the middle of the First Century but didn’t come together until around 367 C.E., nearly three centuries later.

What has happened is that the “grafted in” are trying to take over the tree, and the tree is letting them!

The Old and New Covenants are one Bible, one story that has a beginning, a middle, and an end. It starts with the creation of everything, then God chooses a man (Abraham) to be the father of a nation dedicated to serving God; later, God tells that nation they are to be a nation of priests to the world (Exodus 19:6) and he gives them the Torah, his User Manual (if you will) on how they should live their lives. As priests, of course, they are not only to live their lives in accordance with the Torah but they are to teach the rest of the world how to do that, as well. The story continues as we read how the people of God fail to perform their priestly duties, and after the nation suffers a civil war leaving two nations, Shomron in the North and Judah in the South, their constant sinning forces God to disperse them throughout the world. However, that isn’t the end of the story.

There has, from the beginning, been the promise of a Messiah to come and reconcile the chosen people to God, and then all the world will worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in accordance to God’s commandments (Torah) when God regathers his people into their land, Israel. The promise of a Messiah comes to fruition in the New Covenant, which is the continuation of the Old Covenant. It starts some 400 years or so after the last entries in the Tanakh and it is Yeshua who is the Messiah. As prophesied, he is not accepted by the masses although he was supernaturally born and portrayed God’s power throughout his ministry. The prophecy that all people will come to worship God begins (properly) with the Messianic Jews (early followers of Yeshua) adding to their numbers from the Gentiles who were converting to Judaism. Despite what has been taught, first century Jews that followed Yeshua never converted to Christianity because Yeshua was, is and always will be a Jew teaching the Torah. As his ministry grew in strength and numbers more and more Gentiles were added as fewer and fewer Jews came to accept him as their Messiah. I suppose at some point there had to be a limit, since there were so many more Gentiles than Jews in the world then, just as it is today.

Starting around the end of the first century, the separation of Yeshua’s followers from Judaic worship to what is today Christianity begins to really “take off” and with the Council of Nicene, Christianity is a totally different religion, persecuting the Jews and re-branding Yeshua as Jesus Christ, the blue-eyed, blond-haired Teutonic image that is what people think of today.

The story ends with the regathering of the Jewish people to their homeland and the Acharit HaYamim (End Days) that we read about in Revelation. And, when all is said and done, all people will recognize and proclaim Yeshua as the Messiah and worship God on his Holy Mountain in Jerusalem (the new Jerusalem) as God told us we should, which is found (you guessed it!) in the Torah.

So, nu? What’s my point? My point is this: we need to bridge that gap that people created which God never intended to exist. We need to overcome the bigotry and hatred between Jews and Christians and realize that there is one God who does not have any religion, just laws, commandments, rules, ordinances, and regulations that tell us how we are to worship him and how we are to treat each other.

One God, one set of laws, one people under God and one Messiah for all. The separation between Jews and Christians serves only to help the enemy of God to be able to take over the world. Anyone, therefore, who promulgates that Jews and Christians should remain separated and that following the Torah is no longer valid or needed is an agent of Satan, whether or not that person realizes it.

If you are Christian, read the whole Bible and you will see there is nothing “new” in the New Covenant. If you are Jewish, rebuke the bigotry and fear that Jews have of the New Covenant. Read a Messianic version of the New Covenant (NOT the King James version, please!) and see that what Yeshua said was not in any way different from what Moses said. Yeshua taught the deeper, spiritual meaning of the Mosaic law by using a Drash to teach the Remes (look up the exegesis system called PaRDes to see what I am talking about) but never, ever taught against the Torah. He couldn’t! He was and still is, the Living Torah.

For Jews that are waiting for Messiah, you must be open to the idea that maybe, just maybe, he already came and he will be coming back. You can still wait, and I pray you accept him when he returns, or you can open your heart and mind and just simply study about Yeshua now. Remember, the Talmud talks about the Messiah as the Son of Joseph and also as the Son of David, indicating two separate Messianic occurrences.

For Christians, you must be open to hearing that the Torah is what Yeshua taught and the Canon of Modern Christianity is not what Yeshua taught but what Constantine created. You need to read the Old Covenant to really be able to understand what Yeshua was teaching and accept that following the Torah isn’t just for Jews.

Yeshua is Messiah to the world: Jews, Gentiles, Buddhist, Muslims ….everyone! God has no religion and when all is said and done, we who will survive through faith will worship God in the way he instructed his chosen nation of priests to teach us.

Parashah Pinchas 2018 (Pinchas) Numbers 25:10 – 30:1

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We left the last parashah with Phinehas (Pinchas) killing the Israelite man and Midianite woman to stop the plague. Now God makes a covenant that the lineage of Pinchas will be the High priests forever because of his jealousy for God. God commands Moses to go to war with Midian but first, a new census is taken because the prior generation has died in the desert.  No further mention of the war is given at this point but we return to it in Chapter 31.

The daughters of the Zelophead (who had no sons) request an inheritance and God makes a new statute which identifies the Order of Inheritance regarding family inheritance of land in Israel.

God tells Moses his time has come so Moses asks God to place someone in charge of the people, and God chooses Joshua.

This parashah ends with God having Moses remind the people of the requirements for the offerings that were to be made daily, as well as the festivals that he first told us to honor in Leviticus.

Moses is told he is going to die and his first thought is of the people he has led for the past 40 years. He isn’t concerned about how will he die, will it hurt, will he be taken up into God’s bosom- no thoughts for himself and total concern for those that he will leave behind. This action on Moses’ part shows us the type of person he was: thoughtful, concerned for others, humble even unto death (sound familiar?) and obedient.

Today what I would like to talk about is why God is having Moses repeat the offering instructions to the people before he dies. When I read this I had to ask myself, “Why? Why is God having Moses remind the people about something that they already have been told and have written down for them?”  The answer seems to be because God knew that these offerings were a central part of the daily life of the Children of Israel and, as such, must be followed. They are so important they bear repeating.

Again, why? Because without those daily activities of worship and annual celebrations of the Lord the people would easily fall into corruption. And we see that happening throughout the remainder of the Tanakh: when the leadership fails to enforce the daily offerings and festivals, the people fall into sin and worship the gods of their neighbors.

It is like the old adage: good habits are hard to develop and easy to lose, whereas bad habits are easy to develop and hard to lose.

We need to remember to pray daily, to worship the festivals God gave and when we celebrate holidays (not to be confused with Holy Days: the former are man-made and the latter are God commanded) we should celebrate only those that still honor God and do not replace the festivals he gave us in Leviticus, which are repeated here in this parashah. Only by repetitive worship can we maintain our faith and the strength of that faith, especially in light of our leader’s sinfulness and distracting activities.

When I say “repetitive” I do not mean to repeat prayers and perform actions robotically: what I mean is that we need to develop a regular prayer life and to remember the festivals God told us to celebrate. The ones he reminds us of in this parashah are the daily offerings, Shabbat and new moon, New Year, Day of Atonement and the pilgrimage festivals. Daily, monthly and annually we perform these rites and celebrate these festivals so that worship becomes a regular part of our lives. Every time throughout history that this cycle of worship was broken, the people fell into corruption.

What is your personal worship cycle? Do you pray every day? Do you honor the Lord by celebrating his festivals as he said you should? Too many people (both Christians and Jews) do not honor the Lord by celebrating the festivals as instructed. God isn’t very pleased with a half-way attitude when it comes to our worship of him. Another thing I have noticed: when you pray, who are you praying to? Is it to God or is it to Jesus? Jesus isn’t the answerer of our prayers- he is the intercessor. There is a big difference between intercession of prayer and interception of prayer.

The take-away for today is that we all need to develop a regular cycle of worship: daily and continual prayer, festival celebration as God said to (excepting for the sacrifices, of course) and constant reading of the Bible to remind us of who we are worshiping. Look at your life with spiritual eyes and see all that God has done, and is doing for you, and above all be appreciative for whatever you have. It may be great or it may be small, but if you have anything then thank God for it. He will hear and, knowing what you need, provide what is best for you.

Sometimes it is very hard for us to believe God is working for good in our lives, and that is what faith is all about- steadfastly believing God loves you and wants only the best for you when your life at that moment makes it impossible to believe. These are the times when the cycle of worship we have been talking about today helps us maintain our faith.

 

What Changed After Egypt?

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When we read the 4th Commandment in Exodus 20, it reads this way:

“Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work,  but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns.  For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.”

But later on, after the Israelites have been in the desert for some 40 years and Moses is about to die, he reviews all that has happened, and when he repeats the 10 Commandments in Deuteronomy 5 , the 4th one changes:

“Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you.  Six days you shall labor and do all your work,  but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns, so that your male and female servants may rest, as you do.  Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.”

Do you see the change? The reason for celebrating the Shabbat has been changed! Initially, when the people were freed they were told that God rested on the Shabbat and so they should, also. These were a people that had been in slavery for 400 years and never had a single day’s rest. Slavery isn’t a 9 to 5 job, it is 24/7/365! If God was able to rest, so can they, and it was a totally new life style for them. But later, after 40 years of having a Shabbat, as they were about to enter the land, God changed the reason for celebrating.

They were about to take possession of a land in which, instead of being a slave, they will have slaves of their own. A land where there will be other people living with them who will be working for them instead of the other way around. So they will need to remember how they were slaves, that once they were mistreated and never had a single day’s rest until God provided it for them. Therefore, they were no longer to emulate God just by resting on Shabbat, but also by providing a Shabbat rest for others.

It may seem the reason for celebrating the Shabbat had changed drastically, but there is a common element between the two: whether they were resting as God rested, or providing others rest as God provided for them, they were still emulating God. At first they were told to rest because God rested, and that was something they needed to learn how to do. By the time they were ready to enter the Land the Shabbat had become a regular part of their lifestyle, and the next step was to learn how to allow others to rest from their work with them, just as God had them rest when He did.

From this point in the bible forward, the Shabbat is (almost always) commanded to be observed because we were once slaves in Egypt and now we are free. In fact, if you really look at it, from the time we entered the Promised Land onward, the impetus for the people to emulate God was in that they were once slaves and now they are free. This is the founding principle of God’s plan of salvation: those who were slaves are now free. First we were slaves to Pharaoh, and God freed us through wondrous miracles. He gave us the Torah, which defined, absolutely, sin from righteousness, and so we were able (as Shaul tells us) to identify sinfulness from sinlessness. With Torah we understood that instead of being slaves to a political system, we were still slaves to a spiritual system; more than that, we understood that the freedom to this spiritual system was also provided by God, through Messiah Yeshua.

What changed between Egypt and the Promised Land was not just the reason for celebrating the Shabbat, but our understanding of God’s plan of salvation. It is all about freedom: freedom from a political system, then freedom from a spiritual system, and ultimately freedom from this plane of existence, itself. Whether we are saved by Messiah or still slave to the world system, we are always going to be enslaved by our physicality, our mortality and our flesh. This will not change until we are resurrected into spiritual beings, and then God’s plan of salvation will be completed.

The good news is that for those that have accepted Yeshua as their Messiah, we are already 2/3’s of the way home! Freed from slavery to a world system, freed from slavery to sin, and now just waiting for our resurrected bodies.

I can hardly wait!

Jesus, the Son of the Father: Are we talking the Messiah or the Murderer?

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We all know the accounting of the trial of Jesus (Yeshua), and how Pilate offered the mob a choice: kill Jesus, the king of the Jews or kill the condemned murderer, Barabbas?  The mob (which was actually controlled by the few, politically powerful men who wanted Yeshua out of their hair) screamed to kill Yeshua.  So the murderer Barabbas, a sinful man who was rebellious to the authorities above him, was released and saved from the death he deserved, and Yeshua, an innocent man who wanted nothing more than to properly interpret the Torah and lead people closer to God, was savagely tortured, nailed to a tree and left hanging until He suffocated to death.

FYI: when crucified, if shock from being nailed to a tree didn’t immediately kill you, death came slowly and tortuously because your body would begin to slump, and with your arms above your chest eventually you would have your airway blocked and you then suffocated.

In some circles, it is believed that Barabbas’ full name was Yeshua Barabbas, which when translated means “salvation, the son of the father.” Now, isn’t that interesting?  So the “son of the father” was freed from sin and death by the sacrifice of “the Son of the Father!” Which, consequently, allowed all people to be saved from the consequences of their sinfulness.

This information may not be new to many of you, but I confess I never really thought about it until recently. Wouldn’t it be interesting if Pilate misunderstood the mob? What I mean is, maybe they were really calling for Barabbas to die and to release Yeshua, but since they both had pretty much the same name, Pilate got it wrong?  That would mean, if Pilate did crucify the wrong man, that  what most of Christianity has taught for 2000 years, specifically that the Jews killed Jesus, would be false!  The right man was crucified, from the standpoint of God’s plan of salvation, but maybe the Jews have been given a bum rap all these years? Maybe we didn’t kill Jesus? Maybe we really wanted to accept Him as Messiah and it was that Roman doofus, Governor Pilate, who didn’t know the difference between Yeshua bar Yosef and Yeshua bar Abbas, that deserves the blame?

For the record: Jews didn’t kill Jesus, and neither did the Romans, it was sin that was the real cause of Jesus having to die.

Well, well…this is an interesting thought, but it isn’t what happened. The mob cried for the Messiah to die; Pilate knew the difference between the murderer Barabbas and the king of the Jews; the right man was crucified and the sins of all men (and women) were nailed to that tree with Him. Not the law, not the Torah, not the commandments, but the consequence of our sin of rejecting those things is what died with Yeshua.

You see, once the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, there was no place for people to perform the guilt or sin sacrifice, which meant to the Jews that rejected Yeshua they would have no way to atone, thereby able to avoid dying in their sin. Just think for a second how terrible a realization that must have been to them! Yeshua’s sacrifice replaced the need to bring your sacrifice to the Temple, which is how we avoid the consequences of our sin when we repent and ask forgiveness through His name.

Please note that repentance (T’Shuvah) is mandatory for forgiveness- just confessing that you sinned and asking forgiveness, when you really aren’t sorry, really don’t care and don’t have any plans to stop sinning, is not going to get the job done.

The fact that both Yeshua and Barabbas had pretty much the same name (when translated) is an interesting point: it’s not earth shattering, it’s nothing that will affect your salvation, nothing that will turn heads and make people say, “WOW!!”….it’s just an interesting point.  The Messiah and a rebellious murderer had the same name, the same fate and the same judge, but the innocent died and the guilty was freed.  Now, what makes it more interesting (to me) than anything else is not the coincidence, but the similarity to me: I was the guilty, rebellious murderer (of myself) and Yeshua was innocent, but through His death I was set free.

And it can be the same with you: if you are reading this and haven’t accepted Yeshua as your Messiah, who will expiate your sins and provide the justification you need for redemption, then maybe you have been crucifying the wrong person?

 

Parashah Re’eh (See) Deuteronomy 11:26 – 16:17

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Moses continues to review all the commandments that God has given to the Israelites over the past 40 years. He tells them that as soon as they cross over the Jordan and enter the land He has given to them they are to place the blessing for obedience on Mt. Gerezim, and the curse for disobedience on Mt. Ebal.

Interesting note: these are called the “Shoulder Mountains” because they are across from each other, like a pair of shoulders, and below them is the Valley of Shechem. When all the people, split between the two mountainsides, repeat the blessings and curses aloud, all the inhabitants of the valley below them will hear it.

Moses orders that all pagan memorials and standing stones, idols, etc. be completely destroyed and that Israel is never to do any of the things these pagans did. The people are also told that God will choose a place for His name, meaning a single location where sacrifices to Him will be performed. He orders that no one is to sacrifice just anywhere, but only where God tells them they can. If the tithe to be brought is too much to carry to where the Temple is, it can be converted to money, then when the person gets to the location he can buy the items from someone else.

Another interesting note: One of the reasons Yeshua (Jesus) turned over the money changing tables and threw the merchants out of the Temple courts when He came into Jerusalem (John 2:15) was because the animals they sold to the people for sacrifice were way overpriced, and many were not fit to be a sacrifice.

Moses reviews the laws of Kashrut (Kosher) and the regulations regarding the Festivals of the Lord. He gives the regulations regarding the Shemittah, which is the release of debt every 7 years, and warns against any one who is trying to seduce people to worship other gods, whether a prophet or a family member, decreeing they should be put to death.

Throughout this book Moses keeps telling the people that they are to choose which way they will live: in accordance with God’s laws or in accordance with the pagan practices of the people surrounding them. Even though God ordered every vestige of the pagan practices and people to be be utterly destroyed, He knew that there would always be a remnant of evil left behind.

Seems whether of good or evil, there is always a remnant, somewhere.

The bible verifies God gave us Free Will to choose our path. Too often I hear people make excuses for their actions, blaming the enemy or someone else, or just saying that “God is forgiving so I’ll be OK”, as if God will automatically forgive us for sinning against Him even if we don’t really repent of it. This is one of the wrong teachings of Christianity over the centuries, i.e. that because Yeshua died for our sins we are automatically forgiven.

We are NOT automatically forgiven! Everything in the bible tells us that, and although we do have forgiveness through Yeshua’s sacrifice, it is not automatic. Think about it: if we were automatically forgiven, then what is the use of Free Will? If we are automatically forgiven, then the need to choose right over wrong becomes unnecessary, because no matter what we do we will be forgiven. Automatic forgiveness is, effectively, saying that we don’t even have to do T’shuvah (repent) from our sin.

How many of you out there really think that God will forgive an unrepentant sinner? If you raised your hand, you are way off base and will be very, VERY disappointed at Judgement Day.

God holds us responsible for everything we do and say. Us, me, you- the excuse “But that’s what they told me” is not acceptable at God’s Throne of Judgement. Moses repeats the commandments from God to the people many times so that it will, hopefully, sink in! I think Moses knows what is going to happen; I believe that when God showed Moses the Promised Land He also showed Moses the future. When we read the passionate plea of Moses as he reviews the laws and warns the people against rejecting their God for the gods of the Canaanites, you can hear his heart breaking as he tells them what will happen when (he doesn’t always use the word “if”, and often uses the word “when”) they reject God by rejecting His commandments.

The Torah is not just for Jews and the Blood of Christ is not just for Gentiles; there is not one bible for Jews and one bible for Gentiles. The Torah is for everyone, and the bible is one book- the first part (Tanakh) telling us how we got here and that a Messiah will come, and the second part telling us about that Messiah and letting us know what will happen in the end. One God for everyone, one Messiah for everyone, one set of rules for everyone, and one choice for everyone: joyful life eternal or eternal suffering.

It’s your choice- no one can make it for you and God will not allow you to let someone else take the blame for what you end up doing. No matter what you are told by humans, God says that He, Himself, is going to hold you individually and completely responsible for what you do during your lifetime on earth.

You may be thinking you can change later, or will think about it at some other time, but here’s the problem with that: you will never know when you’re out of time!

Parashah V’etchanan (and I sought..) Deuteronomy 3:23 – 7:11

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Moses asks God to allow him to enter the land, and God says, pretty much, “Enough already! Stop whining about this because I told you that ain’t gonna happen! But, I will do this- after you anoint Joshua climb up to the top of Mount Pisgah, and I will let you see the land.”

Some believe, as I do, that not only did God show Moses the land, but also the future. He showed Moses the eventual degradation of the people into idol worship, the consequent dispersal into the Diaspora and exile to Babylon, ending with their return to Israel. I believe this because of the warning Moses gives right after he observes the land, which is not so much the warning of a possible future as it is the narration of events from one who has seen it happen.

This rest of this parashah holds nearly everything that is important to the Jewish people, and thereby the world:

Deuteronomy 5:6-19: Moses reviews the Ten Commandments;

Deuteronomy 6:4:        Moses teaches us the Shema;

Deuteronomy 6:5-10:  Moses teaches us the V’ahavta;

Deuteronomy 6:16:      Moses teaches us a lesson that is used more often in Christianity (from my experience) than in Judaism: Do not test the Lord, your God.

Clearly, there is in just those 4 lessons more than I could write in a single post, unless that post was something like 15 pages or more. Don’t worry- this won’t be.

Actually, the message I have today is not about any of those passages. It is from Deuteronomy 4:5-8, which is what Moses told the people before he told them all those other things:

See, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it.Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?

I often state that the Torah is not just for the Jews, but for the entire world. The Jews received it so to learn it and live it (just like it says here), so that they may be an example to the world.

Shaul says pretty much the same thing, but to a different audience, in Romans 11:11–

So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no means! Rather, through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous.

Moses is telling Israel to obey Torah so that when the other nations see the wonderful rulings, peacefulness, social closeness, morality and compassion of the people, and how God is always close at hand to help and protect them, they will be jealous and want to be part of it. And Shaul, some 1500 or so years later, tells the Messianic communities that their living in faith to Messiah Yeshua will eventually be an example to the non-believing Jews how much better it is to accept Yeshua and make them jealous for their own Messiah.

Here we have the same message– faithfully believe God and do as He says– being told to Jews and Gentiles first going into the land, and centuries later to Gentiles and Jews who have been living in the land. And the reason is the same: to incite, through jealousy, those living outside of God’s plan to choose to accept God (and His Messiah.)

There are many passages in the bible that confirm this message, and it is unfortunate that much of Christianity has perverted and misused the writings of Shaul to dissuade people from hearing the proper message. Shaul says he is delivering the Gospel to the Jew first, then the Gentile (Romans 1:16); I believe this means if the Good News of the Kingdom of God is not presented in a way that is acceptable to a Jewish person, it isn’t the correct message for a Gentile.

Still and all, we can be confident in this: God’as plan will win out in the end!  Torah will be written on our hearts (Jeremiah 31:33) and we no longer ask our brother (and sister) if they know the Lord, because all will know Him.

In the meantime, what should we do? Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it? Live your life as an example to those who have rejected God and/or Messiah Yeshua to show them how blessed and peaceful it is to be living as God has told us we should.

Most everyone knows that God’s house has many rooms, but what many don’t know is that there is a really big pool in the backyard, which is always refreshing, so to you who are suffering the emptiness, despair, heat and discomfort of living a worldly life…C’mon in- the water’s fine!!!

 

 

The First Hurdle to Overcome When Talking to Jews About Yeshua

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If you have ever tried to talk to a Jewish person about Jesus, you are already done. The moment you use the name “Jesus” pretty much any Jew you are talking to will be screaming, “Shields up, Scotty!!” because, to a Jew, Jesus is a Jew who betrayed Judaism and created his own religion, which has historically hated and persecuted Jews.

As I have talked about before (check out the blogs under the category “Jews and Jesus”), approaching a Jewish man or woman with the Good News is something that has to be done with total respect for, and only referencing, the Tanakh. Use “Yeshua” or “Messiah/Maschiach” when referencing Yeshua. Do not use the terms “Under the blood” or “Under the law” or even imply that Torah is not still valid and necessary, and do not, under any circumstances, use anything from the New Covenant writings to justify a position.

This teaching within Judaism, that Jesus created Christianity, is the major hurdle preventing Jews from even wanting to listen to anything about Jesus. And what makes this even more potent, as a wedge between Jews and Christians, is that Christians believe it, too! The fact is that Jesus did NOT create Christianity as it is practiced today. He did not create anything new, all He did was better define the existing laws in the Torah. Yeshua (let’s practice not using “Jesus”) did not change or delete or teach against anything in the Torah. Christianity teaches that He was the living Torah, that the Word became flesh (the only “word” at that time was the Torah) and that Yeshua lived a perfectly sinless life, which is why He was an acceptable sacrifice for our sins. Christianity teaches and is based completely upon that truth: Yeshua was sinless. Yet, much of Christianity teaches that the Torah is no longer necessary; in other words, Christians are told to live and do what Yeshua did, but in the next breath they are told that they don’t have to obey Torah, which is what Yeshua did! Huh??  Do as Yeshua did, but don’t do what He did? The popular idea of living as Jesus did with the bracelet that has written on it, “WWJD?” (What Would Jesus Do) is creating a lie, because what Christianity teaches is “DDWJD” (Don’t Do What Jesus Did).

To be fair I should say, most of Christianity teaches this. There are the Messianic and Hebraic Roots Christian movements which are turning back to the roots of Christianity and accepting Yeshua as a Jew, and also accepting the Torah as a valid and necessary list of commandments that are, and always have been, as much a part of the New Covenant God made with us (through Yeshua) as the Old Covenant. Mosaic laws are still valid and need to be obeyed for blessings and to remain saved. Ignoring or rejecting Torah is rejecting God, and rejecting Messiah. We are told this in 1 John 2:4-6:

Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person.  But if anyone obeys his word,love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him:  Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.

So, how do we overcome this hurdle? It ain’t gonna be easy, I can tell you that!

First, we should re-train the “Church” to recognize that being saved by Yeshua’s sacrifice does not mean they are no longer subject to the commandments in the Torah. We all need to recognize that the Torah is God’s commandments to the world, not just to Jews.

Second, the “Church” needs to understand that Constantine created modern day Christianity. Before then, there was growing political and social upheaval that caused the rift between Jews and followers of Messiah Yeshua (which was composed of Jews and Gentiles converting to Judaism.) Once the Christian world understands how and why the rift between Jews and Gentiles began, we can begin to overcome the wrongful, hateful and Satanic (yes, Satan is behind the split between Jews and Christians- no doubt about it!) teachings that came from the early “church elders.”

When I use the term “church elders” I am referring to Gentiles who took control of the early followers of Messiah. Even though there may have been thousands upon thousands of Jews that initially accepted Yeshua (and never, ever changed their Jewish lifestyle or worship), by the beginning of the Second Century people following “The Way” were being led by Gentile converts, and the majority of Messianic followers were Gentiles who had been converting from their pagan practices to Judaism. Those Gentile leaders did not want to get in any more trouble then they were already with Rome, so they began to separate themselves from the Jewish lifestyle and worship practices (if you read the letters from Shaul/Paul to his Messianic Communities, you can see between the lines that already they were beginning to fall away from Judaism in their worship and lifestyle, which is what he was trying to prevent.) In the same way Jeroboam separated Israel from Judea when he first took over the 10 Tribes that rebelled against Solomon’s son, Rehoboam, these elders became so passionate about no longer being associated with Judaism that they literally created a new religion, which Constantine made “official” at the Council of Nicene; those canon are the foundation for what we today call Christianity.

Finally, the third step in this process is to approach Jews with the truth about Yeshua: He was a Jew and is still a Jew, Torah is what He preached and followed and that He taught others to do so. His Disciples (use the term “Talmudim”, which means students) also lived a Jewish lifestyle, worshiped as Jews do, and taught others to do so. The early “church” was not a church at all, but made up of Messianic communities (use the term “Kehillot” (ka-hee-lote), which is Hebrew for communities) that were Jews who accepted Yeshua as their Messiah and pagans converting to Judaism.

God willing, once we can get past the wrongful teachings, which are from Satan’s desire to weaken God’s union of those who follow the Messiah, we may then have our Jewish Brothers and Sisters give the order to “lower shields”, and communication can begin.

The truth WILL set you free, and it will also bring us into union as one new person, under Messiah, worshiping God and treating each other as God commanded us to do.

 

 

To Torah, or Not to Torah: OY! What a Question!

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I don’t know where to start on this one, or where it may end. I could probably write a book about this (hmmmm??), but I want to keep it simple, so here I go…

As I have said often, eating ham will not send me to Sheol (the Hebrew word for Hell), and not eating ham will not guarantee me a place in heaven. My sins are forgiven by the sacrifice of Messiah Yeshua, so the Torah, which tells me what is a sin and what isn’t a sin (Shaul says in the book of Romans that the Torah actually created sin, in that it defined it) helps me to act in ways that please God, but no longer really keeps me from death because my sins have been, and will continually be, forgiven through Yeshua. Therefore, there is an argument that can be made that it is no longer absolutely necessary to keep the Torah.

BUT…just because we can make an argument doesn’t mean that the argument we make is valid.

The Torah is composed of many things: it has historical information, it has constitutional regulations, it establishes a system of societal laws and statutes that include torts resolution and a penal code, it outlines a health code, it is a marriage certificate between Jews and God, and it also outlines the procedures for how we are supposed to worship God. These laws, statutes, and regulations are commandments, not suggestions- they are direct and absolute requirements.

The justification (this term means, specifically, being forgiven of our sins) we receive through the sacrificial system defined in the Torah is no different that the justification we receive through the sacrifice of Yeshua. The process is still the same: sin, recognize and accept your sin, do T’shuvah (repentance), present your sacrifice to God and God will accept the blood of the innocent sacrifice (remember that the life is in the blood) as a substitution for your lifeblood. That is the process outlined in Torah, and never, ever did anyone think or say that because we could always sacrifice to be forgiven that the Torah isn’t that important. Never has any Jew ever thought that.

Yeshua’s sacrifice did not do away with the sacrificial system, He only replaced the part where we have to bring the sacrifice to the Temple in Jerusalem. Everything else is the same- we sin, we own up to our sin, we repent, we sacrifice (this is the part Yeshua has provided for us) and then we ask God to forgive us by means of substituting the sacrifice’s blood for our own.

So where did someone come up with the idea that because Yeshua’s sacrifice is the only sacrifice we need that we can now do away with Torah? God never said that we could do away with Torah, and Yeshua never said we could do away with Torah, and Shaul (Paul) never said we should do away with Torah. The sacrificial system that provides salvation from sin is no different after Yeshua than it was before Him- it’s just that Yeshua is the substitute we can use instead of bringing a lamb or pigeon to the Temple. No difference otherwise, so what was valid as the way to live before Yeshua came, died and was resurrected, is still valid as the way to live

Oh wait a minute!! Shaul certainly sounded like Torah wasn’t important. I believe that this is where the ‘No Need For Torah” idea started, as a misinterpretation of Shaul’s letters to (mostly) Gentile communities of Believers (there were no churches as we know them today in the First Century.) Shaul never once thought that Torah was unimportant, and he lived it as best as any human could his entire lifetime.  Despite what humans have entitled “Paul converts on the road to Damascus” that you read as the chapter title to Acts 9, Shaul never converted to anything.  When you read his letters you see he did, in fact, go to synagogues.  he did talk to Jews, but he made it his main ministry to go to the Gentiles. He established Gentile filled Messianic communities, and what he taught was what is in Torah. The misinterpretation is rooted in the fact that his main argument was never against observance of the Torah, it was against observance of the P’shat, the literal meaning of the words, in order to achieve salvation. Shaul was not against Torah, he was against the teaching that a legalistic observance would save one’s soul. That was what the Pharisees and most of the Jewish training and understanding of the Torah was at that time- if you do what it says in the Torah, just going through the motions (so to speak) then you can be saved. In fact, if we could perform all the laws and commandments in the Torah (as Yeshua did) then we would be saved: through perfect performance we can find salvation in Torah alone.

The problem is we can’t perform Torah perfectly, so to observe Torah as the means of our salvation, is a lost cause. That is the message Shaul was relating to the Gentiles who were under stress from their old life (to remain pagans) and also from their new life, from Jews who wanted them to do everything in the Torah because if they didn’t they couldn’t be saved.

This is the same drek I get today as a Messianic Jew: Christians who have been taught Torah isn’t needed now that they have Jesus tell me if I still live as a Jew I am not really saved because I am not “under the blood”, and Jews tell me if I believe in Jesus (their understanding is that I must have converted to Christianity) then I am not a Jew anymore. Both of these teachings are absolutely wrong- as a Jewish man who believes Yeshua is my Messiah, the one God promised my people since the beginning, then I am not a Christian, and I am more than just a Jew- I am a completed Jew, in that I have come full circle, from innocence in Eden to sinfulness in the world to Messianic forgiveness through Messiah, and thereby able to commune with God, again and forever more.

So, nu? What do we have? What we have is what we were given from the start- the Torah. The Torah is how God tells us to live, and defines right from wrong, righteousness from sinfulness, and provides the means by which we can be absolved of our sins in order to come into the presence of God. Yeshua is the Messiah God sent so that we can still find forgiveness after the Temple, which is where the Torah said we had to ask for forgiveness, was destroyed. No Temple, no forgiveness, but Yeshua took care of that by becoming the Temple, Himself,and providing the innocent blood (His own blood) for us. So, Torah is still valid, Torah is still necessary, and Torah is still God’s commandment to us all.

We should all try to follow Torah: not in order to be saved, but because it is what God tells us to do. We will receive blessings for obedience and we will not be blessed if we don’t (Deuteronomy 28.)  If we ignore Torah, we are ignoring God- like it or not, that is the truth. Do we need Torah to be saved- no. Do we need to obey Torah to be saved- no. Should we try to obey Torah, anyway- yes, absolutely. Why? Because it is what God tells us to do.

If God tells you do to something, what other reason do you need to do it?

Expectation is Everything

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I was in the Sales field for about 15 years, between 1992 and 2007, and the title of today’s message is one of the most important lessons I learned about being able to have a successful sales career. 

I am sure all of you reading this have found the most disappointing purchases you have ever made were the ones where what you got wasn’t anything at all like what you expected. That can be the fault of the salesperson, or yourself, or both- neither one really explaining or listening to the other, and ending up having an unrealistic expectation.

 This same thing has happened with Yeshua and the Jewish people, which started in the First Century and is still present, today. 

The Tanakh (Old Covenant) has very explicit expectations of what the Messiah will do. He will regather Israel (Ezekiel 38:16), He will restore the Temple service (Jeremiah 33:18), He will end wickedness and heresy (Zephaniah 3:13),  He will reestablish the religious courts (Isaiah 2:2-4), and He will be a son of David. With these, and the many other Messianic prophecies found in Tanakh, the Jewish people’s expectations for their Messiah, taught to them by their leaders, was for a political savior who would immediately restore the Davidic kingdom, and that it would be just like it was in David’s and Solomon’s times. 

And when you think about it, that expectation wasn’t really all that far-fetched. So, looking back, it is understandable (isn’t it?) that the Jewish people would have rejected Yeshua as their Messiah when He walked the earth because many of the biblical expectations were not met: there was still sin and heresy (in fact, at that time the Jewish political and judicial systems were probably the most corrupt ones we’ve ever had), the Ten tribes were still in the Diaspora, Temple service had not been interrupted (so He couldn’t reinstate it), and He died! Duh! How could this guy be the Messiah and have an eternal kingship if he’s dead?  

These unmet expectations are the reason so many Jews back then rejected Yeshua as their Messiah, and even to this day they are the basis for still rejecting Jesus as Messiah. When you add to that the last two Millennia of the treatment Jews have received at the hands of the “followers of Jesus Christ”, well, it’s no wonder we don’t want anything to do with this Jesus guy. After all, isn’t Jesus the reason for the Crusades, which resulted in thousands of Jews being slaughtered when they didn’t convert?  And wasn’t Jesus the reason for the expulsion of Jews from Spain and her territories, not to mention the torture and murder of thousands of Jews during the 300 hundred years (or so) of the Inquisition? And isn’t Jesus the guy the Nazi’s said was on their side?- the belt buckle of the Nazi uniform had the words, “Gott mit uns” (God is with us) engraved on them. Oh, and let’s not forget the Replacement Theologists who say that God, Himself, has rejected the Jewish people (because they rejected Jesus) and that the Born-Again Christians are now God’s Chosen people. 

Taken altogether- unmet expectations, wrongful teachings, mistreatment, bigotry, persecution- is it any wonder the Jewish people have nearly universally rejected as their Messiah this blonde-haired, blue-eyed, Aryan image of the Jesus Christ we know today? 

So…how do we get around this misunderstanding (and it is a misunderstanding) about who Yeshua is? We start by realizing, within Judaism and Christianity, that what we know today as Christianity, and who we think Jesus Christ is, is wrong. First off, Jesus did not create Christianity: Constantine did, at the Council of Nicene in the Third Century. Without going into an entire history lesson on what happened, let’s simply state that as more and more Gentiles (who were Pagans at that time) were accepting Yeshua (He wasn’t called Jesus until many, many years later) and, thereby, converting to Judaism, all the restrictions of the Torah were too much for them at the start. In Acts (15:29)  there were only 4 absolute “Must Stop Now” restrictions, but when you read the entire passage it is clear that the Elders expected these new converts to learn how to obey the entire Torah as they continued to attend the synagogues. But with the continuing rebellion of the Jewish community against Roman rule, being identified as a “Jew” was becoming more intolerable than being a follower of Yeshua, so those Gentiles who were converting started doing less “Jewish” stuff. As early as the First Century, what was now being called Christianity began to actively separate itself from the Tree of Life it had been grafted into. They changed the Shabbat, they ridiculed and insulted Judaic practices, and by the time Rome accepted Christianity as an approved religion, it had lost most of it’s attachment to Judaism. Then Constantine created Christmas and Easter as a means to make Christianity more “fun” and further separate it from the Holy Days God defined for us. 

That is why today Christianity is not anything like what Christ preached or taught. We need to approach Jews with this information to destroy the expectation that by accepting  Jesus you have to reject Judaism. That is what Jews expect they have to do if they want to accept Jesus as their Messiah, and it is simply not true. 

Once we kill that first expectation of having to reject Judaism, we can then start to kill the next expectation, which is that Jesus taught against Torah. We need to educate people, both Jews and Christians, regarding the false teaching that Yeshua rejected Torah: that is a lie from the pit of Sheol! He not only taught to obey Torah, but He did so by teaching us the deeper meaning of it so we could live it more completely! And Shaul (Paul), John, Matthew and the rest of the gang all lived and taught obedience to Torah. Not as the means of salvation, which was the understanding of Torah then, but as a means of showing God our faithful belief that what He says to do is what is best for us, and to demonstrate our love and thanks to Him through obedience to His word.  

If you have gotten this far, having overcome thousands of years of wrong teaching and bigotry, now you have a chance to show how these expectations, which have resulted in such a massive rejection of Yeshua, are unreasonable. The prophecies were often dual-prophecies, meaning there was a current interpretation, and a future one, as well.  For instance, an argument against Isaiah 53 is that it was talking about Israel as a nation then and there, which could historically be shown, but it was also talking about Yeshua, which wouldn’t happen until far in the future. The expectations that the Jewish people had, and have, of Messiah were based on misunderstanding, not to mention the political and social pressures against accepting Him (back then) due to the corrupt individuals who would lose their power and standing if He had been universally accepted.

Today I can see the spirit of God moving- the regathering of Israel, the Hebraic Roots and Messianic Jewish movements gaining momentum, and the world getting worse and worse- all these point to the Acharit HaYamim (End Days) getting closer and closer. And that means we are getting closer to the return of Yeshua ha Maschiach!   Therefore, let’s educate in a way that edifies people, removing the unrealistic and improper expectations, showing the truth about who Yeshua is and what He teaches, and thereby making it possible for all people to hear the real Good News with unclogged ears and seeing eyes. 

staying clean is more important than getting clean

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I think everyone who believes in God can agree that the greatest gift God has given us is salvation through the Messiah. Whether or not you believe Yeshua (Jesus) is that Messiah or not, salvation through Messiah brings us the eternal peace we all crave.

But how many people are so focused on getting saved (cleansed from our sins) that they forget this is the least important stage of salvation? It is, you know, because (as I discussed in this post: Forgiveness is Only for the Past) getting “saved” doesn’t mean you will stay saved.

I have heard too many people, both Christian and Messianic, tell me that “once saved, always saved” because God’s gift is irrevocable. The understanding they have been given is that once you ask for salvation through Messiah, you have it, always. This is a very misleading teaching because some of the parables Yeshua tells us in the Gospels clearly point to the fact that even though we are saved, we can throw it away on our own!  Yes, we can! Salvation is irrevocable, which means simply that God will not renege on His promise; He will not retract the salvation He promised to us and we can count on Him to deliver on His promise. But, even though salvation cannot be purchased or earned, it is not unconditional: you have to ask for it, you have to really do T’shuvah (turn from your sin) and you have to maintain that new attitude for the rest of your life.

Look to the parable about the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30)- the one servant that did nothing with the gift he was given was berated and thrown into the dark. The ones that used the talents to create more talents were honored and welcomed into their Master’s presence. The talents represent the salvation given, and the one that buried it never changed his lifestyle, kept doing what he had always done, so his salvation was unused, meaning he never really changed. What he was given was worthless due to his never using it.

Let’s take a look also at the parable about the fruit tree that bore no fruit (Luke 13:6-9)- there was a tree in the garden that after three years produced no fruit, so the man who owned the garden told the manager of the garden to cut it down. The manager asked for one more year to tend it and if it still didn’t produce it would be thrown out. The tree is the saved person, and being in the garden means that they have received salvation: they have a promised place in God’s presence. However, after being given a spot in the garden they did nothing to produce fruit. I believe the manager of the garden is Messiah Yeshua, who is our Intercessor and works with us to help us become holier. The extra tending is through strengthening of the Ruach Ha Kodesh (Holy Spirit.) Yet, even after interceding, the manager agrees to uproot and throw the tree into the fire if it continually fails to produce fruit.

The promise of salvation we receive when we ask for it is just that- the promise of salvation. It is, as I said before, conditional: though we cannot earn it in any way, we have to change our behavior (to be less sinful) so that we stay as clean as we can be AFTER being forgiven (cleaned.)

This is a hard word to hear for many, and I have had some very mature Believers argue vehemently with me about how salvation cannot be lost.

Let’s look once more in the bible for absolutely undeniable evidence, understandable without interpretation, that salvation can be lost. We find it in the book of Messianic Jews (Hebrews), Chapter 6, verses 4-8:

It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. Land that drinks in the rain often falling on it and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is farmed receives the blessing of God. But land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless and is in danger of being cursed. In the end it will be burned. 

I have bold printed the part of this that shows people who are saved can throw away their salvation, and it is not taken out of context. The writer of this book is telling the believing Jews (and converted Gentiles) in the Diaspora that once someone has been saved, if they apostasice by failing to live a life devoted to sinning less and being led by the Ruach, they are like land that is barren, full of thorns and thistles and will be burned in the end. He even goes as far as to say don’t even try to “re-save” them because they have known the goodness of God, yet they still rejected it.

Living your life the same way you did before you accepted Messiah and asked for forgiveness through His sacrifice, is essentially having lied to God. You asked for forgiveness and wanted salvation, but you didn’t want to live for Messiah. Yeshua said to follow Him we have to give up what we are and carry our own execution stake (Matthew 16:24), which clearly means a lifestyle change. And we are talking about a major change, not a little change, although the change can occur a little at a time. We can’t stop sinning “cold turkey”, but every day we can sin a little less than the day before. And that’s the point I am trying to make: if you don’t change what you do, what you say and who you are, you aren’t using the salvation you were given and you will have thrown away that chance for eternity in God’s presence; it will be lost, but not by God, not by someone else, not by the Devil, but by Y-O-U!

So- keep running the good race, keep your eyes on the prize, and know that as long as you are trying to be better, as long as you are using the gift God gave you, and as long as you are trying to sin less, everyday, you are guaranteed a place in God’s presence.

When you accept Messiah Yeshua and ask for forgiveness in His name, you have received the greatest promise anyone could ever want: and when you truly do T’shuvah in your heart, you will produce fruit, you will create more talents, and you will be welcomed into your Master’s joy.