Where’d we go wrong?

Before we can answer where we went wrong, we need to understand what is wrong.

What is wrong is that Christianity, for the most part, isn’t following Christ. It is following Constantine. The majority of the Christian world knows the Torah saves the Jews and the Blood of Christ saves the Christians. These two are as separate from each other as East is from the West, yet the entire basis of what Jesus taught was wholly and exclusively in the Torah. What Paul wrote in Romans has always been used as a polemic against the Torah, but it is the exact opposite: it is an apologetic for the Torah. Every place that Paul talks about the Torah failing to save people (because of the Rabbinic use of a strictly legalistic interpretation) he asks if that means that the Torah is dead or no longer valid. He answers that question, in every case, with a very enthusiastic, “God forbid!”

Go on- read it for yourself! The Christian world only reads the part where he says Torah fails, it never talks about the rest of that statement where Paul confirms Torah is valid and necessary and what we should observe.

That is what has gone wrong. I liken this to the Looney Tunes cartoon where Elmer chases Bugs into a tree, and Bugs is sitting out on a branch. Elmer takes a saw, and sitting on the junction of the branch to the bole, he saws through the outer part of the branch so that Bugs will fall. However, after he cuts through, the branch miraculously stays up by itself, and the tree holding Elmer falls. This is exactly what the Christian teachings are expecting you to believe- that you can cut yourself off totally from the root of salvation, i.e. Torah, and not be affected by that.

Christianity went wrong in the Third century when Constantine decided Christianity was OK, and as a (now) reformed pagan, he commercialized Jesus (that hasn’t changed much, has it?) by changing all the major pagan holidays into Christian holidays, and by separating Christianity from Judaism, once and for all.

A little history prior to this: Rome expelled Jews for their rebellious attitude after Yeshua’s (Jesus’s real name) resurrection, and later around 132-135 CE under the Bar Kochba rebellion, Rome destroyed the Jews (580,000 dead, 50 fortified towns and 986 villages razed- it was a massive defeat.) They totaled the Temple and even renamed Judea to Philistia (Palestine) as a final insult, sort of like throwing salt in the wound as they were kicking them laying on the ground.

NOTE: Philistia, or Palestine, was the Roman equivalent of Philistine- they renamed the land God gave to His people after the historic enemies of God’s people.

Now when Constantine “converted”, being Christian went from meaning “lion’s diet” to “government approved”, but Judaism was still on the “Least Wanted List” to Rome, so as more and more Gentiles accepted Yeshua (now being called Jesus more often than His given Hebrew name, Yeshua) and being recognized as “Christians” instead of as converted pagans (converted to Judaism), Judaism was becoming something that you did not want to be associated with. So, when Constantine and the Council of Nicene (of course there wasn’t one Jew on the Council) created what is the foundation of today’s ecumenical laws and church canon, the total schism of Jews and Christians was completed.

The Council of Nicene is, to me, the “where” of where we went wrong.

So, the question now is, what do we do about it?

For the majority of the Christian world, the answer is: nothing. Why change it?

I can understand their desire to leave it as it is; after all, most people don’t like change, and especially when change means accepting that the teachings you have had, from people you trust and admire and (even) love, have been sending you father away from God than closer to Him. And, like it or not, that is what any teaching which identifies the Torah as not valid does- the Torah is God’s word to mankind. It isn’t just for Jews: it was given to the Jews to bring to everyone else.

That is what being the “Chosen” people means- chosen to bring Torah to the world.

My answer to what do we do now is what I am doing- getting the truth about Torah, about Christianity, about Judaism, and about God to you, to the person next to you, to everyone and anyone who will listen, and yes- especially to those who don’t want to hear about it! Like that nice Jewish boy from Tarsus- you know, the one who makes those beautiful tents- said: those who know Messiah have the smell of death to those who don’t accept Him.

The church I worship at is not a Messianic synagogue, it is a Hebraic roots church, For my money, these are two different terms for the same thing. We represent the “One Man” ideal- Jew and Gentile together worshiping God as He said we should, honoring Torah and knowing that what Torah cannot do for us (only because of our nature preventing us from living Torah perfectly), Yeshua has covered through His blood sacrifice.

The Christian world teaches that because Yeshua died you can be saved, and that is correct, but they teach it in a way that doesn’t give freedom from sin but gives license to sin! They teach that you are OK, that Yeshua made it all OK, and you can live your life pretty much anyway you want to, so long as you don’t murder or steal, because Jesus has got your back. They say Torah is no longer valid if you accept Jesus (which is the exact opposite of what Jesus and all His disciples taught) and what is even crazier is that, back then, if you were Gentile and accepted Yeshua, you were converting to Judaism because that’s all there was then-pagan or Jew. Today, if a Jewish person wants to accept Jesus, they are told they have to reject Judaism and convert to Christianity.  If Jesus was here in the flesh, I can only imagine what He would be telling the Popes and the Bishops and the Pastors and the A of G and WCC and all the other “Christian” organizations about what they are teaching.

And I am sure He would have a few choice words for the Jewish equivalents of those organizations,too.

What went wrong was separating Jesus from Torah, and where we went wrong was the Council of Nicene. The path to true worship of God is through obedience to the Torah and acceptance of Yeshua ha Maschiach as the Messiah.

In a nutshell: God gave the Torah to the nation of Israel and assigned them the job of Levite to the world. They were to show everyone else how to live within the laws and guidelines of Torah. Because mankind is sinful by nature, the Torah, in and of itself, was too much for us to obey perfectly, so God provided for us a second option: Yeshua the Messiah. His death was the ultimate sacrifice for sin and His resurrection the proof that His sacrifice was accepted. When we accept that Yeshua (Jesus) is the Messiah God promised to send, and by accepting Him we worship God in accordance with God’s instruction in the Torah (to the best of our ability), we have Yeshua’s sacrifice to “fill in” where we fail to meet Torah’s guidelines.

The truth is that Yeshua’s sacrifice was not a replacement of Torah but only an addendum to it. The “New Covenant” (found in Jeremiah 31:31) did not replace the Old Covenant (Mosaic Law); it simply added to it. The covenants from God have never been exclusive of each other- they are inclusive and each new covenant from God is built on the prior covenant, confirming and expanding it. From Noah to Abraham to Moses to David to final fulfillment in Yeshua- every new covenant has been built upon and contains all the prior covenants.

Yeshua is the word of God in the flesh, and the word of God is the Torah. How could Yeshua, in any way at all, preach against Himself?

You need to decide, for yourself, what is the right path for you. I hope you see the truth in what I am saying here, which is only what God, Jesus and all His Disciples (the ones that were with Him) have said- obey Torah, worship God and accept the truth that Yeshua is the Messiah.

Ask for the Ruach haKodesh (Holy Spirit) to guide you to know the truth and use the gifts God gave you to glorify Him in all that you say and do. I pray for you all, that God will open your eyes to what He has for you, and what He asks of you.