Then came Hanukkah in Yerushalayim. It was winter, and Yeshua was walking around inside the Temple area, in Shlomo’s Colonnade.

John 10:22–23 (CJB)

I know that Hanukkah is not a commanded, Biblical feast day or celebration found in Leviticus. Someone who strictly follows those days may hate Hanukkah and think its origins are tainted. Those in Christianity will think it is just a Jewish holiday that has nothing to do with them. This blog post is mainly to inform Christians that do not understand Hanukkah, why it is significant, and that Christianity would not exist without the events that are celebrated at Hanukkah.

One of the reasons that Christians know so little about Hanukkah is that the books that talk about the history surrounding the holiday were removed from their Bibles. Then, they are told not to read these books of the Maccabees because it talks about praying for the dead, and that it is where the Catholic church gets the idea of purgatory. It’s time for everyone to get away from this dark ages mentality.

“Christianity” started from a group of Torah observant Jews who followed the protocols of the Temple. Jesus, or Yeshua in Hebrew, came from the tribe of Judah, and needed the temple to be in place to fulfill his God ordained mission of saving the world. Without Hanukkah there would be no temple, no tribe of Judah, no Messiah and thus no deliverer, and we are dead in our sins. Could the Creator God have found another way? No, not really. He could not go against His own words.

Genesis 49:10–11 (LEB)

¹⁰ The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff between his feet, until Shiloh comes. And to him shall be the obedience of nations. ¹¹ Binding his donkey to the vine and his donkey’s colt to the choice vine, he washes his clothing in the wine and his garment in the blood of grapes.

This prophecy Jacob pronounced over his son Judah could not be fulfilled if it was not for Hanukkah. Hanukkah is simply the celebration of the cleansing of the temple after the Greeks grossly defiled it. It is recorded history that affects every Christian denomination’s very existence, yet nothing about Hanukkah is taught, and heaven forbid if a Christian were to celebrate Hanukkah instead of Christmas. It is no accident that Christmas and Hanukkah are celebrated around the same time of the year.

1 Maccabees 1:41–53 (NRSV)

Installation of Gentile Cults

⁴¹ Then the king wrote to his whole kingdom that all should be one people, ⁴² and that all should give up their particular customs. ⁴³ All the Gentiles accepted the command of the king. Many even from Israel gladly adopted his religion; they sacrificed to idols and profaned the sabbath. ⁴⁴ And the king sent letters by messengers to Jerusalem and the towns of Judah; he directed them to follow customs strange to the land, ⁴⁵ to forbid burnt offerings and sacrifices and drink offerings in the sanctuary, to profane sabbaths and festivals, ⁴⁶ to defile the sanctuary and the priests, ⁴⁷ to build altars and sacred precincts and shrines for idols, to sacrifice swine and other unclean animals, ⁴⁸ and to leave their sons uncircumcised. They were to make themselves abominable by everything unclean and profane, ⁴⁹ so that they would forget the law and change all the ordinances. ⁵⁰ He added, “And whoever does not obey the command of the king shall die.”

⁵¹ In such words he wrote to his whole kingdom. He appointed inspectors over all the people and commanded the towns of Judah to offer sacrifice, town by town. ⁵² Many of the people, everyone who forsook the law, joined them, and they did evil in the land; ⁵³ they drove Israel into hiding in every place of refuge they had.

This evil king was trying to wipe out the remnant of Judah and force them to sacrifice to foreign gods, forsaking the Creator. If he had succeeded there would be no route for the Messiah, Yeshua to take the throne. This event happened in 167 BCE.

1 Maccabees 1:54–61 (NRSV)

⁵⁴ Now on the fifteenth day of Chislev, in the one hundred forty-fifth year, they erected a desolating sacrilege on the altar of burnt offering. They also built altars in the surrounding towns of Judah, ⁵⁵ and offered incense at the doors of the houses and in the streets. ⁵⁶ The books of the law that they found they tore to pieces and burned with fire. ⁵⁷ Anyone found possessing the book of the covenant, or anyone who adhered to the law, was condemned to death by decree of the king. ⁵⁸ They kept using violence against Israel, against those who were found month after month in the towns. ⁵⁹ On the twenty-fifth day of the month they offered sacrifice on the altar that was on top of the altar of burnt offering. ⁶⁰ According to the decree, they put to death the women who had their children circumcised, ⁶¹ and their families and those who circumcised them; and they hung the infants from their mothers’ necks.

On the twenty-fifth day of Chislev, the Greeks sacrificed a pig on the alter of the temple of God. This was around the time of the winter solstice and they sacrificed to Zeus. The interesting part is that this would have been the very pagan festival that Christmas draws much of its traditions. In one town the priest, Mattathias, would not stand for the blasphemy of the Greeks forcing his people to break the covenant and the defiling of the temple.

1 Maccabees 2:19–28 (NRSV)

¹⁹ But Mattathias answered and said in a loud voice: “Even if all the nations that live under the rule of the king obey him, and have chosen to obey his commandments, everyone of them abandoning the religion of their ancestors, ²⁰ I and my sons and my brothers will continue to live by the covenant of our ancestors. ²¹ Far be it from us to desert the law and the ordinances. ²² We will not obey the king’s words by turning aside from our religion to the right hand or to the left.”

²³ When he had finished speaking these words, a Jew came forward in the sight of all to offer sacrifice on the altar in Modein, according to the king’s command. ²⁴ When Mattathias saw it, he burned with zeal and his heart was stirred. He gave vent to righteous anger; he ran and killed him on the altar. ²⁵ At the same time he killed the king’s officer who was forcing them to sacrifice, and he tore down the altar. ²⁶ Thus he burned with zeal for the law, just as Phinehas did against Zimri son of Salu.

Phinehas was the priest that was so angry with Zimir for being involved with the idolatry of the Moabite women. This example of blending pagan idolatry with the things of God is used as an example throughout scripture. It is even discussed in the seven letters to the seven churches in the book of Revelation.

Numbers 25:6–13 (LEB)

⁶ And behold, a man from the Israelites came and brought to his brothers a Midianite woman before the eyes of Moses and before the eyes of all of the community of the Israelites, and they were weeping at the doorway of the tent of assembly. ⁷ When Phinehas son of Eleazar son of Aaron the priest saw, he got up from the midst of the community and took a spear in his hand. ⁸ He went after the man of Israel into the woman’s section of the tent, and he drove the two of them, the man of Israel and the woman, into her belly. And the plague among the Israelites stopped. ⁹ The ones who died in the plague were twenty-four thousand. ¹⁰ Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, ¹¹ “Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, turned away my anger from among the Israelites when he was jealous with my jealousy in their midst, and I did not destroy the Israelites with my jealousy. ¹² Therefore say, ‘Behold, I am giving to him my covenant of peace, ¹³ and it will be for him and his _⌊offspring_⌋ after him a covenant of an eternal priesthood because he was jealous for his God and made atonement for the Israelites.’ ”

Getting involved with other nations’ gods and their items of worship makes Yahuah very angry. Mattathias was in good company being compared to Phinehas.

²⁷ Then Mattathias cried out in the town with a loud voice, saying: “Let every one who is zealous for the law and supports the covenant come out with me!” ²⁸ Then he and his sons fled to the hills and left all that they had in the town.

This started a war in which this band of Jews, dedicated to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, would eventually beat their oppressors at great odds.

1 Maccabees 4:36–41 (NRSV)

³⁶ Then Judas and his brothers said, “See, our enemies are crushed; let us go up to cleanse the sanctuary and dedicate it.” ³⁷ So all the army assembled and went up to Mount Zion. ³⁸ There they saw the sanctuary desolate, the altar profaned, and the gates burned. In the courts they saw bushes sprung up as in a thicket, or as on one of the mountains. They saw also the chambers of the priests in ruins. ³⁹ Then they tore their clothes and mourned with great lamentation; they sprinkled themselves with ashes ⁴⁰ and fell face down on the ground. And when the signal was given with the trumpets, they cried out to Heaven.

These men cleansed the temple as per the instructions of God and had a great celebration when they once again could have a functioning temple.

1 Maccabees 4:52–59 (NRSV)

⁵² Early in the morning on the twenty-fifth day of the ninth month, which is the month of Chislev, in the one hundred forty-eighth year, ⁵³ they rose and offered sacrifice, as the law directs, on the new altar of burnt offering that they had built. ⁵⁴ At the very season and on the very day that the Gentiles had profaned it, it was dedicated with songs and harps and lutes and cymbals. ⁵⁵ All the people fell on their faces and worshiped and blessed Heaven, who had prospered them. ⁵⁶ So they celebrated the dedication of the altar for eight days, and joyfully offered burnt offerings; they offered a sacrifice of well-being and a thanksgiving offering. ⁵⁷ They decorated the front of the temple with golden crowns and small shields; they restored the gates and the chambers for the priests, and fitted them with doors. ⁵⁸ There was very great joy among the people, and the disgrace brought by the Gentiles was removed. ⁵⁹ Then Judas and his brothers and all the assembly of Israel determined that every year at that season the days of dedication of the altar should be observed with joy and gladness for eight days, beginning with the twenty-fifth day of the month of Chislev.

John 10:22–23 (CJB)

²² Then came Hanukkah in Yerushalayim. It was winter, ²³ and Yeshua was walking around inside the Temple area, in Shlomo’s Colonnade.

If we fast forward several hundred years after Yeshua was celebrating Hanukkah at the temple, we will see something very disturbing. Christianity, now in the hands of the Greeks and Romans, has eerie similarities to 167 BCE when the Greeks were trying to force the remnant Jews to break the covenant with the Creator. The following is from the second council of Nice in 787 CE.

Canon VIII.
That Hebrews ought not to be received unless they have been converted in sincerity of
heart.
Since certain, erring in the superstitions of the Hebrews, have thought to mock at Christ
our God, and feigning to be converted to the religion of Christ do deny him, and in private
and secretly keep the Sabbath and observe other Jewish customs, we decree that such persons
be not received to communion, nor to prayers, nor into the Church; but let them be openly
Hebrews according to their religion, and let them not bring their children to baptism, nor
purchase or possess a slave. But if any of them, out of a sincere heart and in faith, is converted
and makes profession with his whole heart, setting at naught their customs and observances,
and so that others may be convinced and converted, such an one is to be received and baptized,
and his children likewise; and let them be taught to take care to hold aloof from the
ordinances of the Hebrews. But if they will not do this, let them in no wise be received.

In other words, if a Hebrew abstains from eating pork or keeps the sabbaths as commanded by the same God that these church leaders should be following, they will be cut off from the church. I am hoping everyone can see the irony in this. If not, I will spell it out.

The Greek leader, Antiochus Epiphanes, forced God’s only people on earth to abandon the commandments of this God, Yahuah, making them eat swine’s flesh, and sacrifice to pagan gods at the time of the winter solstice, almost completely wiping out this tribe of Judah from which Messiah Yeshua would come. A brave priest and his family fought back and beat this Seleucid Empire, cleansed and rededicated the temple, and declared a yearly celebration of this dedication of the temple called Hanukkah. Yeshua was born a little over one hundred years later, was circumcised on the eighth day, celebrated all the biblical feasts at the temple, yes even Hanukkah, as well as the Sabbaths. He kept the commandments of God perfectly and taught his followers to do the same. Fast forward about 700 years and the “church” is celebrating the same pagan festivals as the Greeks, calling it Christ’s Mass, and falsely assigning it to the birth of the Messiah. Then if a Hebrew wants to join the “church” they must eat swine’s flesh and not observe the God ordained Sabbaths and feasts.

According to Paul, anyone coming into the faith is grafted into the natural olive tree of Israel through the root of Jesse, or in other words, Messiah Yeshua. Those who cross over as Hebrews being born again in the faith should not be acting the same way Antiochus Epiphanes acted forcing everyone to eat swine’s flesh, forsake Sabbaths, and celebrate the feast of Zeus by falsely renaming it “Jesus’ birthday”. This is a very good reason to celebrate Hanukkah!

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And he humbled you and let you go hungry, and then he fed you with that which you did not know nor did your ancestors know, in order to make you know that not by bread alone but by all that goes out of the mouth of Yahweh humankind shall live.

Deuteronomy 8:3 (LEB)

When most people think of the word “satan” they will picture an entity of the underworld with a pitch fork or trident waiting for the souls of the dead to come who were evil during their mortal time on Earth. This is actually Egyptian and Greek mythology that was introduced into Christianity partly through the works of Plato. Paul warned of this sort of thing happening in one of his letters to Timothy.

2 Timothy 4:3–4 (LEB)

³ For there will be a time when they will not put up with sound teaching, but in accordance with their own desires, they will accumulate for themselves teachers, because they have an insatiable curiosity, ⁴ and they will turn away from the hearing of the truth, but will turn to myths.

There are many myths the church embraces that come straight from the mythologies of Osiris, Ashtoreth, Mithra etc.. When one understands this, they are at the beginning of understanding the word “satan”.

“Satan” is a Hebrew word that is defined in the A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language as adversary, accuser, accuse, hate, go about to and fro, and rove with variations of the word meaning diabolic and devilish. We could look at this as being crooked, zig zagging, wandering or deviant. We see the word “satan” in Job.

Job 1:6–7 (LEB)

⁶ And it happened one day that the sons of God came to present themselves before Yahweh, and Satan also came into their midst. ⁷ So Yahweh said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Then Satan answered Yahweh and said, “From roaming on the earth and from walking about in it.”

In this translation of the Bible, the Hebrew word is transliterated into English. This means English phonetics are given to Hebrew letters. “Satan” is שטך in Hebrew, but is not really a proper name. It is a word with the definition noted above. The word is used in other places for adversary.

Numbers 22:32 (LEB)

³² The angel of Yahweh said to him, “Why have you struck this donkey three times? Look, I have come out as an adversary [satan] because your conduct is perverse before me.

“Satan” may not really be a proper name for the arch enemy of God. It is more of a description or title. It is an adversary or one who goes to and fro. In the case of Balaam, the angel of the Lord was actually acting as a “satan” to him. Language is an interesting study, and the Bible was not written in English. I remember there was a time when the country of Iran was said to have called the United States “the great satan”, and everyone was looking at it as a religious statement, yet this can be translated simply as “the great adversary”. See how words can be manipulated?

The Creator told Moses to tell the people YHWH (yud, heh, waw, heh) sent him in Exodus chapter three. This is where we get the name Yahweh or Yahuah. There was no mention of His name being Adonai or Lord at this time, yet many people think it is wrong to use the name given to Moses to proclaim to the people. I even heard a Messianic Rabbi mock people that use the name “Yah” for the Creator, when it is clearly used in scripture. This is where we get the transliterated word “Hallelu-yah” for praise the Lord.

Psalm 150:6 (LEB)

⁶ Every breathing thing, let it praise Yah. Praise Yah.

Both in Judaism and Christianity the practice is to hide and obfuscate the name of the Creator with titles such as Lord, Hashem and Adonai, but then the word “satan” is transliterated to a proper name for someone that is being an adversary.

The word “satan” is clearly used in scripture for something that is adverse or contrary to the Creator, such in the case of Job where an entity roaming the Earth came and accused Job before the Creator and acted as Job’s adversary. A derivative of the word “satan” in English is “satanic”. We limit this word’s meaning greatly when we define “satan” as some entity that is an adversary to God. Even though there clearly is an entity in this role, his proper name is somewhat mysterious, so we give him the title of “the satan” or “Satan” for short. We could say anyone or anything that is in opposition to the Creator’s instructions, character, personality, or ways is actually satanic. After all, what is the goal of the entity given the title of Satan, other than to oppose God and get everyone on Earth deceived into doing the same thing?

Genesis 3:2–6 (LEB)

² The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat, ³ but from the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, God said, ‘You shall not eat from it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die’.” ⁴ But the serpent said to the woman, “You shall not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that on the day you both eat from it, then your eyes will be opened and you both shall be like gods, knowing good and evil.” ⁶ When the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was a delight to the eyes, and the tree was desirable to make one wise, then she took from its fruit and she ate. And she gave it also to her husband with her, and he ate.

The serpent in this case was an adversary to Eve and told her to diverge from what the Creator had specifically commanded concerning the fruit of the tree. This was definitely a satanic act, but was the name of the serpent “Satan”? It is highly unlikely. The title “satan” certainly fits the serpent for deceiving Eve into doing something God said not to do. There have been many people throughout history that have specifically told us to do things contrary to what the Creator God told us by way of His set-apart people Israel. He even tells us He will send people that are “satanic” our way to see if we love Him enough to take the time to learn His ways.

Deuteronomy 13:1–4 (LEB)

“If a prophet stands up in your midst or a dreamer of dreams and he gives to you a sign or wonder, ² and the sign or the wonder comes about that he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods (those whom you have not known), and let us serve them,’ ³ you must not listen to the words of that prophet or to that dreamer, for Yahweh your God is testing you to know whether you love Yahweh your God with all of your heart and with all of your inner self. ⁴ You shall go after Yahweh your God, and him you shall revere, and his commandment you shall keep, and to his voice you shall listen, and him you shall serve, and to him you shall hold fast.

Following other gods is most definitely satanic and the one with the title of Satan gets the worship of these other gods. Anytime one worships, pays homage to or utilizes symbols of these other gods, it is being sent directly to demons, devils and “Satan”. They are called “elohim achreem” which simply means other gods.

I. אַחֵר adj. another (prop. one coming behind) Often with the collat. sense of different, as ˊבְּגָדִים א‍ other garments ; with that of strange, alien, as ˊאִישׁ א‍; esp. in the phrase אֲלֹהִים אֲחֵרִים other gods. Of time, following, next (rare) ˊבַּשָּׁנָה הָא‍ in the next year; דּוֹר ˊא‍ poet. the next generation (in prose = another generation).

Richard Whitaker et al., The Abridged Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew-English Lexicon of the Old Testament: From A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament by Francis Brown, S.R. Driver and Charles Briggs, Based on the Lexicon of Wilhelm Gesenius (Boston; New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1906).

Who is this entity that is a master deceiver, opposes God, given the title of “satan” or adversary and accuser? We can find him every where in the world’s mythology and is represented by various gods. The god Pan may be a good representation of this entity. The following is from Wikipedia with the source text listed as Gods Associated with Male Fertility and Virility.

In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Pan (/pæn/;^[2]Ancient Greek: Πάν, romanized: Pán) is the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks, rustic music and impromptus, and companion of the nymphs.^[3] He has the hindquarters, legs, and horns of a goat, in the same manner as a faun or satyr. With his homeland in rustic Arcadia, he is also recognized as the god of fields, groves, wooded glens and often affiliated with sex; because of this, Pan is connected to fertility and the season of spring.

Pan is connected with the groves, fertility and springtime. These are celebrated at the winter solstice and equinox festivals and have been celebrated this way for thousands of years with fir trees, cones, eggs and rabbits. This is what is so interesting about mythology. No matter what culture or time in history, the gods have similar themes and symbols. This has all been embraced wholeheartedly by Christians everywhere. People have recently renamed where I live Arcadia, where Pan was said to have lived. I haven’t seen Pan around here and hope I never do. Pan is definitely satanic, along with his groves and sex rites. Is he the one everyone calls “Satan”? No, he is a Greek myth. The fact that Pan represents everything the real Creator God, Yah, says not to do is a good indication that the adversary of God is behind Pan. The fact that Christians embrace Pan’s groves and fertility symbols at Christmas and Easter show how deceptive the real “satan” can be.

1 Kings 14:22–24 (LEB)

²² But Judah did evil in the eyes of Yahweh, and they annoyed him more than their fathers did with their sins that they had committed. ²³ They also built for themselves high places and stone pillars and sacred poles on every high hill and under every green tree. ²⁴ There were also male shrine prostitutes in the land, and they did according to all the abominations of the nations which Yahweh had driven out from before the Israelites.

These verses from First Kings make it sound like Pan would have been right at home in Judah at this time. Stone pillars, sacred trees, sacred poles and temple prostitutes are all satanic because Yah hates them. He told us not to have any part of these things, yet Christmas trees are placed on the alters, or “high” places in churches right now.

Mithra is a Roman God that is closer to the god that Christians serve during their holy days. This is due to the Roman influences. The sun god became the son of God. The following is from imperiumromanum.pl

Dies Natalis Solis Invicti (the “Birth of the Invincible Sun”) was a celebration dedicated to Mitra, identified with the Roman god Sol, or the Sun. Sol Invictus was an ancient cult, originating in Persia, but revered mainly in Rome, from where it also received its name. The cult was introduced by Emperor Aurelian in 274 CE.

Festive was devoted to Mitra, identified with the Roman god Sol, meaning the Sun. The holiday commemorated his birth in the mountains of Zagros. The Romans on that day gifted each other and made wishes; kissed under the mistletoe.

To replace the pagan festivals, the Christian authorities decided to place Christ’s birth at this date – this is indicated by the commentary on the twelfth-century relationship of Dionysius Bar Salibi, who says that it was custom of the pagans to celebrate this day (December 25) the birth of the Sun. As people were accustomed to celebrating pagan festive, it was decided to celebrate the birth of Christ on the 25th of December. Interestingly, in the litany of the Most Holy Name Jesus (probably founded in the fifteenth century), we find the naming of Jesus “the sun of justice.”

The Creator’s Sabbath, initiated at creation, has been changed to the “venerable day of the sun”, which is also taken from this sun cult. We know of this day as Sunday. If we are to believe Deuteronomy 13 and the example we see with Eve and the serpent, it leads us to the conclusion that changing God’s special day and melding His son Yeshua with the sun god Mithra is going after “other gods” and actually fits the definition of satanic.

Genesis 2:1–3 (LEB)

And heaven and earth and all their array were finished. ² And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. ³ And God blessed the seventh day, and he sanctified it, because on it he rested from all his work of creating that there was to do.

We see the adversary temping the real son of God, Yeshua, recorded in the gospels. This is likely the same entity that challenged the Father concerning Job. Yeshua handled him by quoting the Father’s words to him every time he suggested doing something that was satanic.

Matthew 4:1–11 (LEB)

4 Then Jesus was led up into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil, ² and after he had fasted forty days and forty nights, then he was hungry. ³ And the tempter approached and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, order that these stones become bread.” ⁴ But he answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man will not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes out of the mouth of God.’ ” ⁵ Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the highest point of the temple ⁶ and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down! For it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’and ‘On their hands they will lift you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’ ” ⁷ Jesus said to him, “On the other hand it is written, ‘You are not to put the Lord your God to the test.’ ” ⁸ Again the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, ⁹ and he said to him, “I will give to you all these things, if you will fall down and worship me.” ¹⁰ Then Jesus said to him, “Go away, Satan, for it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and serve only him.’ ” ¹¹ Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and began ministering to him.

Here the Greek word “Diabolis” has been translated “satan” and we see a comparison to Beezeboul in the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology.

διάβολος G1333 (diabolos), adj., slanderous; noun, slanderer, the devil; διαβάλλω (diaballō), accuse, bring charges with hostile intent; Βεεξεβούλ (Beezeboul), Βεελξεβούλ G1015 (Beelzeboul), Βεελξεβούβ (Beelzeboub), Beelzebul, Beelzebub; Βελιάρ G1016 (Beliar), Beliar; Βελιάλ (Belial), Belial; Σατάν G4927 (Σατάν), indeclinable, and Σατανᾶς G4928 (Satanas), the Adversary, Satan.

H. Bietenhard and C. Brown, “Satan, Beelzebul, Devil, Exorcism,” ed. Lothar Coenen, Erich Beyreuther, and Hans Bietenhard, New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986), 468.

Beelzebul, sometimes called, lord of the flies, could be the great adversary of God, or just some lower ranked entity. All through the mystery religions, which these myths all have in common, there is one entity that opposes the Creator God. However, in these religions it is the Creator God that is evil and the supposed good god that tries to free humankind from his clutches. They would view the serpent as the good entity and the Creator as evil. Sometimes this entity is called Enlil. There is also the view that the Creator God is both the good and bad god at the same time. This is where we get the dark and light aspect of God or “as above, so below”. However, all of this is satanic because there is no darkness in the real Creator God, Yah.

1 John 1:5–7 (LEB)

⁵ And this is the message which we have heard from him and announce to you, that God is light and there is no darkness in him at all. ⁶ If we say that we have fellowship with him and walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. ⁷ But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.

We see these false gods everywhere today. When Yeshua was tempted by the adversary, they were both using scripture to make their case. This happens today. The adversary comes as an angel of light. How do you know which scriptures to follow? Yeshua told us.

Mark 12:28–30 (LEB)

²⁸ And one of the scribes came up and heard them debating. When he saw that he answered them well, he asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” ²⁹ Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Listen, Israel! The Lord our God, the Lord is one. ³⁰ And you shall love the Lord your God from your whole heart and from your whole soul and from your whole mind and from your whole strength.’

The adversary or “satan”, whatever his real name may be, has been very successful using religion to deceive people. He has many Christians believing that the instructions of God and His covenant are no longer important, thus creating a false Messiah, and at the same time, he has deceived those in Judaism into denying the real Messiah because they think he is the lawless, torah breaking, Christmas tree Jesus that Christianity presents. It is a win-win situation for this adversary. This is all prophecy because he deceives the whole world.

Revelation 12:7–9 (LEB)

⁷ And there was war in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. ⁸ And they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them any longer in heaven. ⁹ And the great dragon was thrown down, the ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

Revelation 12:17 (LEB)

¹⁷ And the dragon was angry at the woman, and went away to fight against the rest of her children, those who keep the commandments of God and who hold to the testimony about Jesus.

In these verses in Revelation. there is the woman, the man child and “those who keep the commandments of God and who hold to the testimony about Jesus“. Satan is angry when people keep the commandments of God and believe Messiah Yeshua. It seems very clear to me.

John 8:42–47 (LEB)

⁴² Jesus said to them, “If God were your father, you would love me, for I have come forth from God and have come. For I have not come from myself, but that one sent me. ⁴³ Why do you not understand my way of speaking? Because you are not able to listen to my message. ⁴⁴ You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father! That one was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand firm in the truth, because truth is not in him. Whenever he speaks the lie, he speaks from his own nature, because he is a liar and the father of lies. ⁴⁵ But because I am telling the truth, you do not believe me. ⁴⁶ Who among you convicts me concerning sin? If I am telling the truth, why do you not believe me? ⁴⁷ The one who is from God listens to the words of God. Because of this you do not listen—because you are not of God.”

“The one who is from God listens to the words of God”. Anything that deviates from the words the Creator gave us is satanic by definition. It is to and fro, and adverse to God. As Yeshua stated, quoting Deuteronomy chapter 8, “not by bread alone but by all that goes out of the mouth of Yahweh humankind shall live”.

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Yahweh called your name, ‘A leafy olive tree, beautiful with fine fruit.’ With the sound of a great storm he will set fire to it, and its branches will be good for nothing. And Yahweh of hosts, the one who planted you, has spoken evil against you,
because of the evil of the house of Israel and the house of Judah, that they have done to themselves, to provoke me to anger by making smoke offerings to Baal.”

Jeremiah 11:16–17 (LEB)

I was part of a thread on Twitter this week discussing the start of the church, Paul and what Christians in the twenty-first century are supposed to believe. There are actually people that believe Paul is the only one in scripture we are to listen to, and that the rest of scripture was not written for us. This includes the gospels. The gospels are not the gospel for us because we are supposedly in a different dispensation that started sometime after the cross. At least the people I was twittering with knew what they believed, and I was able to interact with people that actually are hyper-dispensationlist. They were hyper-dispensationlist, but argued that dispensationalism didn’t exist as a form of theology, it was the only way to read scripture. I guess most religions or cults claim their way is the only way and there is an inherent fear to explore any other possibilities.

Paul changed his view on scripture after encountering the Messiah on the road to Damascus. He viewed scripture one way and was murdering people who thought differently, then he realized he was wrong. He then went and tried to convince people that thought like he did previously and people from different religious backgrounds in his new found way to understand scripture. Some were willing to search the scripture and see if what Paul was saying was true, and others mocked and ridiculed him.

Acts 17:10–12 (LEB)

¹⁰ Now the brothers sent away both Paul and Silas at once, during the night, to Berea. They went into the synagogue of the Jews when they arrived. ¹¹ Now these were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica. They accepted the message with all eagerness, examining the scriptures every day to see if these things were so. ¹² Therefore many of them believed, and not a few of the prominent Greek women and men.

I can understand random strangers on Twitter not paying any attention to someone like myself, who is presenting the idea that the whole word of God is true and applicable for all believers today, completely antithetical to their belief system. I have a hard time understanding people who have known me for decades in the church not being curious at all as to how I went from a dispensational Baptist-Pentecostal to someone who embraces the entirety of scripture now.

Acts 22:1–8 (LEB)

“Men—brothers and fathers—listen to my defense to you now!” ² And when they heard that he was addressing them in the Aramaic language, they became even more silent. And he said, ³ “I am a Jewish man born in Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, educated according to the exactness of the law received from our fathers, being zealous for God, just as all of you are today. ⁴ I persecuted this Way to the death, tying up and delivering to prison both men and women, ⁵ as indeed the high priest and the whole council of elders can testify about me, from whom also I received letters to the brothers in Damascus, and was traveling there to lead away those who were there also tied up to Jerusalem so that they could be punished. ⁶ “And it happened that as I was traveling and approaching Damascus around noon, suddenly a very bright light from heaven flashed around me, ⁷ and I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ ⁸ And I answered, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ And he said to me, ‘I am Jesus the Nazarene whom you are persecuting.’

So, when did the church begin? Many believe it started at the event described in Acts chapter two at Pentecost. Some think that Pentecost is called “Pentecost” because that is when the disciples in the upper room were given the holy Spirit and spoke in other languages.

Acts 2:1–4 (LEB)

2 And when the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in the same place. ² And suddenly a sound like a violent rushing wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. ³ And divided tongues like fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. ⁴ And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Spirit gave them ability to speak out.

The disciples were not gathered in Jerusalem in the upper room because it was Sunday. It was due to the fact that it was the feast of Shavuot, which always landed on a Sunday. Pentecost is the Greek word for Shavuot because “pente” is fifty, and Shavuot is the feast that is counted fifty days from the Sabbath in Passover week.

Leviticus 23:15–16 (LEB)

¹⁵ “ ‘And you shall count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day of your bringing the wave offering’s sheaf—there shall be seven full weeks. ¹⁶ Until the day after the seventh Sabbath you shall count fifty days; then you shall present a new grain offering for Yahweh.

The weekly Sabbath is always on the seventh day of the week. The day after the Sabbath will always be a Sunday. This is not where Sunday was turned into a new form of holy day, it was simply a biblical feast day.

The next dispensational belief system states that the church started at the time of Acts 13. This is a form of ultra dispensationalism.

Acts 13:1–3 (LEB)

13 Now there were prophets and teachers in Antioch in the church that was there: Barnabas, and Simeon (who was called Niger), and Lucius the Cyrenian, and Manaen (a close friend of Herod the tetrarch), and Saul. ² And while they were serving the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart now for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” ³ Then, after they had fasted and prayed and placed their hands on them, they sent them away.

Lastly, hyper-dispensationalism has the church starting around the time of Acts 28. This is where Paul, frustrated with the lack of faith of his own people, declares the gospel will be brought to the gentiles. A gentile is simply someone who is not a Jew. The current dispensation in this belief system is the only one that the instructions of God do not apply. How convenient! From Theopedia.com:

Hyper-dispensationalism (or sometimes ultra-dispensationalism), as opposed to traditional (or classic) Dispensationalism, views the start of the Christian church as beginning with the ministry of the Apostle Paul after the early part of the book of Acts. Although variations exist in specifics, all hyper-dispensationalists view the four Gospels and many of New Testament Epistles as applying to the pre-Pauline Jewish-Christian church or to the future Davidic Kingdom; not directly applicable to the predominantly Gentile Church of today.

Acts 28:23–28 (LEB)

²³ And when they had set a day with him, many more came to him at his lodging place, to whom he was explaining from early in the morning until evening, testifying about the kingdom of God and attempting to convince them about Jesus from both the law of Moses and the prophets. ²⁴ And some were convinced by what was said, but others refused to believe. ²⁵ So being in disagreement with one another, they began to leave after Paul made one statement: “The Holy Spirit spoke rightly through the prophet Isaiah to your fathers, ²⁶ saying, ‘Go to this people and say, “You will keep on hearing and will never understand, and you will keep on seeing and will never perceive. ²⁷ For the heart of this people has become dull, and with their ears they hear with difficulty, and they have shut their eyes, lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and turn, and I would heal them.” ’ ²⁸ Therefore let it be known to you that this salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles. They also will listen!”

This concept of salvation going to the whole world was not something Paul invented. God always intended on making a way for the whole world to be saved through Abraham’s seed, Yeshua the Messiah, or in Greek, Iesous the Christ [Christos].

Isaiah 56:6–8 (LEB)

⁶ And the foreigners who join themselves to Yahweh to serve him and to love the name of Yahweh, to become his servants, every one who keeps the Sabbath, so as not to profane it,and those who keep hold of my covenant, ⁷ I will bring them to my holy mountain;I will make them merry in my house of prayer.their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar, for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples,”⁸ declares the Lord Yahweh, who gathers the scattered ones of Israel (still I will gather to him, to his gathered ones).

The gospel did not start with Paul, nor is he the center of the plan of the Creator God, Yahuah. He was a vessel used by God to spread the good news of Yeshua the Messiah.

1 Corinthians 1:10–15 (LEB)

¹⁰ Now I exhort you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all say the same thing and there not be divisions among you, and that you be made complete in the same mind and with the same purpose. ¹¹ For it has been made clear to me concerning you, my brothers, by Chloe’s people, that there are quarrels among you. ¹² But I say this, that each of you is saying, “I am with Paul,” and “I am with Apollos,” and “I am with Cephas,” and “I am with Christ.” ¹³ Has Christ been divided? Paul was not crucified for you, was he? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? ¹⁴ I give thanks that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, ¹⁵ lest anyone should say that you were baptized in my name.

After being under the influence of dispensational teaching for over forty years, seeing how it captivates people like a form of cult, I now believe this system of theology, that took hold of Protestantism in the nineteenth century, is part of the great deception and apostasy of the church. Stephen tells us when the church started and the pre-dispensationalism theology Bible translation gets it right. The King James Bible was translated into English before dispensationalism theology was invented; therefore, it innocently translates the Greek word “ekklesea” to “church” where most translations will use a different word in this one passage.

Acts 7:37–40 (KJV 1900)

³⁷ This is that Moses, which said unto the children of Israel, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear. ³⁸ This is he, that was in the church in the wilderness with the angel which spake to him in the mount Sina, and with our fathers: who received the lively oracles to give unto us: ³⁹ To whom our fathers would not obey, but thrust him from them, and in their hearts turned back again into Egypt, ⁴⁰ Saying unto Aaron, Make us gods to go before us: for as for this Moses, which brought us out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him.

The “church” gathered at the foot of the mountain to hear the Creator give them the ten words of instructions for living successfully on this Earth. It was an assembly of God’s people. This was the family of God. Just like any family there were problems. Some brothers didn’t want to follow the Father’s instructions and were disowned. They went and served wood and stone, trees, sun gods and fertility goddesses. Yeshua alludes to this with the parable of the prodigal son.

Jeremiah 7:16–20 (LEB)

¹⁶ “And you, you must not pray for this people, and you must not lift up for them a cry of entreaty or a prayer, and you must not plead with me, for I will not hear you. ¹⁷ Do you not see what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? ¹⁸ The children are gathering wood, and the fathers are kindling the fire, and the women are kneading dough to make sacrificial cakes for the queen of heaven, and they pour out libations to other gods for the sake of provoking me to anger. ¹⁹ Are they provoking me to anger? ” declares Yahweh, “Is it not themselves they hurt, for the sake of the shame of their faces?” ²⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh, “Look, my anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place, on the humankind, and on the animal, and on the tree of the field, and on the fruit of the ground, and it will burn and not be extinguished.”

These sacrificial cakes for the queen of heaven are still with us at Easter as hot cross buns. These symbols of other gods have been fully embraced by Christianity along with their festivals and special days. The Christmas tree has morphed from tree worship as well as being dismayed at the signs of the heavens, namely the winter solstice and sun god worship.

Jeremiah 10:1–6 (LEB)

Hear the word that Yahweh speaks to you, O house of Israel. ² Thus says Yahweh: “You must not learn the way of the nations, and you must not be dismayed by the signs of the heavens, for the nations are dismayed by them. ³ For the statutes of the peoples are vanity, for it is a tree cut down from the forest, the work of the hands of a craftsman with the tool. ⁴ He decorates it with silver and gold, they strengthen it with nails and hammers, so that it does not stagger. ⁵ They are like scarecrows in a cucumber field, they cannot speak. Indeed, they must be carried, for they cannot march. You must not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil; furthermore, to do good is not in them.” ⁶ There is none like you, O Yahweh, you are great and your name is great in might.

The Father was so angry at all of this idolatry that he disowned some of the family of Israel. Here it is talking about the tribes that sinned with Jeroboam. They are called the House of Israel, Joseph and sometimes Ephraim.

Jeremiah 3:6–10 (LEB)

⁶ Then Yahweh said to me in the days of Josiah, the king, “Have you seen what apostate Israel has done? She has gone on every high hill and under every leafy tree and she has prostituted herself there. ⁷ And I thought, ‘After her doing all these things to me she will return,’ but she did not return. And her treacherous sister Judah saw it. ⁸ And I saw that for this very reason, that on account of apostate Israel committing adultery I divorced her and gave the letter of divorce to her. Yet her treacherous sister Judah was not afraid and she went and prostituted herself also. ⁹ And it was because of the frivolity of her fornication that she defiled the land and committed adultery with the stone and with the tree. ¹⁰ Yet even in all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to me with all her heart, but only in pretense,” declares Yahweh.

Judah returned “but only in pretense”. Paul speaks of these family problems in the letter to the Romans. Anyone of the divorced family could come back through Yeshua the Messiah, along with the rest of the world. He likens to being grafted in to the natural olive tree, which is Israel, or the family of God.

Romans 11:17–24 (LEB)

¹⁷ Now if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although you were a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them and became a sharer of the root of the olive tree’s richness, ¹⁸ do not boast against the branches. But if you boast against them, you do not support the root, but the root supports you. ¹⁹ Then you will say, “Branches were broken off in order that I could be grafted in.” ²⁰ Well said! They were broken off because of unbelief, but you stand firm because of faith. Do not think arrogant thoughts, but be afraid. ²¹ For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. ²² See, then, the kindness and severity of God: severity upon those who have fallen, but upon you the kindness of God—if you continue in his kindness, for otherwise you also will be cut off. ²³ And those also, if they do not persist in unbelief, will be grafted in, because God is able to graft them in again. ²⁴ For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these who are natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree?

We can be grafted in to the olive tree. If we act like the disobedient children of Israel with our trees of foreign gods and breaking of the eternal covenant, we can also be cut off again once we are grafted in. Being grafted into the olive tree is what is meant by being part of the family of God or “joint heirs with Jesus”. There is no such thing as a gentile believer in Yeshua. One is either a gentile or part of the family of God.

Galatians 3:23–29 (LEB)

²³ But before faith came, we were detained under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith was revealed. ²⁴ So then, the law became our guardian until Christ, in order that we could be justified by faith. ²⁵ But after faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. ²⁶ For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, ²⁷ for as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. ²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. ²⁹ And if you are Christ’s, then you are descendants of Abraham, heirs according to the promise.

The point is we are heirs through Yeshua and brought in as sons and daughters of Abraham. The law could not do this. It actually separated people from the family because of unpardonable sin. Yeshua was able to make one sacrifice for all times to repair that problem. The law was a guardian, which if one looks up to what Paul was speaking about, they would find that this specific Greek word was referring to a person a family would have to be a tutor for a child. This tutor would guide and instruct the youth in their learning. Once the child was grown, that person was no longer needed as a tutor. Did the child forget everything the tutor taught and not continue following their instructions? Of course not! They simply no longer needed the tutor to guard and instruct them. It is the same way with the commandments. Do we forget about the Sabbath now that we are in Messiah? Of course not. He called himself lord of the Sabbath and told us it was lawful to do good on the Sabbath. However, a dispensationlist will say that is not written to our dispensation. Dispensationalism theology appears to be a satanic loophole for everything anyone does not want to do.

Galatians 4:1–7 (LEB)

4 Now I say, for as long a time as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he is master of everything, ² but he is under guardians and managers until the time set by his father. ³ So also we, when we were children, we were enslaved under the elemental spirits of the world. ⁴ But when the fullness of time came, God sent out his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, ⁵ in order that he might redeem those under the law, in order that we might receive the adoption. ⁶ And because you are sons, God sent out the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying out, “Abba! (Father!),” ⁷ so that you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, also an heir through God.

There are not two gospels, one for gentiles and one for Jews, as dispensationalism claims. Paul is a mere man who was a vessel of God used to proclaim the good news that had been spoken about for hundreds of years before Paul lived. The “mystery” of the gospel has been solved. There is a way through which the whole world could be brought near to God. We have the advantage of knowing it was through Yeshua the Messiah. The church is simply a united family of God grafted into the commonwealth of Israel. Be like the Bereans who searched the scriptures daily and see if this is true.

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Moses said, ‘The Lord God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brothers. You will listen to him in everything that he says to you.  And it will be that every soul who does not listen to that prophet will be destroyed utterly from the people.’

Acts 3:22–23 (LEB)

There are people in Christianity who believe the only prophecy anyone needs to be concerned with is the pretribulation rapture. Before any of the evil comes upon the world, prophesied all through scripture, they will be whisked away to spend eternity with Jesus is an ethereal place they call heaven, in this belief system. Many of these people also think they are “eternally secure”, meaning if they sincerely “accept Jesus” once in their life, then they have a ticket on the rapture bus.

If you happen to be one of these people, using scripture, please tell me if the pretribulation rapture is a resurrection, where one will get their new physical body like the Messiah, or is it a rapture of some non-material part of a person that will reunite with their physical body at a future resurrection? If it is a resurrection, is it the first resurrection spoken about in scripture? If it is a rapture of some non-material part of us it sounds more like Egyptian mythology than anything biblical.

Acts 3:16–24 (LEB)

¹⁷ And now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, just as your rulers did also. ¹⁸ But the things which God foretold through the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer, he has fulfilled in this way. ¹⁹ Therefore repent and turn back, so that your sins may be blotted out, ²⁰ so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and he may send the Christ appointed for you—Jesus, ²¹ whom heaven must receive until the times of the restoration of all things, about which God spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from earliest times. ²² Moses said, ‘The Lord God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brothers. You will listen to him in everything that he says to you. ²³ And it will be that every soul who does not listen to that prophet will be destroyed utterly from the people.’ ²⁴ And indeed, all the prophets from Samuel and all those who followed him have spoken about and proclaimed these days.

Is our duty as Christians to “accept Jesus” and move on with life? Let’s just “ask him into our heart”. No where in scripture do we find anyone saying the way to have eternal life is either to “accept Jesus” or “ask him into our heart”. We see Peter in the book of Acts quoting Moses from Deuteronomy 18, which says anyone who does not listen to Jesus, or Yeshua in Hebrew, will be destroyed. This word “listen” means much more than to simply hear.

When an English speaking person hears the word “listen” it could simply mean the act of hearing. “Okay I heard what Jesus said, I’m good. Bring on the rapture bus”. When Moses or Peter were speaking, the word they were using means to listen, hear, understand and obey. The word translated to “listen” in Greek is ἀκούω (akouo). In Hebrew it is שמע(shema).

Deuteronomy 18:18–19 (LEB)

¹⁸ I will raise up a prophet for them from among their countrymen like you, and I will place my words into his mouth, and he shall speak to them everything that I command him. ¹⁹ And then the man that will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I will hold accountable.

We could easily say, “anyone who does not listen, understand and obey will be destroyed”. This is prophecy no one wants to fulfill, yet many are doing just that through ignorance. Unfortunately, the pastors and teachers, whose job is to warn the people, fell asleep at the wheel years ago, also fulfilling prophecy.

Jeremiah 23:30–32 (LEB)

³⁰ “Therefore look, I am against the prophets,” declares Yahweh, “who steal my words each one from his neighbor. ³¹ Look, I am against the prophets,” declares Yahweh, “who take their tongues and declare as prophets, ‘Yahweh declares.’ ³² Look, I am against those who prophesy dreams of lies,” declares Yahweh, “and tell them, and they caused my people to err through their lies, and in their recklessness, when I myself have not sent them nor commanded them, so they profit not this people at all,” declares Yahweh.

The prophets from “Samuel and all those who followed” did the work. We don’t need to listen to made up fairy tales from preachers tickling the ears of their congregations. They just need to proclaim what has already been told by the prophets.

1 Timothy 6:3–5 (LEB)

³ If anyone teaches other doctrine and does not devote himself to the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that is in accordance with godliness, ⁴ he is conceited, understanding nothing, but having a morbid interest concerning controversies and disputes about words, from which come envy, strife, slanders, evil suspicions, ⁵ constant wrangling by people of depraved mind and deprived of the truth, who consider godliness to be a means of gain.

What are the “sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that is in accordance with godliness”? First of all, we do not need to continue in the Greek language. “Lord Jesus Christ” is “Kurios Iesous Christos”. “Christ” is not the last name of Jesus. It is a Greek word meaning anointed one and messenger (Messiah). “Kurios”, translated, “Lord”, means master, lord or Yahweh. The name “Jesus” is a combination of Greek, Latin and English, which should be either “Joshua” in English, Yeshua or Yahusha in Hebrew. Most people like to be called by their proper name. Let’s look at the sound words of Master Yeshua the Messiah.

Mark 7:6–13 (LEB)

⁶ So he said to them, “Isaiah prophesied correctly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far, far away from me. ⁷ And they worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ⁸ Abandoning the commandment of God, you hold fast to the tradition of men.” ⁹ And he said to them, “You splendidly ignore the commandment of God so that you can keep your tradition. ¹⁰ For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘The one who speaks evil of father or mother must certainly die.’ ¹¹ But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or to his mother, “Whatever benefit you would have received from me is corban” (that is, a gift to God), ¹² you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or his mother, ¹³ thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down, and you do many similar things such as this.”

Here we see Yeshua upbraiding the religious leaders for ignoring the commandments of God and replacing them with their own traditions. He calls this vain worship. What would be examples of traditions of men replacing commandments of God today? Ignoring the Sabbath and changing the special day to the day of the sun, encouraging people to work on the Sabbath and worship on Sunday as decreed by the Council of Laodecia in 347 CE. Replacing the festivals of God with pagan blended substitutes such as Christmas and Easter, using symbols of witchcraft to supposedly celebrate something for God. These are two that come to mind. Yeshua calls this vain worship and it is not good.

Yeshua also told us the two greatest commandments. He made it easy for us by summing up the Torah in two commands. This is the doctrine of Yeshua. Leviticus 19 and Deuteronomy chapter six.

Mark 12:28–31 (LEB)

²⁸ And one of the scribes came up and heard them debating. When he saw that he answered them well, he asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” ²⁹ Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Listen, Israel! The Lord our God, the Lord is one. ³⁰ And you shall love the Lord your God from your whole heart and from your whole soul and from your whole mind and from your whole strength.’ ³¹ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

Yeshua always backed up what he said with scripture from the Torah (law), prophets and writings. This should be a big clue for where to find truth. So many have abandoned the source of God’s truth.

Deuteronomy 6:4–6 (LEB)

⁴ “Hear, Israel, Yahweh our God, Yahweh is unique. ⁵ And you shall love Yahweh your God with all of your heart and with all of your soul and with all of your might. ⁶ And these words that I am commanding you today shall be on your heart.

The words He was commanding were the ten commandments in the previous chapter, and they are all about loving God and loving one’s neighbor. Love has to be defined by God, not man. If man defines love we get a twisted version. We love God by keeping His commandments and Leviticus tells us how to love our neighbor.

Leviticus 19:17–19 (LEB)

¹⁷ “ ‘You shall not hate your brother in your heart; you shall surely rebuke your fellow citizen, so that you do not incur sin along with him. ¹⁸ You shall not seek vengeance, and you shall not harbor a grudge against your fellow citizens; and you shall love your neighbor like yourself; I am Yahweh.

An important way to love one’s neighbor is to warn them about sin. Take this entire blog site as me loving you by warning about sin. People who do not love their neighbor say things such as is written: Jeremiah 23:17 (LEB) “They are continually saying to those who disregard the word of Yahweh, ‘Peace it will be to you,’ and to each one who walks in the stubbornness of his heart they say, ‘Calamity will not come upon you.’”.

The pretribulation rapture doctrine is explained well in Jeremiah 23. “Don’t worry about anything Yeshua said, the rapture is about to happen”. Yeshua always taught the ten commandments. I do not know how anyone can say otherwise.

Luke 18:18–20 (LEB)

¹⁸ And a certain ruler asked him, saying, “Good Teacher, by doing what will I inherit eternal life?” ¹⁹ And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. ²⁰ You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.’ ”

The commandments have something to do with eternal life according to Messiah Yeshua. This makes sense because the Bible is full of verses about what happens to those who willfully break or ignore the commandments. It never ends well for those people.

John 12:46–50 (LEB)

⁴⁶ I have come as a light into the world, in order that everyone who believes in me will not remain in the darkness. ⁴⁷ And if anyone hears my words and does not observe them, I will not judge him. For I have not come to judge the world, but to save the world. ⁴⁸ The one who rejects me and does not accept my words has one who judges him; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day. ⁴⁹ For I have not spoken from myself, but the Father himself who sent me has commanded me what I should say and what I should speak. ⁵⁰ And I know that his commandment is eternal life. So the things that I say, just as the Father said to me, thus I say.”

Keeping the commandments is how we show our love for the Creator and the Messiah. This is another teaching of Yeshua we must listen to and obey.

John 14:15 (LEB)

¹⁵ “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

A common statement is that there are only nine commandments repeated in the New Testament, therefore the Sabbath is no longer important because it wasn’t re-commanded. This is a ridiculous argument and shows that a people really can justify anything. It will all come crashing down though when Messiah returns. As far as there being only nine commandments, Yeshua tells us to follow all the commandments.

Matthew 5:17–19 (LEB)

¹⁷ “Do not think that I have come to destroy the law or the prophets. I have not come to destroy them but to fulfill them. ¹⁸ For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one tiny letter or one stroke of a letter will pass away from the law until all takes place. ¹⁹ Therefore whoever abolishes one of the least of these commandments and teaches people to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever keeps them and teaches them, this person will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Last time I checked, the Earth is still here. “Whoever abolishes the least of these commandments” means the Sabbath commandment still stands. It is not punishment. Only a fool would think having a day of rest once a week is a bad thing. It is the way the kingdom of God operates. What does it mean to be least in the kingdom? I don’t want to find out. What if it is Isaiah 66? They are still in the kingdom because people are going out after worshiping on the Sabbath and seeing them. It sounds like zombies burning.

Isaiah 66:23–24 (LEB)

²³ And this shall happen: From new moon to new moon and from Sabbath to Sabbath all flesh shall come to bow in worship before me,” says Yahweh. ²⁴ “And they shall go out and look at the corpses of the people who have rebelled against me, for their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh.”

Anyone that teaches there are only nine commandments, or that the law was “nailed to the cross” should consider what happens to “whoever” causes someone who believes Yeshua to sin. It is one thing to believe an error, but it is worse to cause other people to be in error as well.

Mark 9:42–48 (LEB)

⁴² “And whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it is better for him if instead a large millstone is placed around his neck and he is thrown into the sea. ⁴³ And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off! It is better for you to enter into life crippled than, having two hands, to go into hell—into the unquenchable fire! ⁴⁵ And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off! It is better for you to enter into life lame than, having two feet, to be thrown into hell! ⁴⁷ And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out! It is better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than, having two eyes, to be thrown into hell, ⁴⁸ ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not extinguished.’

Yeshua came teaching justice and mercy, yet while scolding the religious leaders for neglecting justice and mercy, he told them they still shouldn’t neglect the less weightier matters of the law.

Matthew 23:23 (LEB)

²³ “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees—hypocrites!—because you pay a tenth of mint and dill and cumin, and neglect the more important matters of the law—justice and mercy and faithfulness! It was necessary to do these things while not neglecting those.

Paul described the current church landscape to Timothy just over 1900 years ago. Leaving the sound teachings of Messiah Yeshua and godliness, people have accumulated teachers that eagerly tell them not to worry about all the commandments Yeshua said to keep, because those were for someone else. “Get ready for the rapture instead! Oh and make sure to leave something in the offering plate before you go”. Prophecy is being fulfilled right in front of us, and it is not good.

2 Timothy 4:3–4 (LEB)

³ For there will be a time when they will not put up with sound teaching, but in accordance with their own desires, they will accumulate for themselves teachers, because they have an insatiable curiosity, ⁴ and they will turn away from the hearing of the truth, but will turn to myths.

The one seated on the throne leaves us with some hard, cold facts about the kingdom of God in the closing verses of Revelation. This is the exact same information that is throughout scripture. Sorry, you have been deceived.

Revelation 21:5–8 (LEB)

⁵ And the one seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new!” And he said, “Write, because these words are faithful and true.” ⁶ And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the one who is thirsty I will give water from the spring of the water of life freely. ⁷ The one who conquers will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be my son. ⁸ But as for the cowards and unbelievers and detestable persons and murderers and sexually immoral people and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their share is in the lake that burns with fire and sulphur, which is the second death.

Featured photo is by Annie Spratt on Unsplash.

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As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former desires you used to conform to in your ignorance, but as the one who called you is holy, you yourselves be holy in all your conduct, for it is written, “You will be holy, because I am holy.”  And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves with fear during the time of your temporary residence

1 Peter 1:14–17 (LEB)

Enter the phrase “age of grace” in any Bible search engine, look it up in a concordance or search the scriptures manually, and this term will not be found. How is this possible? Everyone in Christendom knows we are in the dispensational age of grace where we do not have to obey the God we serve. Why is this term not plastered throughout the scriptures? There are other commonly known tenants of this theology, such as the Old Testament prophets never saw the age of grace coming. Supposedly it is a parenthesis in the prophetic timeline that God had to create once Israel rejected the Messiah. This is where the “church” and “age of grace” got inserted in this make believe narrative called dispensationalism.

Does everyone who uses the phrase “age of grace” know by default they are also projecting the rest of this theological system, where their god made a mistake in judging the acceptance of the Messiah and then had to go to plan B, the church? Imagine, God having to postpone His kingdom because He didn’t know what was going to happen! They are also claiming that there are two distinct people groups of God, Israel and the church. The church will be whisked away to an ethereal place with Jesus while physical Israel has to duke it out with the antichrist on Earth.

2 Peter 3:14–17 (LEB)

¹⁴ Therefore, dear friends, because you are waiting for these things, make every effort to be found at peace, spotless and unblemished in him. ¹⁵ And regard the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as also our dear brother Paul wrote to you, according to the wisdom that was given to him, ¹⁶ as he does also in all his letters, speaking in them about these things, in which there are some things hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable distort to their own destruction, as they also do the rest of the scriptures. ¹⁷ Therefore, dear friends, because you know this beforehand, guard yourselves so that you do not lose your own safe position because you have been led away by the error of lawless persons.

Peter tells us plainly that lawless people will use the words of Paul to lead people astray into lawlessness. This word “lawless” in the Greek is defined as ignoring the divine ordinances. These are the instructions of the Creator, given through Moses, that are supposedly only to be followed in the “dispensation of law”, “which the ignorant and unstable distort to their own destruction” in the “age of grace”. What destroys people and attracts demons more than breaking the laws of God?

ἄθεσμος, lawless, ignoring the (divine) ordinances.

Alexander Souter, A Pocket Lexicon to the Greek New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1917), 7.

We have many people deceived into thinking that for some magical reason everything the Creator said to do is on pause and will get turned back on again once “the church” is removed from the Earth. This is pure fantasy and a trick from the enemy. It may even be designed by God himself to see who really loves Him enough to search out the words He gave us.

Deuteronomy 13:3–4 (LEB)

³ you must not listen to the words of that prophet or to that dreamer, for Yahweh your God is testing you to know whether you love Yahweh your God with all of your heart and with all of your inner self. ⁴ You shall go after Yahweh your God, and him you shall revere, and his commandment you shall keep, and to his voice you shall listen, and him you shall serve, and to him you shall hold fast.

“The church” is not a new concept created after the cross. The word “church” comes from the word that means assembly, and Stephen uses it to describe the twelve tribes assembled at Mount Sinai.

Acts 7:38 (KJV 1900)

³⁸ This is he, that was in the church in the wilderness with the angel which spake to him in the mount Sina, and with our fathers: who received the lively oracles to give unto us:

Qahal is the Hebrew equivalent of the Greek word ekklesia, translated to “church” in the New Testament. The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology shows us how it was used just as Stephen used it.

In Deut. qāhāl means above all the congregation gathered to conclude the covenant at Sinai (Deut. 9:10; 10:4). It is qualified by being linked to the name of Yahweh (cf. especially Deut. 23:2ff.). The word stands here for the people which Yahweh has summoned, which is bound by the rules he has given (→ Commandment; → Law), and whose participation in Yahweh’s → Covenant is only maintained by obedience. Thus qāhāl had also a religious element alongside that of a special, solemn assembly.

L. Coenen, “Church, Synagogue,” ed. Lothar Coenen, Erich Beyreuther, and Hans Bietenhard, New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986), 293.

The term “church” now is used for a group of people who have no obligation to do anything their God said to do according to such doctrines as the “age of grace”. I am not implying anyone can save themselves by keeping rules. Salvation has always been a free gift. If we are serving a loving God, we should automatically be interested in His character and what we can do to please Him. God had love for His people first, it just so happens that if His people love Him back, they will show it by doing what He said to do.

Deuteronomy 7:6–11 (LEB)

⁶ For you are a holy people for Yahweh your God; Yahweh your God has chosen you to be for him a people, a treasured possession from among all the peoples that are on the face of the earth. ⁷ “Yahweh loved you and chose you not because of your great number exceeding all other peoples, for you are fewer than all of the peoples, ⁸ but because of the love of Yahweh for you and because of his keeping of the sworn oath that he swore to your ancestors, Yahweh brought you out with a strong hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. ⁹ So know that Yahweh your God, he is God, the trustworthy God, maintaining his covenant and his loyal love with those who love him and with those who keep his commandments to a thousand generations, ¹⁰ but repaying those who hate him in their own person to destroy them; he is not slow with those who hate him in their own person; he repays them. ¹¹ And so you shall keep the commandment and the rules and the regulations that I am commanding you today to observe them.

We know through Paul that there are only one people of God. It is us who must be grafted in to Israel. There is nothing in scripture about a separate entity that separates itself from the children of Abraham.

Galatians 3:28–29 (LEB)

²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. ²⁹ And if you are Christ’s, then you are descendants of Abraham, heirs according to the promise.

Many of the people that have come out of the theology of dispensationalism and the “age of grace” could not bare the inconsistencies of this belief system due to the blatant contradictions in scripture. This means they were truly searching the scriptures for themselves and not just parroting what their favorite super evangelist preacher or pastor was telling them. Most pastors could not leave this theological system without loosing their housing and income. Imagine the consequences of a pastor telling their congregation that they were studying scripture and realized the Sabbath is just as important today as it was in the time when Jesus walked the Earth and we will be celebrating the Sabbath in the Millennium kingdom.

Isaiah 66:23–24 (LEB)

²³ And this shall happen: From new moon to new moon and from Sabbath to Sabbath all flesh shall come to bow in worship before me,” says Yahweh. ²⁴ “And they shall go out and look at the corpses of the people who have rebelled against me, for their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh.”

There are pastors leaving organized religion for this very reason. It is not just a matter of Sabbath keeping, once one enters lawlessness, that is defying the ordinances from God handed down through Israel, in light of Yeshua’s instructions, there is no end to the amount of sin that can be justified. This can be easily seen throughout the modern church. It is a terrible situation.

Amos 3:7 (LEB)

⁷ Surely my Lord does not do anything unless he has revealed his secret to his servants the prophets.

Much of prophesy is written against the “church” which has followed in the footsteps of the House of Israel with their worship of foreign gods through festivals, images, and lawless theology. The prophets saw the “age of grace” and did not speak well about it.

Jeremiah 23:16–20 (LEB)

¹⁶ Thus says Yahweh of hosts: “You must not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you. They are deluding you with visions of their mind, They do not speak from the mouth of Yahweh. ¹⁷ They are continually saying to those who disregard the word of Yahweh, ‘Peace it will be to you,’ and to each one who walks in the stubbornness of his heart they say, ‘Calamity will not come upon you.’ ¹⁸ For who has stood in the council of Yahweh, that he has seen and heard his word? Who has listened attentively to his word and heard it? ¹⁹ Look, the storm of Yahweh has gone forth in wrath, even a whirling tempest. It will whirl upon the head of the wicked. ²⁰ The anger of Yahweh will not turn back until his doing and until his keeping the plans of his mind. In latter days you will look closely at it with understanding.

This is the “age of grace” that the prophets surely did see and spoke about: “They are continually saying to those who disregard the word of Yahweh, ‘Peace it will be to you“.

Peter, quoting the Torah, told us, “you yourselves be holy in all your conduct, for it is written, ‘You will be holy, because I am holy.'”. This quote is taken from a couple places in Leviticus, right in the middle of the instructions telling us how to be holy. This quote does not stand alone, Peter was telling us how to be holy. It is not by making up rules of conduct in our own imagination or listening to the rules someone else made up. It is listening to every word that comes from the Creator.

Acts 17:10–12 (LEB)

¹⁰ Now the brothers sent away both Paul and Silas at once, during the night, to Berea. They went into the synagogue of the Jews when they arrived. ¹¹ Now these were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica. They accepted the message with all eagerness, examining the scriptures every day to see if these things were so. ¹² Therefore many of them believed, and not a few of the prominent Greek women and men.

Be like the Bereans, who examined the scriptures every day. Repent and be obedient to the God you serve. He will show the truth to anyone who takes a step of obedience.

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Therefore, what am I saying? That food sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything?  No, but that the things which they sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God, and I do not want you to become sharers with demons. You are not able to drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You are not able to share the table of the Lord and the table of demons.

1 Corinthians 10:19–21 (LEB)

There are misconceptions about demons, idols and how they affect our lives. I have talked extensively about where demons came from in other blog posts. They were something Jesus, or by his Hebrew name, Yeshua, dealt with on many occasions in the gospels. They never went away and we still contend with them today, even if many people do not believe this or are unaware of their entanglement with these entities.

Luke 8:26–33 (LEB)

²⁶ And they sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. ²⁷ And as he got out on the land, a certain man from the town met him who had demons and for a considerable time had not worn clothes and did not live in a house, but among the tombs. ²⁸ And when he saw Jesus, he cried out, fell down before him, and said with a loud voice, “What do I have to do with you, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me!” ²⁹ For he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For it had seized him many times, and he was bound with chains and shackles and was guarded, and breaking the bonds he would be driven by the demon into the deserted places.) ³⁰ So Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Legion,” because many demons had entered into him. ³¹ And they began imploring him that he would not order them to depart into the abyss. ³² Now there was a large herd of pigs feeding there on the hill, and they implored him that he would permit them to enter into those pigs. And he permitted them. ³³ So the demons came out of the man and entered into the pigs, and the herd rushed headlong down the steep slope into the lake and were drowned.

Demons and idolatry go hand in hand. Many people think idolatry involves worship of an object or person. In today’s religious landscape it has been downplayed to a person simply thinking too highly of a job, money or hobby. Those can all be idols, but it is not as simple as this. Idolatry is anything that is contrary to the word of God.

Colossians 3:5–11 (LEB)

⁵ Therefore put to death what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, uncleanness, lustful passion, evil desire, and greediness, which is idolatry, ⁶ because of which the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, ⁷ in which also you once lived, when you used to live in them. ⁸ But now you also lay aside all these things: anger, rage, wickedness, slander, abusive language from your mouth. ⁹ Do not lie to one another, because you have taken off the old man together with his deeds, ¹⁰ and have put on the new man that is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of the one who created him, ¹¹ where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, or free, but Christ is all, and in all. neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, or free, but Christ is all, and in all.

Demons prey on people who partake in sexual immorality, uncleanness, lustful passion, evil desire, and greediness because they lose the protection of the Creator. Uncleanness is not talking about not bathing either.

Psalm 106:37–40 (LEB)

³⁷ They even sacrificed their sons and daughters to the demons, ³⁸ and they poured out innocent blood, the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan and so the land was defiled with the blood. ³⁹ And they became unclean by their works, and were unfaithful in their deeds. ⁴⁰ So Yahweh’s anger burned against his people, and he abhorred his inheritance.

Demons are the result of the unlawful union between the fallen angels and women before Noah’s flood. These were the giants or Nephilim spoken about in scripture.

Genesis 6:1–4 (LEB)

6 And it happened that, when humankind began to multiply on the face of the ground, daughters were born to them. ² Then the sons of God saw the daughters of humankind, that they were beautiful. And they took for themselves wives from all that they chose. ³ And Yahweh said, “My Spirit shall not abide with humankind forever in that he is also flesh. And his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.” ⁴ The Nephilim were upon the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God went into the daughters of humankind, and they bore children to them. These were the mighty warriors that were from ancient times, men of renown.

Even if people are not taught this today, it is no less true than it was when Peter talked about it.

2 Peter 2:4–5 (LEB)

⁴ For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held them captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness and handed them over to be kept for judgment, ⁵ and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, and seven others when he brought a flood on the world of the ungodly,

The angles were chained in Tartarus, and many of the demons were sent there as well. This is why the demons did not want Yeshua to send them to the abyss. Luke 8:31 (LEB) “And they began imploring him that he would not order them to depart into the abyss.” All of these events and situations were well known to people in the first and second centuries. It wasn’t until the philosophers took over Christianity that this knowledge was removed from the mainstream.

The only way these demons can bother anyone is if a person does things to invite them into their lives. Living contrary to the Creator’s instructions given to us through Israel is one way a person can open themselves up to demonic oppression. Partaking in the sun god holidays with all the symbols of idolatry will bring oppression as well. One doesn’t have to “worship” their Halloween and Christmas decorations to bring on demon oppression. These holidays belong to the demons and their master. Celebrating with ancient satanic rituals is a really good way to invite demons into one’s life, and it is a factor with the higher depression rates in December.

1 Corinthians 10:14–22 (LEB)

¹⁴ Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. ¹⁵ I am speaking as to sensible people; you judge what I am saying. ¹⁶ The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? ¹⁷ Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all share from the one bread. ¹⁸ Consider Israel according to the flesh: are not the ones who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar? ¹⁹ Therefore, what am I saying? That food sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? ²⁰ No, but that the things which they sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God, and I do not want you to become sharers with demons. ²¹ You are not able to drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You are not able to share the table of the Lord and the table of demons. ²² Or are we attempting to provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than he is, are we?

Paul is telling us that just as taking communion is participating with the body and blood of Christ, participating in ancient rituals of witchcraft, “food sacrificed to idols” is drinking the cup of demons. Remember, these demons are disembodied spirits of offspring of angels and humans. They are unclean because they were not supposed to exist.

Jude 6 (LEB)

⁶ And the angels who did not keep to their own domain but deserted their proper dwelling place, he has kept in eternal bonds under deep gloom for the judgment of the great day,

Clement was the third bishop of Rome, and some of his writings still exist. The following is a writing from pseudo-Clement, which means it was not likely Clement who wrote this, but someone who wrote in his name. It is included in the Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume Eight, and called the Clement Homilies. The point of this is to show the knowledge that these early Christians had about the dark side.

“Since, therefore, the souls of the deceased giants were greater than human souls, inasmuch as they also excelled their bodies, they, as being a new race, were called also by a new name. And to those who survived in the world a law was prescribed of God through an angel, how they should live. For being bastards in race, of the fire of angels and the blood of women, and therefore liable to desire a certain race of their own, they were anticipated by a certain righteous law. For a certain angel was sent to them by God, declaring to them His will, and saying: –

Chap. XIX. – The Law to the Giants or Demons.

“‘These things seem good to the all-seeing God, that you lord it over no man; that you trouble no one, unless any one of his own accord subject himself to you, worshipping you, and sacrificing and pouring libations, and partaking of your table, or accomplishing aught else that they ought not, or shedding blood, or tasting dead flesh, or filling themselves with that which is torn of beasts, or that which is cut, or that which is strangled, or aught else that is unclean. But those who betake themselves to my law, you not only shall not touch, but shall also do honour to, and shall flee from, their presence. For whatsoever shall please them, being just, respecting you, that you shall be constrained to suffer. But if any of those who worship me go astray, either committing adultery, or practicing magic, or living impurely, or doing any other of the things which are not well-pleasing to me, then they will have to suffer something at your hands or those of others, according to my order. But upon them, when they repent, I, judging of their repentance, whether it be worthy of pardon or not, shall give sentence. These things, therefore, ye ought to remember and to do, well knowing that not even your thoughts shall be able to be concealed from Him.’

Chap. XX. – Willing Captives.
“Having charged them to this effect, the angel departed. But you are still ignorant of this law, that every one who worships demons, or sacrifices to them, or partakes with them of their table, shall become subject to them and receive all punishment from them, as being under wicked lords. And you who, on account of ignorance of this law, have been corrupted beside their altars, and have been satiated with food offered to them, have come under their power, and do not know how you have been in every way injured in respect of your bodies. But you ought to know that the demons have no power over any one, unless first he be their table-companion; since not even their chief can do anything contrary to the law imposed upon them by God, wherefore he has no power over any one who does not worship him; but neither can any one receive from them any of the things that he wishes, nor in anything be hurt by them, as you may learn from the following statement.

This is one of the reasons why the commandments of God are so important. Opening a door to these demons by not following the instructions of the Creator has caused many people an abundance of problems in their life from depression to chronic pain. Of course, I am not saying all forms of depression and sickness come from demons, just that a person can go through unnecessary suffering because of their involvement with these things.

Jubilees is a book that was found alongside the oldest copy of the book of Genesis we have available to us in the cave of Qumran. It tells similar information as Genesis but in a less condensed format. This book also tells us of the demon offspring of the giants tormenting people and being sent to the abyss. The following is from Jubilees Chapter 10:

X. 1 And in the third week of this jubilee the unclean demons began to
lead astray †the children of the sons of Noah; and to make to err and
destroy them.

2. And the sons of Noah came to Noah their father, and they told him
   concerning the demons which were, leading astray and blinding and
   slaying his sons’ sons.
3. And he prayed before the Lord his God, and said:
   God of the spirits of all flesh, who hast shown mercy unto me,
   And hast saved me and my sons from the waters of the flood,
   And hast not caused me to perish as Thou didst the sons of perdition;
   For Thy grace hath been great towards me,
   And great hath been Thy mercy to my soul;
   Let Thy grace be lift up upon my sons,
   And let not wicked spirits rule over them
   Lest they should destroy them from the earth.
4. But do Thou bless me and my sons, that we may increase and multiply
   and replenish the earth.
5. And Thou knowest how Thy Watchers, the fathers of these spirits,
   acted in my day: and as for these spirits which are living, imprison them
   and hold them fast in the place of condemnation, and let them not bring
   destruction on the sons of thy servant, my God; for these are malignant,
   and created in order to destroy.
6. And let them not rule over the spirits of the living; for Thou alone
   canst exercise dominion over them. And let them not have power over
   the sons of the righteous from henceforth and for evermore.”
7. And the Lord our God bade us to bind all.
8. And the chief of the spirits, Mastêmâ, came and said: “Lord, Creator,
   let some of them remain before me, and let them hearken to my voice,
   and do all that I shall say unto them; for if some of them are not left to
   me, I shall not be able to execute the power of my will on the sons of
   men; for these are for corruption and leading astray before my judgment,
   for great is the wickedness of the sons of men.”
9. And He said: “Let the tenth part of them remain before him, and let
   nine parts descend into the place of condemnation.”
10. And one of us He commanded that we should teach Noah all their
    medicines; for He knew that they would not walk in uprightness, nor
    strive in righteousness.
11. And we did according to all His words: all the malignant evil ones we
    bound in the place of condemnation, and a tenth part of them we left
    that they might be subject before Satan on the earth.
12. And we explained to Noah all the medicines of their diseases,
    together with their seductions, how he might heal them with herbs of the
    earth.
13. And Noah wrote down all things in a book as we instructed him
    concerning every kind of medicine. Thus the evil spirits were precluded
    from (hurting) the sons of Noah.
14. And he gave all that he had written to Shem, his eldest son; for he
    loved him exceedingly above all his sons.
    

This writing found in the Dead Sea Scrolls has some of the same information we see in the pseudo-Clement writings and alluded to in scripture. People in the first century were well aware of the abyss and why the demons did not want to be sent there by Yeshua.

Simply put, keep the commandments of the Creator with the aid of the Spirit given to us through Yeshua, and there will be no need to worry about demonic oppression. As soon as one starts doing actions contrary to God’s instructions, such as playing around with witchcraft rituals of ancient times, sexual immorality and biblically defined idolatry, the door is open and the protection is lost from these entities.

Featured photo by Stefano Pollio on Unsplash.

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 For I say to you that unless your righteousness greatly surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 5:20 (LEB)

One of the errors Christians believe is that the Pharisees were constantly being upbraided by Jesus for being a stickler on the keeping of the law of Moses. As if Jesus was continually saying “relax guys, we don’t need to keep the law of God that strictly”. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

Matthew 5:17–20 (LEB)

¹⁷ “Do not think that I have come to destroy the law or the prophets. I have not come to destroy them but to fulfill them. ¹⁸ For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one tiny letter or one stroke of a letter will pass away from the law until all takes place. ¹⁹ Therefore whoever abolishes one of the least of these commandments and teaches people to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever keeps them and teaches them, this person will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. ²⁰ For I say to you that unless your righteousness greatly surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter into the kingdom of heaven.

The Christian narrative says, “see the Pharisees kept the law and it didn’t save them”, or “Jesus continually broke the law”. Unfortunately, people are left with this impression for several reasons. Poor teaching, lack of personal study and curiosity of the things of God, laziness and perhaps the hopes that Jesus did break the law and people like me, who are saying to uphold the commandments, are completely wrong. Keeping the law will not save anyone; however, the issue here is that the religious leadership was doing a terrible job of keeping God’s law, or the instructions for living a pleasing life to God He gave the world through Israel.

Mark 7:1–8 (LEB)

7 And the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered to him. ² And they saw that some of his disciples were eating their bread with unclean—that is, unwashed—hands. ³ (For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands ritually, thus holding fast to the traditions of the elders. ⁴ And when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other traditions which they have received and hold fast to—for example, the washing of cups and pitchers and bronze kettles and dining couches.) ⁵ And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with unclean hands?” ⁶ So he said to them, “Isaiah prophesied correctly about you hypocrites, as it is written,

‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far, far away from me. ⁷ And they worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ⁸ Abandoning the commandment of God, you hold fast to the tradition of men.”

It is unlikely one will ever hear this explained from a church pulpit, or at least I never have. Jesus, Yeshua in Hebrew, was being ridiculed for not ritually washing his hands before eating. The Pharisees also had rules about washing pots, cups and kettles. There is nothing in the commandments of God that require any of these things. These were Jewish traditions. There are volumes of rules the Pharisees adhered to that did not come from God. This is very much like the thousands of church denominations today with all of their various traditions.

Matthew 12:9–14 (LEB)

⁹ And going on from there he came into their synagogue. ¹⁰ And behold, there was a man who had a withered hand, and they asked him, saying, “Is it permitted to heal on the Sabbath?” in order that they could accuse him. ¹¹ But he said to them, “What man will there be among you who will have one sheep and if this one fell into a pit on the Sabbath, will not take hold of it and lift it out? ¹² Then to what degree is a man worth more than a sheep? So then, it is permitted to do good on the Sabbath.”

¹³ Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand,” and he stretched it out, and it was restored as healthy as the other one. ¹⁴ But the Pharisees went out and plotted against him in order that they could destroy him.

Yeshua was trying to teach the proper way to keep the Sabbath. Healing was permitted just as saving a life, child birth and circumcision, if the required eighth day after child birth happened to fall on a Sabbath. By the time of the first century, there were many additional laws attached to the original commandments God gave through Moses.

Nehemiah 13:16–19 (LEB)

¹⁶ Tyrian men who lived in Jerusalem brought fish and every kind of merchandise and sold it on the Sabbath to the descendants of Judah and in Jerusalem. ¹⁷ So I quarreled with the nobles of Judah and said to them, “What is this evil thing that you are doing, profaning the day of the Sabbath? ¹⁸ Did not your ancestors do this also, and our God brought on us all of this disaster and on this city too? Now you are adding fierce wrath on Israel by profaning the Sabbath!”

¹⁹ So when it became dark at the gates of Jerusalem before the Sabbath, I commanded that the doors be shut and said that they should not be opened until after the Sabbath. And I appointed some of my young men over the gates to prevent any goods being brought in on the day of the Sabbath.

After the exiles returned to the land, Nehemiah was very disturbed to see commerce on the Sabbath day. He knew this was one of the reasons they were exiled in the first place. He ordered the gates shut at dark before the Sabbath and they couldn’t be opened until after the Sabbath. If “at dark” was before the Sabbath, doesn’t that imply the Sabbath actually starts at dawn? In other words, is this where we get the tradition of starting the Sabbath on the night before? The only Sabbath that starts the day before in the Torah is Yom Kippur and it specifically says so.

Leviticus 23:32 (LEB)

³² It is a Sabbath of complete rest for you, and you shall deny yourselves on the ninth day of the month in the evening—from evening to evening you must observe your extraordinary Sabbath.”

It is a special Sabbath that starts the evening of the ninth day. The actual day is the tenth day of the month. This year it started the evening of October 4th by some calendars. Why would there be a need to tell people to start this day the evening of the day before if the day started at sundown? The answer is there wouldn’t be.

Many traditions had crept in causing heavy burdens on the people. The actual commands of God are not that hard. How hard is it to have one day a week to rest from one’s work? It should be a blessing. Surely one day a week we can cease from commerce and enjoy God’s creation!

Matthew 11:28–30 (LEB)

²⁸ Come to me, all of you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke on you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy to carry and my burden is light.”

Yahuah told us through Moses not to change His commands by adding or taking away anything. Deuteronomy 12:32 (LEB), “All of the things that I am commanding you, you must diligently observe; you shall not add to it, and you shall not take away from it.” How can anyone then heap on rules and regulations that were never given by God, or negate instructions God told us to do? The answer is they cannot. This is what Yeshua tried to get across to them.

Mark 7:8–13 (LEB)

⁸ Abandoning the commandment of God, you hold fast to the tradition of men.” ⁹ And he said to them, “You splendidly ignore the commandment of God so that you can keep your tradition. ¹⁰ For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘The one who speaks evil of father or mother must certainly die.’ ¹¹ But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or to his mother, “Whatever benefit you would have received from me is corban” (that is, a gift to God), ¹² you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or his mother, ¹³ thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down, and you do many similar things such as this.”

“Making void the word of God by traditions”: this sounds similar to changing the Sabbath from the seventh day to the day of the sun, Sunday. We get another clue as to how our righteousness can exceed the Pharisees from Yeshua in Matthew chapter twenty-three.

Matthew 23:1–6 (LEB)

23 Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to his disciples, ² saying, “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on the seat of Moses. ³ Therefore do and observe everything that they tell you, but do not do as they do, for they tell others to do something and do not do it themselves. ⁴ And they tie up heavy burdens and put them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing with their finger to move them. ⁵ And they do all their deeds in order to be seen by people, for they make their phylacteries broad and make their tassels long. ⁶ And they love the place of honor at banquets and the best seats in the synagogues.

When the Pharisees sit on the seat of Moses they read the scriptures, but their lives do not reflect it. How can people not see that Yeshua was saying to do everything Moses said to do? The Pharisees did not do what Moses said even though they sat in his authority. Yeshua never negated the instructions of God, he only clarified how we should keep them. Many Christians claim it is wrong to do what God said in his instructions, but there is only evidence of Yeshua upholding these instructions and clarifying the error of man’s traditions being taught as commands of God. Our righteousness will exceed that of the Pharisees if we just do what He said! Our own righteousness comes from rules we make up and keep where God’s righteousness are the instructions He gave us to keep.

One example of this that comes to mind is the contentious subject of alcohol. Many Christian denominations allow alcohol consumption, while many forbid it. Consuming alcohol does not make a person a drunkard, but all drunkards consume alcohol. This mentality would forbid all sexual relations for fear of someone being sexually immoral. That would quickly bring the end of the human race. The Torah permits alcohol consumption, so forbidding it is adding to the law of God.

Deuteronomy 14:22–26 (LEB)

²² “Certainly you must give a tithe of all the yield of your seed, which comes forth from your field year after year. ²³ And you shall eat before Yahweh your God in the place that he will choose to make to dwell his name there the tithe of your grain, your wine and your olive oil and the firstling of your herd and your flock, so that you may learn to revere Yahweh your God always. ²⁴ But if the distance is too great for you, so that you are not able to transport it, because the place that Yahweh your God will choose to set his name there, it is too far from you, when Yahweh your God will bless you, ²⁵ then in that case you may exchange for money, and you shall take the money to your hand and go to the place that Yahweh your God will choose. ²⁶ You may spend the money for anything that you desire, for oxen or for sheep or for wine or for strong drink or for anything that you desire, and you shall eat it there before Yahweh your God, and you shall rejoice, you and your household.

That is a different way than a tithe is viewed today. The point is that just as the Pharisees made up rules, churches today make up rules and shame everyone into following their rules and preferences citing them as commandments from God. The only commandments that matter are from the words He gave us. Anything else is simply someone imposing their preferences on us.

Psalm 119:142–144 (LEB)

¹⁴² Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and your law is truth. ¹⁴³ Trouble and anguish have found me; your commands delight me. ¹⁴⁴ The righteousness of your testimonies is forever; give me understanding that I may live.

Thankfully, Yeshua promised He would send the Spirit to help us understand and keep God’s commandments. We are able to be in His righteousness by the help of the Spirit of grace.

Hebrews 13:20–21 (LEB)

²⁰ Now may the God of peace, who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, ²¹ equip you with every good thing to do his will, carrying out in us what is pleasing before him through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever. Amen.

The writer of Hebrews gives us a lot of understanding in the conclusion of his letter. ²⁰ Now may the God of peace [the Father, Yahuah], who brought up from the dead our Lord Jesus[ the son, Yeshua], the great shepherd of the sheep[Messiah’s identity], by the blood of the eternal covenant [covenant between God and His people], ²¹ equip you with every good thing to do his will[His commandments and instructions], carrying out in us what is pleasing before him[His commandments and instructions] through Jesus Christ[by way of His Spirit].

This eternal covenant spoken about did not come out of thin air to the writer of Hebrews. Isaiah also spoke about the eternal covenant. This is the covenant Yeshua ratified with his blood instead of the blood of bulls. It is a refreshing of the covenant of Israel that they broke. Through Yeshua, everyone can now be part of it; however, there are terms.

Isaiah 24:4–6 (LEB)

⁴ The earth dries up, it withers; the world languishes, it withers. The elevated of the people of the earth languish, ⁵ and the earth is defiled beneath its inhabitants. For they have transgressed laws; they have passed by statutes; they have broken the everlasting covenant. ⁶ Therefore a curse devours the earth, and the inhabitants in it suffer for their guilt. Therefore the inhabitants of the earth burn, and few men are left.

1 John 5:18–21 (LEB)

¹⁸ We know that everyone who is fathered by God does not sin, but the one fathered by God, he protects him, and the evil one does not touch him. ¹⁹ We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. ²⁰ And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, in order that we may know the one who is true, and we are in the one who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. This one is the true God and eternal life. ²¹ Little children, guard yourselves from idols.

Everything Yeshua does points to us being able to be one with the Father just as he is. Being one with the Father has to be in line with His instructions, otherwise we will have to throw three quarters or more of the Bible away. It is by His spirit we can live by His word.

John 14:23–26 (LEB)

²³ Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves me he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and will take up residence with him. ²⁴ The one who does not love me does not keep my words, and the word that you hear is not mine, but the Father’s who sent me. ²⁵ These things I have spoken to you while residing with you. ²⁶ But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name—that one will teach you all things, and will remind you of everything that I said to you.

I don’t know how it could be any clearer. The Pharisees heaped rules and burdens on people God never did, then did not do what God actually said to do. This is why our righteousness can exceed theirs. It is the righteousness of God we have when we do what God said to do by His Spirit through Yeshua. He gave us His instructions through Moses, the prophets and His son; then He gave us His Spirit by His son to reside in us. All we need to do is what He said. Self righteousness is when we make up our own rules. Do not call people who try to uphold the laws of God Pharisees. It is the people that place their traditions and preferences in place of the laws of God and tell us to do them instead of the commands of God that are acting in the same manner as the Pharisees. Repent and believe the gospel!

Featured photo by shraga kopstein on Unsplash.

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Therefore is the law opposed to the promises of God? May it never be! For if a law had been given that was able to give life, certainly righteousness would have been from the law. But the scripture imprisoned all under sin, in order that the promise could be given by faith in Jesus Christ to those who believe.

Galatians 3:21–22 (LEB)

We all have a unique belief system developed from books we have read, sermons we have heard, education and our experiences. It all plays a role in our personal theology. Even a person that has never darkened a door of a church has a theology. It may be that there is no God and everyone goes back to dust for eternity. How do we know if our theology is true? What if we stripped away everything we have heard about what is in the Bible, church tradition and our own understandings? If a person never was told what to think about God or the Bible, what would the scriptures speak on their own?

Genesis 1:1 (LEB)

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth—

If one was unfamiliar with scripture, the first question might be “Who or what is this ‘God’ that the author is claiming created everything?” The online etymological dictionary has this to say about the origins of the word “God”:

god (n.)

also God; Old English god “supreme being, deity; the Christian God; image of a god; godlike person,” from Proto-Germanic *guthan (source also of Old Saxon, Old Frisian, Dutch god, Old High German got, German Gott, Old Norse guð, Gothic guþ), which is of uncertain origin; perhaps from PIE *ghut- “that which is invoked” (source also of Old Church Slavonic zovo “to call,” Sanskrit huta- “invoked,” an epithet of Indra), from root *gheu(e)- “to call, invoke.” The notion could be “divine entity summoned to a sacrifice.”

As a person reads on in the Bible “God” defines himself, and as it turns out His name is not “God”; that is a title given to many deities. The Creator of heaven and Earth is unique.

Exodus 3:11–16 (LEB)

¹¹ But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the Israelites out from Egypt?” ¹² And he said, “Because I am with you, and this will be the sign for you that I myself have sent you: When you bring the people out from Egypt, you will serve God on this mountain.” ¹³ But Moses said to God, “Look, if I go to the Israelites and I say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they say to me, ‘What is his name?’ then what shall I say to them?” ¹⁴ And God said to Moses, “I am that I am.” And he said, “So you must say to the Israelites, ‘I am sent me to you.’ ”

¹⁵ And God said again to Moses, “So you must say to the Israelites, ‘Yahweh, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is my name forever, and this is my remembrance from generation to generation.’ ¹⁶ Go and gather the elders of Israel and say to them, ‘Yahweh, the God of your ancestors, appeared to me, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, “I have carefully attended to you and what has been done to you in Egypt.”

The Israelites were a family that the Creator pulled out of the Earth’s population to be set apart and unique from the other tribes and nations of the world. He gave their fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob special promises for their future generations. One might say the Israelites are “the family of God”. However, this “God” tells us His name is Yahweh. Except “Yahweh” really is not His name because that is an English representation of four Hebrew letters: yod-hay-vav-hay; יהוה. Josephus, a first century historian, tells us the name is pronounced as four vowel sounds. The meaning of those four letters is “he will cause it to exist, or make it happen”. That is a little different than, “I am that I am”, ah h’yah asher ah h’yah: אהיה אשׁר אהיה. Yahweh is third person where h’yah is first person. If we change what He identifies Himself to simply “God”, then it changes everything and may not even be the same deity.

Moses was a prophet and leader, Yah, short for Yahweh or Yahuah, appointed to lead Israel out of Egypt. They found themselves as slaves there through a series of events. This is where the Creator pulls His people together and gives them the secrets to the universe. Fifteen hundred years later, one of the descendants of the Israelites, Stephen, confirms this idea.

Acts 7:37–39 (LEB)

³⁷ “This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers.’ ³⁸ This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him at Mount Sinai, and who with our fathers received living oracles to give to us, ³⁹ to whom our fathers were not willing to become obedient, but rejected him and turned back in their hearts to Egypt

Yah’s family had an advantage over the rest of the people of the world. They knew how to live in such a way to be in harmony with nature, the Creator and each other. From a mountain in modern day Saudi Arabia, Yah shared the most important instructions to the family of Israel. The ten words, which are called commandments by theologians now.

Exodus 20:1–21 (LEB)

20 And God spoke all these words, saying, ² “I am Yahweh, your God, who brought you out from the land of Egypt, from the house of slaves. ³ “There shall be for you no other gods before me. ⁴ “You shall not make for yourself a divine image with any form that is in the heavens above or that is in the earth below or that is in the water below the earth. ⁵ You will not bow down to them, and you will not serve them, because I am Yahweh your God, a jealous God, punishing the guilt of the parents on the children on the third and on the fourth generations of those hating me, ⁶ and showing loyal love to thousands of generations of those loving me and of those keeping my commandments. ⁷ “You shall not misuse the name of Yahweh your God, because Yahweh will not leave unpunished anyone who misuses his name. ⁸ “Remember the day of the Sabbath, to consecrate it. ⁹ Six days you will work, and you will do all your work. ¹⁰ But the seventh day is a Sabbath for Yahweh your God; you will not do any work—you or your son or your daughter, your male slave or your female slave, or your animal, or your alien who is in your gates—¹¹ because in six days Yahweh made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and on the seventh day he rested. Therefore Yahweh blessed the seventh day and consecrated it. ¹² “Honor your father and your mother, so that your days can be long on the land that Yahweh your God is giving you. ¹³ “You shall not murder. ¹⁴ “You shall not commit adultery. ¹⁵ “You shall not steal. ¹⁶ “You shall not testify against your neighbor with a false witness. ¹⁷ “You shall not covet the house of your neighbor; you will not covet the wife of your neighbor or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey or anything that is your neighbor’s.” ¹⁸ And all the people were seeing the thunder and the lightning and the sound of the ram’s horn and the mountain smoking, and the people saw, and they trembled, and they stood at a distance. ¹⁹ And they said to Moses, “You speak with us, and we will listen, but let not God speak with us, lest we die.” ²⁰ And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you so that his fear will be before you so that you do not sin.” ²¹ And the people stood at a distance, and Moses approached the very thick cloud where God was.

As we saw Stephen in the book of Acts speaking earlier, Acts 7:38-39 (LEB), “³⁸ This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him at Mount Sinai, and who with our fathers received living oracles to give to us, ³⁹ to whom our fathers were not willing to become obedient, but rejected him and turned back in their hearts to Egypt“. They heard these ten great sayings from the Creator Himself, yet still did not do them. Imagine the advantage they would have had if they had of listened. Yah was still faithful to this family and told them He would send someone to explain things that was not as scary as the All Mighty, Creator of the Universe.

Deuteronomy 18:15–19 (LEB)

¹⁵ “Yahweh your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your midst, from your countrymen, and to him you shall listen. ¹⁶ This is according to all that you asked from Yahweh your God at Horeb, on the day of the assembly, saying, ‘I do not want again to hear_⌋ the voice of Yahweh my God, and I do not want to see again this great fire, so that I may not die!’ ¹⁷ And Yahweh said to me, ‘They are right in what they have said. ¹⁸ I will raise up a prophet for them from among their countrymen like you, and I will place my words into his mouth, and he shall speak to them everything that I command him. ¹⁹ And then the man that will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I will hold accountable.

We see this “prophet” spoken about all through the Bible going forward. He is the anointed messenger, the redeemer of the family of Israel, and by extension the whole world. One of the promises Yah gave to Abraham was that through him the whole world would be blessed.

Genesis 18:17–19 (LEB)

¹⁷ Then Yahweh said, “Shall I conceal from Abraham what I am going to do? ¹⁸ Abraham will surely become a great and strong nation, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed on account of him. ¹⁹ For I have chosen him, that he will command his children and his household after him that they will keep the way of Yahweh, to do righteousness and justice, so that Yahweh may bring upon Abraham that which he said to him.”

The world will be blessed through Abraham because his descendant, the anointed one, will repair the damage caused by people continually not doing the instructions of the Creator.

Malachi 4:4–6 (LEB)

⁴ “Remember the instruction of my servant Moses, which I commanded him at Horeb to all Israel, the rules and regulations. ⁵ Look! I am going to send to you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and awesome day of Yahweh! ⁶ And he will bring back the hearts of the fathers to the sons, and the hearts of the sons to their fathers, so that I will not come and strike the land with a ban.”

The “prophet like Moses”, Anointed one, or Messiah, came approximately 1500 years after Moses brought the family out of Egypt.

Luke 2:8–14 (LEB)

⁸ And there were shepherds in the same region, living out of doors and keeping watch, guarding over their flock by night. ⁹ And an angel of the Lord stood near them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened. ¹⁰ And the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring good news to you of great joy which will be for all the people: ¹¹ that today a Savior, who is Christ the Lord, was born for you in the city of David. ¹² And this will be the sign for you: you will find the baby wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a manger.” ¹³ And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God and saying, ¹⁴ “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among people with whom he is pleased!”

This Messiah, or “Christ” will bring “on earth peace among people with whom he is pleased“. I recently saw someone on Twitter say that they do not have a Messiah, the Jews have a Messiah. In this person’s world, Jesus Christ stands on his own, separate from all we discussed in this blog post thus far. This person obviously does not know that Christ comes from the Greek, Christos, which means anointed one, the same as Messiah. As we are reading through the Bible we have come to the “big reveal”. The “prophet like Moses” has arrived. What does he do and say?

Luke 4:16 (LEB)

¹⁶ And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and according to his custom he entered into the synagogue on the day of the Sabbath and stood up to read.

The Complete Jewish Bible translates it this way:

Luke 4:16 (CJB)

¹⁶ Now when he went to Natzeret, where he had been brought up, on Shabbat he went to the synagogue as usual. He stood up to read

We see the Christ going to the synagogue on the Sabbath day as usual. This makes sense in light of one of the instructions of the Creator: Exodus 20:8 (CJB), “Remember the day, Shabbat, to set it apart for God.”

Jesus, Joshua in English and Yeshua in Hebrew, became a Jewish rabbi and taught his disciples the things of Yah, the Creator. They soon understood that they were not following just any rabbi.

Matthew 16:13–17 (LEB)

¹³ Now when Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he began asking his disciples, saying, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” ¹⁴ And they said, Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” ¹⁵ He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” ¹⁶ And Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” ¹⁷ And Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.

Let’s briefly analyze the word “Christ”

Χριστός G5986 (Christos), Christ; χρίω G5987 (chriō), spread, (in biblical Gk.) anoint; Μεσσίας G3549 (Messias), Messiah. Christ is derived via the Lat. Christus from the Gk. Christos, which in the LXX and the NT is the Gk. equivalent of the Aram. mešîḥā’. This in turn corresponds to the Heb. māšîaḥ and denotes someone who has been ceremonially anointed for an office K. H. Rengstorf, “Χριστός,” ed. Lothar Coenen, Erich Beyreuther, and Hans Bietenhard, New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986), 334.

This Messiah that the Creator promised to send to His family echoed everything that was taught to them by Moses. By this time in history, the family had been through so much due to disobedience that the majority of the family had lost its identity and were scattered into the nations. There where only a few tribes of Israel represented during the time Yeshua walked the Earth. Even they had distorted the words of Yah.

John 12:44–50 (LEB)

⁴⁴ But Jesus cried out and said, “The one who believes in me does not believe in me, but in the one who sent me, ⁴⁵ and the one who sees me sees the one who sent me. ⁴⁶ I have come as a light into the world, in order that everyone who believes in me will not remain in the darkness. ⁴⁷ And if anyone hears my words and does not observe them, I will not judge him. For I have not come to judge the world, but to save the world. ⁴⁸ The one who rejects me and does not accept my words has one who judges him; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day. ⁴⁹ For I have not spoken from myself, but the Father himself who sent me has commanded me what I should say and what I should speak. ⁵⁰ And I know that his commandment is eternal life. So the things that I say, just as the Father said to me, thus I say.”

These few verses sum up everything we need to know about what the Messiah taught.

1. The one who believes in me does not believe in me, but in the one who sent me
2. the one who sees me sees the one who sent me
3. I have not come to judge the world, but to save the world.
4. The one who rejects me and does not accept my words has one who judges him; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day.
5. For I have not spoken from myself, but the Father himself who sent me has commanded me what I should say and what I should speak.
6. I know that his commandment is eternal life
7. So the things that I say, just as the Father said to me, thus I say.

It doesn’t look like the Messiah has any different message than the family received through Moses. Yeshua says “his commandment is eternal life” and he didn’t come to judge because that will be done by his word on the last day. Messiah’s current mission was to save the world, then judge at a later date.

Acts 1:6–11 (LEB)

⁶ So when they had come together, they began asking him, saying, “Lord, is it at this time you are restoring the kingdom to Israel?” ⁷ But he said to them, “It is not for you to know the times or seasons that the Father has set by his own authority. ⁸ But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the farthest part of the earth.” ⁹ And after he had said these things, while they were watching, he was taken up, and a cloud received him from their sight. ¹⁰ And as they were staring into the sky while he was departing, behold, two men in white clothing stood by them ¹¹ who also said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand there looking into the sky? This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven like this will come back in the same way you saw him departing into heaven!”

How does all of this relate to the average person living in the twenty first century? Yeshua told us all how to have eternal life. Remember, “I know that his commandment is eternal life“?

John 3:16–21 (CJB)

¹⁶ “For God so loved the world that he gave his only and unique Son, so that everyone who trusts in him may have eternal life, instead of being utterly destroyed. ¹⁷ For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but rather so that through him, the world might be saved. ¹⁸ Those who trust in him are not judged; those who do not trust have been judged already, in that they have not trusted in the one who is God’s only and unique Son.

¹⁹ “Now this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, but people loved the darkness rather than the light. Why? Because their actions were wicked. ²⁰ For everyone who does evil things hates the light and avoids it, so that his actions won’t be exposed. ²¹ But everyone who does what is true comes to the light, so that all may see that his actions are accomplished through God.”

One of the huge misconceptions that Christians have is that Yeshua simply replaced the sacrificial system with his one sacrifice. This is only partly true. Paul gets really excited talking about the inadequacy of the law and people completely miss his excitement. The sacrificial offering system only reconciled unintentional sin! There were no offerings for sacrifice to get forgiveness for intentional, high handed sin. Once someone broke the “Ten Commandments” they were cut off forever according to the law. Yeshua’s sacrifice took care of this problem. Anyone that knew the law understood this. The gospel is cheapened today through ignorance where people think they can keep deliberately sinning and simply ask for forgiveness continually. Some simply ignore the commandments thinking they no longer apply. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Sin is still defined as breaking the commandments of God. Thankfully, there is forgiveness for every sin through Yeshua. However, heed the warning given in Hebrews against blasphemy of the Spirit of grace, that is the holy Spirit:

Hebrews 10:26–29 (LEB)

²⁶ For if we keep on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, ²⁷ but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire that is about to consume the adversaries. ²⁸ Anyone who rejected the law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. ²⁹ How much worse punishment do you think the person will be considered worthy of who treats with disdain the Son of God and who considers ordinary the blood of the covenant by which he was made holy and who insults the Spirit of grace?

We are told not to do what is evil, but to do what is true. What is true then? Remember, “I know that his commandment is eternal life“. It is not a mystery. Yeshua told us the Creator’s words are truth. Once one knows the truth and does the truth, they are trusting in Yeshua because that is what he said to do.

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^{Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world! The one who follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”}

John 8:12 (LEB)

Remember the old chorus we used to sing in church, To Be Like Jesus? “All I ask is to be like him” is the last line, and it is one of those songs that would have been sung five or six times in a row. What does it mean when we say we want to be more like Jesus?

First, we should get his name correct. It is Yeshua in Hebrew, or Joshua, if properly translated from Hebrew to English. The name “Jesus” has been around approximately 400 years. It used to be Iesus in old English. Somebody thought it needed a “J” once the “J” was added to the English language. Iesous was the Greek name for Joshua.

Luke 4:14 1611 KJV

¶ And Iesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee, and there went out a fame of him through all the region round about.

Let’s look at the life of Jesus to see what we need to do to fulfill the words of the song and be “more like him”. First, we see he had a habit of going to the synagogue on the seventh day Sabbath, and he participated in the service by reading scripture.

Luke 4:16–17 (LEB)

¹⁶ And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and according to his custom he entered into the synagogue on the day of the Sabbath and stood up to read. ¹⁷ And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him, and unrolling the scroll he found the place where it was written

Jesus, or Yeshua, was very angry at people selling doves in the temple. This was several days before the Feast of Unleavened Bread and Passover and these doves were being sold for people to give as offerings at the temple. The money changers were taking advantage of the people because these offerings were needed.

Leviticus 1:14–15 (LEB)

¹⁴ “ ‘But if his offering for Yahweh is a burnt offering from the birds, then he must present his offering from the turtledoves or from the young doves. ¹⁵ The priest will present it at the altar and must wring off its head and turn it into smoke on the altar, and its blood will be drained out on the wall of the altar.

Yeshua gave them a strong rebuke. If we want to be more like Yeshua we need to rebuke leadership that takes advantage of the people in the name of providing a service for God.

Matthew 21:12–13 (CJB)

¹² Yeshua entered the Temple grounds and drove out those who were doing business there, both the merchants and their customers. He upset the desks of the money-changers and knocked over the benches of those who were selling pigeons. ¹³ He said to them, “It has been written, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer.’ But you are making it into a den of robbers!”

Peter warns that this will continue to happen to the people of God, and it clearly is still happening today.

2 Peter 2:1–3 (LEB)

2 But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, thus bringing on themselves swift destruction. ² And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. ³ And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.

Yeshua also was very defensive when the religious leaders of his day mishandled the word of God. These leaders were placing their traditions higher than the commandments of God. To be like Yeshua, we must guard the commandments of God passionately, and reject commandments invented by men that are being passed off as doctrine.

Mark 7:5–9 (LEB)

⁵ And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with unclean hands?” ⁶ So he said to them, “Isaiah prophesied correctly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far, far away from me. ⁷ And they worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ⁸ Abandoning the commandment of God, you hold fast to the tradition of men.” ⁹ And he said to them, “You splendidly ignore the commandment of God so that you can keep your tradition.

Another trait that we see that Yeshua has is that he continually quotes verses from the Old Testament. He seems to know scripture very well and uses it while making a point. He used scripture to overcome the adversary when tempted.

Matthew 4:1–11 (LEB)

4 Then Jesus was led up into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil, ² and after he had fasted forty days and forty nights, then he was hungry. ³ And the tempter approached and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, order that these stones become bread.” ⁴ But he answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man will not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes out of the mouth of God.’ ”

Deuteronomy 8:2–3 (LEB) ² And you shall remember all of the way that Yahweh your God led you during these forty years in the desert in order to humble you and to test you to know what is in your heart, whether you would diligently keep his commandments or not. ³ And he humbled you and let you go hungry, and then he fed you with that which you did not know nor did your ancestors know, in order to make you know that not by bread alone but by all that goes out of the mouth of Yahweh humankind shall live.

⁵ Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the highest point of the temple ⁶ and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down! For it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and ‘On their hands they will lift you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’ ”  Jesus said to him, “On the other hand it is written, ‘You are not to put the Lord your God to the test.’ ”

Deuteronomy 6:16–17 (LEB) ¹⁶ You shall not put Yahweh your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah. ¹⁷ You shall diligently keep the commandments of Yahweh your God and his legal provisions and his rules that he has commanded you.

⁸ Again the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, ⁹ and he said to him, “I will give to you all these things, if you will fall down and worship me.” ¹⁰ Then Jesus said to him, “Go away, Satan, for it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and serve only him.’ ” ¹¹ Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and began ministering to him.

Deuteronomy 6:13–15 (LEB) ¹³ “You shall fear Yahweh your God, and you shall serve him, and by his name you shall swear. ¹⁴ You shall not go after other gods from the gods of the peoples who are all around you, ¹⁵ for Yahweh your God is a jealous god in your midst, so that the anger of Yahweh your God would be kindled, and he would destroy you from the face of the earth.

Even the devil can quote scripture. “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down! For it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and ‘On their hands they will lift you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’ ”. This is why we need to study all scripture, so we know when someone is trying to lead us astray by quoting scripture verses that sound legitimate, but in light of all scripture, are being twisted.

Yeshua also celebrated the biblical feast days of God. Many people label these feast as Jewish, but that is simply because the Jews are the only ones still keeping them. They were meant for all of God’s people, and if we want to be “more like Jesus” we would need this to be on our list.

We see Yeshua coming down to Jerusalem for the Feast of Sukkot, also called Tabernacles and Booths.

John 7:2–10 (CJB)

² But the festival of Sukkot in Y’hudah was near; ³ so his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go into Y’hudah, so that your talmidim can see the miracles you do; ⁴ for no one who wants to become known acts in secret. If you’re doing these things, show yourself to the world!” ⁵ (His brothers spoke this way because they had not put their trust in him.) ⁶ Yeshua said to them, “My time has not yet come; but for you, any time is right. ⁷ The world can’t hate you, but it does hate me, because I keep telling it how wicked its ways are. ⁸ You, go on up to the festival; as for me, I am not going up to this festival now, because the right time for me has not yet come.” ⁹ Having said this, he stayed on in the Galil. ¹⁰ But after his brothers had gone up to the festival, he too went up, not publicly but in secret.

The Complete Jewish Bible does a better job of translating what most versions render “the feast of the Jews”. With those versions it is as if John, the author, and Yeshua were not Jewish. Here is how it is translated in other translations of the Bible:

John 7:2–10 (LEB)

² Now the feast of the Jews—the feast of Tabernacles—was near. ³ So his brothers said to him, “Depart from here and go to Judea, so that your disciples also can see your works that you are doing. ⁴ For no one does anything in secret and yet he himself desires to be publicly recognized. If you are doing these things, reveal yourself to the world!” ⁵ (For not even his brothers believed in him.) ⁶ So Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always ready. ⁷ The world cannot hate you, but it hates me, because I am testifying about it, that its deeds are evil. ⁸ You go up to the feast. I am not going up to this feast, because my time is not yet completed. ⁹ And when he had said these things, he remained in Galilee. ¹⁰ But when his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he also went up, not openly, but (as it were) in secret.

On the last day of the Feast, Yeshua was still there in Jerusalem celebrating. He was paralleling this day with himself. Instead of praying for rain, He was telling them to come to him for living water. Learning the intricacies of the feasts will help one understand much of the events in the gospels.

John 7:37–39 (LEB)

³⁷ Now on the last day of the feast—the great day—Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me, and let him drink, ³⁸ the one who believes in me. Just as the scripture said, ‘Out of his belly will flow rivers of living water.’ ” ³⁹ (Now he said this concerning the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were about to receive. For the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified.)

The next day, we find Yeshua back at the temple for Shemini Atzeret. Where he declares that he is the light of the world.

John 8:1–2 (LEB)

8 But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. ² Now early in the morning he came again to the temple courts. And all the people were coming, and he sat down and began to teach them.

John 8:12 (LEB)

¹² Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world! The one who follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Yeshua also came to Jerusalem to celebrate Hanukkah. This was not a biblical commanded feast, but a national celebration of the dedication of the temple after the Greeks had defiled it in 168 BCE. The Jewish people were becoming Hellenized by the Greeks and were losing their identity. The Greek leader, Antiochus Epiphanes, made laws forbidding keeping God’s commandments, burned torah scrolls and he actually defiled the temple of God by sacrificing a pig on the alter at the time of the winter solstice celebration. A priest of God in a small community outside Jerusalem, Mattathias, would not sacrifice to idols and started a revolt by killing the Greek commander ordering the sacrifice in his community. His son, Judah, lead the revolt, eventually regaining control of the temple. The temple had to be cleansed and dedicated back to Yahweh after the defilement of the pig sacrifice. Hanukkah is simply the celebration of the dedication of the temple. Without Hanukkah there would be no temple, no linage of David and no Messiah.

It is no coincidence that it is celebrated in close proximity to Christmas time. This celebration time of the winter solstice was borrowed from the people who desecrated the temple with the pig sacrifice to Zeus (Ba’al) , and converted falsely to the birthday of Jesus. It went from the birthday of the sun, or son of Ba’al, to supposedly the birthday of the son of Yahweh.

John 10:22–24 (CJB)

²² Then came Hanukkah in Yerushalayim. It was winter, ²³ and Yeshua was walking around inside the Temple area, in Shlomo’s Colonnade. ²⁴ So the Judeans surrounded him and said to him, “How much longer are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us publicly!”

Yeshua also kept the feast of Passover and Unleavened Bread.

John 2:23–25 (LEB)

²³ Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in his name because they saw his signs which he was doing. ²⁴ But Jesus himself did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people, ²⁵ and because he did not need anyone to testify about man, for he himself knew what was in man.

Yeshua resurrected from the dead. This is our hope, for if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Paul says we are most pitiable.

Mark 16:1–7 (LEB)

16 And when the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome purchased fragrant spices so that they could go and anoint him. ² And very early in the morning on the first day of the week they came to the tomb after the sun had risen. ³ And they were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?” ⁴ And when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away (for it was very large). ⁵ And as they were going into the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed. ⁶ But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene who was crucified. He has been raised, he is not here! See the place where they laid him! ⁷ But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee. You will see him there, just as he told you.”

1 Corinthians 15:17–19 (LEB)

¹⁷ But if Christ has not been raised, your faith is empty; you are still in your sins. ¹⁸ And as a further result, those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. ¹⁹ If we have put our hope in Christ in this life only, we are of all people most pitiable.

The list goes on and on; however, one more thing we could do to be like Yeshua is be obedient to the Father. He only said what he heard his father say and only did what he saw his father doing. That should be easy for us because we have everything He said recorded in the Old Testament, so we can study the ways of the Creator and do what He said to do.

John 12:49–50 (LEB)

⁴⁹ For I have not spoken from myself, but the Father himself who sent me has commanded me what I should say and what I should speak. ⁵⁰ And I know that his commandment is eternal life. So the things that I say, just as the Father said to me, thus I say.”

Something we do not see Yeshua doing is taking part in the pagan celebrations, such as Saturnalia. This is the festival that would later be converted into the celebration of the birth of Christ by the Roman church, much like the Greeks celebrated when they desecrated the temple in 168 BCE. One would think this would be mentioned somewhere in scripture in a positive light if we were supposed to convert the holy days of the god Saturn (Ba’al), from ancient times, into the celebration of the birth of Yeshua. The irony is overwhelming once examined. Saturn, Zeus, Jupiter and Ba’al are essentially all the same entity with different myths from different cultures. These celebrations have nothing to do with Yeshua, the Messiah.

Ezekiel 22:26–28 (LEB)

²⁶ Its priests treat my law violently, and they profane my holy objects; they do not distinguish between a holy object and what is unholy, or between the clean and the unclean. They do not teach the difference, and they hide their eyes from my Sabbaths, and so I am profaned in the midst of them. ²⁷ Its officials are like wolves tearing prey in its midst, to pour out blood, to destroy people, to make dishonest gain. ²⁸ And for them its prophets plaster whitewash; they are seeing falseness and are practicing divination for them by lying, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh,’ and Yahweh has not spoken.

In conclusion, to “be more like Jesus” is to hold religious leaders accountable, keep and guard the commandments of God, celebrate the Biblical feasts, frequently quote the scriptures, and say and do the things the Father says and does.

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Therefore, what is the advantage of the Jew, or what is the use of circumcision? Much in every way. For first, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God.

Romans 3:1–2 (LEB)

Erasing history is not a new phenomenon, and there is a considerable amount of history erasing happening in real time today. Our building architecture is full of people’s names and statutes of supposedly good people who influenced our present time. All of a sudden, moderns realized that these people were living the same as everyone else around them, and even though they did some great things, their monuments must be torn down and names erased from history.

John 8:3–7 (LEB)

³ Now the scribes and the Pharisees brought to him a woman caught in adultery. And standing her in their midst, ⁴ they said to him, testing him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery! ⁵ Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” ⁶ (Now they were saying this to test him, so that they would have an occasion to bring charges against him.) But Jesus, bending down, began to write with his finger on the ground, taking no notice. ⁷ And when they persisted in asking him, straightening up he said to them, “The one of you without sin, let him throw the first stone at her!”

I am certainly not trying to cast stones here, but it is important to understand history, especially when it comes to our theology. My blog posts are centered around abandoning the traditions of men and returning to the things of God. Unfortunately, Christianity views the things of God as the things of the “Jews” because God used the Jews to deliver salvation to the world through Jesus Christ. We must remember that Jesus was a Jew, from the tribe of Judah, with the name Yeshua H’mashiach. Christ is simply a transliteration of a Greek word that means Messiah, or anointed one. If one hates the Jews and their ways, they hate the Messiah. Jesus did not come to Earth to create a new religion called Christianity. Yet we see early on that this was the mentality of early church fathers.

“For if we are still practicing Judaism, we admit that we have not received God’s favor…it is wrong to talk about Jesus Christ and live like Jews. For Christianity did not believe in Judaism, but Judaism in Christianity.” Ignatius Bishop of Antioch (98-117A.D.) Epistle to the Magnesians

Once the gentile believers took over the church, the wall that was torn down by Messiah slowly built back up. The reason Christianity does not observe the Creator’s feast days, Sabbaths and even commandments, has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with antisemitism. Justin Martyr is a second century “church father”, and this is what he records in his Dialogue with Trypho:

“We too, would observe your circumcision of the flesh, your Sabbath days, and in a word, all you festivals, if we were not aware of the reason why they were imposed upon you, namely, because of your sins and the hardness of heart.

 The custom of circumcising the flesh, handed down from Abraham, was given to you as a distinguishing mark, to set you off from other nations and from us Christians. The purpose of this was that you and only you might suffer the afflictions that are now justly yours; that only your land be desolated, and you cities ruined by fire, that the fruits of your land be eaten by strangers before your very eyes; that not one of you be permitted to enter your city of Jerusalem. Your circumcision of the flesh is the only mark by which you can certainly be distinguished from other men…as I stated before it was by reason of your sins and the sins of your fathers that, among other precepts, God imposed upon you the observance of the sabbath as a mark.” Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho (Between 138A.D. and 161 A.D.)

These words should make any Christian concerned. I have quoted Justin Martyr to make points in the past myself, but in light of these remarks, I would be hesitant to do so in the future. I read Dialogue with Trypho a number of years ago and glossed right over these statements. It is offensive to me now to think this man was using the Sabbath in such a derogatory manner. The Sabbath is not a mark of just Jews, but all the tribes and those grafted in through the Messiah. The Sabbath predated Israel and is ordained by God.

Origen was another church father responsible for much of the doctrine in Christianity today. This is what he has to say regarding the Jewish people:

“We may thus assert in utter confidence that the Jews will not return to their earlier situation, for they have committed the most abominable of crimes, in forming this conspiracy against the Savior of the human race…hence the city where Jesus suffered was necessarily destroyed, the Jewish nation was driven from its country, and another people was called by God to the blessed election.” Origen of Alexandria (185-254 A.D.)

This statement by Origen is pure replacement theology, and makes the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob a liar. A more modern version of replacement theology is dispensational theology. This is the system used by Baptists, Pentecostals and other evangelical denominations where Israel still gets some of its promises here on Earth, but the church gets all the “spiritual” blessings with Jesus in heaven. This is what God actually told us in scripture:

Hebrews 8:8–12 (LEB)

⁸ For in finding fault with them he says, “Behold, days are coming, says the Lord, when I will complete a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, ⁹ not like the covenant which I made with their fathers on the day I took hold of them by my hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, because they did not continue in my covenant and I disregarded them, says the Lord. ¹⁰ For this is the covenant that I will decree with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I am putting my laws in their minds and I will write them on their hearts, and I will be their God and they will be my people. ¹¹ And they will not teach each one his fellow citizen and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. ¹² For I will be merciful toward their wrongdoings, and I will not remember their sins any longer.”

The new covenant is with the House of Israel and the House of Judah. There is nothing about the church there, and it is not because the church got raptured before these verses apply. That is simply a trick of the devil on people who refuse to read for themselves, truly seek God, or unknowingly rely on these men who hated Jews so much that they created a different religion and made a “Jesus” their God.

John Chrysostom (344-407 A.D.), one of the of church fathers, known as “The Golden Mouthed”, a missionary preacher famous for his sermons and homilies, has this to say about the Jews:

“The synagogue is worse than a brothel…it is the den of scoundrels and the repair of wild beasts…the temple of demons devoted to idolatrous cults…the refuge of brigands and dabauchees, and the cavern of devils. It is a criminal assembly of Jews…a place of meeting for the assassins of Christ… a house worse than a drinking shop…a den of thieves, a house of ill fame, a dwelling of iniquity, the refuge of devils, a gulf and a abyss of perdition.”…”I would say the same things about their souls… As for me, I hate the synagogue…I hate the Jews for the same reason.” The Roots of Christian Anti-Semitism by Malcolm Hay

St. Augustine (c. 354-430 A.D.), responsible for much of the church doctrine, is someone whose material I have studied quite a bit. Even at that time I noticed his writing would often burst out with obvious hatred for the Jewish people. This example is from his book called Confessions, 12.14:

“How hateful to me are the enemies of your Scripture! How I wish that you would slay them (the Jews) with your two-edged sword, so that there should be none to oppose your word! Gladly would I have them die to themselves and live to you!“

There are many more examples of the hatred of the Jews among early church leaders and so-called fathers. I am highlighting this to show how Christianity moved away from the teachings of Yeshua, a Jewish Rabbi, and his Apostles and could never go back. This is why someone like me is given the silent treatment when trying to tell my Christian friends and family to examine their belief system and compare it to what the Bible says. It is easier to ignore and silence a person then it is to defend things about the faith that really are not defensible. The adversary, which is called “satan” in the Hebrew language, has deluded people into thinking the things of God are “Jewish” and not to be even considered by a Christian.

Martin Luther played a large role in the protestant reformation. This is where many of the splinters of denominations come from today. It was simply people arguing about doctrine and creating their own “way”. One thing they can all agree on is not to have anything to do with the way of “those detestable Jews”.

Martin Luther (1543); On The Jews and Their Lies:

What then shall we Christians do with this damned, rejected race of Jews? Since they live among us and we know about their lying and blasphemy and cursing, we can not tolerate them if we do not wish to share in their lies, curses, and blasphemy. In this way we cannot quench the inextinguishable fire of divine rage nor convert the Jews. We must prayerfully and reverentially practice a merciful severity. Perhaps we may save a few from the fire and flames [of hell]. We must not seek vengeance. They are surely being punished a thousand times more than we might wish them. Let me give you my honest advice.

First, their synagogues should be set on fire, and whatever does not burn up should be covered or spread over with dirt so that no one may ever be able to see a cinder or stone of it. And this ought to be done for the honor of God and of Christianity in order that God may see that we are Christians, and that we have not wittingly tolerated or approved of such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of His Son and His Christians.

Secondly, their homes should likewise be broken down and destroyed. For they perpetrate the same things there that they do in their synagogues. For this reason they ought to be put under one roof or in a stable, like gypsies, in order that they may realize that they are not masters in our land, as they boast, but miserable captives, as they complain of incessantly before God with bitter wailing.

Thirdly, they should be deprived of their prayer-books and Talmuds in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught.

Fourthly, their rabbis must be forbidden under threat of death to teach any more…

Fifthly, passport and traveling privileges should be absolutely forbidden to the Jews. For they have no business in the rural districts since they are not nobles, nor officials, nor merchants, nor the like. Let them stay at home…If you princes and nobles do not close the road legally to such exploiters, then some troop ought to ride against them, for they will learn from this pamphlet what the Jews are and how to handle them and that they ought not to be protected. You ought not, you cannot protect them, unless in the eyes of God you want to share all their abomination…

To sum up, dear princes and nobles who have Jews in your domains, if this advice of mine does not suit you, then find a better one so that you and we may all be free of this insufferable devilish burden – the Jews…

Let the government deal with them in this respect, as I have suggested. But whether the government acts or not, let everyone at least be guided by his own conscience and form for himself a definition or image of a Jew. When you lay eyes on or think of a Jew you must say to yourself: Alas, that mouth which I there behold has cursed and execrated and maligned every Saturday my dear Lord Jesus Christ, who has redeemed me with his precious blood; in addition, it prayed and pleaded before God that I, my wife and children, and all Christians might be stabbed to death and perish miserably. And he himself would gladly do this if he were able, in order to appropriate our goods…

Such a desperate, thoroughly evil, poisonous, and devilish lot are these Jews, who for these fourteen hundred years have been and still are our plague, our pestilence, and our misfortune.

Translated by Martin H. Bertram, “On The Jews and Their Lies, Luther’s Works, Volume 47”; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1971.

Martin Luther 1543; Of The Unknowable Name and The Generations of Christ

But your [God’s] judgment is right, justus es Dominie. Yes, so shall Jews, but no one else be punished, who held your word and miracles in contempt and ridiculed, insulted and damned it for such a long time without interruption, so that they will not fall, like other humans, heathens and all the others, into sin and death, not up in Hell, nor in the middle of Hell but in the pit of Hell, as one cannot fall deeper…

Even if they were punished in the most gruesome manner that the streets ran with their blood, that their dead would be counted, not in the hundred thousands, but in the millions, as happened under Vespasian in Jerusalem and for evil under Hadrian, still they must insist on being right even if after these 1,500 years they were in misery another 1,500 years, still God must be a liar and they must be correct. In sum, they are the devil’s children, damned to Hell…

The Jews too got what they deserved. They had been called and elected to be God’s mouth as Jeremiah says…Open your mouth wide and I will fill it; they however, kept tightly closed their muzzles, eyes, ears, nose, whole heart and all senses, so he polluted and squirted them so full that it oozes from them in all places and devil’s filth comes from them.

Yes, that tastes good to them, into their hearts, they smack their lips like swine. That is how they want it. Call more: ‘Crucify him, crucify him.’ Scream more: ‘His blood come upon us and our children.’ (Matthew 27:25) I mean it came and found you…

Perhaps, one of the merciful Saints among us Christians may think I am behaving too crude and disdainfully against the poor, miserable Jews in that I deal with them so sarcastically and insulting. But, good God, I am much too mild in insulting such devils…

Finally, the father of Calvinism, John Calvin. I never spent much time studying the doctrine of election that he puts forth, so I really cannot comment much on it. Here is John Calvin’s opinion of the Jews:

“Their [the Jews] rotten and unbending stiffneckedness deserves that they be oppressed unendingly and without measure or end and that they die in their misery without the pity of anyone.“

Excerpt from “Ad Quaelstiones et Objecta Juaei Cuiusdam Responsio,” by John Calvin; The Jew in Christian Theology, Gerhard Falk, McFarland and Company, Inc., Jefferson, NC and London, 1931.

History does not happen by accident. We see the ingrained hatred of Jews in Christianity. One has to wonder if this new religion has anything to do with the religion of the Jewish Messiah Yeshua and the Apostle Sha’ul, also called Pa’al, or Paul today. Paul was a Pharisaic Jew responsible for writing much of the New Testament, and this is what he had to say in defense of himself:

Acts 24:14–16 (LEB)

¹⁴ But I do confess this to you, that according to the Way (which they call a sect), so I worship the God of our fathers, believing all things that are in accordance with the law and that are written in the prophets, ¹⁵ having a hope in God which these men also themselves await: that there is going to be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous. ¹⁶ For this reason also I myself always do my best to have a clear conscience toward God and people.

Paul also taught us where believers in Yeshua from the nations (non-Jews), fit in. It is only by the grace of God that we can be grafted into the natural olive tree of Israel.

Romans 11:13–21 (LEB)

¹³ Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Therefore, inasmuch as I am apostle to the Gentiles, I promote my ministry, ¹⁴ if somehow I may provoke my people to jealousy and save some of them. ¹⁵ For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean except life from the dead? ¹⁶ Now if the first fruits are holy, so also is the whole batch of dough, and if the root is holy, so also are the branches.

¹⁷ Now if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although you were a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them and became a sharer of the root of the olive tree’s richness, ¹⁸ do not boast against the branches. But if you boast against them, you do not support the root, but the root supports you. ¹⁹ Then you will say, “Branches were broken off in order that I could be grafted in.” ²⁰ Well said! They were broken off because of unbelief, but you stand firm because of faith. Do not think arrogant thoughts, but be afraid. ²¹ For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you.

It is clear that modern Christianity has antisemitism built within its framework, and likely the reason Christians will get so angry if dietary instructions, Sabbaths or feast days are brought up. No, those are not simply things of the “detestable Jews”, they are the instructions of God. Examine yourselves, as I will examine myself continually. Repent and believe the gospel!

Featured photo by Wim van ‘t Einde on Unsplash.

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