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To: patlin
Actually I agree with much of what you have written. Every commandment ever given to us by our loving Father has been for our benefit. This includes all of those commands in Leviticus including priests who should wear undergarments when climbing steps, inspecting houses for mold, and the rest. These laws and regulations were given to us to show to others our honoring of God, help us not embarass ourselves, and keep ourselves healthy. Some of these commands evolved; either by going away or turning into something else. That doesn't mean they aren't important to study for each and every one of them tells us something about God and how He cares for us.

But the study of the Old Testament also shows how the Israelites would constantly disobey the teachings and commandments. The generation that died in the wilderness for their rebellous heart, their children who went in to conquer the territory carrying their idols, and it wasn't soon after they settled in that they ceased to obey God. The laws in Leviticus states that God's wrath would go forth against a people who would sacrifice to Molech. Solomon built temples for that specific purpose. This was not surprising to Moses who prophesized:

I would not be so hard on the church since Israel NEVER followed the laws of God. It isn't that the laws are bad. On the contrary they are given to us in love and for our benefit. But they served to show that we simply refuse to keep them. This was true with Adam. It is true with us. (How many of us love our neighbors as ourselves?)

The true church, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Samuel, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, John the Baptist, Peter, James, John, Paul, etc., are all people who are cut from the same cloth. They are those who were led by faith. It isn't that there is a Hebrew church or a Rome church. There is only one church. These are people who had failings in obeying God's laws. Noah got drunk. Abraham lied. Moses, David, and one could even say Paul were murderers. Yet they are also people who knew God in a personal and real way-because God came to them and revealed Himself to them. And that's the way God wants it to the praise of His glory. To call us, to know Him and let Him lead us.

Israel is not the church. The church is Israel. It always has been. That includes those obedient Israelites who believed in the coming promise and those Christians who look back to the resurrected Savior. They all realized their sins at obeying the Law and a need for God to forgive them and redeem them. If we didn't understand the Law, we would not understand grace.

43 posted on 01/21/2013 12:22:23 PM PST by HarleyD
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To: HarleyD
You have it all backwards. Yeshua did not come to form a ‘church’, He came to redeem His nation. The ‘church’ is a man made concept.

The ‘Torah’ was given for His nation to set them apart from all the other nations and grace came in because of man’s disobedience. First to Adam and then again on down the line all the way through the NT. But as Paul says, just because grace was given freely, that does not mean we are then free to disobey Torah. Paul delighted in Torah as did David. James called Torah perfect and liberty giving because through Yeshua Messiah we are no longer under the curse of the Torah which is death. That is what we were freed from, the curse not the Torah.

Titus 2:11 For the grace of Elohim that brings salvation has appeared to all men, 12 teaching us that, renouncing ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live sensibly, righteously, and reverently in the present age, 13 looking for the blessed expectation and glorious appearing of our great Elohim and Savior Yeshua Messiah, 14 who gave Himself for us, to redeem us from lawlessness and cleanse for Himself His own peculiar people, ardent for good works.

Ex 19:5 Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine: 6 And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation.

There is not one place in all the Greek transcripts of the NT where the words ‘grace’ and ‘alone’ are used in the same passage, however, the words ‘faith’ and ‘alone’ are used together just one time in all Scripture.

James 2:17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.

And Paul agrees with this over and over and over again in all his epistles. Doing Torah evidences our faith, it is our fruit. No manifestation of works of Torah is equivilent to dead faith, BUT, because of grace one can not boast that one guaranteed a place in the eternal kingdom because grace is a gift givewn to all the world, not just a select few. One can not say that Elohim is indebted to anyone through their works. Yeshua Messiah is the ‘grace card’.

Faith evidences our receiving of that gift of grace through Yeshua Messiah and then we are to protect that gift so it is not taken away or lost due to neglect.

Now who is Yeshua Messiah? I have already given that answer, He is the walking talkiing Torah of Elohim that put on flesh to instruct us how to walk in all righteousness, to do what is right in the eyes of the Father lest we choose what is right in our own eyes that only leads one to death.

Deut 8:2 And you shall remember that the Lord your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and test you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not.

Deut 10:12 “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, 13 and to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command you today for your good.

Deut 32:46 and he said to them: “Set your hearts on all the words which I testify among you today, which you shall command your children to be careful to observe—all the words of this Torah. 47 For it is not a futile thing for you, because it is your life,

Deut 29:14 “I make this covenant and this oath, not with you alone, 15 but<.u> with him who stands here with us today before the YHVH our Elohim, also with him who is not here with us today

Elohim is outside of time, when He speaks, He speaks to ALL generations of all peoples for all time. All the covenants build upon each other, one does not nullify another, they merely enhance what was previously given, therefore

Deut 33:4 Moses commanded us a Torah, an inheritance of the assembly of Jacob (All Israel, both native and grafted in)

Ex 19:9 And the Lord said to Moses, “Behold, I come to you in the thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with you, and believe you forever.”

John 5:46 For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me. 47 But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?”

Mt 23:1 Then Yeshua spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, 2 saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. 3 Therefore whatever he (Moses) tells you to guard, guard and do (see Jn 14:15), but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.

45 posted on 01/21/2013 11:05:35 PM PST by patlin ("Knowledge is a powerful source that is 2nd to none but God" ConstitutionallySpeaking 2011)
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