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Sermon Review of the Holy Epistle to the Hebrews: Instructions About Washings

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Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings…

–Hebrews 6:1-2 (ESV)

Hebrews 6:1-3 identifies “instructions about washings” as one out of six fundamental, elementary teachings about the Messiah. Does this refer to Baptism? Learn about the Jewish practice of immersion in a mikvah and discover evidence of early, apostolic-era catechism prior to immersion.

Includes a short introduction to the Didache.

-D. Thomas Lancaster
Sermon Twenty-one: Instructions About Washings
Originally presented on June 22, 2013
from the Holy Epistle to the Hebrews sermon series

Instructions about washings (plural). After a brief summary of the first two elementary principles, “Repentance from dead works” and “Faith toward God,” Lancaster continues with the third, “Instructions about washings”. This is often considered in normative Christianity to refer to baptism and easily dismissed as such. The King James Version of the Bible even renders the phrase as “the doctrine of baptisms,” but…

The translators of the English Standard Version, like many Bible scholars, recognized that the Greek word “baptismon” does not sound as if it’s talking about Christian baptism, because it appears in the plural form, whereas Christians are baptized only once. Furthermore, in other places in the New Testament, the word “baptismos” refers to ceremonial purification rituals of immersion in a mikvah. Several scholars looked at this passage and said, “I don’t think he’s talking about Christian baptism. I think he’s talking about Jewish purity rituals.”

-D. Thomas Lancaster
“Chapter 5: Instruction About Washings,” pg 64
Elementary Principles: Six Foundational Principles of Ancient Jewish Christianity

This book leverages much of the material from Lancaster’s sermons on these elementary principles from his “Hebrews” series and is a good companion to use with these audio recordings.

Here we learn that it is highly likely that these “immersions” mentioned in Hebrews 6:2 do not reference the modern Christian concept of baptism, since a Christian is only baptized once and the Greek word used in the text is clearly plural. It is more likely that the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews is talking about Jewish ritual purity rites using the mikvah, since the writer (according to Lancaster) is a Jew writing to other Jewish believers in Messiah Yeshua.

Lancaster presents some historical and archeological information regarding ancient immersion pools in the late Second Temple period to illustrate that it was extremely common for Jews to immerse on any number of occasions for the purpose of ritual purity, including participation in Temple sacrifices.

He also takes this opportunity to go on a small “rant” about how Christianity has fundamentally misunderstood the nature and character of baptism, and he ran through a litany of things that he believes the Church has gotten all wrong (he was talking too fast for me to take notes, so if you want to hear his reasons, you’ll have to listen to the recording). I don’t think Lancaster was trying to “diss” the Christian Church so much as he was being passionate about what he sees as the truth of the early history of Jesus-believing Judaism and how it’s been distorted by subsequent Gentile Christianity.

mikvahAs an aside, Lancaster has been lobbying to build a mikvah at Beth Immanuel for the last seven years (eight years as of this writing) but there hasn’t been much of a response. That reminded me of something I just read in Sue Fishkoff’s book The Rebbe’s Army: Inside the World of Chabad-Lubavitch. Often, when a Chabad family moves into an area without an Orthodox Jewish presence, their first and overriding priority is to build a mikvah, particularly for the use of the Rabbitzin in relation to the laws of ritual family purity. The reaction from the local Jewish community to the Chabad’s fundraising efforts to build a mikvah (and they’re not cheap) is just as lukewarm. What does Lancaster and the Chabad know about the mikvah that the rest of us don’t, or is that a sad question to ask as connected to “elementary principles” of our faith?

So, what were these “instructions about immersions?” How to build a mikvah? The mechanics of how to baptize? At one point, Lancaster might have said “yes”, but then he realized how “dumb” an answer that was…a typical “Goy” answer.

Jews would have been already well acquainted with the rituals surrounding the mikvah, the occasions when one had to engage in ritual purity rites and so forth. This wasn’t a mystery. While Gentiles may have needed those sort of instructions, they would have been less than useless to the Jewish believers.

Lancaster shared his own revelation. When reading a commentary on this part of the Book of Hebrews, he learned that these instructions about immersions could be referred to as “Catechetical Instructions for Conducting the Baptismal Rite.”

When I was a pre-teen and into mid-teens, my parents regularly took me to a Lutheran church. Lutheran churches, like Catholic churches, put their young people into a two-year Confirmation class where we studied Catechism, which according to Wikipedia is “a summary or exposition of doctrine and served as a learning introduction to the Sacraments traditionally used in catechesis, or Christian religious teaching of children and adult converts.”

That’s what Lancaster thinks these “instructions about immersions” are. Not directions on how to immerse or baptize, but the very basic instructions a new believer had to know before being immersed in the name of the Messiah as a full disciple.

Lancaster than referenced the best known ancient “catechism” we have access to: the Didache.

Last fall, I read and wrote about First Fruits of Zion’s (FFOZ) Toby Janicki’s article “The Didache: An Introduction” published in Messiah Journal. Since then, I purchased a copy of the Didache along with a commentary and wrote several blog posts on the topic which can be found here.

While Lancaster isn’t saying the Didache we have is the actual set of instructions being referred to in Hebrews 6:2, they may very well be related. It’s clear that the Didache was written for new Gentile “novices” in Yeshua-discipleship in order to prepare them to be immersed into Messiah by being initiated in the teachings of the Master. These instructions may have begun as oral instructions that accompanied the delivery of the Acts 15 “Jerusalem Letter” to the various Jesus-believing Gentile communities in the diaspora.

Didache CodexI should mention here that as Lancaster correctly states, the Didache’s initial discovery prompted accusations of forgery and fraud, since the document didn’t match the theology and doctrine of any Christian denomination and was seen as “too Jewish”. But today, most Christian scholars admit that the document most likely originated within one or two decades of the destruction of Herod’s Temple, written probably by Jewish disciples of Jesus for newly minted Gentile disciples. As I mentioned though, these written instructions could well have been preceded by an oral equivalent and could possibly have first come from the apostles themselves.

However, the Jewish disciples may have required a similar, parallel set of instructions to familiarize them with the teachings of Messiah and what it is to be a Jew preparing for a lifelong commitment to “take up their cross” and follow Moshiach, even unto death.

So look at it like this.

The newly initiated Jewish believers were first taught the very elementary principles of Yeshua-faith starting with repentance from dead works (sin) and then faith toward God as specific to Messianic devotion. Once they had mastered those first two principles, they were ready for the third, the basic instructions required for them to prepare to be immersed into the name of Messiah, which constitutes a vow of eternal fidelity.

Jewish people would immerse in the mikvah an untold number of times over the course of a lifetime, so immersing for ritualistic reasons was hardly novel. However, John specifically practiced an immersion of repentance (Matthew 4:17, Acts 19:4) and the Master commanded another specific immersion:

Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” (emph. mine)

–Matthew 28:19-20 (NASB)

The immersion in the name of Messiah fits in perfectly with what the Church calls “the Great Commission” but put back into a Jewish context, the ritual immersion in Messiah’s name makes a great deal more sense.

Jewish ConversionFor Lancaster, and I agree with him, a serious time of preparation must have been thought necessary before formally becoming a disciple of the Master. This was probably quite similar to the proselyte ritual process Gentiles experienced when converting under other Jewish sects. Even today, a Gentile converting to Judaism, particularly Orthodox Judaism, undergoes a time of intense preparation and study under the supervision of a Rabbi, and must past several tests before becoming circumcised (for males) and immersing in the mikvah as the final rite in becoming a Jew.

It seems very reasonable to believe that in ancient Yeshua-faith, the Gentile “converts” were required to undergo a similar procedure, although I’m sure there were exceptions (Acts 8:25-40, Acts 10:44-48).

Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it?

–Luke 14:17-28 (NASB)

What Did I Learn?

Actually, I felt there were things Lancaster only hinted at in his sermon. If he believes the Christian Church has gotten baptism all wrong, particularly as far as only being baptized once, what other applications might there be for immersion among the body of believers? I’m sure that Messianic Jewish disciples of the Master could and would immerse for the same reasons as other observant Jews, but what about the “Messianic Gentiles?” If we immerse in the name of Messiah once, on what other occasions should Gentiles enter the mikvah?

It had never occurred to me to apply Matthew 28:19-20 to Hebrews 6:2 but now it makes a great deal of sense to connect the two scriptures. I’m sure an entire study could be done applying what we think of as “baptism” in Christianity to ancient and modern concepts of immersion in the mikvah.

This also made me think of my own immersion. In August 1999, my entire family was immersed, under the auspices of a local Hebrew Roots congregational leader, in the Boise River. The following month, my life started to dramatically fall apart in such a spectacular manner that it would take years for me and my family to recover.

My interpretation is that God takes immersion into the name of Messiah quite seriously, even if the people being immersed don’t know what they’re doing (and I certainly didn’t). God delivered the consequences of my ill-conceived decision directly into my lap and it wasn’t pleasant at all. A lot of re-writing of my script had to be done and it’s not finished yet, not by a long shot. The finger of God is still writing on my heart and slowly converting it from a thing of stone to a heart of beating flesh and blood.

How many churches prepare their people with a dedicated set of instructions and tutelage before determining they are ready for this level of life-long commitment? I know in the church I attend there is some sort of formal preparation, but I fear for the sake of the children, some age nine and younger, who are deemed ready to understand what it is to count the cost, take up their crosses, and follow Jesus, even unto death. How could you be nine years old and possibly comprehend who you’re vowing to obey and what the consequences will be?

child baptismLancaster says he believes our churches are filled with “false converts,” people, like me, who consent to being baptized without any real idea of what that truly means. We have very few formal vows in Christianity left. The one you most likely think of is the wedding vow, but the staggering divorce rate in the Church indicates even that one is not well understood.

When we consent to being immersed in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit of God, we had better know what we’re doing, and if we haven’t been prepared adequately for the commitment, then even though we are acting out of ignorance, God will hold us accountable.

Lancaster believes we should return to instructing new believers in the elemental principles of our faith which might include some familiarity with the Didache or something patterned after it. I think he’s right. People declare Christ as Lord and Savior and are baptized in his name far too casually in our day. I think thousands upon thousands of people in the Church are in a lot of trouble and don’t even realize it.

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Putting a New Face on Sunday School

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In verses 22-23 of Acts 22, Give the details of the “hissy fit” Paul’s Jewish audience threw when he used the “G” word.

Have you or I ever felt or expressed similar emotions when we didn’t get out way in church? (The “no” word) How does submission allow the Lord to bring about spiritual growth in our worthy walk with Him?

-from the Sunday school study notes
on Acts 22:22-29 for June 8th

My Sunday school teacher has a tendency to compare apples with oranges and believe he is actually comparing apples to apples. For instance:

“And He said to me, ‘Go! For I will send you far away to the Gentiles.’”

They listened to him up to this statement, and then they raised their voices and said, “Away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live!” And as they were crying out and throwing off their cloaks and tossing dust into the air, the commander ordered him to be brought into the barracks, stating that he should be examined by scourging so that he might find out the reason why they were shouting against him that way.

–Acts 22:21-24 (NASB)

Teacher was comparing a near-riot situation not only to a “hissy fit” (which Urban Dictionary defines as a “sudden outburst of temper, often used to describe female anger at something trivial”) but to any relatively minor situation a person might experience in church that would cause them unhappiness or displeasure.

Either he thinks people’s problems in church border on crowd violence or he grossly minimizes the angst, frustration, fear, pain, and anger of the Jewish people whose land has been occupied by a pagan foreign army and who were highly sensitized to any offense by Gentiles during a moed such as Shavuot.

Since I published my previous blog post which merely anticipated last Sunday’s class, people have been asking me how class actually went. This is the answer.

Apostle Paul preachingI decided I could not remain completely silent and let what I considered to be unfair or inaccurate statements about Paul’s situation in particular or Christianity’s attitude about Judaism and Jewish people in general go unanswered. While I chose to ignore the “hissy fit” comment (though I was surprised at the number of people in class who agreed that the Jews in the above-quoted passage were merely “throwing a childish fit”), I did zero in on the humanity and the group dynamics of the situation.

I pointed out that presumably, some “Jews from Asia” (Acts 21:27) had been spreading rumors in Jerusalem that Paul had been “teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs” (Acts 21:21), and also that he had “even brought Greeks into the temple and [had] defiled [the] holy place.”

It only takes a few agitators to stir up a large crowd and start a riot. Jerusalem’s population had swelled to millions of Jews in preparation of Shavuot, and it was always during the moadim that emotions ran especially high. Any upset or offense at all, particularly the thought that a pagan Gentile would be taken into the Temple by a Jew who was presumed to be sympathetic to pagans if not a Roman collaborator, would be cause enough for disaster.

Now the Passover and Unleavened Bread were two days away; and the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to seize Him by stealth and kill Him; for they were saying, “Not during the festival, otherwise there might be a riot of the people.”

–Mark 14:1-2 (NASB)

We see even the Romans (not to mention the chief priests and scribes) could not execute the Master with impunity for fear of the crowds. In fact, in Acts 22, the Roman military authorities are doing all they can to prevent such a mass disturbance.

riotingSince none of that qualifies as a “hissy fit,” I decided to toss my two cents into the hat, so to speak, and explain all of this to the class. My teacher was in totally agreement and no one spoke up to suggest otherwise, though I can’t possibly know what anyone was thinking. My one regret was that the individual who previously made the Anti-Gentilism remark wasn’t present to either respond or not respond. But that was probably for the best since I can be more sure that my motivations were clear of the desire to make my own “response” to this person.

Earlier that morning, Pastor was extremely careful to point out that Paul’s troubles weren’t what we might consider in modern times to be “Jews persecuting a Christian.” At that moment in history, in Jerusalem, all of the people involved, apart from the Romans, are Jesus-believing Jews and Jews from other religious streams. The most accurate picture, in my personal opinion, we can paint, is that differing or opposing Jewish religious sects were engaged in “passionate” disagreement up to and including violent outbursts.

But perceiving that one group were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, Paul began crying out in the Council, “Brethren, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees; I am on trial for the hope and resurrection of the dead!” As he said this, there occurred a dissension between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor an angel, nor a spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all. And there occurred a great uproar; and some of the scribes of the Pharisaic party stood up and began to argue heatedly, saying, “We find nothing wrong with this man; suppose a spirit or an angel has spoken to him?” And as a great dissension was developing, the commander was afraid Paul would be torn to pieces by them and ordered the troops to go down and take him away from them by force, and bring him into the barracks.

–Acts 23:6-10 (NASB)

Last week in one of my reviews of D. Thomas Lancaster’s Holy Epistle to the Hebrews sermon series, I wrote that Lancaster taught that the Pharisees and the Messianic Jewish believers all had virtually identical theology and doctrine. They both believed in the world to come, they both believed that God rewarded good and punished evil, both in this world and the world to come, they both believed in the resurrection of the dead, and they both believed in the Holy Spirit and in angelic beings.

But the Sadducees believed in none of that, which is what, according to Lancaster, resulted in the Sadducees barring the Messianic believers from the Temple prompting the Hebrews letter-writer to pen his epistle, and why the Sadducees and Pharisees sitting on the Sanhedrin argued so strenuously, putting Paul’s safety and even his life in danger.

That’s not the same as one religion persecuting another, dissimilar religion.

The Jewish PaulIn fact, in verse 6, Paul said, “ I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees…,” and Pastor pointed this out, not I was a Pharisee. There was nothing inconsistent with being a Pharisee and coming to the realization that Yeshua was the Messiah, Son of God. Yeshua-devotion seems to have been the natural, logical, Biblical extension of Pharisaism in late second-Temple Judaism.

So we might even say (though I could be stepping out on a limb here), that modern Messianic Judaism, in some sense, is the inheritor of first century Pharisaic/Messianic Judaism.

As Sunday school class ended, a gentleman who looked familiar to me, but not in that context, approached me and introduced himself. Actually, he reminded me that he’s the father of my son Michael’s best friend. Apparently, he and his wife had attended this church some years back but left to plant another church in the community. They’ve returned, presumably for some time, so it’s become a more interesting situation.

I recall the few times I’ve spoken with this person before. He’s always been personable and interactive. Very much a “traditional Christian” but willing to listen and discuss my “Jewish” ideas.

No one else in class (or in church) has any connection to my family or my family’s history (my son has known this gentleman and his family for well over a decade, though I’ve only met them just a few times over the years) so I wonder how or if this will affect my future contributions? The situation certainly puts a new face on Sunday school.

One more thing. Pastor did talk about Christians who are being persecuted in the world today, and specifically Pastor Sergey Kosyak of Donetsk in the Ukraine. Please pray for him and for all the Christians who are authentically in danger, being injured, being incarcerated, being murdered for the sake of their faith in Jesus Christ. May God be with them and protect them all.

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Does Unity Always Demand Passivity?

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Therefore I, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing tolerance for one another in love, being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

–Ephesians 4:1-3 (NASB)

How is it pleasing to the Lord when hungry believers with different backgrounds and viewpoints, come together in a spirit of unity to study and apply His Word? What Christ-honoring qualities, in Ephesians 4:1-3, do we need to embrace in order for this to happen?

-from the Sunday school study notes for June 8th

I know I’ve accused myself (and been accused by my wife) of collapsing the Tent of David because of my arrogant presumption, which has subsequently caused me to question my role in the church (if any, beyond being a pew-warmer in services and a silent witness in Sunday school), but I’ve got just one question: are we supposed to “dumb down” the Bible and ignore blatant error for the sake of unity among believers?

I’m really tempted to ask my Sunday school teacher that question, but I know it would just stir up hard feelings (and I’ve done that before).

We’re studying Acts 22:22-29 and somehow my Sunday school teacher has gotten the impression that Paul became all humble, meek, and mild for the sake of Jesus Christ. Really, the last thing I imagine Paul to be in the face of adversity is meek and mild. I also think Christians largely misunderstand humility, especially in leadership.

Moses’s humility was a function of his greatness. Penetrating more deeply into the unfathomable mystery of things than anyone before or since, he was more acutely aware of his ignorance. As the Torah relates at Mount Sinai: “Moses approached the thick cloud where God was” (Exodus 20:18).

-Ismar Schorsch
Commentary on Torah Portion Beha’alotekha
“The Inscription on My Father’s Tombstone,” pg 498,
May 28, 1994
Canon Without Closure: Torah Commentaries

To make his point, he recast a verse in which Moses declares: “It is not because you are the most numerous of peoples that the Lord set His heart on you and chose you — indeed, you are the smallest of peoples” (Deut. 7:17). Nevertheless, the midrash continues, “the Holy One Praised Be He told Israel that I love you because each time I bestow greatness upon you, you shrink yourself before Me. I bestowed greatness upon Abraham and he said to Me: ‘I am but dust and ashes’ (Gen. 18:27). Upon Moses and Aaron and they said: ‘who are we?’ (Ex. 16:7) Upon David and he said: ‘I am a worm, less than human'” (Psalm 22:7).

-ibid,
“The Humblest of Men,” pg 513, June 5, 2004

Reb Yakov Kamenetzky
Reb Yakov Kamenetzky

And from another source:

Rabbi Yaakov Kamenetzky was about to take his place at the end of a long line waiting to board a bus, when someone in the front of the line who knew him called out, “Rebbe, you can come here in front of me!”

“I’m not permitted to,” replied Rav Yaakov. “It would be stealing.”

“I give you permission. I don’t mind.”

“But what about everybody else behind you?” said the Rosh Hayeshiva. “I would be stealing their time and choice of seat by moving them back one. Who says they allow me to?”

-Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
Commentary on Torah Portion Beha’alotekha
“Even when traveling be careful to observe Torah values,” pg 320
Quoting The Jewish Observer, Nov., 1985
Growth Through Torah

Here we see that humility is a reflection of strength of character and the upholding of Torah values (or Biblical values if you prefer), and is not the result of a person willing to sacrifice those values for the sake of unity, peace, or to prevent a “spirited debate.”

Certainly no one could accuse Abraham, Moses, Aaron, or David of being “meek and mild” and unable or unwilling to take a strong personal stand for what is right just to avoid an argument or to dodge a disagreement.

That said, we can also see from Rav Kamenetzky’s example that it is also required to sacrifice personal convenience for the sake of said-values, and from that, I derive the principle that you don’t enter into a debate, even if you think you’re correct, just for the sake of being right and proving the other person or people wrong.

I continually struggle with that last bit, even as I compose this blog post and anticipate (as I write this) Sunday school tomorrow morning (yesterday as you read this).

And as compelling as the examples I’ve already presented may be, there’s one more that should “seal the deal” so to speak:

When the ten heard this, they began to be upset with Ya’akov and Yochanan. Yeshua called to them and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles are the ones who oppress them, and their great ones dominate them. But it is not to be that way among you. Rather, one who desires to be great among you is to be as a servant to you, and the one who desires to be the head will be a slave to all. For even the son of man did not come in order to be served, but rather to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

–Mark 10:41-45 (DHE Gospels)

It is true, and Chancellor Schorsch supports this in his commentary, that people operating outside of the Covenant community (Gentiles, in Schorsch’s as well as Jesus’ case) have leaders who feed off of power and self-glorification, while leaders in Judaism, at least in the ideal, become more humble as God heaps greatness upon them.

Ismar Schorsch
Ismar Schorsch

But as I said, this doesn’t mean humility equals passivity.

In the Temple he found merchants of cattle, flocks, and young doves and those who give change for money sitting there. He took cords, twisted them into a whip, and drove all of them out of the Temple, along with the flocks and cattle. He scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To the dove merchants he said, “Take these out of here, and do not make my Father’s House into a marketplace!” His disciples remembered the passage, “For the zeal of your House has consumed me.”

–John 2:14-17 (DHE Gospels)

Of course, that hardly gives me license to make a whip and go charging into Sunday school, even metaphorically, for the sake of making a theological point. On the other hand, if unity were the single, overriding priority in the community of faith, then we would never see any Jewish leader, including Jesus, take a strong, personal stand for the sake of Heaven.

There is a line in the sand that, once crossed, must provoke a response. So on the one hand, I could have been wrong to remain silent in Sunday school class when I felt that line had been crossed. On the other hand, I need to choose my battles. I usually do that in class, selecting only one or two points in the class notes to address openly, but even then, it doesn’t always work out.

How do I tell my Sunday school teacher (or do I tell him at all) that unity is not the be all and end all of communal life in the congregation of Christ?

Be careful not to become involved in quarrels with your friends. Arguments will only create distance between you and others.

The most effective approach to avoid needless arguments is to master the ability to remain silent. You don’t have to say everything you think of saying. At times there is an actual need to clarify a specific point and it’s appropriate to speak up. But a large percentage of arguments come from making comments that don’t need to be made.

-Rabbi Zelig Pliskin
quoted at Aish.com

By the time you read this (Monday morning), I might have the answer.

Addendum: It’s Sunday afternoon and Sunday school class actually worked out better than I thought it would. I’ll write more about this later.

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What is it to be in a Community of Faith?

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Being ignored is very dismissive and disrespectful, especially if you claim to have a relationship. I think all of us desire to be understood and that our contributions are useful, not just feigned interest when your real intent is to build a relationship only for the purpose of setting the other person straight. Yes, the Christian need to maintain a semblance of agreement and avoid conflict and the hashing things out that might be useful is discomforting, but that is the way it is.

-chaya1957
from a comment on What I Learned in Church Today: Anti-Gentilism and Crypto-Supersessionism

This speaks to the theme I was discussing on that particular blog post as well as on Old Wine Made New, which is a continuation of my exploration of my role in the church and more fundamentally, who am I?

As much as I’d like to think that I’ve backed off of being arrogant or even disingenuous in my rationale for returning to church, I don’t think I’ve progressed very far. In reading Chaya’s comment though, I realized (or was reminded) that in my case, there are three possible motivations for being in church (although they can certainly overlap):

  1. Seeking community with fellow believers.
  2. Seeking an encounter with God.
  3. Seeking to share my unique perspectives with other believers.

Number three is the one I tend to lead with and the one that has gotten me in plenty of trouble. It’s this part of what I refer to as the Tent of David process that is the most difficult to implement. Actually, the toughest part is to find the right balance between competing priorities in being at church, and I think the balancing point is in a different place for each person.

As I’ve learned before, it’s important to establish yourself as a member of the community, otherwise, no one will take you seriously. I’ve been “standoffish” as far as becoming a community member goes, especially if it requires formally joining the local church. I realize that Pastor Randy has privately taken me through the curriculum he presents in his “new member” classes. Needless to say, I don’t agree with not of the “particulars” of the Baptist or Fundamentalist Church, so I could hardly become a member in good faith.

But being a committed member of the community is a basic requirement that must be fulfilled prior to offering anything in the way of a perspective on a theology or doctrine that differs from the Evangelical Christian norm. Certainly a Messianic Jewish viewpoint on theology and doctrine can be considered quite outside the traditional Christian norm.

But then, I’ve been cheating myself, since one of my major issues, at least within my own mind and heart, is how I lack “like-minded community” in my little corner of Southwestern Idaho. By not joining community, I’ve been denying myself community and thus remaining isolated, at least in terms of face-to-face transactions from fellow believers. Sure, I can show up at church, participate in the worship services, and go to Sunday school afterward, but that’s not community, it’s attendance.

I go out of a sense of obligation, out of a sense that this church is where God wants me to be for some reason, as if I may still have a purpose there, but then, I can’t tell what that purpose might be. For about the first year give or take a month or two, I thought I had a purpose. I spent a lot of face time with the head Pastor and I thought we were building a dialog that could result in at least the introduction of some material from a Messianic point of view.

But it didn’t work out that way. Periodically, someone will pull me aside to ask a few questions or complement me on my participation in Sunday school, but that’s pretty hit and miss.

All of these musings are against the backdrop of First Fruits of Zion’s (FFOZ) Annual Shavuot Conference at Beth Immanuel Sabbath Fellowship in Hudson, Wisconsin which, as you read this, has just ended. While I’ve struggled with my participation at the conference in the past, in my heart, Beth Immanuel or some place like it is more who I am than a Fundamentalist or Evangelical Christian church.

This isn’t to say that going to church for a Christian is bad, it just isn’t really “me.” And even then, if being a square peg in a church of round holes had some purpose or meaning, then being different would be OK, especially if, among all the differences, I could find a common “meeting place” with the other people in the church community.

Sometimes I feel like the character “Uncle Martin” in the old TV show My Favorite Martian (1963-1966). I look like everyone else, but the internal differences are remarkable.

I recently read an article at the Rosh Pina Project called The mature Messianic Jewish believer is also a disciple. Writer Dror discussed the variability of Jews in the Messianic Jewish movement who nevertheless, should be considered part of the community. The issue revolved around Jewish Torah observance:

There is a school of thought within Messianic Judaism that teaches that Messianic Jews can only truly be “Messianic” if they are also Torah observant. A sharp divide is made between Messianic Jews who do keep Torah, and those who don’t – with those who don’t even compared to Bin Laden!

Rebbe
Rabbi M.M Schneerson, the Rebbe

I’ve been reading Sue Fishkoff’s book The Rebbe’s Army, which is about the history, development, and activities of the Chabad in connecting with largely secular Jewish people and bringing them closer to the Torah through performance of mitzvot and association in Jewish community. Regardless of what you may think of the Chabad and what they do, they have a single-mindedness of purpose and are remarkably inclusive of Jewish people, regardless of background or knowledge.

Messianic Judaism struggles with this issue because, in my opinion, at the same time it is attempting to present Yeshua as the Messiah to non-Jesus believing Jews, it is also trying to establish itself as a Judaism, observant in the mitzvot, knowledgable in Talmud, and everything that every other religious, ethnic, and cultural Judaism is.

I can understand why Messianic Jews want to be taken seriously as a “Judaism”, alongside the other accepted Jewish religious movements. Some Messianic Jews seek to shore up the boundaries of Messianic Judaism by explicitly stating that practitioners must keep Torah. They go too far. People can get carried away with an idealistic vision of a religion accepted even by the Orthodox world, and end up using harsh language against secular Messianic Jews.

Yet only perhaps 13% of Jews worldwide could really be described as Torah-observant, which leaves the 87% of non-observant Jews whom Yeshua still loves. I would imagine that at least 87% of Messianic Jews are not Torah-observant, and it would be weird to have a Messianic Judaism that pretends this huge non-observant majority does not exist or is somehow worth dismissing.

This struggle isn’t my struggle to the degree that I’m not Jewish and have no meaningful input in the Jewish world, Messianic or otherwise, but it does define a parallel issue among the Gentiles involved in the Messianic Jewish movement (who are the majority of members in the movement, at least in western nations).

While many aspects of Torah are found in messianic Judaism as a unique expression of our Jewish faith in the Messiah, we do not believe that the Gentile church, or Gentile Christians universally, are called to the same expression as us. In fact, it is the unity of Jew and Gentile in Messiah, in spite of our cultural diversity, which glorifies God in the body of the Lord, via the one new man. (Eph. 2:15). In our view, therefore, it is wrong to admonish Gentile believers universally to think that they need to observe the Torah. It is clear, furthermore, that the Apostles dealt with this precise question of Gentile Torah observance and answered it on point in Acts 15. All of this will be discussed further in this paper.

-from “One Law, Two Sticks, A Critical Look at the Hebrew Roots Movement,” pg 4
A position paper of the International Alliance of Messianic Congregations and Synagogues (IAMCS) Steering Committee, January 15, 2014

The reception of such a statement among non-Jews involved in some aspect of the Hebrew Roots movement is generally not accepted very well and is often understood as the Torah being completely applied only to the Jewish people and having no relevancy for non-Jewish disciples of Yeshua (Jesus) at all. This is a basic misunderstanding as the above-quoted paper states:

At times, this can be rather ambiguous, as the term “Torah” (law), of course, has different meanings depending on context….

Generically, the term “Torah” is often thought of as a set of laws providing a moral code for right living. Although there are such commandments in the Torah, the moral law is a very limited part of Torah, and is not a good basis for understanding what Torah is. While the Torah does contain certain moral laws given to Israel, it was not in fact, given in order to be the ultimate moral statement and standard of God to humanity for ethics and basic right v. wrong living. The Torah does not purport to be such a statement. While there clearly are universal moral laws in the Torah, there are many aspects of the Torah that have nothing to do with morality, and which therefore are not intended to be universal. For example, the commandment to Israel to wear tzitzit (Num. 15:38), or to be circumcised (Lev. 12:3).

The Torah does not approach being an exhaustive, all-encompassing, moral code. In fact, Paul’s assertion in Romans 2:14 states:

“Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law.”

-ibid, pg 5

In fact, much of the Torah applies to all of humanity but the Torah uniquely applies to the Jewish people, the descendants of the ancient Israelites who received the Torah from God through Moses as Sinai as the conditions of the Mosaic Covenant between God and Israel.

God gave the law at Sinai, creating a unique nation. There are things given in the Torah which are unique to Israel. Above all, the actual revelation at Sinai was not the law, but rather, the lawgiver. In fact, God not only gave the law at Sinai, but God revealed Himself unto the people Israel. (See Ex. 19 and 20). The Jews from the most ancient times have understood this.

-ibid, pg 6

Mount SinaiA Gentile believer’s obligation to the Torah is more involved and complicated than it would seem on the surface, especially when accessing an Evangelical Christian (low) view of “the Law”. Nevertheless, no one is trying to minimize or marginalize the Gentile participants in Messianic Judaism or those who have discovered the “Hebrew Roots” of the Christian faith.

But what does this have to do with my sense of Christian community or lack thereof? Plenty. Actually, it has more to do with my sense of community within the Messianic Jewish movement, even though that community is remote.

In reading Fishkoff’s book about the Chabad, I came across a bit of dialog attributed to an older Jewish gentleman, a businessman, who had become involved in Chabad activities and who had been encouraged to perform some of the mitzvot, including laying Tefillin. He found it compelling to increase his observance, at least to some degree, but he admitted, “I still work on Shabbos.”

I’ve read in any number of Jewish sources, that Judaism relative to the mitzvot is not an absolute. In Christianity, we are taught that Judaism is an “all or nothing” religion. Either you perform all of the mitzvot and perform them perfectly, or you are condemned by God. It’s the rationalization for us to say that Jews cannot keep the Law perfectly (who could?) and therefore, they need to abandon the Law entirely and accept the free gift of grace and salvation from Jesus Christ.

But that’s not how observant Jews see themselves, and certainly not within the Chabad framework. In fact, Jews who have grown up in other branches of Orthodox Judaism complain, according to Fishkoff, that Chabad services are too elementary and that the Chabad siddur (prayer book) is laced with English translations of the Hebrew and Hebrew transliterations for Jews unfamiliar with Jewish worship. That’s great if you’ve been a secular Jew all of your life and are uninitiated in the synagogue service, but if you have been raised an Orthodox Jew, it’s bound to be slow and frustrating.

But all of these people along the scale of observance and familiarity with Torah and Talmud are Jewish and all of them are universally in covenant with God. That needs to be understood by the rest of us (Gentile Christianity). The expectation is to strive to be better without necessarily ever becoming perfect. In Judaism, God is a gracious and forgiving God, not a harsh taskmaster.

Evangelical Christianity, for its part, is also lenient relative to any expectation of “performance” by its constituency, but there are expectations nonetheless, though they tend to center around things like church activities, tithing and other giving activities, church and classroom attendance, and so on. Ironically, Evangelicals, at least some of them, perform more “Torah” than you might imagine, such as visiting the sick, giving to charity, donating food items to the hungry and those organizations that feed them, praying for the well-being of others, both in the church and beyond, and so on.

churchBut what about me? That is, what about the “Messianic Gentile” or one who self-identifies as such? I work on Shabbos, not at my job, but I typically do my lawn work. I try to spend as much of Saturday as possible reading the Bible and studying, but my wife, who is in fact Jewish, does work on Saturday. So does my Jewish daughter. And I’m likely to have some sort of “honey do” list to complete on Saturdays.

My wife will light the Shabbos candles for Erev Shabbat but typically she doesn’t invite me to be a part of the event. We eat “Leviticus 11 kosher” or as the local Chabad Rabbi calls it, “kosher-style,” but we’ve never kashered our kitchen. My wife doesn’t always fast for Yom Kippur. She rarely attends Shabbat services.

Neither one of us lead what you might call an “observant” lifestyle. Now how that works in my wife’s Jewish experience is between her and God and I will not question how she chooses to live out a Jewish life.

But identifying as a “Messianic Gentile,” what does Messianic Judaism expect of me? Some have said that Gentiles are “invited” to extend their observance beyond the minimum required by the Acts 15 ruling, but depending on who you talk to, some people in Messianic Judaism (more of the Gentiles than the Jews) are a little stiff about what you do and don’t do.

It gets even worse in some (but not all) Hebrew Roots communities to the point of “legalism,” and as we saw from the Rosa Pina Project quote above, if you’re a Messianic Jew and you aren’t scrupulous in your observance, you can be open for some harsh criticism.

I say all this to illustrate the challenges in establishing and maintaining community, regardless of what that religious community might be. While I find that I missed attending this year’s Shavuot Conference at Beth Immanuel, some part of being there is intimidating. I worry about fitting in sort of the way I worry about fitting in at church. The theology and doctrine taught at Beth Immanuel is more in line with my personal beliefs, but what about my practice? And at church, although my practice isn’t much of an issue, what about my theology and doctrine?

A believer is someone who believes Yeshua is the Messiah.

A disciple is someone who believes Yeshua is the Messiah, and is making a serious attempt (although it will be weak and flawed in many ways) to conform his life to the ways and teachings of Yeshua. As well as his behaviour and attitudes changing, his conceptualising of faith will change and he will begin to understand concepts which were initially tricky, like Yeshua died in our place, Yeshua is divine, and we need to work on our hearts to produce spiritual fruit.

See the difference?

Mature disciples who meet regularly with other disciples will strengthen their faith, and may or may not choose to observe Torah in order to supplement and enhance this spiritual journey. Yet at its core, this is a personal choice.

-Rosh Pina Project

Regardless of who you are, Jew or Gentile, as a believer in and disciple of Yeshua (Jesus), it ultimately is less about what you do as who you are in relationship to God through Messiah. The relationship, the walk, the interaction, is where it all starts. Performance of the mitzvot, however you want to define that, is the outgrowth, the expression, the fruit of that relationship in faith, but how many of the mitzvot you perform and how well you perform them doesn’t define you as a disciple, since each person negotiates his or her relationship with God.

I’m convinced that people of faith are far more judgmental of other people of faith than is God.

But that doesn’t solve the problem of community, it only gives us the means to dodge the judgmentalism of other people in our community (or sometimes outside of it).

I suppose part of my issue of community within the church is my own judgmentalism, how I view Christian viewpoints on Israel and Judaism and why they don’t conform to my own. As I’ve said several times before, it is arrogant presumption to believe Evangelical Christians would have any desire whatsoever for some outsider to breeze into their church and tell them what’s what. How dare I judge their theology and doctrine and yet bristle when they judge mine?

coastI feel caught in the middle, between my struggles with Christian theology and Messianic practice. But those are community issues. The real issue is whether or not I’m a believer or a disciple. If the former, then it’s all about what I know about God and if the latter, then my heartfelt desire should be to know God. If I am truly seeking to know God, then everything should flow out of that pursuit and whatever community of faith I find myself in should judge me, for good or for ill, on that basis.

In turn, I should judge myself on what my goals really are. They should never be about changing anyone’s mind for only God does that. If I am a disciple, my single goal should be to draw nearer to God through Messiah Yeshua (Christ Jesus). From that, everything else will come.

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Sermon Review of the Holy Epistle to the Hebrews: Faith Toward God

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Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, of instruction about washings and laying on of hands, and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment.

–Hebrews 6:1-2 (NASB)

The second elementary teaching of the Messiah in Hebrews 6:12 is called “faith toward God,” but how is this distinct from other first-century sects of Judaism? Even the Sadducees believed in God. Find out how Yeshua transformed the faith of his followers, and get a fresh handle on what it means to “believe in Jesus” and to be “born again.”

-D. Thomas Lancaster
Sermon Twenty: Faith Toward God
Originally presented on June 15, 2013
from the Holy Epistle to the Hebrews sermon series

Apparently I was premature last week in writing No One Comes to the Father Except Through the Son, because Lancaster tells the same parable I referenced in that blog post in today’s sermon. I should have guessed when the chapter of Elementary Principles I quoted from was called “Faith Toward God”.

Fortunately, there are many other details revealed by Lancaster within the context of his “Faith Toward God” lecture. Here’s what I mean.

Remember, we’re studying the elementary principles of the faith, the very first things one must absolutely grasp as disciples of Jesus, the “milk,” the really simple stuff, the basic “food” you must consume and get used to before you’re ready for “meat.”

But doesn’t “faith toward God” seem a little too elemental? I mean saying “have faith in God” is like saying “God made the Earth” or “the Torah was given through Moses.” How did having faith in God distinguish the Jewish religious stream of “the Way” from all the other Judaisms of their day? All of the Judaisms, no matter how they otherwise differed, had faith in the existence of God.

In fact, the Way and the Pharisees had almost identical beliefs. They both believed in the resurrection, they both believed that God rewards good and punishes evil in this life and the life to come, they both believed that you had to repent to be forgiven of sins.

Apparently though, the Greek we translate as “faith in God” or “faith toward God” is better rendered “faith ON God” or “faith UPON God,” implying a sort of reliance.

Later in the epistle, the writer of Hebrews defines faith, which should help us solve our small mystery:

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the men of old gained approval.

–Hebrews 11:1-2 (NASB)

faithYou probably have that one memorized. But although I’ve read it many times, the meaning of these two verses seems rather vague, or they did until I heard Lancaster’s explanation.

Here’s the key to understanding how a Messianic faith on God would be different from that of a Pharisaic faith or the faith of any other branch of first century Judaism:

And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.

And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised, because God had provided something better for us, so that apart from us they would not be made perfect.

–Hebrews 11:6, 39-40 (NASB)

In case you’re still wondering what all that means, here’s Lancaster’s parable, which I referenced last week, to provide clarification:

Once, a man who had two daughters went off to war. Before he left, he promised to return to them, and he also promised them, “When I return, I will bring you each a fine string of pearls and a summer dress.” No one except the two girls knew about the promise. After many years, the man had not returned, and everyone presumed him dead. His daughters, however, continued to hope, believe, and wait. A decade passed, and they grew to become adult women, but neither of them forgot their father or his promises. Deep in their hearts, they continued to hope and to believe. One day a messenger came seeking the girls. Finding only one daughter, he told her, “I have news of your father. He is returning, and he sends you this gift.” The messenger presented her with a fine string of pearls.

Now both girls still believed in the promise of the father, but one had received a token of the promise, and the other had not. One had faith in the father’s promise on the basis of her hope and confidence in the father’s promise, but the other had faith in the father’s promise on the basis of the good news that she had already received and on the basis of the partial fulfillment of her father’s promise. She already had the pearls. She had no question in her mind that she would soon see her father face to face. Think of that girl’s confidence, certainty, and joy. She no longer had any doubt that her father was coming. She knew that he would bring the summer dress because she had already received the pearls.

-Lancaster,
“Chapter 4: Faith Toward God,” pg 56
Elementary Principles

prayingA Messianic faith upon God isn’t just believing in God’s existence and it isn’t just believing that somehow, someday, God will keep all of His promises, the promise to redeem all of Israel, to return all of the exiles to their Land, to elevate the nation of Israel above all the nations, that there will be a resurrection of the dead, that God will punish the evil and reward the righteous. It’s not just believing in all that. It’s knowing that there’s actual proof, evidence witnessed by the apostles that God was beginning to keep His promises starting in their day.

Remember, the writer of Hebrews said that Abraham, the patriarchs, and all of the Jewish people came before Yeshua (Jesus) also had great faith in God but “did not receive what was promised.”
 But the apostles saw the resurrected Jesus as proof of the promise of the resurrection because he was the first fruits from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:20).

A Messianic faith includes believing not just that God exists but that He is just and that He keeps His promises and that He gave proof of this through the Messiah, through Jesus. The Messianic Jewish disciples did not just believe by faith that there would be a redemption, that the Kingdom of Heaven would come, and that King Messiah would ascend to the throne in Jerusalem, as the Pharisees did. They had direct evidence that the promises were starting to be fulfilled. The apostles were witnesses to this evidence and they passed their testimony to many others, both in the Land of Israel and beyond, both to the Jews but also to the Gentiles.

But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear. For truly I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.

–Matthew 13:16-17 (NASB)

That maps right back to Hebrews 11:39-40. Many great men and women of faith in the history of the Bible longed to see the beginning of the fulfillment of all of God’s promises to Israel but they died and did not see. Yet all those who lived in the time of Yeshua did see and not only did they believe, they believed by faith in the evidence and what they saw with their own eyes.

Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God…

–Romans 1:1 (NASB)

Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother…

–1 Corinthians 1:1 (NASB)

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God…

–Ephesians 1 (NASB)

I said last week that Jesus was the messenger bringing evidence as a gift that God would do all that He said He would do. The importance of this role of Jesus was (and is) incredible, and we see how the apostles, particularly Paul, responded by inexorably linking Jesus and God, for example, in each of the salutations of his letters.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “But the righteous man shall live by faith.”

–Romans 1:16-17 (NASB)

PrayerI’ve wondered what “faith to faith” meant, but in this case, it’s the distinction between one’s faith being through Messiah and any other faith in God, just like the difference between the two sisters in Lancaster’s parable. Faith in God, which is good and which the Jewish people have always had, when viewed and apprehended through the revelation of the Messiah and through his resurrection, becomes more than longing and is transformed into confidence and a lived hope. It’s not just “how long Moshiach, how long,” but “I have faith because I’ve seen.” The one sister in the parable held the pearls in her hands. She could see them, touch them, wear them, and she knew they came from her father and were evidence that he would return bearing his other gift. She knew that not only would he come bringing gifts for her but that he would return to both of his daughters and reward them both with his gifts, just as he promised.

Paul too desired this for both believing and unbelieving Jews.

For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises, whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.

–Romans 9:3-5 (NASB)

Paul would have given up his “gift” to the other “sister” if only she would believe and have the confidence that Paul possessed in God, through Messiah, that all of the New Covenant promises would be fulfilled and were in the beginning process of being fulfilled, having believed from faith to faith.

It was this confidence, through Messiah, that was the only real difference between the Messianic believers and the Pharisees, and it should foreshadow the relationship between observant Messianic Jews and other observant Jews in the modern era. Grasping this Messianic faith and knowing by evidence that it is true is like being born again, like dying and being resurrected, like submerging below the waters of the mikvah and rising again into the air.

Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept secret for long ages past, but now is manifested, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, has been made known to all the nations, leading to obedience of faith…

–Romans 16:25-26 (NASB)

“Obedience of faith.” This Messianic faith isn’t just belief, it’s a lifestyle based on the actual knowledge that God keeps His promises, that God is just, that God rewards the righteous and punishes the wicked, that God requires repentance for the forgiveness of sins, that God requires we turn from sin and back to Him, transforming and conforming our lives to the will of God by the power of the Holy Spirit and faith in the Gospel message of Jesus Christ, who is the “Gospel messenger” who delivered evidence that the promises are going to happen and are beginning to happen right now.

What Did I Learn?

This pretty much reinforces what I wrote about last week and further confirms why having faith in Yeshua as Messiah was and is the next logical step in the progression of a Jewish person’s (as well as a Gentile’s) devotion to the One God. If you do believe that Jesus is the Messiah and that his message is Good News to Israel and also to the Gentile nations, that he brought evidence as to his identity but more, that he brought evidence of God’s gifts through the revelation of his resurrection, then you have not just hope in the unseen, but a sure confidence in what has happened and in what has not yet happened but what will indeed occur. You have the pearls in your hands and believe, by faith, they came from the Father. You don’t just have to believe they will arrive someday by faith. You know they will because part of the promised gift is already with us.

MessiahIf you don’t accept what the messenger said was true and you do not believe the pearls came from your Father, you still have faith, as did the Pharisees, and as many observant and faithful Jews today have, that God will keep His promises, that a Messiah will ascend the throne, that the Temple will be rebuilt, that Israel will be elevated to the head of the nations, and that the exiles will be returned to their Land, but…

…but you have set aside God’s assurances. Even though you have faith and even though you believe very, very strongly that you are doing the right thing, you still are denying something precious that God gave to you. This is what broke Yeshua’s heart (Matthew 27:37-39) and Paul’s (Romans 9:3-5). This is what makes the difference. Denying Yeshua as the Messiah is denying that God gave evidence of His promises through His revelation.

For nearly two-thousand years, Gentile Christianity has been beating up the Jewish people, calling them vile and horrible names, persecuting them, torturing and maiming them, even killing them in the name of Jesus, all because the Jewish people continually refused to accept Jesus as the Messiah. But the “Messiah” that the Gentile Christians offered the Jews was not the Yeshua that the apostles knew. The Church, in splitting from the Jesus-believing Jewish ekkelsia in the early second century and later, rewrote the Gospels and reinterpreted the entire Bible to the point where Yeshua became “Jesus” and Messiah became “Christ”. All of the “good news” that would have been seen as good for the Jews now seemed like poison.

I mentioned last week that the Church is its own worst enemy, but it also has historically been the enemy of the Jews.

Messianic Judaism has come to take back their history, their Messiah, and their Bible and to say, “this belonged to us first.” Jews in Messiah have come to take back their faith toward God through the revelation of Yeshua and his resurrection. These Jews are not only like their distant ancestors, the readers of the Epistle to the Hebrews, but they are the first fruits of the Jewish Messianic Kingdom, the citizens of Israel, the subjects of the King. It is only through them that we Gentiles too may be saved, through the same faith they have, the faith toward God, the faith upon God, the faith Abraham had when he was called righteous (Genesis 15:6, Galatians 3:6).

“A brilliant mind without faith is like a beautiful face without eyes.”

-Shalom Cohen

May the hearts of all those who do not know Yeshua turn to God through Messiah’s revelation, first the Jew and also the Gentile, in the name of my Master and my King, I pray.

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Old Wine Made New

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He told them this parable: “No one tears a piece out of a new garment to patch an old one. Otherwise, they will have torn the new garment, and the patch from the new will not match the old. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, new wine must be poured into new wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for they say, ‘The old is better.’”

–Luke 5:36:39 (NIV)

I normally don’t use the NIV translation, but it more accurately translates Yeshua’s (Jesus’) last word as “better” rather than “good” or “fine”.

Let me explain.

I wasn’t going to write another blog post so soon, but two things happened. The first is that I saw yet another photo posted on Facebook of a presentation, in this case, by Jacob Fronczak, at the First Fruits of Zion (FFOZ) 2014 Shavuot Conference at Beth Immanuel Sabbath Fellowship in Hudson, WI (the photo is posted below), and the second was a comment made by Steve Petersen on a prior blog post:

New wine = new teachings
Old wineskins = disciples who can’t embrace new teaching.

He also provided a link to an article written by D. Thomas Lancaster called New Wine and Old Wineskins: The Parable of Luke 5:36-39 Re-examined.

According to Lancaster, the “wineskin” parable is typically interpreted by the Church as old wine/wineskin being the old, outmoded Law, and new wine/wineskin being the new teaching of salvation by the grace of Christ.

Just as the new wine would burst the old skins and be spilled, so too the New Covenant Gospel of the Church Kingdom would be wasted if it was poured into the Old Covenant, Mosaic, legalistic religion of Judaism. In almost unanimous consent interpreters and commentators have agreed that the old wine, old wineskins and the old coat are all symbols of Judaism and Law whereas the new wine and the new coat are symbols of Christianity and Grace.

The problem, and maybe you spotted it, comes in with the last sentence: “The old is better.” If the Old is the Law and Jesus was teaching that the New, that is grace replacing the Law, is better, how can he possibly say that the old is better?

That is, unless the traditional Christian interpretation has problems.

The answer lies in interpreting Yeshua’s words through the lens of other, similar Rabbinic teachings of that era rather than filtering them through modern Christian doctrine. I won’t go into all the details. I’ve provided the link to Lancaster’s original article. It’s not long and you can read it for yourself.

I want to point out something else, something that’s directly related to my experience at church last Sunday.

Jacob Fronczak, a church Pastor and contributor to First Fruits of Zion, particularly in recent issues of Messiah Journal, is one of the presenters at this year’s Shavuot Conference. I saw his photo next to a projection of a PowerPoint slide. The slide displayed numbered list:

  1. All theological systems are based on premises that cannot be proved, but must be accepted on faith.
  2. The premises we choose will determine the shape of our theology.
  3. If Israel is not present in our premises, Israel will not be present in our fully formed theological system.

Beyond what I can read on the screen, I have no idea what Jacob is teaching, nor will I until FFOZ publishes his presentation in a text or audio format. However, I’d like to take his list and add a little something to it. Especially relative to point three, I’d like to say that it is how Israel is presented in our premises, assuming it’s present at all, that will shape our theological system.

ffoz1Many churches, including the one I attend, believe that Israel and the Jewish people have eschatological significance, that is, they have an existence and purpose in the end times. On the other hand, it is “the Church” as a unique and even supernatural entity that has primacy and is ultimately ascendant (as Israel is presumed to be based on the Hebrew Scriptures and New Covenant language contained therein). So Israel can be present in our premises but cast in a role that renders it secondary to the Church and ultimately, totally subjugated by said-Church (which includes Jews who have converted to Christianity).

Lancaster’s article speaks also to my experience in class last Sunday at church. Here’s his interpretation of the Luke 5:36:39 parable:

No one takes a lesson meant for a new student and tries to teach it to an old (already educated) student. If he does, he will fail to teach the new student, and the lesson meant for the new student will be rejected by the old student.

No one teaches new Torah-teaching to old (previously educated) students. If he does, the new teaching will be rejected, the student will be lost. No. Instead new Torah-teaching must be taught to new students. And no one after receiving old teaching (previous education) wants the new, for he says, “The old teaching is better.”

I’m not sure what to do with this. People, once educated in a particular system, rarely step outside that system or accept new information that apparently contradicts that system, even if the new interpretation objectively makes more sense and is more consistent with the source document (in this case, the Bible) than their current system.

No one likes change. I know I don’t. I’m a real creature of habit. I love my routine. It bugs me when my schedule is thrown off, even a little.

On the other hand, I love learning new things. And over time, I’ve learned many new things and have slowly allowed my perspective on theology and doctrine to change as new information became available and, after I thoroughly assessed it, determined that this “new wine” did indeed belong in my “old wineskin” (go figure). I guess to a limited degree, this old leopard can take on a few new spots.

walking-into-churchBut that means certain things relative to being at church and being in Sunday school. It means that I was right (or rather, my wife was) in saying that I have nothing to offer anyone at church. This assumes that everyone is there at church because they want to be there and that they agree with everything (or most everything) being taught. Even if there are minor disagreements with particular points, there is still more agreement between all the people within that system than there would be with just about anything I had to say from my “alien” viewpoint.

So, for them, “the old is better.” Who wants the new wine I’ve tried to peddle in their midst? I was right to keep quiet in Sunday school, even when I heard Jewish people and Israel being momentarily “dissed”.

On the other hand (like Tevye, I find there’s almost always an “other hand”), people have periodically approached me and said that they liked some point I made or found something I said interesting or enlightening. I assume that everyone in Sunday school and in church all universally agree with each other and unless they say otherwise, there’s no way to know for sure. I can speak up from time to time and hope I get lucky (or perhaps hope that the Holy Spirit will render someone’s heart a little more open to my opinions), or keep quiet, respecting the majority (including the church leadership since several members of the Board of Elders go to the same class) and withhold anything that might be elucidating to the possible minority who could be open to hearing it.

On that day, when two, poorly educated fishermen stood before the Sanhedrin, they demonstrated the full caliber of their education under Yeshua and vindicated his choice of disciples. New garments, new wineskins and new students.

Lancaster’s interpretation of Yeshua’s parable has limits. It assumes that only new (uneducated) students would accept the Master’s teachings, but we know he attracted the attention of “old wineskins” such as Nicodemus (John 3:1-21) and Joseph of Arimathea (John 19:38). Who knows how many other “old” and well-educated disciples Yeshua attracted, either during his “earthly ministry” or later, during the time of the apostles?

I think an old dog can learn new tricks, it’s just not as easy as when you were (I was) a new dog.

Everyone listening to Jacob Fronczak and the other presenters at the Shavuot conference wants to be there. They bought tickets to attend the event, arranged to travel there, arranged for lodgings, and so on. They went through no small effort to make their way to Hudson and to find themselves sitting in the pews of this beautiful synagogue setting. So each and every person there is open to what is being taught.

And like I said, although it’s not quite the same effort to attend my local church, all of the people present are there willingly, and they all are open to learning what is being taught, even if they don’t agree one-hundred percent of the time.

But they didn’t sign up to listen to me spout off about new wine. That’s not my job and no one asked me to take it onboard. Maybe there are some old wineskins that might want a little new wine, but I can hardly tell who they are and what they might be open to.

On the other hand, my blog is open to the world or at least anyone with Internet access. I can only assume that each person who visits, if they stay long enough to read, is doing so willingly, even if they disagree with some of the things I say. My “wine” is welcome for the most part within their “wineskins.” At least I don’t have worry that there’ll be some outcry to ban me from the web.

wineThe Internet isn’t “community” though sometimes we fall into the illusion that it is. Facebook, twitter, and blogging aside, you don’t really form a community in virtual reality. I know the difference between Facebook “friends” and face-to-face friends.

But sometimes the Internet is all you’ve got, especially if “face-to-face” are old wineskins and all you’ve got to offer is new wine.

But my new wine has the flavor of the centrality of Israel, the primacy of the Jewish people in past and future prophesy, with the capstone being Messiah, Son of David, Son of God. My wine doesn’t spill all over the pages of the Torah, blotting out major sections, shuffling about the letters and words, and making them appear as if God said one thing but really meant another.

In a very real way, my “new wine” is actually old, really old. In fact, I’m banking that it’s at least as old as what the apostles, and even the Master taught. That means the old really is better, for the old is God who makes a covenant and never breaks it, who embraces Israel and never releases her, who presents the Torah through Moses and never changes a word or a letter as long as Heaven and Earth continue to exist.

In my bottle of old wine, Messiah brings a Gospel message that really is good news to the Jewish people and that supports and upholds the dignity and preservation of national Israel. It’s also good news for the Gentiles as long as we realize that salvation comes from the Jews (John 4:22).

It’s amazing what a single photograph and a few sentences of text will inspire. A toast to old wine made new again.

Chag Shavuot Sameach!