Why we Believe

What we Believe

 

History and Challenge

© Mark Pitrone, September 03, 2003

At the outset of this exercise I’d like to set some parameters.

1). I believe in YHWH, the God and Father of our Messiah, Yeshua of Nazareth, the God of Avraham, Yitzak and Ya’akov.

2). I believe Yeshua was born to a virgin, Miriam of Nazareth, who, outside of being chosen of YHWH to be the mother of Yeshua in fulfillment of Isaiah 7.14 (‘a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and call his name Emmanuel’), was no one special, a sinner like me.

3). I believe that Yeshua is the eternal Son of YHWH, and that,

4). With the Father and the Ruach haKodesh, commonly called the Holy Spirit/Ghost, he is an integral part of the Triune Godhead.

5). I believe Yeshua was the fulfillment of all the sin offerings and trespass offerings to which Israel was subjected after their transgression in the wilderness at the foot of Mt. Sinai, while Moshe was on the mountain receiving the covenant etched in stone by the very hand of YHWH, and that,

6). This substitutionary atonement of Yeshua is mankind’s only basis for justification before YHWH.

7). I believe that the Godhead created the universe, and all that in it is, in 6 literal 24 hour days, and that if that bedrock truth of B’reshit (Genesis) chapter 1 is not true, all the rest is just chasing after the wind, as there is no foundation on which to build a solid doctrinal structure.

8). I believe that in this creation, YHWH the Father planned, YHWH the Son executed that plan and made, and YHWH the Spirit energized, all that exists or lives.

9). I may be Sicilian, but I'm humble enough to know that I don't know everything. If I hold a position that goes against the revealed Word of YHWH IN ITS CONTEXT, I will change my position to match his. I am after YHVH's heart. I want it to be my heart. So, I am open to wiser and more learned minds than mine correcting me when I am wrong.

Those statements of belief and trust in YHWH to be true should establish that I am fundamentally sound in my doctrine, though I may seem somewhat unorthodox in my presentation and interpretation of the truth of scripture.

 

As I was reading through the vision that came to Ezekiel about the dry bones in the Valley of Jehoshaphat and the prophecy given him immediately following and concerning that vision, I was struck with the two sticks that YHWH told him to take up. On the one he was to write, “For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companion.” And then he was to take a second stick and on it write, “For Joseph, and for all the house of Israel his companions.” Then he was to join the two sticks together in one hand, so that the two sticks would be one in his hand.

This was an object lesson, which was a favorite way for YHWH to reveal things to Israel through Ezekiel. A little history is necessary to put all this into perspective.

When Shlomo (Solomon) died, his son Rehoboam was not nearly as wise in ruling the nation as YHWH had given Shlomo to be. He was full of the rashness of youth and would not listen the wise counselors who had served Shlomo in such good stead. The tribes of Israel asked for tax relief and Rehoboam laid even more taxes on them. So the 10 northern tribes left the union and formed their own country, naming it Israel. They set up Jeroboam as their king in the city of Samaria. These northern tribes came to be called Ephraim and Joseph by the prophets of YHWH.

Jeroboam knew that if his people went up to Y’rushelaim (Jerusalem) to worship they would end up going back to following Rehoboam as their king. So he set up idols in Dan and Bethel (on Mt. Gerizim, which is the seat of the Samaritan religion), exactly like the ones Israel had gone after in the transgression at Sinai. Don’t ask what he was thinking. It’s a mystery to better minds than mine.

Suffice it to say YHWH was not happy with this turn of events, nor was he happy with the ten northern tribes who blindly followed their political leaders rather than revealed truth, and sent prophets to try to turn them back to the true faith of YHWH. In the 200+ years of the northern kingdom, every king followed after the sin of Jeroboam, and they got worse and worse as time went on. YHWH finally had enough and brought Assyria to carry them away from the land to be assimilated into the native populations of the countries to which they were carried. This was NOT such a big deal to Israel as it was to Judah when they were finally carried off to Babylon, because Israel had over 200 years of idolatry in their immediate past. No one in Israel had ever known true YHWH worship. When they returned to god, it was not to YHWH, but to the false gods of Jeroboam. Their revivals were to reawaken a slightly less wicked (from our human point of view) pagan idolatry and merely CALL it YHWH worship.

So the northern kingdom of Israel was carried off and assimilated into the pagan nations, lost to human history. But not to YHWH. He knows who the descendants of Israel are. And he says in our prophecy of Ezekiel 37.15ff that he will bring them out of the nations and join them to their brethren, Judah. There is a B’rit haDashah (commonly known as the New Testament) passage that I believe corresponds to this prophecy. It is found in Rev.7, where 12,000 of each tribe will be marked by the angels of YHWH for protection during the time of trouble that is to come on all the earth. There is no way to know who among all the people of earth are descendants of the ten tribes. Only the Jews, the descendants of the southern kingdom, know their ancestry all the way back to Adam. The Jews are from the tribes of Judah, Levi and Benjamin. YHWH only knows who are the descendants of the other tribes. I submit to you that the stick of Ephraim represents the gentile believers in the Nazarene (some call it Messianic) faith of Yeshua and Sha’ul (Paul) and Kefa (Peter) and Ya’akov (James) and Yohannan (John) and others. I also submit to you that the stick of Judah is the Jews who will ALL be saved one day soon.

Here is something that may be new to your thinking, but consider it before discarding it. YHWH made a promise to Avraham in B’reshit (Genesis) 12.3 that in him ALL the families (nations) of the earth would be blessed. While the ultimate spiritual fulfillment of this promise is Yeshua, could it not be that the physical fulfillment was accomplished with the carrying away and assimilation of Israel into the pagan nations, and that ALL of humanity - each of us - are physical descendants of Avraham, and physically Ephraim thereby?

If that is the case, all of the gentile nations are physical descendants of Jacob; all are heirs according to promise if they follow after YHWH, the God of Avraham, Yitzak and Ya’akov. And, if that is the case, we need to find out just how to follow after YHWH. To accomplish that we can do nothing but enquire at the revealed Word of our Father in heaven. He has revealed to us what we need to do. The middle wall of partition has been torn by the death of our Messiah and we, Jews and gentiles, have been made one in the Blood of the Lamb. So how are we to follow after Yeshua?

Now, you may not believe this, but the answer is really pretty simple to arrive at. There was a very successful ad campaign a few years ago, which is still pretty much in vogue today among Christians and non-christians alike. It had the slogan, “What Would Jesus Do?” or “WWJD”.

I submit to you that that was the wrong question. Who are we to try to guess what the Creator of the universe would do in a given situation? Is that not setting ourselves up as ‘God’? Yeshua could do whatever he pleased to do within the bounds he’d placed on himself. We have neither the power, nor the wisdom to use it if we did possess it. The proper attitude for the believer in Yeshua to have and live by is, “Do What Yeshua Did” or “DWYD”.

Think about it for a minute. If you are claiming to follow Yeshua, should you not keep your eyes on him and put your feet in the very tracks he left? There are numerous references throughout scripture to not turning to the right hand or to the left. Is that not what YHWH meant; to follow directly behind and not look anywhere else?

So how do we do what Yeshua did? We are to live the covenant that YHWH gave us to follow, trusting that he will graciously enable us to perform all that he would have us perform. The nation of Israel and later Judah proved that they could not keep the covenant in their own strength, walking by sight rather than faith. Even the relatively good kingdom of Judah was only good under believing and trusting kings. They had numerous revivals in Judah, but all were instigated by the king and all were as short lived as he. Within a very few years of the good king’s death Judah would be right back to their usual backslidden condition, having slid further back than they’d been before the revival.

The key is trusting YHWH to do what he says he will do. Now, he never said he would give us all we want. He promises to take care of our food and clothing, not our cars and houses and all the other things that we Americans think we need. He never promised to give us riches in this life, but that we would reign with him in the life to come. He promised to make us a kingdom of priests.

I say he promised to make us a kingdom of priests. The church loves to say they are a royal priesthood, and they are (1Pe.2.9). But didn’t he promise the same thing to Israel? In Ex.19.3-6, YHWH gives the basics of the covenant. Vv.3 and 4 are the enabling clause of the covenant, where he gives his qualifications to make these conditions. Vv.5 and 6 are the rudiments of the covenant. “…if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar people: for all the earth is mine: and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation.” Israel responded by saying, “All that YHWH says we will do.”

Did we not enter into the same covenant? If not, how can we expect what YHWH promised to Israel to be ours? Did he nullify his covenant with Israel? Is YHWH a cosmic ‘Indian-giver’? (Sorry if that phrase offends you. It is succinct and everyone knows what it means. By the way, if that offends you, you really need to get a life.) I submit to you that he is not an Indian-giver, and his promises to Israel were forever, ‘for the gifts and the callings of YHWH are without repentance’ (Rom.11.29). What has happened is that WE have become a part of the commonwealth of Israel; grafted into their root, not they into ours. And if that is the case, we are to abide by the same conditions as they. We have a great advantage over them in that the covenant has already been kept by a human being in the life of Yeshua the Messiah. He has kept all righteousness and imputed that righteousness to us, IF we trust him. Not that he didn’t impute righteousness in times past, but we have it in our history and can point back to it, while they had to trust that it would be done for them in their future. It was harder for them to trust YHWH would deliver than it is for us to trust in what he's already delivered.

Before Messiah Yeshua lived on earth, the people of Israel were saved by their trusting YHWH to deliver on his promises. Now that he’s come, we are saved by trusting YHWH to deliver on his promises. The only real difference between us is our placement in history. And the only difference between believers in Messiah now and then is, likewise, our placement in history.

That last statement is going to get me in very hot water with both Christian and Jew, but it shouldn’t. The Jew won’t like it because I use the name Yeshua as both YHWH and Messiah (Acts 2.36). The Christian won’t like it because I said Jews who believe YHWH and trust his Messiah as deliverer are saved. There is really no contradiction. The Jew believes his deliverance is in Messiah, and it is. The Christian points to the writings of Rav Sha’ul and says ‘there is no salvation in any other name’. Well, no kidding! What most Christians fail to understand is that the very name Yeshua means ‘salvation’ and ‘deliverance’. When a Jew trusts in YHWH's Deliverance, whom do you think he names? In whom does he trust?

Now comes the part you Christians are really going to get up in arms about, but I believe YHWH would have me say this to you. We gentile believers in Jesus are every bit as guilty as the people of the northern kingdom were in syncretizing the faith of YHWH with the faith of the pagans. Syncretism is the act of melding together two systems of thought or belief and calling the product by one of the original names. In the case of the gentile church, the syncretism was joining the true early Nazarene teaching and faith with Roman/Greek sun worship.

We have been fed lies by our fathers in the faith for almost 1800 years, since Constantine ‘accepted’ Christ and issued the Edict of Toleration in 321CE. Constantine was a devotee of Sol Invictus Mithra, the sun god of Rome. He believed he was the son of Sol Invictus and as such should be worshipped as a god. This Mithra religion had been around in various incarnations and by many names since at least Nimrod’s time, and is in fact the basis for ALL non-YHWH religions.

Constantine incorporated the Nazarene faith’s terminology into Mithraism and called it Christianity. He put ‘christian’ names to all sorts of pagan practices, like changing the name of Childmass, which was the practice of sacrificing babies to the sun (in the 'person' of Moloch) on the morning of December 25th, to Christmas. You can see how the pagan celebration has become part of our Christmas celebration by reading Yerem’Yahu (Jeremiah) 10.2-4. “Learn not the way of the heathen” seems to be pretty plain to me, but we see these things in scripture and say, “Oh, that doesn’t apply to me on this side of the cross! I have ‘liberty’ in Christ. I can do as I pretty well please.” Nothing is further from the truth.

While it is true that you are not saved by keeping the covenant yourself (and neither, by the way, is Israel), you do have to keep the covenant, or you will find yourself in habitual sin. We are to ‘work out your salvation with fear and trembling’, not to be justified, but because we are justified by the faith of Yeshua.

Another example of our syncretism is our celebration of the pagan holiday of Easter. I know we celebrate it as ‘Resurrection Sunday’, but Yeshua was not raised on Sunday. Let me say that again, and emphasize, Yeshua was NOT raised on Sunday!

It can get kind of involved, but I can prove from scripture that Yeshua died on Wednesday and was buried just before sundown, and then was raised on Sabbath afternoon, just before sundown. Look at Matthew 12.39-41 and Luke 11.29-32 for the basis of that timing. Now remember that the 1st day of Unleavened Bread (Lev.23.6) was a Sabbath and the problem most people raise is resolved. So when you’ve gone to those Sun Rise services, you’ve participated in satanic sun worship without even knowing it. Until now, that is. Now you have no excuse, and to do so again is sin to you. You are welcome. (Refer questions to the e-mail address below.)

Just to give you a little background about that sunrise service, it was originally a service in which the priests of Ishtar (Ashtaroth, Esther, Easter) would rape a virgin on the altar of Ishtar in order to impregnate her. The altar had already been ‘purified’ by the blood of the innocent infant product of the previous years raping, and the rest of the blood was used to color eggs for use in the rest of the day’s festivities. Planned Parenthood and all the rest of the culture of death would love this one. Satanism has always loved slaughtering innocents. The last 2 sentences are personal opinions of YHWH’s and mine, and should be viewed as such, personal opinions. Planned Parenthood and other Satanist’s may attempt to sue me for what I think is true, but they can’t get blood from a stone, try though they may.

These pagan religious practices come down to us by way of the Roman Catholic doctrines that were incorporated into almost all of the protestant denominations that the Roman Catholic Church birthed. She is the Mother of Harlots. Notice please, that I was careful to single out the Church and her doctrines, not Roman Catholic people. I know and know of many Roman Catholic people who are just as appalled at these things as I am, and who are just as justified by the faith of Yeshua as anyone else is. I hate the satanic system they are part of, but not the people themselves. The fact is that most, if not all, of the offshoots of Roman Catholicism are as guilty of the same sins as the Mother of Harlots is. Yeshua called these denominations harlots in Rev.17. I am merely repeating his judgment. I think believers ought to get out of both the Roman Church and her harlot children (Rev.18) so they can live righteously, but they are responsible before YHWH and he may have something for them to do there. One can attend a church and not be a part of the paganism, though it is difficult and looks like tacit approval. The course of staying to try to influence the faithful back to the faith of Yeshua should be entered into only by those who have a specific call of YHWH to do so. The tendency is for the faithful to be assimilated into the paganism, not vice-versa.

Now to the meat of the issue. If all the above is true, and I think it is, gentile believers are as bound by the covenant as Jewish believers. We are not bound to the law that came as a result of the transgression (Jer.7.21-24, Gal.3.19), which is the ceremonial law of trespass offerings and all the stuff that goes with them (see our article on Gal.3.19). We are bound to the covenant. We spoke briefly of it near the beginning of this piece. In EX.19.3-6 we have the basics of the covenant. In Ex.19.16 - 20.17 YHWH spoke the covenant outline to the people, and they were so frightened by the voice of YHWH that they asked Moshe to be their mediator. They also agreed to do whatever Moshe said YHWH said they should do. Then in ch.21-23 YHWH gave the complete covenant to Moshe, who then presented it to them, first by mouth and then, after writing it down, he read it in their hearing. And they agreed again to do what YHWH said. Then in Ex.24, Moshe went back into the mountain with Aharon, the priests and elders of Israel and they had a ‘wedding feast’ on a plateau to which YHWH had brought heaven’s throne room down in which to have the party. All this took place over a period of one day.

Next Moshe went into the mount for 40 days to receive the covenant at the hand of YHWH. At the end of that time the people got Aharon to make them golden calves, like they’d had in Egypt. When YHWH threatened to wipe them out, Moshe interceded for them, but YHWH added the trespass offerings and a bunch of other stuff to remind them of what they’d done and to lead them to want their Messiah. These laws that came down AFTER the golden calf incident (cf Jer.7.21-24) are the laws that, in Gal.3.19, were “added because of transgressions”. These laws that are added have nothing to do with the covenant. Here is an equation that you may not like, for it is new to you:

Old Covenant = New Covenant.

Look at Yerem’Yahu 31.31-34 and tell me if there is anything there to support the claim that the covenants are different. I submit to you that the only difference between the covenants is the medium on which they are written. The New Covenant is actually a Renewal of the existing Covenant. I further submit to you that the covenant written on our hearts is, in context, to be fulfilled in the Millennial Kingdom, though it has application for today.

Notice in Jer.31.31 that the covenant is with BOTH houses of Jacob, Israel and Judah. Do you see the reference to YHWH being our husband? Ex. 24 was the wedding feast. We were married. Do you remember the Last Supper? Do you remember that Yeshua, after supper, took the cup and blessed it and said, “This is the New Covenant in my blood…?” That was the betrothal ceremony that Jewish men of the day went through when they wanted to take a bride. The man would offer a cup of wine to his intended and promise to protect and provide for her, if she chose to drink of the cup. The moment she did, they were married legally, though not yet in practice. Then he would go to his father’s house and prepare for her a home and build a business by which to provide for her. Does this ring a bell in your mind? Like Jn.14.1-6?

The betrothal is not the marriage feast. The promised new covenant is yet future and will be fulfilled in the millennium. The term ‘after those days’ in Jer.31.33 refers to the 2 millennia that followed between our betrothal to Yeshua and the consummation. After 2 days, or 2 thousand years (2Pe.3.8) - ‘those days’ - will YHWH write his laws on our inward parts so we will no longer sin, and he will forgive our iniquities, and he will remember our sins no more. It is yet future. Don’t make the common mistake of confusing ‘those days’ with ‘that day.’ ‘That day’, the day of Messiah, immediately follows ‘those days.’

For right now, he sees our sin, and it is ever before him. He forgives us of the eternal consequences of them when we confess and forsake them, but we still get to live with the physical consequences; illness, death, poverty, hunger and such. This time is ‘those days’. The New Covenant comes AFTER those days.

Now, if the house of Israel corresponds to the gentile believers, and it does, then all the promises and warnings the prophets delivered to Israel are things we ought to look at and heed. The prophesies of Isaiah, Elijah, Hosea, Amos and others are for us. We need to return to YHWH’s true worship as embodied in the Covenant, not to be saved, for no one was ever justified by any works. We need to keep the covenant to prove our salvation to ourselves and to others, especially the Jews. When they see us celebrating Sabbath and the Feasts and receiving the blessings that were promised to them, they will be provoked to jealousy and maybe return to the YHWH of their fathers, Avraham, Yitzak and Ya’akov.

There are 613 mitzvoth, commandments, in Torah, which are summarized by the 10 Commandments of the Covenant. More than ½ of the 613 are of no consequence today because there is no temple or priesthood. Of the rest, many are for either men or women, but not both. All told there are about 280 mitzvoth that apply to any one of us, and often not all at the same time. If we do them, we will never be in transgression of any righteous law of men. And if the laws of men are contradictory to the laws of YHWH, then they are no laws.

Would it not be wonderful to only have around 300 laws to worry about, instead of the over 2.5 million laws, and the 84 shelf MILES used to catalogue them, in the Library of Congress? That is what America’s founding fathers intended; that we each would govern ourselves by the 10 Commandments of YHWH. If we would do that, we would be the freest country ever to exist. Our founders intended us to be the New Zion, the city on the hill, the beacon of light to which all would hope to come.

If you’ve come this far, you are of sturdy stuff, and what I’ve written must have struck a chord in your heart. If that’s the case, I ask you to do one more thing. Read Amos 6, and see if by replacing Zion and Samaria with America and Washington, respectively, it doesn’t send chills down your spine at the thought of the judgment of YHWH that is coming down on the US of A very soon.

I welcome comments, hate letters and questions.

Mark Pitrone
mark@fulfillingtorah.org

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