How to Engage in the Jewish Foundation of our Faith Without Getting Weird

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I was praying about what to share about a week or so ago because a lot of different things you could talk about in the Jewish space, and I felt really strongly the Lord led me to basically figure out how to engage the Jewish foundation of our faith and not be weird because I’m sure you’ve never met any weird person in the Jewish Christian space. They don’t exist. But something that we say at Gateway a lot regarding the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit’s not weird. People are weird. And it’s the same concept. If someone came to me and they said, you got to go to this church, they love the Holy Spirit, and they were a little weird,
I would be like, is this going to be a weird experience for me? Not because the Holy Spirit’s weird, but because that’s the only thing that you’ve told me about this church and you’re really excited and you’re a little weird In the same way if people are like, you got to come to this church, they love the Jewish stuff, I’d be like, is this going to be a weird spot for me? Not because the Jewish stuff is weird. That’s amazing, but because you’re a little weird and it’s the only thing you’ve told me about this church, it’s not like they have great communion and great worship intimacy of God and the Bible teaching is great and they love the Jewish stuff. You’re like, it sounds amazing, but so many times it’s just siloed and it’s the only thing that we want to talk about, whether it’s this is the Holy Spirit, it’s the Holy Spirit church.
I also think it’s interesting that the gifts that God gives us, oftentimes the ones that are the most helpful are the most attacked. Another message that I love to give is on praying in the Spirit. And it’s interesting that the Holy Spirit as a concept is already sensitive in the church. I mean, there’s multiple streams of churches that are like, don’t talk about the Holy Spirit. And Jesus literally said, do not go fulfill the great Commission until you have the Holy Spirit. And yet we’re now walking onto eggshells about the Holy Spirit. You get even deeper into that and you start talking about praying in the spirit. I mean, don’t even talk, don’t touch it in many streams of the church, and it’s interesting to me because when I read the gifts of the Holy Spirit, one Corinthians 14 is very clear and Paul says, when you pray in the Spirit, you do not speak to man.
You speak to God. No one understands him, but in the spirit he speaks mysteries. When you prophesy, you build up the church. When you pray in the spirit, you build up yourself. I’m like, wow, there’s a gift that God gave us that builds yourself up. If I’m the enemy, I’m like, get that one off the list mean you can do something 24 7 at any point in time to build yourself up. Yeah, I’m going to make sure you never do that. How has the enemy done that with weirdness? Because every time I talk about praying in the spirit, typically, and in my case, every time someone has a trepidation or a contention, it’s never because they read first Corinthians 14 and they just have a different take every time. It’s because of bad experience. Something weird happened or they saw something weird or a weird YouTube video, something weird around that which kept me from engaging.
And I think it’s brilliant from the enemy’s perspective because if he can just label it as weird, I won’t even want to engage with it and I’m actually keeping myself from something that’s going to build myself up in the same way, when you understand the Jewish context of scripture, the Jewish context of our faith, the foundation, the Bible comes to life like never before. If I’m the enemy, I don’t want that. So lemme just keep you from engaging. And I think one of the primary ways the enemy does this is through weirdness. So how do we engage without ourselves becoming weird? And how can we understand how to delve into this world in a clear and balanced and healthy way? So we’re going to talk about engaging in this Jewish foundation. So I have to preach with a whiteboard. I just decided even last time when I didn’t have a whiteboard, I pretended I had a whiteboard.
So why not just bring it out? So what people don’t often think about when they dive into the Jewish stuff is where they’re going to land. They don’t really think about that. So to make it clear, here’s how the Lord’s kind of shown it to me. There are three pools or jacuzzis, whatever floats your boat that you will land in as you begin to dive into the Jewish stuff. And so the title of my message, if there was a title, is Engaging the Jewish Foundation of our Faith without Getting Weird. And these are called the three pools of the Jewish plunge. So as you plunge into the Jewish world and the Jewish context of scripture and the Jewish foundation of our faith, you will land in one of these three pools. So before we mention what the three pools are, what you’ll see is when you begin engaging with the Jewish Foundation of Scripture and how that impacts us today, you basically have to answer a couple questions and you begin to wrestle with, I shouldn’t say what’s a good word, four concepts.
So the first one is Torah, or as it’s often translated in the New Testament, is the law. And as you dive into the Jewish context, you’ll realize that Hebrew has one word that means 50 things. In the Greek you have 50 words that mean basically the same thing. So they’re kind of the exact opposite language. And it’s really hard to translate because Torah, yes, it means law, but what does it also mean the Torah? If a Jewish person talks about the Torah, they’re talking about the five books of Moses, they’re talking about the Bible. But if you have to choose one word to translate it, then you’re mic in a sticky situation because not only does it mean law, not only does it mean Bible, but it also means teaching because it’s the Torah of Moses. So it’s the teaching of Moses. So when we begin diving into the Jewish context and we see Paul talking about the Torah, are we going to translate that as law?
Because if it’s law, we might get some confusion because we’re not under the law. But what if we translate it as teaching? Are we no longer under the teaching of Moses? I don’t know. Are we no longer under the Bible? Because when Joshua says we need to meditate on the Torah day and night, what do we think he means? Probably means scripture. But when we translate it law, we can get confused. So as you dive into the Jewish world, you have to figure out what do we mean by Torah? And then you start getting in all of these commandments in the Hebrew scriptures, what we call the Old Testament and which ones relate to me and which ones am I supposed to practice? If you live in one of these pools, you might just push all of that into the Old Testament. Thank God we don’t exist in that anymore.
But as you dive into the Jewish context of all of scripture, we’re confronted with Torah. Second thing we’re confronted with similar to this is the feasts. So what do we do with the feast? Because God’s very clear in the Hebrew scriptures, this is what you have to celebrate and this is how you celebrate and how many days you celebrate and this is what you eat and this is what you don’t eat. So what do we do with this as we’re diving into the Jewish Foundation, the next thing that we are confronted with is Israel, what do we do with the land of Israel? And this is a modern problem that we haven’t had to deal with for about 1900 years because for 1900 years there was no Israel. So it was really easy to figure out what to do with Israel Old Testament. And then 1948 Israel pops on a map again and we’re like, well, what do we do now? So we’re confronted with Israel. And then lastly, we’re confronted with Jew and Gentile because the Bible talks about it a lot old and New Testament, and we have to figure out what that means as we’re diving in taking the Jewish plunge into these pools. So we’re going to start on the left here with the most common theology, the most common pool that the church dives into regarding Israel, and that is the replacement pool.
This is where most churches will end up. Replacement theology is the basic belief that God chose Israel in the Old Testament, but it was really just a foreshadow of the church. He did it with Israel, but it was always pointing to something bigger than just Israel. And when Jesus came, the Jewish people had the opportunity to receive him. They didn’t. So he rejected them and he gave the promises to Israel, to the church. And now we can retroactively read the Old Testament as a very spiritual truth that was just leading to where we are now, kind of a universal model. The problem with replacement theology is it defames God’s character because all throughout the Hebrew scriptures, the Old Testament, God is saying, I’m a covenantal faithful God. I will make a covenant with you and your descendants after you as an everlasting covenant. Everlasting meaning lasts forever.
But then the Jewish people rejected Jesus. And so that covenant lasts forever stopped, but he gave it to us. And what it does when you really think deeply about it is it makes Israel and it makes the church his new bride. And there’s several problems with that, let alone God’s character as a faithful God. But how would we feel secure? What if there’s a third bride coming? Why would we feel secure now? He broke that covenant. Why would he break ours? We’re not doing too hot right now in the church. So it defames God’s character and it puts us on very shaky ground. So replacement theology is the spiritual understanding that God replaced Israel with the church. So what do we then I’ll do different colors. This is the green pool. Algae. Algae everywhere. Okay, so what does replacement theology believe about the Torah? Well, because we most likely all grew up in the church and church context, what do we believe about the Old Testament spiritual? It’s a spiritual principles. It’s good stories, but it really doesn’t influence what we do today. If someone read you most of the commands in the Old Testament, you have to do this. What do we say? Well, we don’t have to. Why? Because it’s the Old Testament. We’re in the New Testament and it’s really a great kind of get out of jail free card like it’s the Old Testament, I ain’t got to do any of that. So we see it as law and we see it as spiritual.
So everything is spiritualized and universalized. This was something he did for a season, but it was really then to just do this thing with the whole world where that’s not important anymore. It’s more about the new covenant. And then we read scriptures where Paul says, you are not under Roman six 14 for sin shall no longer be your master because you are not under the law, but you’re under grace. So then we can see this and say, okay, so we’re not under the old anymore, we’re under the new. And that’s how we view the Torah. That’s how we view the law. So what do we do with the feasts? Well, similar to this, the feast have been fulfilled. So Jesus fulfilled the feasts and the ones that he didn’t fill, he’s going to fill right in revelations when the trumpet sounds. That’s the shofar blast.
That’s a feast. He’s going to come back and tabernacle with us. That’s tabernacle. So he fulfilled Passover and Pentecost first fruits and he’s going to fulfill these other fees. So that’s Jesus’ world. We don’t have to do that anymore. That’s old. That’s under the old covenant. What do we do with Israel? Some of this I want to highlight some language. Language is both very important and not important. It’s important because we will often use specific language to communicate a truth. What I want all of us in this room to be able to do is to hear language and begin to decipher, okay, what pool is that in? Because oftentimes you’re going to be listening to somebody and be like, this is great. They love Israel. But then they say something that should make us think, okay, wait, is this replacement theology or on the other side of the spectrum, someone that loves Israel and is preaching all this stuff and your mind’s being blown because diving into this Jewish pool and you realize, wait, am I in the wrong pool right now? And so this is really to help equip you and all of us to say, okay, where are we landing? We’re going to land in one of these three spots regarding Israel, some language that you’ll hear. I’m not saying this language is inherently wrong, that’s why I say it’s not important because it’s not inherently wrong, but all languages. Language is sometimes. Sometimes language now has its own meaning, even though that wasn’t the original intent, you will hear ancient Israel.
So when I hear ancient Israel, not every time, but oftentimes it’s a way of verbally communicating. Not today though, because there’s no way Israel right now is ancient Israel. Why? Because we’re in the replacement pool and there’s no way that modern Israel can be ancient Israel. So we’re going to give a very clear distinction. That’s ancient Israel, that’s God’s chosen people. Well, who’s chosen the people now me, the church. So what do we think about Israel? Israel’s a nation just like any other nation. And I love Israel, I love Brazil, and God loves Israel, he loves Brazil. It’s just a regular nation. People that need to receive Jesus. That’s it. Now, ancient Israel or God’s chosen people, but as you think deeper, what does that mean about ancient Israel’s modern day context? We are ancient Israel. So what you’ll hear is there’s ancient Israel and then there’s spiritual Israel who is spiritual Israel? The church. We are the people of God. We are the new spiritual Israel. And they’ll use scriptures like Galatians three, seven. Know then that those who have faith, our children of Abraham. So if I have faith, I’m a child of Abraham, what does that mean? I’m Israel now and in the replacement pool, there’s no space for the Jewish people or modern Israel to be that because it applies only to us.
Lastly, what do we do with Jews and gentiles? And you’re going to find this scripture is going to, we’re going to kind of interpret this scripture in every pool, but Galatians 3 28, there is no longer Jew or Gentile for those who are in Christ Jesus. There is no longer Jew or Gentile period. So that’s what we believe. If you’re a Christian, this form of theology can also be called third race theology. Why is it called Third Race? Because there’s three races. There’s Jew, there’s Gentile, and there’s Christian. And if you receive Jesus, you’re now in that third race. You’re kind of your own thing and you’re no longer Jew or Gentile. Now to get a little bit more in the weeds, sadly everything in life, we exist on a spectrum. I did this to young adults and I was like spectrum. And everyone was like, that’s not a spectrum. And I was like, it’s a spectrum to me. So everything exists on a spectrum. I think about a spectrum like a hundred times a day because so many things in scripture exist on a spectrum. For example, L-G-B-T-Q, this exists on a spectrum. On one extreme you’re going to have Westboro Baptist, which believes that God hates gays. That’s their website. Most churches aren’t there,
Right? That’s the extreme. On the other side of the extreme, you have, God doesn’t care about sexuality, he doesn’t care about sexual identity, he doesn’t care about purity, he just wants to love everybody. So we’re not even going to talk about it. Most churches, there are some, but that’s the extreme. Most churches live somewhere on this spectrum, right? It is really easy to see the extremes. Most people don’t say at this church, we believe in replacement theology. We’re the church now, not the Jews. No one’s going to really say, I mean, I’m sure they exist, probably not having a lot of people flock to them. So most exist somewhere here on this spectrum. So I want to say most of what we’re talking about today is not things that we just found. We’re not so smart at Center for Israel, we just figured this out.
Smarter people like Greg Stone have informed us. A lot of what I’m talking about was informed by Dr. David Rudolph, who is the supreme messianic leader in the world in our eyes, he’s been over our Messianic Jewish studies program at the Kings University since 2015, has done dissertations thoughtfully, thought through all of these issues, and he has a perspective paper that I put on my PDF to have it read to me, and it was two hours long. So my gift to you is giving you a little bit of a synopsis, but some of you’re going to want to go deeper. So we’re going to put it the link for those who are watching because it’s worth the read and he’ll dive into every objection, every scripture that we won’t have time to go in today. So I say that to say, Dr. David Rudolph uses these two terms.
There is hard super session and soft super session. Super session is another way of saying replacement. Why do we not say replacement? That sounds bad. I remember I was watching a Spider-Man TV show. I was with my younger cousin. I don’t just watch that. No, I do. And he was teaming up with Deadpool, who is a very aggressive, violent character, but it’s a kid show. And so he wanted to hurt the bad guys. And Spider-Man said, you want to kill them? And he goes, no, I want to unlive them. And he was like, wait, what? And he’s like, yeah, it sounds way better than kill. So this is kind of what we’ve done in our space. Replacement theology sounds so bad. We replaced Israel, that’s gross. We superseded them, which sounds like a little bit more academic and it’s a little nicer. We didn’t replace ’em, we just kind of superseded what was going on.
So hard and soft, super supersessionism live on this spectrum. Hard supersessionism is what we talked about. And typically the reason people come to this conclusion is they read scriptures where the Jews killed Jesus, the Jews commanded he be crucified, or Jesus was talking and said something like, I’m taking the kingdom away from you and giving it to others. And we assume he’s always talking about the Jews. The problem with that understanding is, and we don’t have time to go into all of it, it’s typically out of the Book of John and the Book of John. When you read the Jews, it can be more appropriately translated the Judeans, which are people from the south. And it’s almost always in juxtaposition to the Galileans which are in the north because everybody is Jewish. So in the same way we might talk about someone in Austin versus someone from Dallas, and we all know what I’m talking about when I say, this guy from Austin came in, you already have pictures in your head.
It’s the same thing. They’re saying, well, the Judeans were coming to Jesus. Everyone in that day is like, I know who these guys are. Religious probably Pharisees or Sadducees, maybe priests, law, the customs, the traditions of the fathers. When you say, but the Galileans, they’re like, oh, rednecks. Okay, now we’re talking like country people who are in the north. So it’s often juxtaposing these two Jewish identities. But when we read Jew Dayan and it’s translated Jew, we can then make the false assessment that he’s talking about. All of the Jews, we don’t think about the fact that Jesus was a Jew. All of its disciples were Jews and none of them stopped being Jews. So this theology really breaks down, and that’s what I’m going to show in the two ends of the spectrum. When you really think deeply about it, everything starts to break down.
The Jews killed Jesus, really, the Jews, all of them. I thought all of his disciples were Jews. So I could by that logic say the Jews loved Jesus. The Jews followed Jesus and died for him. But then someone would say, whoa, whoa, whoa. Not all Jews. And I would say exactly, and not all the Jews killed him either. So let’s not bring this into this universal understanding. So hard supersessionism sounds like this. This is Martin Luther, which I wish I could do this whole class on Martin Luther because we do not get taught nearly enough of the other side of his ministry. But he wrote a book called Of the Jews in their lies really happy book. He says this, listen, Jew, are you aware that Jerusalem and your sovereignty together with your temple and priesthood have been destroyed for over 14? That 1400 years for such ruthless wrath of God is sufficient evidence that they assuredly have aired and gone astray. Therefore, this work of wrath is proof that the Jews surely rejected God and are no longer his people and neither is he any longer their God. So what do we believe about Jews in hard supersessionism? They are a different religion.
And it was decided at the Council of EA in 3 25 ad that a Jewish person could not maintain Jewish identity. And then there was a second council of EA and it was reaffirmed, a Jewish person cannot follow Jesus and stay Jewish. So that’s where we get this idea and this confusion in the church that you used to be Jewish, but then you followed Jesus and you became the third race Christian. But we don’t believe that that is what scripture is saying. So if you get off of hard super secession, which is where most people don’t live today, you get into soft supersessionism. Soft supersessionism sounds like this. This is n Nt Wright who is an amazing scholar and has done a lot at helping people understand kind of the Jewish context of the New Testament and grounded things into the culture of Second Temple Judaism.
However, he’s a soft super secessionist. So here’s his writing, Romans five and five through eight, Paul develops the picture of the church in terms of belonging to Israel. This transfer is achieved in two stages. He’s talking about transferring all the promises of Israel to the church. So this is how it happened. First, Israel’s calling responsibilities and privileges have been taken over by the Messiah himself. Second, what is true of the Messiah is reckoned to be true of his people in him. All believers without distinction of race, no longer Jew and Gentile inherit all that was Israel’s Paul in line with the Old Testament prophecies, claims that God’s glory has been taken away from Israel according to the flesh and given to the community of the new covenant. The Christian is the true Jew, the first five verses of the chapter, Romans five verses one through five, thus set out the grounds of assurance in terms of the transfer of Israel’s privilege to the church, the land like the Torah.
So see how he’s hitting all these? Here’s what we have to be confronted with is if we’re going to dive into the Jewish stuff, we’re confronted with these things. The land like the Torah was a temporary stage in the long purpose of God. It was not a bad thing now done away with, but a good and necessary thing now fulfilled in Christ and the spirit. So hard intercession says the Jews rejected Jesus, therefore God rejected the Jews and the church replaced Israel. Soft Supersessionism says Jesus fulfilled the promises of Israel and we receive Jesus. So therefore the church has had the of Israel superseded onto them. You see how it’s different, but you’re swimming in the same pool. Where are the Jews supposed to be? Where do the Jews go? Is there any need for Jewish life? Is there any need for Jewish identity? Is there any need for Jewish distinction in this pool?
No, because there’s a third race and it’s Christian and it’s void of Jew and Gentile. So I wish I could go through every scripture. The big one we read Galatians three, seven know then that those who have faith are children of Abraham out of context. This verse, if it was as Francis Chan once said, if this verse just came up on the beach and you were on a desert island and that’s the only one you read, it’s a fair conclusion to jump to. I’m a child of Abraham, therefore they aren’t because I’m a child of faith and they rejected Jesus. But there’s a lot of things that have to be taken into context. One Galatian is written to Gentiles and what kind of gentiles was he writing to Gentiles who were convinced by people of the circumcision party, Pharisees, who then followed Jesus, who were trying to say, you need to be circumcised and live a Jewish lifestyle in order to receive eternal life.
And Paul, the Hebrew of Hebrews, as he says, of the tribe of Benjamin circumcised on the eighth day of zealous for the law. So he comes in kind of flexing his Judaism, you think those guys are Jewish? I’m Jewish. And we’re still like, but you’re a Christian though, I don’t know. He comes in flexing his Judaism and says, I am more zealous than any of the people that were growing up in Judaism with me. And because he says that people say used to be Jewish, he was growing up in it. But then in Acts 21 he says, I am a Jewish man in Hebrews, I am a Hebrew of Hebrews. He says, of the tribe of Benjamin, he’s talking about how Jewish he is, but he’s writing to gentiles saying, do not think for a second that my Jewishness is what’s getting me to eternal life.
So he kind of flexes Judaism and then talks about how that’s not actually getting him to eternal life. But if we only read the parts where he says, this is not getting me to eternal life, we then put all of the Torah into this category that says it’s useless now even though as we read Galatians three, seven, all those who have faith, our children of Abraham, verse 10, for all who rely on the deeds of the Torah are under a curse. He’s saying in Deuteronomy 27 verse six, it says, if you do not obey one of these commands, then you are walking under a curse. He’s saying, these guys are saying you should follow Torah. If they get out of a step just by one command, they’re under a curse. Because if you’re expecting reliance on the Torah, he doesn’t say the Torah. He says, reliance on the deeds of the Torah, you’re going to be walking under a curse because you cannot rely on the Torah to get you to eternal life.
Who do we rely on? Yeshua, the Messiah. So he says in verse 13, Messiah liberated us from that curse having become a curse for us. For it is written curse is everyone who hangs on a tree in order that through Messiah Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles. So again, if we’re thinking, well, God did away with Jew and Gentile and we just absorb every promise that came to Israel, then he wouldn’t say the whole reason Messiah came was to bring the gospel to the Gentiles. He would say everyone, all people, all Christians. But you’ll really start to see what pool you’re swimming in with what they say about Gentiles. Most Christians that swim in this pool, they’re not gentiles, they’re Christians. In fact, many think that gentile is a bad word and it means pagan. And so you can read our YouTube comments.
People are very frustrated that we say that we’re gentiles because gentile means pagan in their minds because they’re the same Greek word. But with the context when you’re looking at a Judean versus a Galilean or you’re looking at a Jew versus a Gentile, we know what words they’re talking about. They’re talking about Gentiles. And this pool leaves no space for Gentiles and it leaves no space for Jews. It only leaves space for Christians. So now we move on to the other end of the spectrum. This is where most churches swim. This is where most, I would just maybe say most, but this is where primarily the Jewish Christian weirdness is going to live. And this is called one law.
One law is really the, let me, I’m going to give you the name for the movement associated with one law, which is called Hebrew roots. And the Hebrew roots movement is passionate about this Jewish plunge and understanding the Jewishness of your faith, understanding the Jewishness of Christianity and bringing back so much of the richness that we’ve forgotten about or avoided or we’re confused about. And much of what the Hebrew root and the one law people preach is amazing. If you read a Hebrew roots book, your mind will probably be blown because they’re going to bring things in from Jewish context and they’re going to talk about how Jesus fulfilled this feast. And you’re going to be like, I never saw this before. This is amazing.
But we don’t often think about where we’re ending up and where you end up is becoming Jewish and living a Jewish lifestyle. And so the Hebrew roots and the one law movement is that now that we have faith in Yeshua and we follow Yeshua, we should do what Yeshua did. And he’s no longer Jew and Gentile. We are all now part of Israel, which again, there’s truth to, but it will break down distinction. So let’s talk about these same three things. So Torah and the law. So the Hebrew roots views Torah as Torah for all. So the Hebrew roots and the one law movement says that Torah is for everybody. And so we should all be adhering to the Torah. We should all be living the same life style that Jesus came to live. What do we do with the feasts? The feasts are observed by all and by all I meaning follower of Jesus, obviously not someone who’s secular or not a believer observed by all.
So Jesus celebrated the feasts and used to celebrate the feasts. If you’ve ever heard of someone in the Jewish Christian space talking about how you need to rip down your Christmas tree and stop using the term Easter and every other pagan’s solar feast that you celebrate and you should be doing the Bible, you’re probably swimming in the one law pool. And there’s a lot of truth in things that they’ll bring up, but it’s not all truth. And again, it exists on a spectrum. So what do we do with the torts for all? What do we do with the feasts? It’s to be observed. And what do you do with Israel? So they’ll be pretty similar to what we’re used to, which is Israel is God’s land promise.
God’s land promise to Israel. And they see scriptures that we’ve talked about a lot, which is that we are adopted into this family. Gentiles are adopted into Israel, and therefore we should partake in our family culture. And so many times what they’ll talk about is if you were adopted into a family, wouldn’t you do what the family does? And not only is it the family, but it’s the person that you follow Jesus. So not only are you doing what your family has been doing, but you should be doing what the person that you’re following should be doing. So that’s why you should observe the feasts. That’s why you should obey the commands. And scripture even says, Jesus says, if any of you obeys these commands, there will be blessing the least of you. If you obey these commands, there will be a blessing. And they look at this and say, don’t you want to be blessed? So you’re in this family now you say you follow Jesus. Well, you should do what he did. And Jesus even said, even the least of these, if you obey my commands, there will be a blessing.
Now we confused. So we’ll talk about kind of where we land in a moment. Lastly, or second to last, Jews and Gentiles, what do we believe about Jews and Gentiles is that we are one. And again, there’s truth to this because we talk about the one new man, but there is no distinction in how we’re supposed to live. So we’re one without distinction. Lastly, Galatians 3 28, there is no longer Jew or Gentile for those who are in Christ Jesus. They would look at the same verse where the replacement said no longer Jew and Gentile we’re all Christian. They would say There’s no longer Jew and Gentile. We’re all supposed to obey Torah. We’re all supposed to live as Jews. We’re the ones that have been added to this family. So now we participate. So again, let’s put all of us observe a Jewish lifestyle. So where’s my third marker? Black neutral troll.
So where we fall, and we will open this up to questions after, and that’s why Greg’s here. Yeah, he thought he was just listening. I call this one the olive tree. If you’ve heard any of the past cohorts and of our teachings, we talk a lot about the olive tree that Paul brings up in Romans 11. And it’s very nuanced because some of these things are true, but they’re very nuanced. And I’m reminded is rayel means to wrestle with God. There’s a wrestling match going on. What do we do when we wrestle? Wrestling is intimate. And when we struggle with what do we do with this, we actually grow closer to God. And I think that’s part of the reason why he doesn’t just label out all the answers, because he’s enticing us to wrestle and to get intimate. And what else does it do? If we’re supposed to live this life as Jews and Gentiles, it forces us to come together. So what we’re going to do is we’re going to read Acts 15 together.
Acts 15 is the foundation for the olive tree understanding. Even though the olive tree itself comes out of Romans 11 where Paul says there was this tree and out of the tree came natural branches, and those were the Jewish people, but you gentiles were wild olive shoots that were then grafted onto this tree. In Romans eight, he uses a different analogy, same principle. He says, you Gentiles were adopted into the family and now can cry out Abba Father. Which again, that’s why we’re sons of Abraham because we’re adopted. But adopted is a distinction. A wild olive chute that’s been grafted in is a distinction of the natural branches. So there’s unity with distinction, and we always talk about Jew and Gentile is like male and female. It’s a God-given distinction. God does not want to blurry that distinction, but he wants to unify the distinction. And unity is not uniformity. I was just having a conversation with someone earlier this morning and when the entire orchestra plays the same note in a movie score, do you know what? It creates anxiety. So when you’re watching a movie and nothing is happening, it’s just a girl walking in a hallway and you hear, you’re like, she’s dead. Know it. I know it.
We didn’t read the script. We just saw uniformity. We saw the same note being played. That creates anxiety, that creates chaos. Our bodies feel it. God does not want uniformity. He wants unity. Unity is harmony. Different instruments, different notes coming together to make a symphony. God’s plan that requires distinction. As much as we don’t like it requires distinction. So in Acts 15, I want you to read all of Acts 15 because it’s rich. The context of Acts 15 is you’ve had Acts 10 where Peter goes to Cornelius’s house who’s a gentile, gets filled with the spirit. This blows Peter’s mind because he’s a Gentile. God didn’t require him to get circumcised and become Jewish. Paul’s experiencing the same thing in Antioch. All these Gentiles getting filled with the spirit, which is God’s stamp of approval. They’re supposed to be Gentile, but you also have all these former Pharisees that are now part of the circumcision party following Jesus, but doing so in a very strict observance like Jews have always been called to do.
And they see these gentiles as a band of misfits coming from a pagan history, and now they’re just going to follow the God of Israel. That makes no sense. And when I think about it from their perspective, we’ve been following the God of Israel for thousands of years and he gave us a very strict way to live. Now all these backwood gentiles that have been worshiping multiple gods and doing terribly profane things, they’re just going to jump on board, just nice and easy, just smooth transition. No way that’s going to be smooth. So what’s it easier? Just let ’em do what we do, right? Just let ’em be circumcised and follow toward. That’s clean. That’s simple. I might’ve been in that camp. That’s way easier. I mean, we can’t just like, yeah, just follow the God of Israel, but you don’t have to do any of the Israel stuff, okay?
But Peter comes to the table, Paul comes to the table, Barnabas, Silas, and they all start arguing. No, no, no. God’s doing something different. He’s filling them with the spirit and they’re not being converted into Judaism. God’s finally fulfilling Genesis 12 as Gentiles. So it says they all get up and they talk. In verse 19, it says, therefore, this is Jacob. His name is James. In the translation, his real name’s Jacob. It was later changed. So Jacob, the leader of the Jerusalem church in verse 19 says, this is after hearing Peter and Paul, all the say Gentiles are supposed to be Gentiles. He says, therefore, I judge not to trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God, but to write to them, to abstain from the contamination of idols, from sexual immorality, from what is strangled and from blood for Moses, from ancient generations has had in every city those who proclaim him since he has read in all the synagogues, every Shabbat.
Verse 22. Then it seemed good to the emissaries and the elders of the Jerusalem church, all Jewish with the whole community to choose men from among themselves to send to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judah and Silas leading men from the brethren and this letter along with them, the emissaries and the elders, your brothers, to the Gentile brothers of Antioch, pause. This is so important because so many people that say God does not want Jew and Gentile, Gentile means pagan. We’re all supposed to be Christians. Then why is the letter written to the Gentiles? They all believe in Jesus. That should say Christian or brethren or future Jews or something, but it doesn’t. It says Gentiles because gentile is their God-given identity, and that’s not changing. Write this to the Gentiles. Greetings, since we have heard that some from among you have been troubled with words disturbing your souls, they’re confused.
They received, Jesus got filled with the Holy Spirit, and now these people are coming in who have had the word of God for thousands of years saying, we’ve read this, you haven’t. You have to be circumcised. And they’re like, that’s going to hurt and obey all of the Torah. And they’re like, there’s a lot of, I mean, I’ve just barely gotten through my Bible reading plan, but there’s some hard ones in there. So it’s disturbing them. It’s a big decision. And it says, although we gave them no such authorization, it seemed good to us having come to one accord. There was unity in the room to select men to send to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul men who have risked their lives for the name of the Lord, Yeshua, the Messiah. We therefore have sent you Judas and Silas, who themselves will report to you the same things by the word of our mouth.
It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to place on you. No greater burden than those of the essential that you abstain from the things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled and from sexual immorality by keeping away from these things you will do well, peace. So they were sent off, they went down to Antioch, and when they had gathered the whole group together, they delivered the letter and the people read it and rejoiced over its encouragement. They rejoiced probably because they realized we’re not getting circumcised, but also because God is affirming them in their God-given identity. Gentiles, this won’t fit in the one law movement because you’re not supposed to be gentile. You’re supposed to live more of a Jewish lifestyle. Now here’s what’s not said in Acts 15, but it’s the obvious implication. All of the Jews in the room, because that entire room is Jews and they’re asking themselves, do the Gentiles need to be circumcised and obey the Torah, the whole Torah like we do?
And their answer is no. What’s the obvious implication? We still do if we’re not supposed to follow Torah? Why are we having this conversation? Do they need to do things that we don’t need to do? That wouldn’t make sense because in scripture it’s obvious that Jews are still called to follow Torah. The Jewish believers in Jesus are still called to maintain Jewish identity. The question was about the Gentiles, what do they need to do? And what’s crazy is they came up with a top four list, and I don’t know if you read that top four list. It looks nothing like my top four list. If you said a bunch of people that have never read the Bible before following Jesus, give ’em your top four list, I’d be like 10 commandments. That’s one, right? I for sure wouldn’t have made three of the four food
Strangled animals drinking blood. I’m like, we could put that under one. Just don’t do weird stuff with food. Food that’s been sacrificed to idols. I’m like, that’s three of the four. We haven’t even gotten past food yet. And then they’re like sexual morality. And we’re like, yes, praise God. There’s one that have made my top four. So what’s with the four? The reason there’s a couple of interpretations. Here’s what I truly believe as I’ve studied this. Those are the four things they had to commit to not do in order to come to the table with Jews, because especially our gateway way of processing things with systems. I imagine there were some systems people in that room, okay, how are we going to walk ’em through the nudge of this? And they haven’t even gotten to Leviticus Let, so how do we get them to understand this, this? And here’s what the Holy Spirit decided. We’ll figure that out through the Holy Spirit and through relationship they’ll figure it out.
That would’ve been my plan. But he says, let the Holy Spirit and relationship figure it out. So it’s no shocker that in 3 25 ad the enemy weaves his way in and says, Jews cannot come to the table. They have to renounce Jewish identity and they have to become Christian. It was his way of getting them out of the table. Just let the Gentiles figure it out themselves with the spirit. But there’s a needed part of this story that is relationship and we’ve been cut off from relationship. What David Rudolph says, which I think is so good, is in Ephesians, let me find this verse.
Ephesians three 14, scripture says, for he is our peace, he is our shalom. I’m reading out of the TLV, he is our shalom. The one who made the two into one replacement says two into one Christian, the one law says two into one Jews, it were all part of Israel. We would say, I’m going to skip around here. The Jew and Gentile distinction is like male and female when he makes the two into one in marriage, that is unity with distinction. Females don’t become males when they get married because God made them female. And males and females are just different. They just are. Now, there’s a spectrum, but they’re different.
And when a male and female get married, I would love to systemize a way that they could just stay married for the rest of their lives. But you know what we do? We say, you’re making a covenant. Come to the table to each other and allow the Holy Spirit to lead you. You’ll be good. That’s exactly what God did in Acts 15. If we were to give advice to a married couple, the advice might look something like this. Just keep coming back to each other. Forgive each other. Why should they forgive? Because they don’t forgive. They’re not coming to the table. The Holy Spirit will figure it out. Yeah, we can talk about reading your Bible and we could talk about here’s what you do as a man. Here’s what you do as a woman. Those things aren’t bad, but that’s not what we spend the whole wedding talking about. We just want them to make sure that they’re hearing the Holy Spirit and they’re coming to the table together.
So he says, for he is our peace Shalom, the one who made the two into one, which is ahha, which from the very beginning has always meant that there could be multiple in this ahha, male and female become one flesh and broke down the middle wall of separation. There was a very stark separation. Gentiles could not be in the family of God, but he broke that wall down within his flesh. He made powerless the hostility, the law code of the Mitzvah, which means the command contained in the regulations. He did this in order to create with himself one new man from the two groups. So this creates one new man, which we believe is the biblical mandate where unified is Jew and Gentile, but we’re still distinct as Jew and Gentile. The replacement theology creates one new Gentile because Jews are supposed to become Christian, which basically means Gentile and Jews are supposed to really live not like Jews anymore.
That’s what Nyia came up with. They have to abandon a Jewish identity and live like us. The one law creates one new Jew because it’s the same thing. It’s Gentiles need to be the ones to essentially convert or change and lay aside Gentile identity and become more Jewish. At the end of the day, both are replacement theology because in both ends of the spectrum, you’re erasing Jewish identity because in one, we’re all Jews and we all obey the Torah and there is no distinction. So what do we do? We replaced you in this one. You need to live like us, and there’s no Jewish identity. So what do we do? We replaced you. So both ends of the spectrum don’t make room for Jew and Gentile distinction and Jew and Gentile unity. Does that make sense? So he has created for us one new man out of the two. And I said this before and this is kind of how I’ll end. We’ll go through Torah in law. What do we now think about the Torah?
You’ll hear us talk about the Torah as the Hebrew scriptures. Now we’re practical. We know people call the Old Testament. I don’t think we have the clout to just say we’re just going to change that. Stop calling it Old Testament, even though it is a little confusing at times because we think old meaning gone away with, maybe we should call it the old D Testament, but we’ll refer to it as the Hebrew scriptures. And as Paul says in Galatians, as Paul says in Romans, I think I have it here in Galatians 20, that same kind of scripture we’re talking about. He says, if you’re going to rely on the deeds of the Torah, you’re going to be under a curse in verse 20. He comes back to that point and says, so then why the Torah? It’s just old. It’s bad, it’s wrong. He says, it was added because of the wrongdoings.
Until the Messiah would come, the seed would come to whom the promise had been made. It was arranged through the angels by the hand of an intermediary, someone to link the two. Now, this is not for one party alone. God is one. Then this Torah then is the Torah against the promises of God. So is Torah bad? Now, is it a curse? Because that’s how a lot of us do it. We’re not under the law anymore because the law was a curse. And so the Torah was there for a curse, and the Jewish people are under a curse. He says, may it never be if you’re going to have that outlook, which is the replacement pool, that the Torah is a curse that was brought by God. God’s not bringing a curse for if a law had been given that could impart life. Certainly righteousness would’ve been based on the law, but the scripture has locked up the whole world under sin.
So the promise, based on the trust in Messiah, Yeshua might be given to those who trust. Before faith came, we were being guarded under Torah bound together until the coming faith would be revealed. Later, he talks about the Torah was like a Tudor. It was a protector. Paul says, I wouldn’t know what sin was if it wasn’t for the law. The law’s not bad, but in Romans, he says, but my flesh is, and when my flesh sees a rule, what does my flesh want to do? Break it. He says, the Torah is not bad. Sin and flesh used the Torah to then incite me to break it, but don’t for a second think Torah is bad. Torah is from God. And that’s the nuance we have to have. If you’re relying on the deeds of the Torah for eternal life, sorry, you’re under a curse, but the Torah is not a curse.
That’s a nuanced way of thinking. So the Torah is a Hebrew scriptures. It’s from God reliance on it’s not going to get eternal life, but it’s from God. What about the feasts? You’ll hear us talk about the Jewish feasts. Again, this is language. Why do we call it the Jewish feasts or the feasts of Israel? Because they weren’t given the Gentiles and we never will tell someone at the Center for Israel, you have to obey the feasts. Now, just like we talked about, there’s hard supersessionism and soft supersessionism. There’s also hard one law and soft one law. Hard one law is that you have to celebrate the commands. You celebrate feast. You have to obey the whole Torah. Soft one law is ideally you should. And so it’s a softer way of getting you in the same pool. I’m not saying you have to want to do pagan stuff with Christmas and you go right ahead, you go, you go do your idolatry all day long.
But if you really want to be spiritual, you should really obey the Torah. And because when we read Torah or you hear Pastor Greg Stone speak, you’re like, this is gold. This is rich. I want to be a part of this. And so what we will tell people, and this is David Rudolph and Pastor Greg and the Center for Israel, you’re invited to but you’re not commanded to. You’re invited, but you’re not commanded. One law will make you feel like this is the ideal, really. And they’ll even use the end of Acts 15 to say, this was kind of always supposed to be the ideal. We read Acts 15 together, therefore, we’re not going to put the Gentiles under a yoke that we ourselves can’t bury. But instead just do these four things, the abstaining from contamination of idol sexual morality. This is verse 19, from food that’s strangled drinking blood for Moses from ancient generations has had in every city those who proclaimed him since he has read in all the synagogues, every Shabbat.
So the Hebrew root or the one law will say, see, that’s always been the ideal, is the Gentiles should come to the synagogues and celebrate Shabbat. Well, our interpretation of this is that many of these, what’s their title? The Pharisees that had gotten saved, the circumcision party, their concern was if we just let all the Gentiles not do the law, what’s going to allow the Jews to keep the law? The Jewish people, they’re going to see all these gentiles just living life free from all these commands, and then we’re going to want to do it. So it’s safer to just let them come under our law. And this encouragement was, but guys in every city in the synagogue, because they’re teaching this, they’re teaching the commands of God. We don’t have to worry that the Jewish people are not going to follow the Torah anymore. It’s been read in every city for generations we’re going to be okay. So the feast are the Jewish feast. You’re invited. It’s not the ideal. You’re not a super Christian if you celebrate the feasts. And our encouragement is that you do so in partnership with the Jewish people because from Messianic Judaism to traditional Judaism that don’t believe in Jesus, many will both agree Gentiles doing Jewish things by themselves is weird. It’s weird because we’re not at the table.
We’re supposed to be at the table together. If you’re invited to a Shabbat, if you’re invited to a feast, if you’re invited to a mess, please, you are invited to come. But doing so outside of the community of the Jewish people, it’s like you’re replacing us. You don’t need us anymore. I can be married, but I don’t need intimacy with you. If you’re married and seeking intimacy outside of your spouse, you don’t have a good marriage. I can fulfill my own needs. Actually, that was not God’s design. God’s design was for us to come together. So you are invited and we encourage that you do. So alongside the Messianic community. What do we believe about Israel? This one, I’m sure it’s land promise, it’s special, it’s unique. It’s different. Just like Israel is the firstborn. A firstborn is different than a second born, not better, but first, not in a better way.
It’s equal. It’s different. It’s equal, but it’s distinct. And Israel is not better than Brazil. Israel is not better than Honduras, but it’s different because it’s the only piece of land that God said that’s mine. And I’m putting my name on that. So it’s just different. And much of replacement theology comes out of an offense. I don’t like that. Where am I in that? It’s not where I live. That’s not my ancestors. Unless it’s spiritual and therefore I’m spiritual. Abraham and Israel is spiritually under my feet, but that’s not God’s heart. And lastly, Jew Gentile, which we covered is male, female. So hopefully this gives you a little bit of clarity, even though it might’ve also been a fire hydrant. We’ll send out this paper so you can read that as well. But hopefully this gives you clarity in navigating these waters pools. But yeah, we want to invite you to take a step in this journey because we don’t want you to be afraid of the Jewish plunge because it’s created weirdness or a weird experience.
We don’t want you to avoid it. But we also don’t want you to go head first into one law because that’s also going to disintegrate the distinction of Jew and Gentile. So nuanced. And when I first started working in the Center for Israel, I felt like I was walking into a field of landmines. Every word I had, choose very carefully what I was saying and what website I felt like was safe, and what commentary can I read. That’s not one law, that’s not replacement. And so we want to be a resource for you. So however we can help you, whether it’s with commentaries or messages or sermons, or whether it’s just sitting down in Greg’s office with a Bible, I like how I’m just offering Greg out to everybody I do. So facetiously, anything that you need, we want to be here for you. We know it can be confusing, but we don’t think that’s God’s heart.
But I think part of the reason it’s initially confusing is because we’re supposed to rely on relationship too. So let’s pray. God, thank you so much that your heart is for relationship, not just relationship with us, which obviously I think that’s priority, but relationship with Jew and Gentile together. And Lord, the enemy is going to use everything he can, whether it’s bad experiences or politics to keep us from engaging. But Lord, we want to dive into the Jewish foundation of our faith because regardless, we follow a Jewish Messiah. We follow Yeshua and we want to understand him. We want to understand you because we know He said whoever sees him, sees you, the Father. And so Lord, we thank you that you still speak to us and I pray anytime that we have confusion, we would come to you and we would come together in Jesus’ name and everybody said, amen. Amen.