A few months ago my spiritual community Heritage LA hosted a Super Bowl party in Palisades Park with an outdoor screen, food and beverages. Though it was mostly a gathering of regulars, the event was open to the public. Heritage LA is a community of people who believe that Yeshua (Jesus) is the Messiah, with a focus on the Jewish heritage and ancient paths of the faith. We celebrate the Biblical Feasts with the understanding that Yeshua fulfills them all and is the Messiah who came to save the world, both Jew and Gentile.
There was a middle-aged couple sitting in front of me on the grass whom I had never seen before. I knew they were Jewish because he was wearing a Kippah and she a wig and a skirt. They were sitting alone and off to the side so I had it in my heart to go and introduce myself to them. They were very warm, friendly and talkative; a new couple who met online and were meeting in person for the very first time. How romantic! She was bubbling over with joy and he was smiling ear to ear; you could tell they were very smitten with each other (blush, blush). In her effort to be a good hostess, she searched for a Super Bowl event online and found ours. She assumed it was a Jewish organization because of the name but didn’t know that we were Messianic. This led us into a talk about God and Torah which lasted the rest of the event. For the sake of privacy I will call the man Steven though that is not his real name. Steven said that at one time he had explored Jesus as a possibility but decided that Orthodox Judaism was the way to have a relationship with God. How could ‘that man’ who was dead be the way? He began to quote a lot of midrash (Jewish Rabbinical commentaries) about our father Abraham and what the Rabbi’s claim righteousness before God is; she was in agreement with him as they shared an understanding of the commentaries. Orthodox Jewish people are taught to study the Rabbi’s books as the authoritative voice on the Torah because they contain ancient wisdom from the Sages that unpacks the Torah; the problem with the weightiness of studying Midrash is that while there is history and revelation in them, there are also many man-made rules and opinions that are outside of what God gave us to do as written in The Torah itself. I appreciated the story but in turn I asked them the question that burns in my heart daily about Rabbinical and modern Judaism; “How do you explain that we no longer offer sacrifices to God for sins?” Their faces burned red as they flustered to answer, “well, we have no more Temple…we do mitzvot now (good deeds). God understands, we are only human.”
Sadly because of Covid regulations the event was interrupted by park monitors and we had to shut it down quickly. Our conversation came to an abrupt halt but we exchanged WhatsApp info so that we could speak again in the future – it was a very pleasant exchange but those last words he said have remained in my heart since that day…”God understands…” Does He? What makes Steven believe that God accepts our way over His?
In the Torah, God gives many examples of what happens when we decide to do things our own way and break covenant, especially concerning the Levitical Priesthood and offerings made for sin and fellowship with God. A powerful example of this is given right away in Leviticus Chapter 10 when Aaron’s sons Nadab and Abihu are killed by the Holy fire of God for burning strange fire on the incense altar. We must understand that God had just given Moses and Aaron very detailed instructions on how to consecrate the Kohanim with their garments and sacrifices, isolating them for seven days before they could even be released to minister to the congregation. The Priesthood, sacrifices and offerings are so Holy unto God! On the eighth day the consecration of the Priesthood was completed and all were gathered by Moses to make their offerings to Adonai. It was a very specific, elaborate and orderly process which only when done as commanded did the Glory of Adonai appear to the congregation. Fire came out from the Glory and consumed the offerings, it was such a powerful encounter that all the people of Israel shouted and fell on their faces. This was the way of life for the Jewish people and how we had an ongoing, experiential relationship with God. You would see the Glory of God and Holy fire with your very own eyes! It was just after this glorious event that Nadab and Abihu decided to break protocol and burn incense to God on their own. Immediately, they were consumed by the fire of God and destroyed! God did not accept this and nor was He okay with it. All agree on the scripture that tell us that God is the same forever; “For I am Adonai. I do not change, So you, children of Jacob, are not consumed.” – Malachi 3:6 As He does not change, how can we say we are in a covenant relationship with Him today like we were in the Old Testament?
The Torah is very clear, we must have a Kohen Gadol (High Priest) assigned by God and not the Rabbis. The Mishkan (Tabernacle) is to be consecrated according to God’s elaborate instructions and the Kohens (Priests) must also be consecrated with multiple sacrifices along with the anointing of their priestly garments. The sacrifice for sins must be what God ordains, not something we decide to offer Him on our own. No matter how well intentioned our hearts are, it is always His way.
Adonai ordains the covenant and provides the sacrifice.
So, why aren’t we struck down or consumed by His fire today? In just one example the Torah clearly commands that we must keep Shabbat holy or be cut off from among the people, even be put to death for working on Shabbat. Why is it then that we are all not destroyed on every Shabbat that we don’t keep? The reason is simple but can be a hard pill to swallow. God provided a new covenant for us in Yeshua Messiah; if we choose not to accept Him we are no longer in covenant with the God of Israel. Without Him, we have become like the nations, cut off from the root for going our own ways. We are either living as the world does or following man-made religion but no longer set-apart unto God. Simply being a descendant of Jacob is not enough.
How could this be? Israel is still a nation and the Jewish people are blessed!
Isn’t God’s Hand upon us? Yes, He is always good to us, and He fulfills His promises, even restoring us to the land in 1948. He is true to His Word. It is us who have departed from Him. The spirit of religion has captured the Rabbis and caused them to walk down their own path following the rules of Halacha (Rabbinical Judaism) which are man-made and outside of Torah. The children of Israel have abandoned the Torah of Moses and split apart into many sects, either following the Rabbis religion or believing our traditions are enough to make us right with God. “God understands.” But that is not what the Tanakh tells us.
The Prophet Isaiah wrote, “All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way;…” Isaiah 53:6 NKJV.
This is evident in all the different forms of Judaism; Orthodox, Conservative, Reformed, Bu-Jew (Jews that follow Eastern religions such as Buddhism) and so on. God gave us the commandments and ordinances to be in unity! Our ancestors agreed to the covenants and sealed them with a sacrifice and sprinkling of blood on the people at Mt. Horeb by Moses. The ordinances tell us clearly that to be unified and in covenant with God, we must have a God-ordained Kohen Gadol who intercedes for us and a specific sacrifice must be offered to atone for sins, completed by the Kohens themselves. We cannot go before God in our own merit and we have not had the Levitical priesthood for thousands of years.
Through the Prophet Jeremiah, God foretold of the new covenant that He would give to us which we could not break:
“Behold, days are coming”
—it is a declaration of Adonai—
“when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah—
not like the covenant
I made with their fathers
in the day I took them by the hand
to bring them out of the land of Egypt.
For they broke My covenant,
though I was a husband to them.”
it is a declaration of Adonai.” – Jeremiah 31:30 TLV
Some argue that God’s commandments to Israel are forever but as we can see from the text above, we broke those commandments. The Good News is that God provided a way for us to be restored to Him in the new covenant:
“But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days”
—it is a declaration of Adonai—
“I will put My Torah within them.
Yes, I will write it on their heart.
I will be their God
and they will be My people.
No longer will each teach his neighbor
or each his brother, saying: ‘Know Adonai,’
for they will all know Me,
from the least of them to the greatest.”
it is a declaration of Adonai.
“For I will forgive their iniquity,
their sin I will remember no more.”- Jeremiah 31:31-33 TLV
The complete verse of Isaiah 53:6 tells us this: ” “All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” – Isaiah 53:6 NKJV
Who is “He”?
The New Covenant promised to us is established through the Messiah Yeshua and His sacrifice. All of Isaiah 53 tells us that He, (Yeshua) is our suffering servant whom God chose and was pleased to have Him take our punishment for us. God ordained this! He is also our Kohen Gadol, who offered Himself to be the sacrifice for our sins. Yeshua is the One whom God sent, our Messiah who died for our sins and also resurrected as our eternal King, all according to prophecy:
- “Therefore Adonai Himself will give you a sign:
“Behold, the virgin will conceive.
When she is giving birth to a son,
she will call his name Immanuel (which means ‘God is with us’).” – Isaiah 7:14 TLV
2. “For a Child will be born to us, a Son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.” – Isaiah 9:6 NASB
3. “For You will not abandon my soul to Sheol nor let Your faithful one see the Pit.” – Psalm 16:10 TLV
How can this be since most of Israel does not believe this? Children of Israel please understand this; the sobering fact is that we were lied to.
Just like the story of Joseph and his brothers (the sons of Israel), Yeshua is the Chosen One rejected by His brothers, who was thought by Israel to be dead. Joseph lived however and became a great ruler in Egypt. So too did Yeshua resurrect and go on to rule the nations, but the truth was hidden from us by the Rabbis in charge of the Temple in Yeshua’s time, the Pharisees. They assigned guards to Yeshua’s tomb who fully witnessed that He resurrected. The guards told the Pharisees every detail but instead of recognizing Him as the Messiah, just like Joseph’s brothers, the Pharisees conspired to be rid of him and lie to Israel. To keep their power, they agreed to tell us (Israel) that His body was stolen by His disciples. The Bible tells us that this story is what is widely circulated amongst Israel to this very day. They also paid the guards a large sum of money to keep their witness quiet. We were lied to and led astray! This is the root of our separation from God. We were told that Yeshua was dead and so, we believed them and still we wait for ‘Mashiach’, each one continuing to go our own way…
Soon after the Temple was destroyed and the Rabbis decided that mitzvot would replace sacrifices. Who gave them permission to do this? They are not God! “For I Adonai do not change, so you Jacob are not consumed.” They denied the One who was sent, lied to us and came up with their own rules. To this day the Rabbis want us to follow their teachings which are heavy laden and laborious, too much for anyone to bear – a religious prison that is not the life God intended nor one that He gave to Israel. They condemn us for not following their ways, saying we are “no longer Jewish” but even more so if we follow Yeshua. That is their greatest accusation for a Jew to be cut off from Israel but what they don’t realize is that they are cut off themselves and keeping Israel from seeing the truth. This is why we see so many secular Jewish people today saying, “I’m spiritual but not religious.” We don’t even look at Christianity because we only see Gentiles worshipping Yeshua/Jesus with Gentile traditions that are also unbiblical; what do they have to do with the God of Israel?
What we have missed is God’s promise of salvation planned not only for Israel but for the whole world, through the Messiah:
“he says:
“It is too small a thing for you to be my servant
to restore the tribes of Jacob
and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make you a light for the Gentiles,
that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth” – Isaiah 49:6 NIV
All of us have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. Sadly, the Gentiles have also not observed the Biblical Feasts and have come up with their own traditions but they are still in covenant with God for salvation by believing Yeshua/Jesus is the Messiah. Its that simple – through faith in what Yeshua has done for us we are saved and in covenant with God, restored to His Kingdom forever. God calls everyone, both Jew and Gentile to Teshuvah through Yeshua’s atoning sacrifice. In the new covenant we are no longer under law but under grace. Yeshua is the Mashiach and Savior of the world! His sacrifice is the Kippur (covering atonement) for the sins of the world. So may I ask then, where is Israel’s sacrifice today?
Joseph’s brothers learned that he was still alive and had become a great ruler of Egypt; he was also the one that would save their lives in the time of the great worldwide famine. In the same way, Yeshua is coming back soon where He will land on the Mt. of Olives to defeat our enemy in a great battle that He will win, saving people from every nation who would call upon Him. All of Israel will recognize Him as Mashiach and Adonai, turn to Him and be saved. The Prophet Zechariah tells us this:
“Then I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication, when they will look toward Me whom they pierced. They will mourn for him as one mourns for an only son and grieve bitterly for him, as one grieves for a firstborn.” – Zechariah 12:10 TLV
Yeshua is the One whom we pierced on the cross, who died and resurrected and is seated at the Right Hand of God our Father. Crowned King of the universe, He rules over all and His Kingdom reigns forever! He is the Name above every name this is named in the universe and the only way by which man can be saved. He is the Sacrifice and the Kohen Gadol, ever living to make intercession for us. All we must do is believe in Him and we will receive eternal salvation and forgiveness of our sins – a final, perfect, God ordained sacrifice given to us for once and for all.
“For if you confess with your mouth
that Yeshua is Lord,
and believe in your heart
that God raised Him from the dead,
you will be saved.” – Romans 10:9 TLV
Baruch HaShem Adonai!
SHEMA ISRAEL 
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