The Yearning

MY MOTIVE

Today I want to talk about something that is widely misunderstood. I have felt for most of my life that there was something missing. I knew somehow that there was more to life than what I was experiencing. It seems like I had a longing for something that I could not define for as long as I can remember. At the same time they were many voices telling me that the way to an abundant and eternally joyful life was through “Jesus”.  One night at a revival service at a church I decided to “accept Jesus”. Shortly afterwards I was Baptized by immersion and joined the church. I expected great things to come from this. The following months I sat and listened to the same bible lessons that I had heard my whole life. Every sermon was about how we must “accept Jesus”. Well, I had already done that. I am ashamed to admit that grew bored of it and soon fell away. One thing was different though. I kept praying. I knew there was some truth to what I had learned but it wasn’t enough to satisfy whatever craving I had inside me. Over the next few years I studied the doctrines of every church I could find. There were many that I had never even heard of. Some of them were traditional main stream and some were extremely strange. I will spare you the details of my involvement in various churches and move on.

I sometimes envied people that found a church and forty years later were still seemingly happy there. Nothing ever changed with them. They dressed up on Sunday morning, went to church, sang a few songs, listened to a sermon, contributed to the collection, shook the pastor’s hand and went home. That seemed to be all they needed. I felt like something was wrong with me because that kind of experience was not all I needed. In fact it left me feeling worse than before. Something was missing. 

I went off to bible college and studied very hard. The college I went to still taught pretty main stream traditional christian doctrine but I finally had access to people that looked at the scriptures differently. There were a couple of professors that didn’t look at the scriptures through the lens of what the church taught but they looked at the church through the lens of what the scriptures taught. The curtain began to be pulled away. I learned that there were several manuscripts of almost every book of the Bible and in many cases they did not concur with each other. I learned about common mistranslations in the many versions the Bible. I learned that I could look up the oldest manuscripts and with a concordance translate passages myself. This gave me an ability to grow less dependent on the teaching of others and it gave me a way to test other teachers. Over many years it has caused me to question everything that I grew up believing. It has also at times caused my friends and family to question my sanity. It has forced me to examine myself, what I believe and change. I admit that I have followed roads that were dead ends. But, I learned a valuable lesson and moved on. It has not been easy. I have been discouraged. I have been attacked. I have been lonely. 

It is my hope that I can lend you a hand on your journey. It is my hope that you can bypass a few of these dead ends and point you in a better direction. I do this not out of any desire to become your teacher. I am not wanting you to join anything. I don’t want you to send me money or get on my mailing list. I have no church organization. I have no “ministry”. I don’t need a Lear jet to “spread the gospel”. I have no holy water from the river Jordan to sell you so that you can receive your miracle and for goodness sakes don’t be planting any “seed money” with me. I don’t want it. In fact, I want nothing from you. My motive is simply to obey YHVH and point out the truth.

THE MISUNDERSTANDING

So, what widely misunderstood thing am I going to tell you about?

Yeshua is not God!

For far too long christians have been living under the mistaken idea that “God is a trinity of three persons”. This is not only a falsehood but a falsehood that has kept the Jewish people from believing. The greatest law of Judaism is the Shema. It is found in Deuteronomy 6:4 

4Hear, Israel: Yahweh is our God. Yahweh is one. 5You shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might. 6These words, which I command you today, shall be on your heart; 7and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. 8You shall bind them for a sign on your hand, and they shall be for frontlets between your eyes. 9You shall write them on the door posts of your house and on your gates. (very important)!

Yeshua also reiterated these words Mark 12:28

28One of the scribes came and heard them questioning together, and knowing that he had answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the greatest of all?” 29Jesus answered, “The greatest is: ‘Hear, Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment. 31The second is like this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” 

The misunderstanding is about who YHVH is and who Yeshua is and is not. So, who is YHVH? YHVH is GOD the creator and sustainer of the universe. He is the Father. The one to whom Yeshua prayed and the one to whom we must also pray to. He is the almighty and He is one, and only one. So, who then is Yeshua? Yeshua is the Messiah and the prophet of Deuteronomy 18:16 and He is the Messiah (the anointed) of God. Deuteronomy 18:15 reads,

15Yahweh your God will raise up to you a prophet from among you, of your brothers, like me. You shall listen to him. 16This is according to all that you desired of Yahweh your God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, “Let me not hear again Yahweh my God’s voice, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I not die.” 17Yahweh said to me, “They have well said that which they have spoken. 18I will raise them up a prophet from among their brothers, like you. I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I shall command him. 19It shall happen, that whoever will not listen to my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.

The Jews had long been awaiting that prophet. They even referred to him as “The Prophet”. Listen to John the baptists testimony as to who he himself was,

John 1:19This is John’s testimony, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20He declared, and didn’t deny, but he declared, “I am not the Christ.” 21They asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “ARE YOU THE PROPHET?” He answered, “No.” Notice that there was no explanation needed as to who THE PROPHET was, it was part of the fabric of being Jewish that you understood that THE prophet had been foretold to Moses by YHVH. His coming was anticipated.

Listen to what YHVH said about Yeshua, (This occurred at what is commonly referred to as “the transfiguration”)

Matthew 17:5While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them. Behold, a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. LISTEN TO HIM” 

Listen to Yeshua speaking about himself. He plainly states that his words come directly from YHVH,

John 7:16 My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me. 17If anyone desires to do his will, he will know about the teaching, whether it is from God or if I am speaking from myself.

John 14:10 The words that I tell you, I speak not from myself; but the Father who lives in me does his works.

John 14:23 “If a man loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24He who doesn’t love me doesn’t keep my words. The word which you hear isn’t mine, but the Father’s who sent me.

John 12:49For I spoke not from myself, but the Father who sent me gave me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak. 50I know that his commandment is eternal life. The things therefore which I speak, even as the Father has said to me, so I speak.”

Matthew 24:35Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.

Yeshua told us that he alone was our sole pastor and teacher. That it was he who had the words of life. He said the He was the good shepherd and that his sheep would not follow another. He said that He was the Rock and if anyone built upon any other foundation that their work would not stand but be washed away. It is plain here that the words of YHVH were spoken from Yeshua’s mouth and that we must give him the final authority on all matters. In John 13:16 he said,

 16Most certainly I tell you, a servant is not greater than his lord, neither is one who is sent greater than he who sent him. 17If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.

The word translated servant is” APOSTOLOS” what he is saying here is that not even an apostle can override or change even one of Yeshua’s teachings.

But, Yeshua was not God.

I used to believe that even though I had to do all kinds of mental acrobatics to make sense of why Yeshua would pray to himself, to say “not my will but yours be done”, to say that even he didn’t know the time when the end would come but only “my Father in heaven”. Yeshua called YHVH “my God and your God” when speaking to the Apostles.

But, but, but, Yeshua says in John 8:58 Jesus said to them, “Most certainly, I tell you, before Abraham came into existence, I AM”. Doesn’t that prove that Yeshua said he was God? No, Remember? YHVH spoke through Yeshua. The speaker in that instance was YHVH.

I believe that the church has been hoodwinked into not following and obeying YHVH because we don’t follow Yeshua. We have been fooled into not following YHVH’s commandments because we were sold a false Jesus. A false Jesus that has more in common with a Greco Roman mystery cult demigod than the Jewish Messiah and Prophet prophesied about by all the Jewish prophets. His life giving words concerning salvation through repentance followed by obedience to YHVH’s commandments has been overthrown and supplanted by a new gospel of salvation by faith alone and just a knowledge of his “death, burial and resurrection”. We have been fooled into paying lip service to Yeshua’s teachings and actually following the teachings of Saul of Tarsus. We do not even pray to YHVH we have been taught to pray to Jesus. Yeshua said 

John 16:23“In that day you will ask me nothing. Most certainly I tell you, whatever you may ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. 24Until now, you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be made full.

Could it be that is the reason our prayers go unanswered? Could this be the reason we have a weak an ineffective church? I tell you the truth, I do not have all the answers. I know there is much more that is coming and that not all of the deep mysteries of YHVH have even been revealed. For now I am happy to be able to just point you in the right direction. I hope that the yearning in all our hearts is soon satisfied.