Countering the comments of some counter-missionaries and their followers

SOME THINGS COUNTER-MISSIONARIES HAVE POSTED RECENTLY:

"This isn't xtianity folks, we don't get to cherry pick." "Torah commands us to follow the Rabbis."

"The Torah was given to Israel to make them a 'separate people unto G-d.' Having said that, if a person gravitates toward following G-d's ways more closely, that's fine. But he/she is not under the same obligation as a Jew is."

"Contextually Judaism is not just defined to just what is written in a book but how the Jewish people have over a period of time sought to practice what was revealed to them at Sinai and what we inherited from our forefathers. Our forefathers have placed us in a unique position as the reinstators/ practicers of monotheism in the context of surrounding paganism with their multiple gods etc.. In other words both historically and contextually we have had no other revelation of monotheism prior to ours which needed replacing with an allegedly better revelation." 

OUR RESPONSE:

Well, since Jews believe ONLY THEY are special to G-d, and they must not "cherry pick", then perhaps they could do the following for us:

• Provide the exact Torah scripture that tells us to follow the Rabbis. That is, provide the scripture that today's rabbis have replaced the Levite Cohen (Deuteronomy 17:8-13) who were appointed as authority.

• Sing “The Song of Moshe” for us” complete with the melody (Deuteronomy 32:1–43). The Jew is supposed to know these words and the song in order to pass them on to their children (Deuteronomy 32:46).

• Provide the scripture that tells us Jews were given an “Oral Torah”, the "Torah Sheba'al Peh", in addition to what Moshe wrote down and that YHWH’s people are to follow it.

• Tell us why the Jews believe they were the only ones standing before G-d on Mt. Sinai when the Ten Commandments were given. (Answer can be found on our blog: http://blog.therefinersfire.org/2016/09/torah-tells-us-that-gods-word-and.html)

• Tell us WHY apparently only "the Jews" are supposed to be holy and provide exact scriptures to back up their claim. (The answer can be found on our blog: http://blog.therefinersfire.org/2015/09/does-god-only-expect-jews-to-be-holy.html)

• Where in Torah are Rabbis told they should make their living being “counter missionaries” who spend all their waking hours sitting around bashing other religions and joining Facebook threads where people have gathered to hack around on those with different beliefs?

A few more random thoughts concerning their comments above:

It seems counter-missionaries (most of whom – judging from some of the comments we see on Facebook) are too busy reading through 2,711 pages of the Talmud trying to decipher the confusing and contradictory statements of the rabbis, whom they are taught they must listen to. "They" have splintered into Orthodox, Conservative, Progressive, Reform, and Reconstructionist Jews, not to mention Karaites and Samaritans.

What "they" inherited is so clear that they have a calendar that does not keep the moedim at the right times, they've lost the correct shemitah year, don't observe the Jubilee year, can't understand Isaiah, have added countless rules and regulations to Torah, etc., despite their forefathers teaching them not to do so!

So, it is truly ludicrous to suggest, "Our forefathers have placed us in a unique position as the reinstators/ practicers of monotheism!" If that were true, why are there so many Jewish factions and why the disagreements within Talmud?

Moshe knew modern Jews would stray! (Deuteronomy 31:30). Are these counter-missionaries REALLY following G-d’s Divine Rules….or are they following their own? YOU decide!

So, Jesus was married, according to some?

The loonies are are out again, trying to sow seeds of doubt into your belief by suggesting Jesus was married...

Let's check some facts, shall we?  If Y'shua – a Jewish man with a divine qnoma/nature - had had a wife and kids, He would never have chosen to die on that stake, to leave behind a widow and orphans! YHWH would not have expected Him to do that. Y'shua's mind - as we see in Luke 2:49 - was always on YHWH. He knew who He was, and He didn't have time for a wife and family. That would have been a huge distraction. So, this attempt by the anti-missionaries is like ALL their attempts to discredit Y'shua - it's weak, and it's a slap in the face of YHWH whom they are calling a liar.

Plus, He followed Torah, even to His death. An example is that He made sure His mother would be cared for after he died:

John 19: 25. Now at the stake of Y’shua were standing his mother and the sister of his mother and Maryam, that of Qalyopa, and Maryam of Magdala. 26. And Y’shua saw his mother and a disciple whom he loved who was standing there, and he said to his mother, Woman, behold your son. 27. And he said to that disciple, Behold your mother.[1] And at that hour that disciple took her with him. 28. After these things Y’shua knew that everything was complete so that Scripture might be fulfilled, and he said, I thirst. 29. And they placed a vessel there that was full of vinegar, and filled a sponge with the vinegar and placed it on hyssop and brought it to his mouth. 30. And when he had taken that vinegar Y’shua said, Behold, it is finished! And he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

[1] Not as in “behold the mother of Elohim” but that John would care for Y’shua’s mother, and so he takes her with him.

[2] By the time of Y;shua’s death, his earthly mother was a widow who had no close male relative to look after her and faced a precarious existence. By entrusting Maryam to the “beloved disciple” (commonly understood to be John), Y’shua was not only showing love and concern for his mother, ensuring that she would be safe and cared for after his death; but following the Torah command to do so (Exodus 22:21-23)!

(See Isaiah 53 and all of the Feasts/Appointed Times which foreshadow Y'shua. Also, “Whodoes Yeshua say He is: Man or God?”)

Torah tells us that God's Word and Divine Instructions are for ALL who accept Him!

COUNTER-MISSIONARY COMMENT:  Torah was just for the Jews!

MESSIANIC RESPONSE:  That’s not what Torah says.  Let’s do a little study:

Deuteronomy 29: 10 "Today you are standing, all of you, before ADONAI your God - your heads, your tribes, your leaders and your officers - all the men of Isra'el, 11 along with your little ones, your wives and your foreigners here with you in your camp, from the one who chops your wood to the one who draws your water.

Note who was also standing before YHWH: The "foreigners"...those who had not yet accepted YHWH and His Torah! They too stood before Him to hear what He was telling Israel! YHWH's message was for ALL to hear. Just like in Numbers 15:13-16 when He reiterated four times in a row that ALL who accept Him as God MUST obey His Torah! Obedience to His "forever" commands was never, and will never be an option....

In Deuteronomy 29:13-20 we see Moshe (Moses) telling his people that YHWH's covenant and oath were made with everyone who believes in Him; not just with those who were standing before Him on the day He uttered these words. (Please note how He kept telling His people (paraphrased), "Obey Me; obey Me; obey Me - and if you've messed up, repent and return to Me!):

Deuteronomy 29: 12 The purpose is that you should enter into the covenant of ADONAI your God and into his oath which ADONAI your God is making with you today, 13 so that he can establish you today for himself as a people, and so that for you he will be God -as he said to you and as he swore to your ancestors, to Avraham, Yitz'chak and Ya'akov.

14 "But I am not making this covenant and this oath only with you. 15 Rather, I am making it both with him who is standing here with us today before ADONAI our God and also with him who is not here with us today. 16 For you know how we lived in the land of Egypt and how we came directly through the nations you passed through; 17 and you saw their detestable things and their idols of wood, stone, silver and gold that they had with them. 18 So let there not be among you a man, woman, family or tribe whose heart turns away today from ADONAI our God to go and serve the gods of those nations. Let there not be among you a root bearing such bitter poison and wormwood.

If Deuteronomy 29:14-15 somehow slipped by you, please read it again. YHWH was making His oath not only with those standing before Him, but with all future generations of those who have accepted Him as their Elohim! (Remember, as believers in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, YOU are part of Israel - Halleluyah! He made this oath with YOU as well as those standing before Him at Sinai: Obey Him and all will go well with you; disobey and you will be cursed....)

Deuteronomy 29: 19 If there is such a person, when he hears the words of this curse, he will bless himself secretly, saying to himself, ‘I will be all right, even though I will stubbornly keep doing whatever I feel like doing; so that I, although “dry,” [sinful,] will be added to the “watered” [righteous].’ 20 But ADONAI will not forgive him. Rather, the anger and jealousy of ADONAI will blaze up against that person. Every curse written in this book will be upon him. ADONAI will blot out his name from under heaven.

It couldn't be any clearer, and YHWH is not kidding around! Since we are in the “end times” as outlined in the Books of Daniel and Revelation, we need to be taking Him VERY seriously and stop beating each other up about what we THINK He said, or twist His Word into what we WISH He had said.

Telling it like it is: Police don't come around unless you're posing a threat!

I don't know about anybody else, but I'm really bothered and saddened by this little girl's testimony. They put this poor, innocent little girl (who, at 9 years old doesn't have the slightest clue as to what's really happening) in the limelight to voice her opinion that the police is all bad and are purposely going around killing innocent and "unarmed" blacks.

Her parents apparently didn't tell her that police don't come around or send squad cars out UNLESS there's a threat of some kind; or that, while there are certainly "trigger-happy" cops in tense situations where there is a THREAT of some kind, there would be fewer shootings IF people wouldn't (1) commit crimes in the first place - thus providing the THREAT that brings cops to the scene; and (2) they decided to cooperate with the police once they're caught INSTEAD of mouthing off and arguing and even taking a "shooting stance" and generally being uncooperative!

(Notice how quickly everyone whips out their cellphone to get the whole thing on video to "catch the bad cop" - yelling at the cops and generally interfering. It's as if everyone is out to "catch the cops" these days, instead of getting criminals to stop their despicable behavior! And then they "protest" - which is a code word for RIOT - in the streets; thus committing CRIMES themselves - and then they make a big deal out of attending the thugs' funerals to make heroes out of them.)

Something is severely WRONG in this country; we are godless and totally out of control! And the liberal media and their one-sided, anti-law enforcement reporting is fanning the flames. We are literally watching the Books of Daniel and Revelation unfolding. Everything YHWH considers "bad" is considered "good" by the world; and everything He considers "good" is considered "bad"....

 

2 Timothy 3: 1. But know this: That in the latter days hard times will come:  2. and men will be lovers of themselves and lovers of money, boasters, proud, revilers, unyielding towards their own people, deniers of grace, wicked,  3. unloving, addicted to irreconcilable malicious gossips, ferocious, haters of the good,  4. treacherous, rash, inflated, attached to pleasure more than to the love of Elohim,  5. having a form of respect for Elohim but wide from the power of Elohim. Them who are such, repel from you.  6. For of them are they who creep into this and that house and captivate the women who are plunged in sins and led away by divers lusts,  7. who are always learning, and can never come to the knowledge of the truth. (AENT)
 

When in doubt, don't shout it out!

I recently went for a hair trim and color at a new hair salon where – to my dismay, I was thoroughly disappointed on every level by the stylist … and I truly, truly, TRULY wanted to post a negative review about her, especially when she surreptitiously added a $5 tip to my bill AFTER I had signed it and given her a $20 tip in cash!

She did this by “chatting me up” which caused me to overlook that I was walking out of the salon without a copy of my receipt … but what she didn’t count on, is that I would return for it a couple days later. At first, she tried to tell me she would need supervisor approval to print a new receipt (and the salon owner conveniently wasn’t there that day), so I returned the next day – and the owner still wasn’t there, but the stylist had printed the receipt.

When I got home and entered the total into my spreadsheet, I noticed – quite to my surprise – that a $5 tip had been entered into the “tip” section! So, I called that stylist to ask her why she added that unauthorized amount, especially since I had given her a huge tip IN CASH. Her response? “I don’t know how that happened!”

Needless to say, I returned to retrieve my $5! Neither that particular stylist nor the owner were there, but a stylist who was there reached into the cash drawer and gave me my money – because she could see by the determined look on my face that I was NOT leaving without it! (She said she had the owner’s permission.) She, like her co-worker who had ruined my hair, also tried to tell me, “I don’t know how that happened”….

Yeah, right. I guess the computer added the money all by itself….

Anyway, it’s been two weeks now, and I have yet to hear from the owner (who I feel should have called to apologize on behalf of that stylist and offer me some kind of incentive to return); and so you can bet I am NEVER going back there again! Not to mention, if anyone ever asks me what I think of that salon, I won’t hesitate to tell my sob story.

So, why didn’t I post a negative review? Because, honestly, I cannot prove that she did it intentionally! Perhaps it WAS a glitch in the computer (which I doubt), but I cannot, in all good conscience, defame that stylist’s character just because I “feel” she ripped me off. That would be LASHON HARA (evil tongue/gossip), and I know for a fact that YHWH wouldn’t approve. No matter how much I want some kind of "revenge" Scripture tells us we shouldn't do that.

Sooooo, I guess my eternal absence from that place will have to suffice.

"A man who lacks judgment derides his neighbor, but a man of understanding holds his tongue. A gossip betrays a confidence, but a trustworthy man keeps a secret." (Proverbs 11:12-13).

"A fool's mouth is his undoing, and his lips are a snare to his soul. The words of a gossip are like choice morsels; they go down to a man's inmost parts" (Proverbs 18:7-8)

On Judgment Day, don't be caught being "lukewarm"....

SOMETHING TO PONDER: The latest two Torah portions serve as major wake-up calls for us to stop fiddling around and get ourselves “right” with YHWH! Not only did we see that poor Moshe, the holiest man on earth at the time, was denied entry into the Promised Land because he was guilty of just a couple of infractions (Numbers 20:12, 24 and 27:14; Deuteronomy 1:37; 3:26-27; 4:21; 32:51); but we also saw that Adam and Eve were evicted from the Garden because they disobeyed just one command (Genesis 3:24) – and the whole human race is still feeling the repercussions of their willful disobedience! Just those two things all by themselves reveal that we Believers truly need to watch our step in our daily walk.... 

Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned….

In other words, we can’t go around mentioning YHWH/Yeshua/Torah out one side of our mouth while out the other, allow cuss words or curses or evil things to come out of that same mouth. We’re not supposed to plan revenge or lie, or steal or commit lashon hara or adultery, or “shack up” under the misguided impression that “God knows our hearts.”

And if we have any addictions – such as viewing porn, or giving in to our penchant for pedophilia or same-sex unions, etc. – we MUST resist, or else WHOM are we serving? The Ruach haKodesh/Holy Spirit does NOT remain in someone who commits an endless string of willful and deliberate sinning! Yeshua’s death erased our PAST sins so that we could come before him with a clean slate; it didn’t give us permission to continue the same lifestyle!

Numbers 15: 30 "'But an individual who does something wrong intentionally, whether a citizen or a foreigner, is blaspheming ADONAI. That person will be cut off from his people. (CJB)

Hebrews 6: 4. But they who have once descended to immersion and have tasted the gift from heaven and have received the Ruach haKodesh 5. and have tasted the good Word of Elohim and the power of the world to come, 6. cannot again sin and a second time be renewed to repentance; or a second time execute him on a stake and insult the Son of Elohim. 7. For the earth that drinks the rain which comes often upon it and produces the herb that is of use to those for whom it is cultivated, receives a blessing from Elohim. 8. But if it should put forth thorns and briers, it would be discarded and be approaching closely to a curse, and its end would be a conflagration. (AENT)

As a matter of fact, we are even considered “guilty” if we simply witness those things and don’t bother doing anything about them! (See Matthew 18:15; 1 John 5:16 ). I’ve personally witnessed congregation leadership turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to sins committed right under their noses (as a matter of fact, I wrote a novel entitled, “Destroyed from Within!” about this very subject). It is a given that weak and “lukewarm” leadership destroys entire congregations! Once “satan” is allowed to enter a congregation (or our homes), he’s VERY hard to get rid of. He takes up residence and permeates everything. He will destroy your relationship with YHWH – guaranteed!

Therefore, we must take YHWH/Yeshua/Torah VERY seriously because, while “grace” covers that proverbial “multitude of sins,” it does NOT give us “carte blanche” to ignore Scripture or to pick and choose what we wish to believe. YHWH has always given man a “way to please and return to Him”; but just because He’s made it really easy for us to gain eternal life through our belief in Yeshua, it doesn’t mean we won’t be vomited from Yeshua’s mouth upon his return:

Revelation 3:15. I know your works, that you are neither hot, nor cold; I would desire that you would be either cold or hot. 16. So, because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I am about to vomit you from my mouth. (CJB)

Revelation 3:19. As many as I love, I rebuke and discipline. Be faithful emulators therefore, and repent. 20. Behold, I have been standing at the door, and I will knock: if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with me. 21. And to him that is victorious, to him will I give to sit with me on my throne, even as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22. He that has ears to hear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies. (AENT)

3 John: 11. Our beloved, be not a follower of what is evil, but of what is good. He that does good is of Elohim; but he that does evil has not seen Elohim. (AENT)