Discourse: Sinaite to Christian Pastor – 7

[This is like listening to a phone conversation between two friends, both formerly Christian, both in active ministry, but one defecting to Sinai 6000. If you not been following this series, please refer to the earlier exchanges:

—Admin1]

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In my previous letter I had mentioned my involvement with the Messianic movement. In fact BAN and I (with five others) started the first Messianic congregation in Baguio, most likely the first in the Philippines. As I also have mentioned, we were with this group for 7 to 8 years, when we left in 2010. As elders, we are assigned to teach every Sabbath the portion of the scriptures assigned for the week.

This is taken from —

the Torah called Parasha,
a portion from the Tanach (Prophets), called Haftorah,
and a portion from the New Testament.

In Messianic teaching, the main theme is—- that the roots and foundation of our faith in the Messiah (Yeshua/Jesus) connects with the Land, the People, and the Scriptures of Israel. We believe, as I still do, according to the New Testament—-

that Jesus/Yeshua was a Jew,
believed in the God(YHVH) of the Torah,
taught from the Torah,
and lived a Torah lifestyle.

This why as Messianics,

we celebrate the Sabbath (instead of Sunday worship),
the biblical festivals of Pesach (Passover),
Shavuot (Pentecost),
Rosh Hashanah /Yom Teruah (Trumpets),
and Sukkot (Tabernacle).

Although then we still believed in Jesus as God, we celebrated his birth on September/October, at the feast of Tabernacles/Sukkot and not in December as Christians do. I may be able to explain this the next time there’s an opportunity.

In Messianic teaching, the focus was on the Tanach ( Hebrew Scriptures) or OT in Christian bibles. This had given me the opportunity to concentrate my study in the OT of the Christian bible. Having said this, let me now take you to the time I first discovered a discrepancy or an inconsistency in the application of a doctrinal teaching based on scriptures.

This was at the time I was asked again to teach on the Passover festival during a Sabbath fellowship. The topic was not new to me anymore because as an elder this is usual, teaching on the same subject almost every year. However, I just don’t know what occurred then but suddenly I could not connect Jesus as the fulfillment of the Passover lamb. All the years that I was teaching the Passover I found myself facing a blank wall. Let me explain.

Messianics, as well as Evangelicals, teach and believe that Jesus is the fulfilment of the Passover Lamb. The Gospel of John supports this claim when John the baptizer, pointing at Jesus said: ”Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

In my understanding therefore, the flesh (lamb or goat) was to be eaten in haste for a quick or fast departure from Egypt to avoid being overtaken by the Egyptians. The blood on their houses was a sign to spare them from God’s judgment on the firstborn of any family.

On the day I was going to teach, I was very much disturbed on what I had discovered. And, so I asked the congregation in the presence of the Elders, and presented my problem and asked them what they thought because it did not coincide with the doctrinal position we have been taught. I found out later that everybody was shaken up by what I said. Nobody could give me an explanation. I decided therefore to step down from my position, as an elder, and asked to leave the congregation so I could concentrate more on studying the Scriptures without being influenced by anyone; an opportunity to study without any preconceived ideas or notions; in effect, an opportunity to just start all over again, getting out of my ‘comfort zone’.

Going back in studying the Scriptures on the subject of the Passover lamb, I started asking myself these questions:

Why did God chose a lamb or goat ?
Why just not any other animal?

In Exodus 8:25-26, why did Moses refuse Pharaoh’s offer that they sacrifice to their God within the land; then further explain that for them to do so would be an abomination to the Egyptians who might even “stone” (execute) them (the Israelites).

In Gen. 46:34, shepherds are “loathsome” to the Egyptians.

Also in Gen.43:32, when the brothers of Joseph came to have a meal with him, they were served separately: the Egyptians by themselves, Joseph by himself, and the brothers by themselves. Why? Because the brothers of Joseph were shepherds.

I later on found out that the lamb or goat is sacred and is worshipped as a god. God’s judgments were on the gods of Egypt who held the Israelites captive in idolatry. God’s command to kill this one Egyptian god was intended to show that the Israelites have abandoned their gods and therefore have to make a new commitment to follow YHVH by putting the lamb’s blood on their houses. None of these can show that the lamb was offered as a sacrifice and that the lamb’s blood as in effect an atonement for sin.

Many of the Gospel accounts pertaining to the crucifixion leading to the death of Jesus as the Messiah tend to support the claim that the Passover lamb is “the shadow of things to come.” In Messianic teaching, we learned that every aspect of the Seder or the Last Supper also point to Jesus and yet much of it also have no connection whatsoever with the Passover lamb.

All these would seem to fall within the biblical interpretation of scripture defined as EISEGESIS-”when one reads his own meaning with the text” instead of EXEGESIS-the act of critically interpreting a text in an attempt to “draw the meaning out” of the text.

The scriptural passages discussed above is just one of the many problematic interpretations and/or applications of a doctrinal position. The problem is in trying to justify two conflicting positions on one specific passage, one coming from the Torah and the other from the New Testament which claims to be the fulfilment of the Torah. For this reason I decided to focus my study on the Torah which is accepted after all, as the word of YHVH, as well as the rest of the Tanach as commentaries.

Studying the Torah is like breathing fresh air for the first time. Yes, I read and refer to other sources for meanings and better understanding of some Hebrew words. I also seek the positions or opinions of Rabbis or non-Rabbis, Jews or non-Jews, even Atheists or Agnostics, Christians or non-Christians, practically almost anyone and everyone. In this manner I get to know whether I gain a better understanding of the Torah. This is the reason why we (BAN & I) no longer belong to any church or organization. It is for this reason that we and some others have banded together to set up the website sinai6000.net. with just one purpose for seekers of the truth. We are gentiles and will continue to remain as such believers in GOD (YHVH) Who revealed Himself in Mt. Sinai and Who has given us the Torah for all the peoples and for all the nations.

I am glad to hear from you that you are now preaching a lot on the Old Testament. I would suggest, if I may, to focus merely on the specific passage of the Scriptures and set aside for the meantime, any connection with any New Testament passage. Then ask yourself; What does it say and What does it mean? Don’t bother referring to any preconceived idea or notion. You will discover first of all that the scripture is easy to understand because this is how God (YHVH) intended it to be – understandable.

When my grandson, age 15, came to visit us I decided to take him through Genesis chapters 1 to 3. When we got to the part that God covered their nakedness with garmentS of skin, I then asked him what kind of skin? Much to my surprise he said it was “snake’s skin.” When I asked him why snake skin’; he said it is the only animal so far mentioned and named in the garden, after God created all the animals. This is the answer of a child with no preconceived idea or notion. This caught me by surprise. I was always made to understand that the animal skin must have come from a lamb to connect it to Jesus, since he was the Lamb sacrificed whose blood was offered for the sin of the world. This what I mean when I urge you to read the Scriptures, specially the Tanach or OT of the Christian bible.

I completely agree with you that this exchange of correspondence is purely an exchange of opinions or concerns, and certainly between friends, and hopefully NOT between combatants.

Let us keep this exchange of correspondence open by all means. And certainly I will follow this up with what I think about the book ‘The case for Christ” by Lee Strobel” as soon as I have finished reading it. I’m just getting slow nowadays. Just getting old!

Let me now close by wishing you, your family, and loved ones, a Pleasurable, Productive, and Prosperous New Year!

VAN and BAN@S6K

Next: Discourse: Christian Pastor to Sinaite – 8

Source: Exodus/Shemoth 24 – "the sight of the Glory of YHVH (was) like a consuming fire" -- We gentiles living in this 21st century are able to experience that climactic moment [God appearing on Sinai] by reading and studying this portion of the TORAH. Indeed, we see YHWH not quite as dramatically as the mixed multitude did, but perhaps even better through these accounts recorded in Exodus. There is a saying that hindsight is 20/20 vision, i.e., we begin to see and understand the question marks in our past only later in our lives, as we mature and hopefully become wiser and more introspective about the meaning or seeming meaninglessness of happenings in history, whether personal, national, or universal. Søren Kierkegaard adds a twist to this: “Only 20:20 vision is hindsight. Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” As we endeavor to understand each portion in the TORAH of YHWH, much of it will seem irrelevant to our current situation but if we see beyond the time-bound cultural and religious situations and begin to understand what truly has not change—human nature and the Great Revelator who designed the perfect blueprint for living in peace, happily and contentedly with family, community, country and the nations, the unquestionable conclusion is: TORAH is relevant to ALL humankind, not just to Israel, to this very day.

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