This Ain’t That #3

In this post in our “This Ain’t That” series, I want to talk about how faith is not what most of us think and it’s not what most of us have been told to believe it was. There has been a long-standing debate over faith vs works. The sad thing is that we see it as FAITH…versus…WORKS. Do the two really work in opposition to each other? I want to propose that if they do, if faith and works are really in direct opposition to one another, it would’ve been news to the disciples of Yeshua, Paul, and even Yeshua Himself.

As I said in our last video, I grew up in traditional evangelical Christianity, so that’s my reference point and in that traditional understanding, I can’t tell you how many sermons, Sunday school lessons, devotionals I sat through that pounded into my head the idea that “all of our righteousness is as filthy rags”. I had become so convinced that I could do absolutely nothing to ever please God that I eventually quit trying. Oh, I still went to church faithfully. Heck, I even started teaching and preaching. I even went so far as to make my entire life about teaching other people about God. But I always struggled with this idea that not even my most earnest, humble, heart-felt desire to please God and do things that He says are pleasing, would please Him. For instance, Yeshua Himself commanded us to care for the widows and orphans, those downtrodden and less fortunate than us. So if we do those things, does that not please the Father? We are commanded also to love God above all and to love our neighbors as ourselves…does that not please God? The 10 commandments…when we do our best to live out the “Big 10”, does God not look upon that with pleasure?

There seems to be a disconnect here somewhere. Christendom is filled with writings telling us that all we have to do is put our “faith” in the finished work of Christ on the cross. That when God sees us in our despicable, rotten, sinful state, He looks at us through Yeshua’s righteousness and we are able to commune with Him because of Christ’s sacrifice. So the big question is, what does that mean? I mean, tangibly, what does that mean. Because I don’t know about you, but for me, there is a real life out here that I have to live. One with challenges, opportunities, relationships, careers and families. Is all that we need to please God “faith”? Well, yes, that’s certainly the basis and the foundation. But what is faith? Thousands, maybe millions, of people have defined faith. Just do a Google search for “what is faith” and you could literally spend the next 2 weeks reading opinions and attempts at defining it. I’ve done this and have read for days and days, people’s outlook on what faith is and honestly, very little of what I’ve read seems to reconnect this disconnect.

In Deuteronomy 32. Verse 20 says, “And He said, ‘I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very forward generation, children in whom there is no faith”. Wow, sounds pretty harsh on the Israelites, doesn’t it? Well, let’s look at it like this. Israel had been delivered from Egypt, which is a type and shadow of the greater Exodus that Messiah would provide as He delivered us from slavery to sin. So the Israelites were “saved”, delivered…they had become the nation and people of God that He chose to be His nation of priests to the entire world. So why was He so peeved at the nation? Let’s read up just a few verses. Verse 16 They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they him to anger. 17 They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not. 18 Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee. 19 And when the Lord saw it, he abhorred them, because of the provoking of his sons, and of his daughters. 20 And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very froward generation, children in whom is no faith. So apparently Israel had committed some offenses that got God really ticked. But they were already delivered, remember? The point is that their actions AFTER having the FAITH to follow God out of Egypt and leave their slavery was very important to God, both their obedience and their disobedience.

Let’s fast forward to Isaiah 64. Starting in verse 5You shall meet him who rejoices and does righteousness, who remembers You in Your ways. See, You were wroth when we sinned in them a long time. And should we be saved? 6And all of us have become as one unclean, and all our righteousnesses are as soiled rags. And all of us fade like a leaf, and our crookednesses, like the wind, have taken us away. 7And there is no one who calls on Your Name, who stirs himself up to take hold of You; for You have hidden Your face from us, and have consumed us because of our crookednesses. 8And now, O ????, You are our Father. We are the clay, and You our potter. And we are all the work of Your hand. 9Do not be wroth, O ????, nor remember crookedness forever. See, please look, all of us are Your people!

Here we have the famous, or infamous, verse about our righteousness being as filthy rags. The term “filthy rags” is really interesting. Most English translations clean it up to make it less offensive. The word filthy is a translation of the Hebrew word iddah, which literally means “the bodily fluids from a woman’s menstrual cycle.” The word rags is a translation of begged, meaning “a rag or garment.” So, these “righteous acts” are considered by God as repugnant as a soiled feminine hygiene product. Sorry if that disgusts you, but it’s Scripture—so blame Isaiah. Isaiah is drawing a pretty vivid picture of our “righteousness acts” here. But, there’s more to the story.

What righteous acts was Isaiah referring to? Well, in chapter 42, we see that they were indeed worshipping, but they had turned their backs on Him by worshipping false gods, in chapter 65, they were making sacrifices and burning incense…seems like they were doing as God instructed…but they were sacrificing on strange altars. Isaiah had even called Jerusalem a harlot and compared it to Sodom in chapter 3. See they were doing all the things that God had commanded, but they had twisted them and were being haphazard with them. Sounds a lot like the Golden Calf doesn’t it? So God did not esteem their “righteous acts” as anything but “polluted garments” or “bloody tampons” to use today’s vernacular. Their falling away from walking out the Torah of God as He commanded it, had rendered their righteous works totally unclean.

Now we can see that the “righteousness” that is called filthy rags is not actual righteousness. Isaiah may have been imploring the use of a little sarcasm here. Or, he meant that what Israel really was convinced was righteousness was actually way off from what God intended. It was a perversion and twisting of His perfect Torah. But they were still the people of God and in covenant with Him. So does God care what we do after we’re “saved”? Again, if He doesn’t, it would’ve been news to Isaiah and those who heard his words.

Ephesians 2 tells us that by favour you have been saved, through belief, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of Elohim, it is not by works, so that no one should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Messiah ????? unto good works, which Elohim prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. See, we were delivered from the law of sin and death to be doers of good works. Just as Israel was delivered from Egypt not by their own power, we are not delivered by our own power. But does that mean we’re off the hook to perform righteous acts after our deliverance? Peter encourages us to ADD TO YOUR FAITH. That constitutes actions on our part.

So if you’re understanding of faith is simply an agreeing with the facts of the gospel of Messiah, then guys, this ain’t that. It’s not the fulness of faith. Faith is believing, but it’s believing to the point that it causes us to act in accordance with what we believe (good works). Faith only in the head is not faith at all. James tells us that he shows his faith BY what he DOES. So it’s very important that we rid ourselves of the mindset that we can never do anything to please God and thereby we don’t even try to attain righteousness. Simply understanding gets us nowhere. We are called, even commanded to ACT. That’s true faith. And what do our actions tell us? They tell us unequivocally what we believe and whether what we say we believe and what we actually believe are 2 different things or not. Faith and works are only opposed if they contradict each other. And for too many believers, this is the case. Faith and works are a beautiful choreography of our new lives in Messiah.

If you’ve heard over and over that you can never please God by what you do and that even your best tries at holiness are offensive to Christ’s’ sacrifice, and maybe you’ve given up on working on your faith and you find yourself frustrated and empty thinking there must be more to this life, let these words resound in your mind…THIS AIN’T THAT. It’s time for us to correct this mindset and start being God’s people who God is pleased with.

So welcome to the journey, I pray your life will never be the same.


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This Ain’t That #2

Before we jump in this week, I want to say a couple of things that I did not mention last week. So, first off, who is this series for? These videos are intended to speak mostly to those who grew up in a religious system and are now seeking the truths of God not bound by religious culture, especially those who have found that Torah or, “the law” is still valid, applicable, and yes even profitable for believers today. If you are new to imitating Yeshua’s way of living the Torah as your lifestyle of worship of the King, many mindsets that you brought over from Christianity will make this walk incredibly difficult if we don’t get them sorted out. Most of you watching this have some sort of religious background, whether catholic or protestant, conservative or liberal, christian or Jewish. In this series, we are going to be contrasting some mindsets that we all may have, or still do see as normal and right, with some opposing ideas from Scripture. One point I want to make is that, listen, I grew up in conservative evangelical Christianity so that will be my reference point. I am going to be saying things like “In the church we believed, but” or “in the church we taught, but” or “Christianity teaches this, but” and I want to be very clear that my intent is not to divide us from nor offend any of our Christian brothers or sisters who are actively seeking and doing their best to serve the Father. But there are some mindsets that those of us who grew up in church hold to that are simply not in line with God’s heart and are actually directly contradictory to His Words. There are ideas being propagated by preachers, teachers, evangelists, and “prophets” that are creating a false sense of hope and when that falsity is realized and people’s lives begin to fall apart, many, many sadly turn away from Yeshua and the Father. This series is not about encouraging you to simply be comfortable and stay in the frustration, confusion, and indecisiveness where you currently live. Listen, we ALL think and act in ways that Messiah never thought nor acted and if He is the mark we aim to imitate, we have to deal with some of these hard issues. The reputation of our King is at stake. Let’s jump in.

So the first “This Ain’t That” that we are going to tackle is “the Sabbath” vs Sunday, but we’re not going to spend any time proving why Saturday is the Sabbath and why it is still a blessing and our responsibility to keep and guard the sabbath, there is plenty of info online and it’s incredibly clear in Scripture, but I want to address some other things surrounding the sabbath that I think are important and if you’re coming from a traditional Christian background I want to tackle some mindsets that may make the Sabbath a difficult thing to grasp. Let’s look at some ways “This” (the Sabbath) “Ain’t That” (sunday worship).

Alright, let’s set a baseline. In Deuteronomy 30 God says, “For this command which I am commanding you today, it is not too hard for you, nor is it far off. “It is not in the heavens, to say, ‘Who shall ascend into the heavens for us, and bring it to us, and cause us to hear it, so that we do it? “Nor is it beyond the sea, to say, ‘Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it to us, and cause us to hear it, so that we do it? “For the Word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart – to do it. So straight off the jump I want to remind you that if keeping the sabbath seems like a burden, seems like it’s difficult when God clearly said it is not, it’s not the sabbath that’s the problem…it’s us. There is something in us that God is wanting to change so that we can think like He does. This is part of the “dying to flesh”. Fun, right?

So how is the Sabbath not like traditional sunday worship? In this video, I want to address one glaring difference that many struggle with in hopes that we can gain a better understanding and practice of keeping the sabbath. Gen. 1 tells us that the day actually begins at sunset. In God’s calendar, a “day” is from sunset to sunset. Exodus 31 and Leviticus 23, (among other places) are where we find the instructions of the Sabbath Day. Sunday worship isn’t really a “day”. Let’s be honest. If you’ve gone to church on a sunday, had a worship experience, heard a message, maybe even participated in a sunday school or discipleship class, you’ve basically honored the day of worship. This Ain’t That! God’s instruction to us is that we would dedicate a “DAY” to Him, not a part of a day. When we begin to celebrate the Sabbath, our tendency is to treat it like what we’ve done our whole lives in church. If you have a Sabbath fellowship to attend, simply going to the Sabbath meeting and doing your religious duty is not keeping the Shabbat. Congregational meeting is a part of the Sabbath, but not the whole of the Sabbath.

See, the Sabbath doesn’t start when service starts and it doesn’t end when service ends. If your congregation or fellowship meets on Friday evenings, you don’t have all of saturday to do what you want just because you’ve already met on Friday evening, you still have a whole day to “shabbat”, to rest. Likewise, if your fellowship meets on saturday, it’s not just enough to carve out of your saturday enough time to go to fellowship then take the rest of the day to do what you want. If that’s how we’re keeping the sabbath, all we’ve really done is moved sunday church to saturday.

You know how it goes…”if I can just make it to church” or “it’s sunday so we have to go to church”. Or we get all dressed up and geared up emotionally and mentally for sunday worship so we can put our best face on and then when it’s over, we go back to whoever we were. We tend to think that just because we enter a building on sunday that we are honoring God and will get His blessing. The keeping of the sabbath is not about simply entering a building, but it is a segment of space in time where we get to rest in Him and turn our hearts away from what we want to Him and what He desires. It’s SO important that we understand this. What did you go to church for? For some, it was rest. For some it was encouragement, hope, joy, relationship and belonging. I’m not downplaying these things as they’re all very important. But in keeping the sabbath, we shouldn’t have to put on a pretty face in order to walk into the building. We shouldn’t have to strive to get to the building in hopes of finding a breath of life and hope. The sabbath doesn’t begin when the first notes of worship are struck or the first song is sung. When you walk into your sabbath meeting, you should have already been “shabbatting” since sunset. You shouldn’t have to be encouraged to worship or to pray or to participate in the service. You should have been worshipping and praying since Friday evening. There is such a huge weight on ministers in churches because of the pressure to coax people into worship. Pastors are leaving the ministry in droves because of the weight of having to cause people to be excited about God. The Sabbath should be teaching us that it is our responsibility to meet with the King, not the pastor’s responsibility to bring the King to us. It’s not the teacher’s responsibility to tell you how to think or what to believe and grow your relationship with the Father. Then, when we come together for our sabbath convocation, it is full of joy, peace, and hope, because we are all of the same mind…we are in God’s rhythm because we have taken it upon ourselves to honor His timing and prepare for the King. So ask yourself, is this a mindset that I need to look at in my life? Would an adjustment here help me understand the blessing of the Father’s sabbath better?

Here’s another way “This Ain’t That”. Exodus 31:13 tells us ‘My Sabbaths you are to guard, by all means, for it is a SIGN between Me and you throughout your generations, to know that I, ????, am setting you apart. Was (or is) sunday church simply an addition to your life, something you didn’t really bother with except when it was sunday? Or was it maybe something that really didn’t affect the rest of your week? Were you simply committed to an institution? In Exodus 31, Abba tells us that the Sabbath, in contrast to the way many approach sunday worship, is a SIGN, not simply something we do because of religious guilt or cultural expectations, but that it tells everyone who we are and whose we are because we are acknowledging the day that HE set apart. I like to think of the sabbaths and feasts of the LORD as His heartbeat in time. Every seven days the heart of God is beating and calling for us to meet with Him. If we believe God’s words, that the Sabbath is a SIGN, then our entire lives should revolve around the shabbat. If He were to look over the earth to find His children, would the sign we’re carrying identify us as His? It shouldn’t be something that sneaks up on us guys. Again, if your fellowship meeting on shabbat, while important, is the main way you keep the sabbath, then you’re honestly not understanding the heart of the sabbath instruction and you aren’t getting the true blessing of rest that He has for you. Is the sabbath just a meeting you attend? Or do you carry it as a sign that you’re His? If you find yourself struggling with the sabbath in this way, it may be that you need to address this mindset.

The sabbath is not sunday church guys. And if we don’t correct this mindset we will continue to be frustrated and empty just like many of us were in traditional Christianity. I pray you find the heart of the Father’s sabbath rest and begin to rely on Him for the blessing that only comes from honoring His ways.

If you like these videos, please remember to give us a thumbs up. If you aren’t yet, please consider subscribing to our YouTube channel where we have many more devos just like this as well as our weekly Shabbat Torah portions & teachings. Also, If you hit the bell icon you’ll be notified automatically every time we upload a new video. Until next time, shalom.


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This Ain’t That #1

You know, we have all come to places in our walk with God where we’ve been challenged to leave things behind in order to go to where God is calling us and you know as well as I do that the bigger that deliverance, the more incredible the breakthrough, the bigger the promises, the more we have to leave behind. It’s tough, but that’s just the way Abba works.

Let me ask you this…What is one thing that you can vividly remember God asking you to leave behind as He called you to a new level of commitment? Without a doubt I believe that hardest thing to leave behind is actually not a person, relationship, job, or possession…but a MINDSET. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about. I firmly believe that we can leave all the toxic people, idols, and unholy lifestyles behind but if our mental paradigm doesn’t change, we’ve suffered losing those people and things for nothing. We will go right back to where we were if we don’t have a change of mind.

In Phillipians 2:5, we are challenged to “let this mind be in you which was also in Messiah, Yeshua” (Jesus’ Hebrew name). This statement begs the question, “What kind of mind did Yeshua have in Him?” Romans 12 tells us not to be conformed to this world, but that we are going to be transformed into something different, separate, set-apart, peculiar, as we renew our minds. Renew our minds to what model? Messiah’s, of course.

I want to read really quickly from Ephesians 4. “And He Himself gave some as emissaries, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some and shepherds and teachers, GET THIS, for the perfecting of the set-apart ones, to the work of service to a building up of the body of Messiah, until we all come to the unity of the belief and of the knowledge of the Son of Elohim, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the completeness of Messiah, so that we should no longer be children, tossed and borne about by every wind of teaching, by the trickery of men, in cleverness, unto the craftiness of leading astray, but, maintaining the truth in love, we grow up in all respects into Him who is the Head, Messiah.

There’s really much more in these words than we have time to cover today, but I want to key in on a couple of phrases. Do you realize that what we know as the “5 fold ministry” is given to us for our perfecting? And not just to anyone’s perfecting, but specifically the perfecting of those who have already been set-apart. But didn’t Jesus accomplish ALL of that at the cross? If He did, then why are we being challenged that after being set-apart, there’s still more work to do? And what is the purpose? So we can grow up into Messiah’s stature. Pretty tall order don’t you think? So, what does that look like with skin on? Well, if Messiah was our example, what did that look like for Him? It should remind us that He wasn’t tossed by every wind of teaching. He wasn’t tricked by smooth talking or ear-tickling. Even the most crafty and clever couldn’t lead Him astray from who He knew He was. Now ask yourself honestly, does that sound like us?

Stop and listen to conversations around you (not like creepy stalking) but just take a moment to take stock of the what is being bantered about around you. The reality is that humans love fads. We love new stuff. Clothes, music, TV shows, food. Did you ever stop to think that maybe we treat the things of God the same way? Always looking for a new spiritual fad?

This isn’t a 21st century American issue. This propensity has been in humans for all of recorded history. Don’t believe me? Read about Adam and Eve again and see if there isn’t a pattern here. So how did Yeshua stay so rock solid? Well, obviously, He was Yeshua. Yeah, I know, and here’s the thing, we’re supposed to imitate Him.

In this series of videos, we’re going to go through what may seem like some mental gymnastics but stick with me. We want to take stock of where we are and see if it’s really worth it to us to grow into Messiah’s shoes. Welcome to the journey. I pray your life will never be the same.


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This Ain’t That #3

In this post in our “This Ain’t That” series, I want to talk about how faith is not what most of us think and it’s not what most of us have been told to believe it was. There has been a long-standing debate over faith vs works. The sad thing is that we see it as FAITH…versus…WORKS. Do the two really work in opposition to each other? I want to propose that if they do, if faith and works are really in direct opposition to one another, it would’ve been news to the disciples of Yeshua, Paul, and even Yeshua Himself.

As I said in our last video, I grew up in traditional evangelical Christianity, so that’s my reference point and in that traditional understanding, I can’t tell you how many sermons, Sunday school lessons, devotionals I sat through that pounded into my head the idea that “all of our righteousness is as filthy rags”. I had become so convinced that I could do absolutely nothing to ever please God that I eventually quit trying. Oh, I still went to church faithfully. Heck, I even started teaching and preaching. I even went so far as to make my entire life about teaching other people about God. But I always struggled with this idea that not even my most earnest, humble, heart-felt desire to please God and do things that He says are pleasing, would please Him. For instance, Yeshua Himself commanded us to care for the widows and orphans, those downtrodden and less fortunate than us. So if we do those things, does that not please the Father? We are commanded also to love God above all and to love our neighbors as ourselves…does that not please God? The 10 commandments…when we do our best to live out the “Big 10”, does God not look upon that with pleasure?

There seems to be a disconnect here somewhere. Christendom is filled with writings telling us that all we have to do is put our “faith” in the finished work of Christ on the cross. That when God sees us in our despicable, rotten, sinful state, He looks at us through Yeshua’s righteousness and we are able to commune with Him because of Christ’s sacrifice. So the big question is, what does that mean? I mean, tangibly, what does that mean. Because I don’t know about you, but for me, there is a real life out here that I have to live. One with challenges, opportunities, relationships, careers and families. Is all that we need to please God “faith”? Well, yes, that’s certainly the basis and the foundation. But what is faith? Thousands, maybe millions, of people have defined faith. Just do a Google search for “what is faith” and you could literally spend the next 2 weeks reading opinions and attempts at defining it. I’ve done this and have read for days and days, people’s outlook on what faith is and honestly, very little of what I’ve read seems to reconnect this disconnect.

In Deuteronomy 32. Verse 20 says, “And He said, ‘I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very forward generation, children in whom there is no faith”. Wow, sounds pretty harsh on the Israelites, doesn’t it? Well, let’s look at it like this. Israel had been delivered from Egypt, which is a type and shadow of the greater Exodus that Messiah would provide as He delivered us from slavery to sin. So the Israelites were “saved”, delivered…they had become the nation and people of God that He chose to be His nation of priests to the entire world. So why was He so peeved at the nation? Let’s read up just a few verses. Verse 16 They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they him to anger. 17 They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not. 18 Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful, and hast forgotten God that formed thee. 19 And when the Lord saw it, he abhorred them, because of the provoking of his sons, and of his daughters. 20 And he said, I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end shall be: for they are a very froward generation, children in whom is no faith. So apparently Israel had committed some offenses that got God really ticked. But they were already delivered, remember? The point is that their actions AFTER having the FAITH to follow God out of Egypt and leave their slavery was very important to God, both their obedience and their disobedience.

Let’s fast forward to Isaiah 64. Starting in verse 5You shall meet him who rejoices and does righteousness, who remembers You in Your ways. See, You were wroth when we sinned in them a long time. And should we be saved? 6And all of us have become as one unclean, and all our righteousnesses are as soiled rags. And all of us fade like a leaf, and our crookednesses, like the wind, have taken us away. 7And there is no one who calls on Your Name, who stirs himself up to take hold of You; for You have hidden Your face from us, and have consumed us because of our crookednesses. 8And now, O ????, You are our Father. We are the clay, and You our potter. And we are all the work of Your hand. 9Do not be wroth, O ????, nor remember crookedness forever. See, please look, all of us are Your people!

Here we have the famous, or infamous, verse about our righteousness being as filthy rags. The term “filthy rags” is really interesting. Most English translations clean it up to make it less offensive. The word filthy is a translation of the Hebrew word iddah, which literally means “the bodily fluids from a woman’s menstrual cycle.” The word rags is a translation of begged, meaning “a rag or garment.” So, these “righteous acts” are considered by God as repugnant as a soiled feminine hygiene product. Sorry if that disgusts you, but it’s Scripture—so blame Isaiah. Isaiah is drawing a pretty vivid picture of our “righteousness acts” here. But, there’s more to the story.

What righteous acts was Isaiah referring to? Well, in chapter 42, we see that they were indeed worshipping, but they had turned their backs on Him by worshipping false gods, in chapter 65, they were making sacrifices and burning incense…seems like they were doing as God instructed…but they were sacrificing on strange altars. Isaiah had even called Jerusalem a harlot and compared it to Sodom in chapter 3. See they were doing all the things that God had commanded, but they had twisted them and were being haphazard with them. Sounds a lot like the Golden Calf doesn’t it? So God did not esteem their “righteous acts” as anything but “polluted garments” or “bloody tampons” to use today’s vernacular. Their falling away from walking out the Torah of God as He commanded it, had rendered their righteous works totally unclean.

Now we can see that the “righteousness” that is called filthy rags is not actual righteousness. Isaiah may have been imploring the use of a little sarcasm here. Or, he meant that what Israel really was convinced was righteousness was actually way off from what God intended. It was a perversion and twisting of His perfect Torah. But they were still the people of God and in covenant with Him. So does God care what we do after we’re “saved”? Again, if He doesn’t, it would’ve been news to Isaiah and those who heard his words.

Ephesians 2 tells us that by favour you have been saved, through belief, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of Elohim, it is not by works, so that no one should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Messiah ????? unto good works, which Elohim prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. See, we were delivered from the law of sin and death to be doers of good works. Just as Israel was delivered from Egypt not by their own power, we are not delivered by our own power. But does that mean we’re off the hook to perform righteous acts after our deliverance? Peter encourages us to ADD TO YOUR FAITH. That constitutes actions on our part.

So if you’re understanding of faith is simply an agreeing with the facts of the gospel of Messiah, then guys, this ain’t that. It’s not the fulness of faith. Faith is believing, but it’s believing to the point that it causes us to act in accordance with what we believe (good works). Faith only in the head is not faith at all. James tells us that he shows his faith BY what he DOES. So it’s very important that we rid ourselves of the mindset that we can never do anything to please God and thereby we don’t even try to attain righteousness. Simply understanding gets us nowhere. We are called, even commanded to ACT. That’s true faith. And what do our actions tell us? They tell us unequivocally what we believe and whether what we say we believe and what we actually believe are 2 different things or not. Faith and works are only opposed if they contradict each other. And for too many believers, this is the case. Faith and works are a beautiful choreography of our new lives in Messiah.

If you’ve heard over and over that you can never please God by what you do and that even your best tries at holiness are offensive to Christ’s’ sacrifice, and maybe you’ve given up on working on your faith and you find yourself frustrated and empty thinking there must be more to this life, let these words resound in your mind…THIS AIN’T THAT. It’s time for us to correct this mindset and start being God’s people who God is pleased with.

So welcome to the journey, I pray your life will never be the same.


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This Ain’t That #2

Before we jump in this week, I want to say a couple of things that I did not mention last week. So, first off, who is this series for? These videos are intended to speak mostly to those who grew up in a religious system and are now seeking the truths of God not bound by religious culture, especially those who have found that Torah or, “the law” is still valid, applicable, and yes even profitable for believers today. If you are new to imitating Yeshua’s way of living the Torah as your lifestyle of worship of the King, many mindsets that you brought over from Christianity will make this walk incredibly difficult if we don’t get them sorted out. Most of you watching this have some sort of religious background, whether catholic or protestant, conservative or liberal, christian or Jewish. In this series, we are going to be contrasting some mindsets that we all may have, or still do see as normal and right, with some opposing ideas from Scripture. One point I want to make is that, listen, I grew up in conservative evangelical Christianity so that will be my reference point. I am going to be saying things like “In the church we believed, but” or “in the church we taught, but” or “Christianity teaches this, but” and I want to be very clear that my intent is not to divide us from nor offend any of our Christian brothers or sisters who are actively seeking and doing their best to serve the Father. But there are some mindsets that those of us who grew up in church hold to that are simply not in line with God’s heart and are actually directly contradictory to His Words. There are ideas being propagated by preachers, teachers, evangelists, and “prophets” that are creating a false sense of hope and when that falsity is realized and people’s lives begin to fall apart, many, many sadly turn away from Yeshua and the Father. This series is not about encouraging you to simply be comfortable and stay in the frustration, confusion, and indecisiveness where you currently live. Listen, we ALL think and act in ways that Messiah never thought nor acted and if He is the mark we aim to imitate, we have to deal with some of these hard issues. The reputation of our King is at stake. Let’s jump in.

So the first “This Ain’t That” that we are going to tackle is “the Sabbath” vs Sunday, but we’re not going to spend any time proving why Saturday is the Sabbath and why it is still a blessing and our responsibility to keep and guard the sabbath, there is plenty of info online and it’s incredibly clear in Scripture, but I want to address some other things surrounding the sabbath that I think are important and if you’re coming from a traditional Christian background I want to tackle some mindsets that may make the Sabbath a difficult thing to grasp. Let’s look at some ways “This” (the Sabbath) “Ain’t That” (sunday worship).

Alright, let’s set a baseline. In Deuteronomy 30 God says, “For this command which I am commanding you today, it is not too hard for you, nor is it far off. “It is not in the heavens, to say, ‘Who shall ascend into the heavens for us, and bring it to us, and cause us to hear it, so that we do it? “Nor is it beyond the sea, to say, ‘Who shall go over the sea for us, and bring it to us, and cause us to hear it, so that we do it? “For the Word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart – to do it. So straight off the jump I want to remind you that if keeping the sabbath seems like a burden, seems like it’s difficult when God clearly said it is not, it’s not the sabbath that’s the problem…it’s us. There is something in us that God is wanting to change so that we can think like He does. This is part of the “dying to flesh”. Fun, right?

So how is the Sabbath not like traditional sunday worship? In this video, I want to address one glaring difference that many struggle with in hopes that we can gain a better understanding and practice of keeping the sabbath. Gen. 1 tells us that the day actually begins at sunset. In God’s calendar, a “day” is from sunset to sunset. Exodus 31 and Leviticus 23, (among other places) are where we find the instructions of the Sabbath Day. Sunday worship isn’t really a “day”. Let’s be honest. If you’ve gone to church on a sunday, had a worship experience, heard a message, maybe even participated in a sunday school or discipleship class, you’ve basically honored the day of worship. This Ain’t That! God’s instruction to us is that we would dedicate a “DAY” to Him, not a part of a day. When we begin to celebrate the Sabbath, our tendency is to treat it like what we’ve done our whole lives in church. If you have a Sabbath fellowship to attend, simply going to the Sabbath meeting and doing your religious duty is not keeping the Shabbat. Congregational meeting is a part of the Sabbath, but not the whole of the Sabbath.

See, the Sabbath doesn’t start when service starts and it doesn’t end when service ends. If your congregation or fellowship meets on Friday evenings, you don’t have all of saturday to do what you want just because you’ve already met on Friday evening, you still have a whole day to “shabbat”, to rest. Likewise, if your fellowship meets on saturday, it’s not just enough to carve out of your saturday enough time to go to fellowship then take the rest of the day to do what you want. If that’s how we’re keeping the sabbath, all we’ve really done is moved sunday church to saturday.

You know how it goes…”if I can just make it to church” or “it’s sunday so we have to go to church”. Or we get all dressed up and geared up emotionally and mentally for sunday worship so we can put our best face on and then when it’s over, we go back to whoever we were. We tend to think that just because we enter a building on sunday that we are honoring God and will get His blessing. The keeping of the sabbath is not about simply entering a building, but it is a segment of space in time where we get to rest in Him and turn our hearts away from what we want to Him and what He desires. It’s SO important that we understand this. What did you go to church for? For some, it was rest. For some it was encouragement, hope, joy, relationship and belonging. I’m not downplaying these things as they’re all very important. But in keeping the sabbath, we shouldn’t have to put on a pretty face in order to walk into the building. We shouldn’t have to strive to get to the building in hopes of finding a breath of life and hope. The sabbath doesn’t begin when the first notes of worship are struck or the first song is sung. When you walk into your sabbath meeting, you should have already been “shabbatting” since sunset. You shouldn’t have to be encouraged to worship or to pray or to participate in the service. You should have been worshipping and praying since Friday evening. There is such a huge weight on ministers in churches because of the pressure to coax people into worship. Pastors are leaving the ministry in droves because of the weight of having to cause people to be excited about God. The Sabbath should be teaching us that it is our responsibility to meet with the King, not the pastor’s responsibility to bring the King to us. It’s not the teacher’s responsibility to tell you how to think or what to believe and grow your relationship with the Father. Then, when we come together for our sabbath convocation, it is full of joy, peace, and hope, because we are all of the same mind…we are in God’s rhythm because we have taken it upon ourselves to honor His timing and prepare for the King. So ask yourself, is this a mindset that I need to look at in my life? Would an adjustment here help me understand the blessing of the Father’s sabbath better?

Here’s another way “This Ain’t That”. Exodus 31:13 tells us ‘My Sabbaths you are to guard, by all means, for it is a SIGN between Me and you throughout your generations, to know that I, ????, am setting you apart. Was (or is) sunday church simply an addition to your life, something you didn’t really bother with except when it was sunday? Or was it maybe something that really didn’t affect the rest of your week? Were you simply committed to an institution? In Exodus 31, Abba tells us that the Sabbath, in contrast to the way many approach sunday worship, is a SIGN, not simply something we do because of religious guilt or cultural expectations, but that it tells everyone who we are and whose we are because we are acknowledging the day that HE set apart. I like to think of the sabbaths and feasts of the LORD as His heartbeat in time. Every seven days the heart of God is beating and calling for us to meet with Him. If we believe God’s words, that the Sabbath is a SIGN, then our entire lives should revolve around the shabbat. If He were to look over the earth to find His children, would the sign we’re carrying identify us as His? It shouldn’t be something that sneaks up on us guys. Again, if your fellowship meeting on shabbat, while important, is the main way you keep the sabbath, then you’re honestly not understanding the heart of the sabbath instruction and you aren’t getting the true blessing of rest that He has for you. Is the sabbath just a meeting you attend? Or do you carry it as a sign that you’re His? If you find yourself struggling with the sabbath in this way, it may be that you need to address this mindset.

The sabbath is not sunday church guys. And if we don’t correct this mindset we will continue to be frustrated and empty just like many of us were in traditional Christianity. I pray you find the heart of the Father’s sabbath rest and begin to rely on Him for the blessing that only comes from honoring His ways.

If you like these videos, please remember to give us a thumbs up. If you aren’t yet, please consider subscribing to our YouTube channel where we have many more devos just like this as well as our weekly Shabbat Torah portions & teachings. Also, If you hit the bell icon you’ll be notified automatically every time we upload a new video. Until next time, shalom.


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This Ain’t That #1

You know, we have all come to places in our walk with God where we’ve been challenged to leave things behind in order to go to where God is calling us and you know as well as I do that the bigger that deliverance, the more incredible the breakthrough, the bigger the promises, the more we have to leave behind. It’s tough, but that’s just the way Abba works.

Let me ask you this…What is one thing that you can vividly remember God asking you to leave behind as He called you to a new level of commitment? Without a doubt I believe that hardest thing to leave behind is actually not a person, relationship, job, or possession…but a MINDSET. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about. I firmly believe that we can leave all the toxic people, idols, and unholy lifestyles behind but if our mental paradigm doesn’t change, we’ve suffered losing those people and things for nothing. We will go right back to where we were if we don’t have a change of mind.

In Phillipians 2:5, we are challenged to “let this mind be in you which was also in Messiah, Yeshua” (Jesus’ Hebrew name). This statement begs the question, “What kind of mind did Yeshua have in Him?” Romans 12 tells us not to be conformed to this world, but that we are going to be transformed into something different, separate, set-apart, peculiar, as we renew our minds. Renew our minds to what model? Messiah’s, of course.

I want to read really quickly from Ephesians 4. “And He Himself gave some as emissaries, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some and shepherds and teachers, GET THIS, for the perfecting of the set-apart ones, to the work of service to a building up of the body of Messiah, until we all come to the unity of the belief and of the knowledge of the Son of Elohim, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the completeness of Messiah, so that we should no longer be children, tossed and borne about by every wind of teaching, by the trickery of men, in cleverness, unto the craftiness of leading astray, but, maintaining the truth in love, we grow up in all respects into Him who is the Head, Messiah.

There’s really much more in these words than we have time to cover today, but I want to key in on a couple of phrases. Do you realize that what we know as the “5 fold ministry” is given to us for our perfecting? And not just to anyone’s perfecting, but specifically the perfecting of those who have already been set-apart. But didn’t Jesus accomplish ALL of that at the cross? If He did, then why are we being challenged that after being set-apart, there’s still more work to do? And what is the purpose? So we can grow up into Messiah’s stature. Pretty tall order don’t you think? So, what does that look like with skin on? Well, if Messiah was our example, what did that look like for Him? It should remind us that He wasn’t tossed by every wind of teaching. He wasn’t tricked by smooth talking or ear-tickling. Even the most crafty and clever couldn’t lead Him astray from who He knew He was. Now ask yourself honestly, does that sound like us?

Stop and listen to conversations around you (not like creepy stalking) but just take a moment to take stock of the what is being bantered about around you. The reality is that humans love fads. We love new stuff. Clothes, music, TV shows, food. Did you ever stop to think that maybe we treat the things of God the same way? Always looking for a new spiritual fad?

This isn’t a 21st century American issue. This propensity has been in humans for all of recorded history. Don’t believe me? Read about Adam and Eve again and see if there isn’t a pattern here. So how did Yeshua stay so rock solid? Well, obviously, He was Yeshua. Yeah, I know, and here’s the thing, we’re supposed to imitate Him.

In this series of videos, we’re going to go through what may seem like some mental gymnastics but stick with me. We want to take stock of where we are and see if it’s really worth it to us to grow into Messiah’s shoes. Welcome to the journey. I pray your life will never be the same.


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