“2009”  GOD’S PEOPLE REMAIN IN EXILE ( EGYPT )

By: Frank Guasto  May 2, 2009

Whether we choose to believe it or not God’s people continue to remain captive to the elements of this world, much the same as the children of Israel were, when they, like us, were as strangers in a land not their own. Most all would agree that the identity of this land is Egypt , symbolic of a place of sin. By His grace and an outstretched arm God saved His people out of that land of sin, out of the house of bondage to be a peculiar treasure, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation unto Him.   

It was at Sinai that he told the people; “if they would obey His voice and keep His covenant, then they would be His own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth belongs to Him. In this setting God gave the people His marriage contract, “THE Torah.” In doing so, all of the people answered together, saying, “all that the LORD (Yahweh) has spoken we will do.” By accepting the Torah and its terms, the agreement was made for entering into the betrothal stage of the marriage contract between God and His people Israel .  

Now, before we go any further I believe it is necessary for us to have a clear understanding of some terms.  First, Torah, the first five books of the Bible, normally construed as “Law” (or Law of Moses), is ill defined. A more appropriate rendering would be “Teaching and Instructions in righteousness, or for righteous living.”  Torah is the foundation of truth by which all subsequent Biblical writings must be judged. If they do not agree with the “Torah” they are not to be considered as acceptable. Second, when God speaks of Israel , He is either dealing contextually with faithful Israel or unfaithful Israel . There is a huge difference, and is very important for one to properly discern. “Biblically speaking,” anyone who believes in and follows the Messiah of Israel, is considered to be born again, they are considered to be one of the “Children of Faithful Israel,” and therefore, an Israelite having part in the coming thousand year Kingdom of the Most High. After we come to the knowledge of salvation through the “Living Torah” Messiah Yeshua (Christ Jesus), the written Torah is given to us as our guide for determining right from wrong and acting accordingly. It is very important to understand that our focus should be on becoming a “Messiah observant disciple,” because in doing so we would, by design, become “Torah observant.”

God’s second commandment is for us to have no other God’s before Him. Unfortunately, in a very short period of time after the giving of His commandments, and the people taking their marriage vows, the sin of the “Golden Calf” occurred.  Many believe that this sin of the people was a complete defection, and a total turning back to the ways of Egypt . We propose that soon after being saved out of bondage there would have been no cause for them to defect. A better probability is that soon after coming out of a pagan culture the people were attempting to define God by pagan standards. We suggest that this resulted in a paganized worshipping of the LORD. The people may have done so with good intentions, but to put it in the mildest of terms, they did so with totally improper protocol. One might say, their hearts were in the right place. Even so, they had fashioned the invisible, indestructible, incorruptible God of Glory into the image of a temporal beast. In so doing they had committed the sin of syncretism by “mixing the profane with the HOLY” and considering it as being HOLY and pleasing to the LORD……………THIS GOD HATES! 

God continuously warned the children of Israel not to go whoring after the gods of the strangers of the land that they would be entering, and not to worship Him as the unbelievers worshipped their gods. Guess what? That is exactly what they did, and that is exactly what has persisted to this very day in every culture and religion in every part of the earth. In time we see this apostasy ongoing when Jereboam sets up a golden calf in Bethel, another in Dan, and appointed priests that were not of the Levite’s and changed God’s appointed times. This can be found in (1Kgs 12:25-33) and was the straw that broke the camels back, and because of their unrelenting rebellion, God divorced the House of Israel, also known as the Northern Kingdom. But God, at some future time, according to the prophecy of (Hosea 1:1-11) and (Eze 37:15-28) promised that He would gather to himself the outcasts of the House of Israel and their companions and unite them with the House of Judah and their companions and they would become one nation in His hand. The coming together of these two houses represents the “whole House of Israel,” “Kingdom of Israel ” the Kingdom of the Most High, the end time millennial reign of Messiah Yeshua.

Earlier, the LORD had made a covenant with the descendants of Jacob and commanded them: "Do not worship any other gods or bow before them or to serve them or offer sacrifices to them. Later on, we see in (2Kgs 17:24-41) that the people feared the LORD, and made unto themselves the priests of the lowest pagans and offered sacrifices at the pagan shrines. And though they worshiped the LORD, they continued to follow the religious customs of the nations from which they came. This is still going on to this very today. They followed their former practices instead of truly worshiping the LORD by holding dear the laws, instructions, and commands he gave the descendants of Jacob, whose name he changed to Israel , after his wrestling match with the angel of the Lord. This is referred to as “The Time Of Jacob’s Trouble,” and is a prophetic picture of the “Great Tribulation” of Mathew 24:29.   

Then in (2Kgs 23) we see Josiah making reforms after a copy of the Torah was found and read to Josiah.   It so convicted Josiah that his repentance was evident by making a covenant before the LORD to walk after Him, and pledged that he and his people would keep God’s commandments, testimonies and statutes with all their heart and with all their soul. He did away with the pagan priests, who had been appointed by the previous kings of Judah , and brought back to Jerusalem all the priests of the LORD, who were living in other towns of Judah . The king removed the Asherah pole from the altar of the LORD's Temple (where we normally would put a Christmas tree) and took it outside Jerusalem to the Kidron Valley, where he burned it. Then he ground the pole to dust and threw the dust in the public cemetery. He also tore down the houses of the Temple prostitutes that were inside the Temple of the LORD, and he cleansed the Temple where the pagans offered incense to Baal and sacrifices to Molech in many places

In Malachi we see the word of the LORD “For I [am] the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed” (Mal 3:6). This is of significant importance, because without the unchanging assurances of God we then have no basis on which to cling to His promises, and then onto our faith. Shortly after this passage is another in (Mal 4:4-6).  It is God’s last instructions before the silent years………..  . Remember ye the Torah of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel , [with] the statutes and judgments. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.

An important item to note in the above is the “Law of Moses.”  The Law of Moses is the Torah, the eternal unchanging word of God. The other entry is the verse pertaining to the turning of the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers. This does not, in any way, represent turning to our fathers in the flesh or the early church fathers, but refers to our spiritual fathers, namely, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

The year of this writing is 2009 and the practice of syncretism is still alive and well in Christianity and in Judaism, the only two people of the Bible. This observable fact can be attributed to religious men in Judaism and in Christianity having usurped the authority of God and replaced God’s Torah with the traditions of men. The Roman Church as the main instigator of this travesty has influenced all of Christendom with their deceptive and self serving practices. Earlier the “Jewish Rabbinical System” merged their oral man made traditions with the Torah also known as the “Law of Moses.”  Allegorical and dispensational implementations have been cleverly masked and incorporated into “Church Doctrine” replacing Biblical truth. These reforms were not put into effect by election, but through “Submitting to the Roman Church under the threat of death.” By doing this the Roman Church has made it extremely difficult for even the most able of Biblical students to learn the truth. This is not to say that I am specially gifted with a wealth of intelligence, actually, far from it. But, the LORD did put a desire in my heart to know the truth, and He literally sent people to my door to explain more fully the Word of God. I pray the same for you! 

Our captivity may not be readily apparent to many of us, but with certainty, we are on the short end of an incremental imminent path to oppressive authority. Our liberties are eroding year by year, day by day and hour by hour. We are living in a world full of corruption, injustice, inequality, confusion, myopia, increasing godlessness, abounding in deceit and lies and the list goes on.

This is the harvest of a society that has lost its way. What we are experiencing today in this country that we label a Christian country, is not even close to what it was like fifty years ago, much less than the one that God says is righteous. So if we profess to be a Christian country why is it that we have found ourselves in such a downslide to Gomorrah? We propose that the reason for this nose dive is relatively simple, but the cure more difficult, this, because of men’s interference with God’s instructions. Men caused this confusion when they first started to redefine God’s “Holy Word” and mixed it with their idolatrous practices. What we are doing today is essentially the same as what the children of Israel had done in the sin of the golden calf. History continues to repeat itself!  We are caught up in what could be called a conundrum or an unsolvable mess, but it is by no means beyond repair. The LORD has called us to repentance and to turn back to God’s Torah instructions rooted in Messiah Yeshua for the “restitution of all things” which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.

Most Christian believers innocently observe pagan holidays such as Easter, Lent, Halloween and Christmas as well as other days that are not the Lords appointed times. At the same time, I have talked with believers who understand that these “really were” pagan holidays, (actually they still are) but by attaching the label of “Christian” to them it somehow seems to sanitize them. And, from this mindset a magical transformation has occurred. So by this, it changes these unholy days into a holy state that is seemingly acceptable to God. But where does it say that in God’s “Holy Word?”    

The exile or captivity that we are now experiencing is due to our refusal to go back to the Father’s teaching and instructions found in Torah. Through intentional neglect and by outright refusal to observe His Sabbaths, Feast days and dietary laws are partly why we are in exile. By His death and resurrection Yeshua has brought those who were far off, near. Because of His sacrifice we have been set free from sin and death in the spiritual realm, but this does not speak to the here and now in our physical home on planet earth. God expects believers to “do the right thing.” If we want the blessings of God then “We are to walk as Yeshua walked!”

Many believe that by honoring these unholy days as holy in their heart meets God’s criteria of justification. I must admit to doing the same until I was convicted that “God truly makes the rules, but we make the choices.   

The Scriptures tell us something about the human heart in     (Jer 17:9)

 The heart is deceitful above all (things), and desperately wicked: who can know it?

Also, we are told in    (Jn 4:23 & 24)

 But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God [is] a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship [him] in spirit and in truth.

The key word in the previous verse is “truth,” and our heartfelt desire to worship our LORD is to be done in truth, and to use the assertion of “heart obedience only” is not in keeping with the truth of the Word. You must understand that God places obedience “above” sacrifice. The Bible teaches how we are to approach and worship our Holy God.  By not doing so His way and to replace it with Frank Sinatra’s way (My Way) will bring about severe judgment. The casual attitude taken by Nadab and Abihu’s departure from the LORD’s instructions in the performance of their priestly duties is precisely what led to their earthly demise. I would say that is severe judgment. Make the right choice!

As we look into the book of Hosea it reads:   (Hosea 4:6)

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the Torah of thy God, I will also forget thy children.

While we are here on earth it is the responsibility of the gentiles, who have received Messiah Yeshua by faith, and have been grafted into the “ Commonwealth of Israel” (Eph 2:11-13) to provoke Judah to jealousy. God's people of Judah did not stumble and fall beyond recovery. God’s purpose was to make His “Gospel” available to the Gentiles by hardening Judah . According to the Scriptures, God’s plan for the house of Judah was to provoke them to jealousy when they saw the gentiles coming back to Torah, and want for themselves that which they thought was rightfully theirs. (Ro 11:11)

There is another verse in Romans that is rarely studied or taught in the church, perhaps for lack of concern, ignorance and for other motives. Whatever the reason, it has proven to be a disadvantage for God’s people, and as a result, only receiving a limited knowledge of the Torah. It is never too late to start learning His ways.  Declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times (Is 46:10a)

(Ro 11:25) The verse reads:    

For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.

What this means in its historical Biblical context relates to how the coming kingdom will be revealed. The fullness of the gentiles coming in refers to a certain number of gentiles coming back to keeping Torah and having a desire to take part in the Feasts of the LORD (not the “feast of the Jews”) and His Sabbaths. Only the LORD knows what that certain number is. Because of partial blindness, Judaism has denounced Yeshua, and Christianity has denounced the Torah for close to two thousand years. Guilt can be shared equally by the house of Judah (Judaism) and the house of Israel (Christianity), which together makes up the whole house of Israel . This somewhat parallels Judaism’s neglect of the New Testament and Christianity’s neglect of the Old Testament.

So, until the time of His coming Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth, for God is calling man out of Babylon (confusion by mixing) and all of its wickedness.

Paul instructs us in (2 Cor 6:14-18)

Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in [them]; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean [thing]; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.

Yeshua warns us in (Mat7:21-23)

Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity (Torahlessness).

(2 Tim 2:19)

Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that names the name of Christ depart from Torahlessness.

May the blessings of the Holy One of Israel guide you into all truth and keep you from harm until the day His return.

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