Question:

Why God would even have a "new covenant" if it were not going to replace the "old covenant?" Law and Grace are just about as exact opposites as anything can get... and the old covenant of law just cannot mix with the new covenant of grace. Why do you think that Jesus gave the parable of the wine skins!!! He was talking about the old covenant not being compatible with the fullness of the "new wine" of the new covenant!! If he were not, in essence, replacing the old covenant, but simply mingling them, this parable would not make any sense (and yet, that is what the parable is talking about).

Answer:

I really see three questions here.

1. We believe that each successive covenant does not automatically "cancel" out the previous one. In each successive covenant there can be some modifications, in some instances, to a previous one (such as the need for a sin sacrifice on Yom Kippur or any other day for that matter is not needed since it has found it's fulfillment in the death of Yeshua on the cross) but to modify something and to cancel it out are two different things. The Abrahamic covenant did not cancel out the covenant made with Noah, the Mosaic covenant did not cancel out the covenant made with Abraham, etc. The successive covenants simply were fuller revelations of the person of God, the character of God and a deepening of our understanding of God's desired relationship with man and how this is accomplished. Why didn't God tell everything about Himself with the very first covenant that He established with Adam?? I don't know. Why did we have to wait to understand a fuller revelation of His grace when He delivered not only Noah and his family, but the animals of the earth as well……why wasn't that completely revealed in Adam's time? I don't know. Why were there several thousand years between His first act of grace in the Garden, and the fullest revelation of His grace through Yeshua? I don't know. God chose to reveal more and more about Himself and His grace with each successive covenant.
   
   
2. We don't believe that the law throws out grace or that grace gets rid of the law. IF salvation in the Mosaic covenant was based on law and now salvation is based on grace, (many Christians and non-Messianic Jews believe this, but the Bible does not teach it this way.) THEN law and grace would cancel each other out in their respective times. BUT we do not believe that salvation was ever based on keeping the law. Not then, not now, not ever.
   
   
3. We believe that the parable of the wineskins are a teaching more on the hearts of people than the entire old covenant itself. Yeshua came to accomplish many things and one of them was to prepare the hearts of the people to receive His teachings regarding the Kingdom of God and to receive the infilling of the Holy Spirit. If people's hearts are hardened to the point that they cannot change their beliefs when a fuller understanding of God comes from the lips of Messiah Himself, then everything that He teaches and seeks to pour into their lives will be wasted because their hearts are not pliable enough to receive it. Their hearts are hardened…the new wine being presented by Messiah was not received by a large number of people….they burst (i.e,. did not receive the life that Messiah came to give).

Question:

What is required for salvation? What makes a man acceptable in the sight of God?

Answer:

According to the Bible, both the Old and New Covenants, there is nothing that man can do in and of himself that would make him acceptable to God. Many people erroneously believe that people were "saved" during the "Old Covenant times" by keeping the law. This would have been a thoroughly works-based salvation which is NOT taught in any part of the bible. Salvation is ALWAYS (past, present and future) based on the provision for sin that God Himself has provided for man. That provision was completed by Yeshua, seen by God as occurring since the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8), and pictured by the sacrifices offered during the times of ministry of the tabernacles and the temples. The sacrifices did not "save" anyone and they were never intended too. The offerer needed a heart decision out of faith placed in the provision of God (His grace). Did they completely understand this concept? Many did, many did not. That is one of the reasons that Yeshua came, to accomplish salvation by His sacrificial death and to bring this fuller understanding.

Question:

How, then, if you know what makes a man acceptable in the sight of God, can anyone be saved? Because it most certainly is not be observing the law... if anything the law has taught us, it has taught us that even on our best day we can not even come close to fulfilling even one simple part of it... the law condems, it does not save...

Answer:

I think I answered this in the above statements.

Question:

Does your church teach that you have to follow the feasts and stuff like that, in order to be "complete" or "saved"?

Answer:

First of all, we consider ourselves a synagogue rather than a church…..but we do celebrate the feasts as God instructed in the Mosaic covenant, but doing that does not earn us salvation, nor does it get us "brownie points" with God. When you follow the commandment of "loving your neighbor as yourself" that is taught in Lev 19:18 and was emphasized by Messiah, do you do that to be "complete" or "saved" or to earn "brownie points" with God?

NEXT ROUND OF QUESTIONS:

Many Christians and non-Christians want to know why Messianic Jews desire to "follow the old traditions" when "Jesus clearly did away with the Law."

The answer, in part, is:

In order to have eternal life, one needs do nothing besides believe that Yeshua died for us and to ask the Holy Spirit to come and live in our hearts and guide our lives. Period. There's nothing else required.

Many, if not most, Messianic believers, however, choose to "walk in Torah" -- that is, they believe in trying to "keep kosher", in saying the "Shema" and in honoring the Torah, and in keeping God's feasts and honoring Him according to Old Covenant ways. The reason for this is because we believe that Yeshua -- contrary to popular Christian belief -- did NOT "do away" with the "Law". (Actually, Torah never meant "law" but rather, "God's Teaching and Instruction".) Matthew 5:17 clearly states this fact when Yeshua said:

Matthew 5:17 -- "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill."

The thing is, most Christians who question Messianic Judaism, are looking at the Bible through "Greek," and not "Jewish" eyes. YHWH is the God of the Jews as indicated in the Old Testament; He is also our Father; Yeshua was His "Son" - an aspect of God sent in human form to personally teach us how to worship God and how to treat each other. Gentiles are grafted in to Israel by the blood of The Lamb; not vice versa. Yeshua, the very first Messianic Jew, and all of His disciples were Jewish, and they all kept the feasts and worshipped in synagogues on Saturday. Example:

Luke 22:8 -- And Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, so that we may eat it."

Yeshua has already fulfilled the first four of the feasts, which indicates that the feasts held a significance for Him:

• While Passover was being celebrated, which included the slaying of an unblemished Lamb, Yeshua was being slain on the cross (1 Cor 5:7).
• The feasts that followed, Unleavened Bread, is a picture of sanctification, as Yeshua was buried. Leaven is representative of sin, of which Yeshua had none.
• And then the feast of Firstfruits, to be celebrated on the morning AFTER the first Sabbath following the feasts of Unleavened Bread (Sunday) (Lev 23:10-11) is symbolic of Yeshua being the first of the Firstfruits (1 Cor 15:23).
• Even more interesting, the next big event for Christians was the coming of the Holy Spirit. And it fell EXACTLY on the next feast 50 days later, on what Christians call Pentecost. The symbolism is again obvious as two loaves of bread are offered, which is a picture of the Old and New Testaments.

As you can clearly see, the feasts of the OT must have meant something to Yeshua, or else why would He have bothered to "fulfill" -- not do away with them or the Old Covenant?

Matthew 5:17 -- "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill."

Paul's Teachings

Often, people cite Paul's teachings in Galatians as meaning that, if one is led by the Spirit, he or she is not under law... that the authority of the law has been abolished for believers in Yeshua and thus the Torah has been superceded.

However, there is an important hermeneutic principle--that scripture cannot contradict itself. Paul would have never rendered his teaching contradictory because it would have rendered scripture contradictory. (Please read Acts 21:15-21, which was written after Paul wrote Galatians. The verses clearly reveal that Paul was Torah observant.) Understanding the hermeneutic principle and many other statements that again and again declare the Torah as authoritative, means that the church's interpretation is wrong.

When Paul speaks of "under the law" and "works of the law" whenever he discusses uses of the Torah, he is speaking against legalism, and not against the Torah, per se. The church has confused legalism (man's requirements) with Torah observance. There is no Hebrew word for the concept of "legalism" or "legalist" so Paul was hindered in his attempt to explain that legalism was not what God intended. Indeed, if one pays closer attention to the nature of Paul's language, one learns that Paul was not teaching against Torah observance by believers of Yeshua; rather, he was being careful in his language to make it clear that Torah was not given by God to be used in a legalistic manner.

The early believers were taught to live according to the Torah. In Acts 15, we see the attitude of the early Messianic leadership in Jerusalem towards the Gentiles who were coming to Yeshua. Contrary to what some Bible teachers teach, these new believing Gentiles were encouraged to learn and follow the Torah. Romans 11 shows that Gentile believers in Yeshua are grafted into Israel, thereby uniting Jewish and Gentile believers into an inseparable bond. The nature of this unity is expanded upon in Ephesians 2. From this passage we can see that Gentile believers are considered to be honorary citizens of Israel, even family members with their Jewish counterparts.

Acts 15 says the following:

Acts 15: ¹³ After they had stopped speaking, James answered, saying, "Brethren, listen to me. ¹⁴ "Simeon has related how God first concerned Himself about taking from among the Gentiles a people for His name. ¹⁵ "With this the words of the Prophets agree, just as it is written, ¹⁶ 'AFTER THESE THINGS I will return, AND I WILL REBUILD THE TABERNACLE OF DAVID WHICH HAS FALLEN, AND I WILL REBUILD ITS RUINS, AND I WILL RESTORE IT, ¹⁷SO THAT THE REST OF MANKIND MAY SEEK THE LORD, AND ALL THE GENTILES WHO ARE CALLED BY MY NAME,' ¹⁸ SAYS THE LORD, WHO MAKES THESE THINGS KNOWN FROM LONG AGO. ¹⁹ "Therefore it is my judgment that we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles, ²⁰ but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood. ²¹ "For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath." ²² Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders, with the whole church, to choose men from among them to send to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas--Judas called Barsabbas, and Silas, leading men among the brethren, ²³ and they sent this letter by them, "The apostles and the brethren who are elders, to the brethren in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia who are from the Gentiles, greetings. ²⁴ "Since we have heard that some of our number to whom we gave no instruction have disturbed you with their words, unsettling your souls, ²⁵ it seemed good to us, having become of one mind, to select men to send to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, ²⁶ men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. ²⁷ "Therefore we have sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will also report the same things by word of mouth. ²⁸ "For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these essentials: ²⁹ that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; if you keep yourselves free from such things, you will do well. Farewell." ³⁰ So when they were sent away, they went down to Antioch; and having gathered the congregation together, they delivered the letter....

What, exactly, does verse 29 mean?

God specifically outlined in Leviticus what foods were good to eat and what foods he did NOT want us eating; along with how we were to conduct our sexual behavior--all of which we have ignored, and for which we are suffering now. Without going into the gory details, AIDS is a disease for which there is no cure, no will there ever be because the virus keeps mutating. Before AIDS we had sexually transmitted diseases which we could cure or at least live with, while AIDS kills you, period. This shows that we have ignored God's warning about "fornication." The foods He spoke of in Leviticus contain many parasites, diseases, etc. to this very day. Many people today eat raw seafood, or they like their steaks rare or bloody. Too often, you hear of people who have gotten sick from eating clams, snails, or shellfish, and pork and beef that was contaminated with parasites/disease. Pork has always, and still does contain parasites and one can get sick or die if it isn't cooked thoroughly. As for beef, God tells us the proper way to kill it (cutting its throat) and to drain the blood completely. Have we followed this to the letter? Nope. Consequently, some strange things have been happening to our livestock, ie, "hoof and mouth" and "mad cow" disease, and others. Also, we're constantly hearing about beef that was improperly processed being recalled, etc. As for "idols" well, many worship money and material possessions; many worship false gods in weird religions, and many worship themselves. God is in the process of making us realize who's in charge, one way or the other.

"Okay, my Messianic Jewish friend," you might say. "I dare you to find one scripture in the entire New Testament that explicitly tells us that God wishes us to continue in the footsteps of the old covenant, and that we should continue following the old traditions."

Sure thing! Read Romans 3 and pay specific attention to verse 31: "Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law."

How about Matthew 5:18-20: ¹⁸ "For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. ¹⁹ Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. ²⁰ For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven."

Also, please check out Romans 8: 1-5. Those scriptures indicate that Man could not fulfill the Torah because of his sinful nature, and that Yeshua gave us our salvation, which we could not get on our own. Nothing in that text says that Torah was done away with.

The bottom line is that most people receive their impressions of the scriptures from the various English language versions of the Bible. For instance, the NT was written by Jews, not Gentiles -- Jews, who had the "Jewish mindset"; who upheld Jewish customs and traditions, etc. Once the Bible was translated and re-translated, much of it lost the Jewish flavor as Gentiles with a "Greek mindset" tried to interpret what was being said. For instance, Romans 10:4 in the KJV, NIV, NASB, etc., all say:

Romans 10:4 -- "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes."

To most people, this indicates that Yeshua "did away with" the law. However, read what the original version (from the "Jewish mindset" says:

"For the Messiah is the goal of the Torah for righteousness to everyone who believes."

He's not the end of the "law" but the "goal" for righteousness! If we were to read the other translated scripts properly, they don't say Christ is the "end of law," but rather "the end of the law for righteousness." Without Yeshua, we are but sinful beings who absolutely cannot get into heaven on our own. Through Him, however, we have been made "righteous."

More information about the proper interpretation of scriptures, can be found in the book: "May Your Name be Inscribed in the Book of Life -- a Messianic Jewish Version of the New Covenant Scriptures". This book, written by a Jewish man who desired to help us discover what the original scriptures actually said, is published by The Messianic Vision, POB 34462, Bethesda, MD 20817.

(For more reader questions, comments or opinions, please see our Readers' Questions and Comments section.)