Torah in the Flesh - Impossible

I am blessed by YHWH to have received messages from people who have found Torah Perspective from other places in the world. When you sit in the middle of flyover country, in a little town, you often wonder if anyone notices, or if what you’re doing has any impact. It makes you wonder, sometimes, if you are really supposed to be doing what you’re doing; did YHWH really call you to ministry in this capacity. It is at these times that I get an e-mail, or one is directed to Messiah Fellowship, from someone who is blessed by Torah Perspective, or the teachings on the Messiah Fellowship site. I know my brother Ron Hyre and Josh Brown are equally blessed. Abba, thank you for giving us these kisses of encouragement.

These messages are a blessing to receive because Abba uses them to encourage me and my brothers in the ministry at Messiah Fellowship. I often wonder why HE chose me to write a blog and proclaim HIS Truth. And then I remember – HE has called us ALL to proclaim HIS Truth; foremost by the way we live.

The “way we live” part is the real challenge of living out the Truth of Torah, by grace through faith. Its one thing to speak Truth, but one must live Truth. Torah life must be in both word and deed. Matthew Five is where Yeshua tells us that “whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” The context of what is to be done and taught is the Law – the Torah of our Creator. This is an equation that doesn’t work without both factors. One can assent to the Truth and tell others about it, but apart from the adding the factor of doing the Truth we do not reach the correct sum of the factors. In effect, we’ve missed the mark. This is sin.

Likewise, living out Torah must be precise and must be a work of the Spirit and not a work of the flesh. That might sound a bit strange to you, for me to say that Torah must be lived in the Spirit and not in the flesh. Am I suggesting that we can live Torah in the flesh, apart from the Spirit? Well, not exactly, but there is an application of attempting to live Torah in the flesh, or one of allowing the flesh to take the wheel in Torah application. That is sin. Remember that Yeshua said, “Apart from ME you can do nothing.” And Paul told the Galatians “Are you so foolish, having begun in the Spirit are you now being made perfect by the flesh?”

When Paul wrote to the Galatians he was addressing a specific issue; the so-called Judaizers who were telling the Galatian believers that it was not enough to be born again by the Spirit of Yeshua, but they had to become a Jew to have access to the kingdom. The professing church has taught that the Judaizers were attempting to bring the Galatians, and us, back into bondage to Torah. But that is not accurate either. Torah, the pure Torah, by the Spirit’s work of grace, accessed by faith in the Living Torah – Yeshua, is not bondage. Sin is man’s way and is bondage. Torah is Elohim’s way and is freedom, when accessed by faith, bringing forth the work of grace, resulting in Torah observance by the Spirit of Yeshua.

To stay in context with the Scriptures we have to understand what we were in bondage to, and what we’ve been set free from. Paul tells us clearly that born again believers; disciples of Yeshua, have been set free from the bondage to sin. We find nowhere in the text, from Genesis to Revelation, that anyone was ever in bondage to Torah. But indeed there is bondage to sin.

Bondage to sin is a place we were in when we had no choice in the matter. Before we were born again we had a heart of stone that was not in a condition for Torah to be written upon. Our minds were totally carnal; men and women who had no desire to know or be obedient to the Torah of the Creator. But when we realized our condition and came to Yeshua that all changed. We are now free to choose.

The New Covenant, promised by Yeshua, was given to us. HE took out our heart of stone and gave us a heart of flesh; a heart that HE then wrote HIS Torah upon. HE then put HIS Torah in our mind; we have the mind of Christ – Messiah. A born again believer has the Spirit of Messiah Yeshua, the LIVING TORAH residing in him or her. HE, the LIVING TORAH, is written on our hearts, and HE is in our minds, causing us, as we submit to HIS work of grace, to walk in HIS statutes and keep HIS commandments.

Yeshua, quoting HIS Torah HE gave to Moses, said that the greatest commandment is to love YHWH with all our heart, soul, and mind. HE said the second commandment, being like the first (coexisting as two factors in an equation) is to love our neighbor as ourselves. Yeshua said that all of the Torah and the Prophets hang (the sum of the equation) on this. The object of Torah keeping is to love YHWH and to love our brothers and sisters. The commandments of Torah are the prescribed way we love HIM and one another. When we live by the precepts of Torah, by grace through faith, we show forth that we have the Elohim, who is Love, living in us. But in the flesh we can get off course.

In Matthew 23, beginning in Verse 23, Yeshua said, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. 24Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!
25“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. 26Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also.
27“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. 28Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

The Pharisees were men who knew the Torah and believed they were keeping it better than anyone else. In fact, they were the enforcers who added fences to Torah and began to elevate their traditional additions to a level alongside and in replacement of the pure Torah. They were guilty of adding to Torah, and, subsequently, subtracting from Torah. The additions diminished the purity of Torah by adding the leaven of sin. The additions were tantamount to the question that the serpent asked Eve in the garden, “Did YHWH really say…?” Eve believed the word of the Serpent over the Word of the Creator bringing sin into the picture and the result; death. The wages of sin is death.

Here’s the point I’m getting at. Even as those who are born again we can still lean to the flesh, even in keeping Torah, just as the Pharisees did. We are no better than they were. I’ve been accused of being a Pharisee. I don’t want to be one, but if I’m not submitted to the Spirit I can be one. You can too!

When people say that you can’t keep Torah, they are partially right. We CANNOT keep Torah in the flesh. We might go through the motions and it might look like it on the surface, but we are not keeping Torah when we are being driven by the flesh. When we try to keep it in the flesh, to those who are doing it in the Spirit we are exposed. To the non-believer or to a person who is just beginning to come to the Truth of Torah we show ourselves to be non-genuine and we hinder the cause of Messiah. YHWH knows when we are in the flesh and we do too, if we truly belong to HIM; if HIS Spirit is in us. In the flesh we are not reflecting the work of the Spirit (grace); we are showing forth the work of our own words, ideas, and intellect.

No, we cannot keep Torah in the flesh. We can only keep Torah by the work of the Spirit of the Living Elohim. Apart from the LIVING TORAH driving the car the car wonders aimlessly and crashes into things and causes damage! We all are capable of taking the wheel back from Yeshua at any given moment!

I’d be a liar to say I don’t struggle with that. I do. I won’t say that you do. But, I’ll bet that if you really take an inventory, you probably struggle with it too.

I deal with prejudices and preconceived notions just like everyone else. They have changed over the past few years, as I’ve come to believe that Torah is for the follower of Yeshua, but nevertheless they exist. The only way I recognize them is when I submit to the Spirit. And when I don’t I am chastised by HIM. If I’m hearing HIS Voice then I realize that I haven’t been keeping the “weightier matters of the Torah.”

The more I study Torah and know my Savior more the more I realize the seriousness of lawlessness. Lawlessness WILL keep a man or woman out of the kingdom of Yeshua! These are the words of Yeshua from Matthew 7. I forget sometimes who the battle is with. It is not a war against flesh and blood, but it is a war against the true enemy; Satan, the lying serpent, and his minions. There are men and women in his sway but they are not the enemy. Some of them are closer to him than others and some are just victims. In my flesh I can’t sort them out. That’s why I need to be led by the Spirit in all matters. But I don’t always do that. I want to, but I don’t always. And when I’m not led by the Spirit I say and do things that are not helpful to the cause of Messiah.

I forget that it was just a few short years ago that I was lawless myself. I was living a life apart from Torah, just as many that I come into contact with today. Where are these people in the journey? Are they really on the journey at all? Are they walking the other way? Are they walking toward the kingdom, yet slipping and sliding and falling down, yet getting back up and continuing to walk? We all, if we’re honest, fall into the last category, if we’re truly born again. But as we continue to walk we should slip and slide less and fall down less often. But that doesn’t mean that it won’t still happen. And it happens when we run ahead of the Spirit of Yeshua as our flesh gains control.

When I slow down and allow the HOLY SPIRIT to lead I am slow to speak. I measure my words and there is fruit born from it. When I run ahead I am in the works of the flesh and what comes from that is not pretty. It is harmful.

I’m saying all of this to tell you, the reader, that I am sorry for any words or actions on my part, when I’ve run ahead of the Spirit, that have harmed HIS cause in you. I ask your forgiveness. I am called to be a man who loves YHWH and who loves you through Torah, as I walk by faith, realizing the Spirit’s work of grace in and through me. I fail sometimes and I’m grieved by it, and I know that my LORD is grieved by it more than me. I don’t want to do it again.

Torah is the great leveler of the field. No one man or woman can lay claim to the high ground when Torah is applied. We all fail and come short of the glory when we try to do that. The only sound, solid high ground is when we cede control to the Spirit of YHWH and allow HIM to rule and reign in our hearts and actions. The Spirit of the LIVING ELOHIM will NEVER lead in opposition to Torah. There is truly no room for boasting n our flesh. Our boasting will be in what HE is doing!

HE is loving and merciful, not wanting anyone to perish. I pray that I will reflect HIS character in my actions and in my speech. I can only keep the pure Torah by the leading of HIS HOLY SPIRIT. I can’t keep it in the flesh.

You see, I can go through the motions of keeping Sabbath, and eating clean. I can observe the Feasts of YHWH on the days HE prescribed, but if I’m not doing it by grace through faith then I am left to observing the commandments in the flesh. I won’t get them right! The focus will not be LOVE! Only in the Spirit do we fulfill the Torah in Love. Only in the Spirit will we fulfill the Torah to love HIM with all our heart, soul and mind and love our neighbor as ourselves. We can only keep the commandments in LOVE. We only love HIM because HE first loved us. I pray that my life and yours will be a reflection of HIM – HIS LOVE. The pure Torah is LOVE.