I know a lot of people who are gravitating toward a theology where they accept keeping the statutes of Torah as “a good thing to do” but refuse and outright oppose calling it a salvation issue. A perfect example of this is a video clip I have seen of a popular megachurch pastor actually teaching his people to follow the biblical food laws for our health’s sake—as opposed to saying we should follow them because The Bible mandates it and Revelation 21:8 says the abominable/detestable, those who do what The Bible says is an abomination or detestable, will have a place in the lake of fire. In this message I am going to seek to clarify this. If you are currently of a persuasion that keeping Torah cannot be a “salvation issue”, then I encourage you to take the time to read this message in its entirety before drawing any opinion of the teaching.
Let me start off by saying, and I cannot emphasize this enough going into a teaching like this, that you CANNOT earn or maintain/keep your salvation by obeying anything in The Bible. This is a position I will vehemently and dogmatically argue tooth and nail with any legalist who believes that salvation is in any way “earned” by obeying something in The Bible.
This includes the initial action of accepting Yeshua as Messiah by faith. He is the door through which we receive salvation, but you don’t “earn” or “keep” your salvation through your faith in Him. In fact, you can believe in Him and still go to hell, just read Matthew 7:21-23. The Bible is clear that salvation is a free gift; you don’t earn it by believing in Yeshua anymore than you would earn it by obeying anything else in The Bible. You receive salvation first through faith in Him, and, as I will show in this message, the resulting proof that you have received true biblical salvation is that you will obey Yahweh’s Torah.
With that said, just as clearly as The Bible says that salvation only comes through faith in Yeshua as Messiah, The Bible is equally clear that those who do not obey Yahweh’s Torah will be rejected and cast out at The Judgment. Here is the simple reality: After a discourse where Yeshua describes people who cast out devils, prophecy, and work miracles in His name—a group of people that can only be among those called “Christians” today, because it has only ever been “Christians” who have done these things IN HIS NAME—He says, “I will declare to them [people who work miracles, signs, and wonders in His name—“CHRISTIANS”], ‘I never knew you. Get away from Me, you workers of lawlessness!’” (again see Matthew 7:21-23) As I pointed out in much greater detail in my article Lawlessness, this word as used in this and other similar passages in the writings of the Apostles means TORAHLESSNESS—those who do not obey what is commanded in The Torah.
The simple fact of the matter is that if we take the traditional modern Christian approach to salvation, securing yourself as “spared” from hell and welcomed into heaven upon your departure from this life, then we already have enough to say that obeying Torah is a salvation issue. After all, if the thing that causes a person to be told “Depart from Me” and cast into hell is a lack of obedience to Torah, then obedience to Torah absolutely would be a matter of whether or not you are saved—from a future judgment where you would either be admitted into heaven or sentenced to an eternity in hell. But salvation from hell is actually not even based on a biblical concept of salvation.
What Are You Saved From?
She will give birth to a son; and you shall call His name Yeshua, for He will save His people from their sins. ••• Matthew 1:21 (TLV) •••
Let’s get one thing perfectly clear—biblical salvation is a salvation from sin, not hell. And 1 John 3:4 is where sin is defined, biblically, as the transgressing, violating, breaking of Yahweh’s Torah. This means that if you are saved then you are saved from transgressing, violating, breaking Torah. The proof that you really are saved is that you will read The Father’s Torah and obey The Father’s Torah. If that has not been your experience, than biblically speaking you are probably not really saved, but are most likely bound to religion. One of the irrefutable signs of new covenant salvation is where The Father puts His Spirit in us to cause us to obey The Torah (Ezekiel 36:26-27). This is true even if you have “been in ministry” for decades and traveled the world preaching to people. Again, it is people who traveled the world preaching, casting out devils, and working miracles in His name that our Messiah says He will reject, not because they directly rejected Him but because they neglected to obey Torah—which, technically speaking, is a rejection of Him.
Here’s a simple fact: If someone tells you that your choice to obey or reject anything commanded in Torah is not a salvation issue, not only are they lying to you they have rejected the power of the Gospel.
Can you imagine someone who traveled the world preaching in many nations or someone who led a Christian church for decades hearing the words “Depart from Me” at The Judgment simply because they ate unclean things like pork or because they didn’t keep The Sabbath or because they celebrated certain unbiblical holidays rooted in pagan religions like Christmas and Easter? Yet this is a very real probability according to The Bible. Getting a revelation of this biblical truth is one of the most freeing things that you will ever experience because it is the knowledge of what salvation truly saves you from—the breaking, transgressing, violating of Torah—that actually sets you free.
You shall know the TRUTH, and the TRUTH shall make you free (John 8:32). Yahweh’s Torah is the truth (Psalm 119:142) and, according to Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews 8, the sign and seal of the new covenant is The Torah put into your mind and written on your heart. So, in actuality, it is reading, studying, and obeying The Torah through faith in Yeshua that makes you free—as opposed to what religion claims through the “mental acknowledging that ‘Jesus is the Christ’” setting you free. James 2:19 essentially says that a mere “mental acknowledgement” is the faith of devils, so what Christianity teaches today about “just believe in your mind that ‘Jesus is the Christ’”—what I call “Jesus-only theology”—is a doctrine of demons (1 Timothy 4:1).
1 John 2:4 says that anyone who claims to know God but does not keep the commandments—in other words, someone who transgresses, violates, breaks The Torah—IS A LIAR, and the truth is not in them. Again, The Torah is truth (Psalm 119:142), so those who claim to know Him but don’t follow The Torah are liars because The Torah is not in them (in their mind, on their heart, Jeremiah 31, Hebrews 8). Think about it, the very first act of sin recorded in Genesis 3 started with a lie initiated by the questioning of the commandment of God. When people tell you that you don’t really have to obey that commandment, whatever that commandment might be at the time, they are a liar, engaged in the spirit of the serpent, and the truth [Torah] is not in them. When they say that this commandment or that commandment or any commandment is “not a salvation issue”, they are a liar, engaged in the spirit of the serpent, and the truth [Torah] is not in them. THAT is what 1 John 2:4 is saying.
These people who claim to know God but do not obey Torah or say people don’t really have to keep it to be saved are liars and the Torah is not in their mind and on their heart. And if you allow yourself to be deceived by them, they will drag you straight to hell with their lies.
But John was really just building off of what his teacher, Yeshua, said as documented in John 14:15, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” The opposite of love is hate. So, technically, what He was saying here is that if you eat unclean things like pork, shellfish, or any of the other prohibited meats from Leviticus 11 you do not love Yeshua, you hate Him. If you do not keep The Sabbath or the Feast Days you do not love Yeshua, you hate Him. If you celebrate holidays rooted in Satanic pagan religions like Christmas, Easter, and Halloween, you do not love Yeshua, you hate Him. If you get permanent tattoo markings on your body—after you have made your decision to follow Him—you do not love Yeshua, you hate Him. Even if you look at the commandment not to wear wool and linen together and you say “Well, that one is pretty silly, and it makes no sense, and I can’t imagine God cares about that today”, according to the very one you call your Messiah you do not love Him, you hate Him.
Not so long ago I was discussing theology with someone who was so adamant about their grace message that when I asked them if the commandment “do not commit murder” is a salvation issue, they replied dogmatically and without hesitation: “No!” While it is true that any act of sin committed in ignorance—you didn’t know you were violating Torah when you did it—can be repented of and forgiven, the very fact that you would have to repent is proof that such violation of Torah is absolutely a salvation issue. If keeping or breaking Torah is not a salvation issue, then there is no need for repentance. Repentance is the act of renouncing and turning from sin through faith in Yeshua, so to repent means to make a conscious decision to stop breaking The Torah. To put it another way, if obedience to Torah, either as a whole or in regard to individual commandments, is not a salvation issue then there is nothing to repent of and if there is nothing to repent of then the entire Gospel falls apart.
REPENTANCE IS A SALVATION ISSUE, because repentance is a mandatory requirement to receive the gift salvation. That’s basic Bible accepted by practically every Judeo-Christian movement in history with the exception of the most heretical fringe groups. And repentance is the turning away from sin [breaking Torah] and embracing Torah obedience through faith in Yeshua. Repentance is literally the act of making a conscious choice through faith in Yeshua to stop sinning [breaking Torah] and when you do that The Father is faithful to put His Torah in your mind, write His Torah on your heart, and put His Spirit in you to cause you to obey The Torah that is in your mind and on your heart.
Let me help clarify this point. The modern liberal hyper-grace Christian view is that all you need to do is mentally place your faith in Yeshua (“Jesus”) and then you are saved. They believe repentance is the act of calling Yeshua the Messiah. In some circles you might still find people who believe repentance is a “sinner’s prayer”—a practice found nowhere in Scripture—apologizing to God for your sin, which is still wrong but at least they are still acknowledging that they are wicked sinners in need of a Savior (saving them from their sin). Such heretical views are built on the Calvinist view of eternal security theology, which is one of the great heresies of Calvinism.
Like sin and salvation, a wrong definition of what it means to “believe in Yeshua” leads to wrong theology. He taught a message of Torah-obedience—consistently. He said that if we don’t believe what Moses wrote (The Torah), then we cannot believe in Him (John 5:46). Belief in a whole Bible context is to obey Torah, which means even the most quoted verse in the entire Bible, John 3:16, is telling us to obey The Torah.
We also need to have a proper definition of grace. Titus 2:11-12 says that grace, which brings salvation, trains us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live in a manner that is self-controlled and righteous and godly in the present age. If you do a word study on “righteous”, part of its definition and what most applies to biblical faith is: observing divine laws, keeping the commands [Torah] of God. Romans 6:19-20 contrasts sin [breaking Torah] with righteousness [obeying Torah] as direct opposites of each other and says you are a slave to one or the other. It says that righteousness [obeying Torah] leads to holiness [being set apart to The Father]. When you read the whole Bible, the message is very clear—You are either an unsaved Torah-breaker or a saved Torah-keeper.
In James 4:4 the Apostle calls worldly compromisers “adulterers” and then says that embracing worldliness makes you the enemy of God. When you choose to follow the ways of the world instead of The Torah you are the enemy of God. It doesn’t matter how religious you are. It doesn’t matter how much you read your Bible, pray, worship, go to church, and whatever. It doesn’t matter how much you believe that you believe in Yeshua as Messiah. If you are not living according to The Torah you are the enemy of God.
Let me make it a little more clear to you. If you eat unclean things like pork, shellfish, and other things prohibited by the guidelines in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14, you are God’s enemy. If you celebrate Satanic holidays appropriated from pagan religions like Christmas, Easter, and Halloween you are God’s enemy. If you tattoo your body, you are God’s enemy. If you are in favor of things like abortion, you are God’s enemy. If you participate in, are permissive of, or have a passive attitude toward sexual immorality you are God’s enemy. If you embrace worldliness and shun Torah-keeping you are God’s enemy, plain and simple.
Religion will lie to you and tell you that you are saved from sin past, present, and future. I will prove to you that this is simply not true according to The Bible. In doing this, I will also show quite conclusively that sin—violation of Torah (1 John 3:4)—absolutely is a salvation issue.
Blasphemy Of The Holy Spirit
“For this reason I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but blasphemy against the Ruach will not be forgiven. Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Ruach ha-Kodesh will not be forgiven, neither in this age nor in the one to come.” ••• Matthew 12:31-32 (TLV) •••
As I just mentioned, there are those who would say that not even murder is a salvation issue. This is because of their incomplete view of salvation, apparently believing that “faith in ‘Jesus’ through mentally accepting Him as your Savior” is the only thing that can be called a salvation issue. It would seem that the reason people can say that acts of sin, the breaking of Torah, is not a salvation issue is because they realize that all things listed under this banner of sin have the ability to be forgiven. Well, all but one at least.
In a moment I will show that it is not always the case, biblically, where anything in Torah will necessarily be forgiven. There are parameters in place that must be considered. But before getting to that I must bring up the one sin that our Messiah, Yeshua, Himself said cannot and will not be forgiven under any circumstance, and that is the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.
Now, to be clear, this is a sin by the terms of sin being the breaking of Torah. You see, Deuteronomy 18:15-19 speaks of a prophet like Moses to whom we must listen. This means that listening to, and of course following in obedience, this prophet like Moses is itself a Torah commandment. Several places in The Book of Acts confirms this prophet like Moses to be Yeshua, so anything Yeshua says is also Torah under the banner of the commandment in Deuteronomy 18 to listen to and obey the prophet like Moses. So when Yeshua said that blaspheming The Spirit will not be forgiven, blaspheming The Spirit became a Torah violation.
I have heard a lot of theories from religion about what this sin is. The religious will work hard to explain this sin away as to make it seem impossible to commit, thus eliminating the reality that someone can do something that cannot possibly be forgiven. But I believe The Bible is much easier to comprehend than religion wants it to be. After all, we are told that God is not the author of confusion (1 Corinthians 14:33) and that obeying His Torah is easy (Deuteronomy 30:11-14, 1 John 5:3).
Religion tries to complicate The Bible so that gullible parishioners think they “need” churches and pastors, and that’s how churches, pastors, and other “Christian” ministries make their money through manipulating the masses. The moment you realize that receiving Yeshua as your Messiah gives you the power to do everything The Bible instructs—without reliance on the church, pastors, or religion—is the moment religion loses it’s power over your life and you can truly be free. If you study the first century movement of The Way, they did not have “churches” and “organized religion”—they had faith in Yeshua, obedience to The Torah, and fellowship with each other.
Let me challenge you for a moment: Name one thing in the entire Bible that is originally Christian. I’ll wait. You can’t because Christianity as almost everyone in it knows it today is a 500-year-old false religion. In fact, it is a split-off false religion from the false religion of Roman Catholicism that started about 300 years after the life and ministry of Yeshua. There is not one thing in The Bible that is “Christian”, at least not according to what “Christianity” is today. The Bible is a Hebrew book, everyone who contributed to writing it was a Hebrew author, Yahweh is the Hebrew God, and the culture built on the words of The Bible has always been Hebrew. Christianity, at least as practiced today by the masses, is a false religion that twists the words of The Bible and makes stuff up.
In order to know what Yeshua was referring to as the blasphemy of The Spirit we need only look a few verses earlier to figure out the context to which He was speaking. In Matthew 12:24 we see religious leaders accusing our Messiah of casting out devils through Beelzebub. In other words, they were attributing the working of Holy Spirit to being the work of the devil. That’s it.
I can remember as a kid in a Baptist Church being told that speaking in tongues is of the devil. This is a popular Calvinist belief, coming out of one of the other heresies of Calvinism (cessationism), and those who have said this have in all likelihood blasphemed The Spirit. Assuming this action of saying speaking in tongues is of the devil truly was this act of blaspheming The Spirit, which I believe it appears to be, then according to Yeshua Himself those who said that cannot be forgiven.
Now, here’s the thing: If there is a sin that a person absolutely cannot be forgiven of, then that is a salvation issue. After all, if you cannot be forgiven then you cannot be saved. That seems pretty harsh, but I didn’t make the rules. And if one thing that cannot be forgiven is a salvation issue, anything and everything that cannot be forgiven is a salvation issue.
Sins Of Ignorance, Sins Of Intent
If you unintentionally fail, not keeping any of these mitzvot that ADONAI related to Moses—that is, anything that ADONAI commanded you through Moses’s hand, from the day ADONAI commanded and onward throughout your generations—and it is done unintentionally out of sight of the community, then the entire community is to offer one young bull from the herd for a burnt offering as a pleasing aroma to ADONAI, along with its appropriate grain offering and drink offering, and one male goat as a sin offering. So the kohen will make atonement for the entire community of Bnei-Yisrael, and they will be forgiven, for it was unintentional and they brought a fire offering and their sin
offering to Adonai for their error. So the whole community of Bnei-Yisrael along with
the outsider residing among them will be forgiven, for all the people were involved
in unintentional wrongdoing.
If but one person should sin unintentionally, he is to bring a year-old female goat for
a sin offering. The kohen is to make atonement before ADONAI for that person who erred
by sinning without intent, and he is to be forgiven when atonement has been made for him.
Whether a native-born of Bnei-Yisrael or an outsider living among them, one Torah applies
to you for the one sinning unintentionally.
But the person who sins defiantly, whether native or outsider, reviles ADONAI and that
person is to be cut off from his people. Because he has despised the word of ADONAI and
has broken His commandment, that person will certainly be cut off—his guilt will
remain on him. ••• Numbers 15:22-31 (TLV) •••
In this passage we see that there is a clear distinction made between what is deemed sins committed in ignorance, meaning that the person did not actually know what they were doing was wrong when they did it, and sins of intent, meaning that the person knew it was a violation of Torah and they did it anyway. Churches today are filled with people who know what is commanded in Torah and they do what they want anyway. They are walking the line of intentional sin.
Now, I do believe that God’s mercy will fall on those who have been deceived by the lies of modern religion, but that mercy only stretches so far and if He has revealed to you that something is a commandment and you reject it, biblically there might not be any forgiveness left to be extended to you. I know that you may be thinking that what I quoted above is out of The Torah so maybe it only applies to those people “modern Christian religion” claims were under Torah—the Israelite communities prior to the work of the cross. But this is not the only place where we find this idea presented in Scripture.
For if we keep on sinning willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth,
there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but only a terrifying expectation of judgment
and a fury of fire about to devour the enemies of God. ••• Hebrews 10:26-27 (TLV) •••
It needs to be noted at this point that the context of Hebrews 10 is dealing with the sacrifice of Yeshua at Calvary. This means that under the parameters of the new covenant, particularly regarding the principles of intentional and unintentional sin from Numbers 15, even the blood of Yeshua is no longer able to cover the sins of the person who openly defies Torah, knowing that it is the commandment of God, after they have been shown that Torah still applies today. This doesn’t sit well with people bound by the lies and false interpretations of Scripture found in modern religion, but it is simply a biblically based fact that it is possible for you to defy Torah in a way where even the blood of Yeshua can no longer save you. This is a form of apostasy.
Look, The Bible says narrow is the gate and difficult the way that leads to life, and few find it. There are 2.4 BILLION people who call themselves Christians today, and most are following the counterfeit version of salvation I have described of “just believe in ‘Jesus’ and you will be saved”, what I call “Jesus-only theology”. THAT’S NOT BIBLICAL SALVATION. It’s not biblical because it’s an incomplete concept of salvation and a partial truth is a whole lie. The modern Christian view of salvation is a lie, plain and simple. In that, and because “Christianity” has a wrong definition of key Bible words like sin, salvation, repentance, righteousness, grace, holiness and several others, what most people today practice under the banner of “Christianity” is a 100% false religion. A whole reading of Scripture and a context built on everything The Bible says regarding salvation proves it.
By definition apostasy is the renouncing of a religious belief. As regarding biblical faith, this includes the open defiance of God’s commandments. 2 Thessalonians 2:3 connects apostasy (also called rebellion and revolt in some translations) with “the man of lawlessness”—lawlessness directly referring to those who do not obey Torah. Further down in the chapter Paul, the author of 2 Thessalonians, essentially says that people who think they are saved but practice lawlessness—not obeying The Torah—are delusional. There may be no better word to describe modern Christianity that discards most of Scripture to support a religion of TORAHLESSNESS—Christians who believe this, a potential one-third of the world’s population today, are delusional.
Rebellion is at the heart of the matter. Adam and Eve rebelled and started the sin problem. Nimrod rebelled, his name literally meaning “The Rebel”, and he established humanist religion in a replica of Eden with his man-made mountains, the ziggurats of Mesopotamia. Solomon rebelled, marrying foreign wives, initiating the cultural assimilation with pagan religions that plagued Israel and Judah for generations after. The spirit of rebellion is always present in counterfeit expressions of biblical faith, and “American Christianity”, which today influences all of the world’s expression of Christianity, is built on a platform of rebellion.
America was born out of a rebellion against Britain in the Revolutionary War. Protestant Christianity was born out of a rebellion against the established Catholic Church in the 16th century—about 500 years ago. No matter how “justified” these events may seem to have been, they were still acts of rebellion. The root word of “Protestant” is “PROTEST”. The whole of most people’s Christian faith is built on a foundation of rebellion, and people can’t even see it because we, as Americans, view the tyranny of Britain and the heresy of Catholicism as great evils that needed to be overtaken. But instead of submitting to God in faith and prayer, in both cases men chose to take matters into their own hands and establish the faith their way instead of God’s Way.
Protestant Christianity was not a return to the first-century Hebraic faith of The Apostles. It is a split-off false religion of a bigger false religion. Read through The Bible, try to find what Christianity does in The Bible, and try to find what is in The Bible being practiced in Christianity. It will totally shock you how night and day different Christianity is from what The Bible actually says to do.
A theology that claims obedience is not a salvation issue has more holes in it than Swiss cheese, as the popular slang goes. These false teachings that appeal to the itching ears of the religious fall apart when presented with solid facts from the whole Bible.
We must never forget that The Bible was written by Torah-observant followers of Yahweh from cover to cover. The idea that Torah is no longer a requirement of faith—that keeping Torah is “not a salvation issue”—is a concept that simply is not established in The Bible and is an insult to those who gave their lives, many literally, to give us God’s Word. It is the invention of religion that had deviated from sound principles of the Hebrew faith delivered in the pages of the Hebrew Bible.
A Warning To Preachers And Teachers
Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters, since you know that we will receive a stricter judgment. ••• James 3:1 (TLV) •••
This is a verse you don’t hear brought up very much, because this passage tells us that the people who teach in error will receive some type of stricter judgment than those they are leading. James does not define what this stricter judgment is—it may be a harsher eternal punishment, it could be a higher standard that must be met to gain entry into heaven, or it might be something else entirely. Regardless, being a preacher or teacher puts someone at a higher standard in some form or fashion.
Matthew 5:19 says, “Whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever keeps and teaches them, this one shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” Here we are presented with an option for those who teach people to obey Torah and those who do not. In actuality, this passage provides two potential positive eternal rewards for those who teach in favor of Torah-obedience and two potential negative rewards for those who oppose Torah in any way.
Of those who would teach people that new covenant Believers are mandated to keep Torah, the possibilities are between being called greatest in the Kingdom, as Yeshua says in His “Sermon on the Mount” or simply getting into heaven with everyone else. Seeing as Yeshua clearly says that those who properly teach the mandate of Torah will be greatest, it seems logical that would be what is rewarded upon those who teach it this way.
On the other hand there are those who teach against Torah, which would include those who teach Torah-obedience as a suggestion and insist it’s “not a salvation issue”. You see, these people saying that it’s “not a salvation issue” or that people “won’t go to hell” for breaking commandments are misleading professing Christians, even if they go as far as telling them it’s “a good idea” to obey Torah for something like health or because you want to instead of acknowledging that Torah-obedience has been the mandate from Genesis 1 forward. These “preachers” are rolling the dice between either being least in the Kingdom and not getting in at all. I’ll remind you that there are things in Scripture that are plainly stated as resulting in people being cast out. Revelation 21:8, as I mentioned at the beginning of this message, includes the abominable/detestable among those who will have a place in the lake of fire and among the many things called detestable or an abomination in Torah is eating unclean meats like pork, shellfish, rodents, and a variety of other creatures.
My friend mentioned above, a skilled preacher, doesn’t like it when I suggest that something like obeying the biblical food laws or celebrating the commanded Spring and Fall Feasts may be a salvation issue or that people might end up in hell if they refuse to keep them. But the simple fact of that matter is that anything commanded in The Torah—depending on factors like whether or not the transgression was committed in ignorance or with intent after knowing the truth—absolutely can and must be considered a salvation issue.
With a distinction made between intentional and unintentional sin there is no way for any human person to know if another person’s sin will cause them to be rejected at The Judgment. That’s how God set this up, so that we can only warn the wicked of their wicked ways (Ezekiel 3:16-21, 33:7-9), but not giving us the ability to actually determine at the final judgment what that person’s fate will be. Even if we think we know a person “knows better”, we really don’t know 100% where they are with God. But The Bible is very clear on this matter and if your view is that Torah is somehow optional, not a salvation issue, then you are in error and you need to get right with God.
I have another friend who I have shared the hard truths of Scripture with many times. I have told him about the food laws. I have talked to him about things that are connected with witchcraft beliefs, like unicorns and mermaids as he has a young daughter, and I have even presented him facts about why holidays such as Christmas and Easter are essentially Satanic. To date, I have not seen him make the actual changes in his life you would expect from a true Spirit-filled Believer. But I will continue to press on when opportunity presents itself to minister the truth to him, and if he rejects it then it will be up to The Father to decide if he was still in ignorance.
There is what Scripture calls the delusion of the lawless to consider, and those who are under such delusional beliefs likely remain as ignorant to truth no matter how much truth you have shared with them. In other words, it may be possible to have been plainly told the truth but because you are still under the delusion of the lawless you may be considered by The Father to be sinning in ignorance even if you are technically sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth (Hebrews 10:26-27). But I sure wouldn’t advise gambling with that.
Romans 2:13 (TLV) says: “For it is not the hearers of Torah who are righteous before God; rather, it is the doers of Torah who will be justified.” Think about that. This verse in one fatal blow cripples modern soteriology (salvation theology). Scripture says we need to establish every word on two or three witnesses, so let’s turn to James 2:24, where the Apostle says: “You see that a man is proved righteous by works and not by faith alone.” If the Apostles taught that justification comes through doing what is commanded in Torah, then you better believe that obeying Torah is a salvation issue!
The Bible says the soul that sins, it shall die (Ezekiel 18:20). Look also at this passage from James:
My brothers and sisters, if any among you strays from the truth and someone turns him
back, let him know that the one who turns a sinner from the error of his way shall save
a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins. ••• James 5:19-20 (TLV) •••
Notice first of all that this is addressed to brothers and sisters, so he was speaking about Believers, those who had already received salvation. Then he speaks about some turning back to sin, backsliders, and says that if you turn them back to the truth you save a soul from death. It doesn’t get more clear than that. There is not “just believe in ‘Jesus’ and you will be saved” in this passage. It is all about a refusal to obey Father’s Torah causing a soul to die.
2 Peter 2:20 says: “For if—after escaping the world’s pollutions through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Yeshua the Messiah—they again become entangled in these things and are overcome, the end for them has become worse than the beginning.” Hebrews 6:4-6 reads: “For it is impossible for those who once were enlightened—having tasted of the heavenly gift and become partakers of the Ruach ha-Kodesh, and having tasted the good word of God and the powers of the olam ha-ba, and then having fallen away—to renew again to repentance, since they are again crucifying Ben-Elohim for themselves and publicly disgracing Him.” I could go on and on. Acts 3:19 says: “Repent, therefore, and return—so your sins might be blotted out,” while Revelation 3:5 speaks of those who will have their name blotted out of the Book of Life. Look, in order for your name to be blotted out, it had to first be written in.
The error of saying that sin—the breaking, transgressing, violating of Torah—is not a salvation issue is one of the most deceptive and blasphemous doctrines of modern religion. If you are caught up in that mess you just need to repent. If you are “in ministry”—which most of the time in modern expressions of “Christianity” is totally unbiblical anyway—and you are teaching this mess, you definitely need to repent. Let’s settle this: If your faith in Messiah, your belief that you have received the Spirit of God, your claim to be under the new covenant where Torah is put into your mind and written on your heart, does anything other than causing you to read and obey Torah, then you are not really saved. Obeying Torah is the result of being saved from sin, so Torah-obedience absolutely is a salvation issue, and if your concept of salvation does not result in Torah-obedience then you are not saved and you need to repent and renounce the counterfeit expression of the faith warned about in 2 Corinthians 11:4.
Let me close with Revelation 14:12 (TLV), which says: “Here is the perseverance of the kedoshim—those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Yeshua.” You see, it is both faith in Yeshua and obeying Torah that are required. The Jewish people who reject Yeshua are rejecting one half of what is a salvation issue, but Christians who do not keep Torah are rejecting the other half. Ecclesiastes 12:13 (TLV) says: “A final word, when all has been heard: Fear God and keep His mitzvot! For this applies to all mankind,” and in the Complete Jewish Bible translation it reads: “Here is the final conclusion, now that you have heard everything: fear God, and keep his mitzvot; this is what being human is all about.”
As I mentioned earlier in this message, Yeshua is the door—He is that narrow gate that few find. Most find the fake “Jesus” of 2 Corinthians 11:4 where they follow the masses down the broad path of lawlessness Christianity that will lead to death and destruction. Beyond the narrow gate is the way, which is The Torah (Psalm 119:1), and that way is the purpose for which you were made, that way that applies to all mankind, that way that is what being human is all about. I do not know if I can make it more clear than I have in this message—Torah-obedience is a salvation issue and if your faith in Yeshua does not result in you obeying The Torah you are not saved, at least not according to everything The Bible says about salvation and not just the cherry-picked “Jesus-only” lies of modern “Christianity”. Everything in The Bible is a salvation issue, and that includes obeying The Torah. Otherwise, if “Jesus-only” theology were correct, there would be no reason for us to have a Bible—much less to read it and do what it says.
~Blessings and Shalom~
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