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Ironically, the New Testament exhorts Christians to "contend for the faith once delivered" to the saints.
Jude 1:3 3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. (KJV)
However, simple analysis surely dispels this notion.
Yet we are told again in this New Testament that there exists this "one" faith.
Eph 4:5 5 One Lord, one faith, one baptism, (KJV)
Few Christians would quarrel with Jude's exhortation to "carry on a vigorous defense of the faith that was once for all entrusted to God's people" (Jude 3). It is surely a praiseworthy goal to which all of us should aspire. But we must be quite clear on what it means!
We are exhorted in Scripture to grow in knowledge.
Answer for yourself: Doesn't this imply that we may have imperfect knowledge of "truth"?
Answer for yourself: Is it possible that truth, garnered in one generation, can be buried through persecution, martyrdom, deception and lost to the next generation? And later be rediscovered?
No church can remain as some kind of doctrinal fossil!
In fact, my original questions as to what was that faith, when was it delivered, and who delivered it are at the heart of the matter. Let's consider them.
Specific "doctrines" the Bible teaches is largely irrelevant in this study except for the mention of a few. My goal is for you as Gentile believers to see for yourself what you have not been taught and its importance in personally defining truth for you in your spiritual walk. It is our hope at Bet Emet Ministries that you, having evaluated and will study out this information for yourself. If you do then you will see that the Law of God has not passed away as many of you have been taught, but instead, continues today as a yardstick that should determine our religious belief system. It is our hope that you will see that this Law, God's Law, when obeyed in your love for God, will instruct you to properly worship the Father in Spirit and Truth by revealing God's intention for both Jews and Gentile believers to observe and celebrate the Biblical Feasts and Sabbaths, as well as instruct you how your finances and tithes must be used in building the Kingdom of God.
The central fact is that there is a single, specific body of belief, of teaching (doctrine), that is "true" Christianity as opposed to a "false" Christianity. A study of the twentieth century's two thousand-plus Christian denominations goes a long way in revealing the conflict and competition between them is based on a multiplicity of contrasting doctrines.
Answer for yourself: Can the Holy Spirit be responsible for guiding professed Christians such as Adolph Hitler, Jim Jones, Pope John Paul, and David Koresh, let alone the Church of England and the Brethren Church and the Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses -- and the Church of God, International [even your denomination] with so much disagreement in beliefs among them?
Notice these examples are taken from
mainstream Christianity. Include other groups claiming to be Christian and
we could also contrast those who observe Sunday with those who consider
the seventh day as the Sabbath (many millions of Christians, in fact!);
those who keep Christmas and Easter with those who consider these
festivals pagan; trinitarians with non-trinitarians; the immortal soul
concept with "soul sleep"--almost ad infinitum!
There
is one thing for certain…both camps cannot be right and somewhere
between both camps is the truth whereby, if we can obtain it, we can be
assured of worshipping the Father in Spirit and in Truth.
Answer for yourself: Do you, a typical Christian, possess the knowledge whereby you can discern between truth and error perpetrated in the name of God when reading your Bible?
Answer for yourself: With such variation--who is right? Is anyone?
Answer for yourself: And if all conflicting "religious doctrines" represent "the truth" (and do any proclaim themselves to be teaching error?) where does that place the Holy Spirit? Should we blame God for such conflicts?
Answer for yourself:
Is the Spirit perhaps confused? Clearly not.
There is only one expression of the truth, of the mind of God. Paul wrote: "There is ...One Spirit, One Faith..." Eph. 4:5
The challenge, surely, is for the Church of God to extract the nuggets of truth from the Scriptures! That is where truth lies. Not from added traditions, not from the ravings of some prophet or prophetess, not from long-hidden plates dug from a mountain-side, nor from hoary traditions of "the Fathers."
Sanity and stability can return only when we recognize that we dare not add to, or detract from the Word of God as expressed in the Hebrew Scriptures, the Jewish Old Testament! When once considers the purposeful hundreds of mistranslations, misquotations, and misapplication of Old Testament Scriptures in the New Testament there is only one conclusion the "thinking believer" can have:
Only
in the Old Testament lies "the faith once delivered to the saints"
First, let's look at the writings of our "Old Testament."
Few Christians would challenge the idea that these writings of the Old Testament represent the foundation of New Testament teachings. For example, there are in the New Testament over six hundred direct quotations and references to the Old Testament. But what few Christians are aware of, unless they have studied the issue for themselves, is that numerous of these "quoted" Old Testament texts are purposefully misquoted, mistranslated, misapplied and some even invented out of thin air as used in the New Testament by the writers who applied them in such ways to suit their antisemitic and anti-Judaic "agenda". This means that there is a lot of teachings in the New Testament that is not rooted in the "Holy Scriptures"--that is, the thirty-nine books into which modern versions of the Old Testament are divided. Although one must be cautious in reading the New Testament for truth because of these error, much in the New Testament is of value and Divine Truths of God are within it....in "places". Discernment is the "key" and this comes by knowledge. But one must have knowledge of such errors and be able to recognize them if one is to read the New Testament with discernment; separating truth from error. This will require your personal study, make no mistake in that.
Indeed, Paul, or as believed by modern scholars a later pro-Pauline writer, wrote to his "pupil" Timothy that these same Holy Scriptures (that we call the Old Testament) are "inspired by God, and useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in doing what is right" (II Timothy 3:16). The first Christians initially had no other writings from which to learn the truth! At Thessalonica they were commended by Paul for "carrying on a daily study of the Scriptures [i.e., the Old Testament]" to see if Paul's message were true (Acts 17:11). This is hardly the view of most twentieth century Christians!
Acts
17:11 11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they
received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures
daily, whether those things were so. (KJV)
The New Testament "Christ", himself, identified these Scriptures as "the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms" (Luke 24:44-45). In the language of those times, He thus described the entirety of what Protestants today call the "Old Testament" and which Judaism terms the "Holy Scriptures."
Luke
24:44-45 44 And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto
you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which
were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the
psalms, concerning me (the Christ). 45 Then opened he their
understanding, that they might understand the scriptures, (KJV)
The Hebrew Scriptures, and not the later altered Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, is certainly a reliable source for discovering "the faith once delivered to the saints." Without it the writings of the New Testament would be largely gobbledygook and incomprehensible! Yet most Christians all but ignore it and relegate it to history's dust bin. Few pastors and teaches teach from it in their churches today, unless of course they are taking up an offering, then Malachi gets a "work out".
Here is how the problem developed and which plagues us today as non-Jewish believers who have Bibles containing the Old Testament Scriptures as well as the New Testament passages. The primitive Church of God relied on the Old Testament writings, but supplemented by the words--through letters and sermons--of the apostles and prophets. Many teach that God was directly inspiring these men to lay the foundation of Christianity through the writings of the New Testament.
Answer for yourself: But to these we must ask: "Did God lead these men to misquote, mistranslate, take out of context, and misapply the Old Testament in order to promote "truth"? THINK....I think not!
Wrote Paul to the Ephesian Christians:
"for you are built upon
the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself the
cornerstone" (Ephesians 2:20). Indeed Paul claims
that the words he spoke were "in
words taught by the Holy Spirit" (I Corinthians 2:13).
Answer for yourself: Were they?
Today it is very hard to determine because of the above mistranslations and misquotations that abound in the New Testament and especially in Paul's writings. One thing is for certain: either Paul is guilty of such errors or those who came after him who altered his writings (presuming they were not incorrect at the time) and needed Pauline authority for their antisemitic and anti-Judaic doctrines in Rome's theology spread throughout our New Testaments. My other website deals with this subject matter extensively and I suggest you investigate for yourself.
In his final counsel to the disciples prior to his death, Jesus is supposed to have said, "when the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into the whole truth" (John 16:13). He also told them, "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you" (14:26).
Many look to these verses and claim that the Holy Spirit enabled the writers of the New Testament to preach and teach--and later to have written down--the whole counsel of God. These writers of the New Testament contend that they were inspired to perfectly recall all that the Jewish Christ taught them during his three and a half year or one year ministry (depends on what Gospel you read) --and also that burning instruction imparted to them in the nearly six weeks following his resurrection (Luke 24:32, Acts 1:3). Indeed throughout their lives we are taught that the Holy Spirit guided them writes of the New Testament into all truth.
Answer for yourself: Once you see the hundreds of conflicts in the New Testament as compared to the Old Testament you need ask yourself only this: "Is the Holy Spirit" responsible for such misquotations of God's Word as found in the New Testament or was it men who purposefully wrote to deceive the "non-Jews" and lead them away from Biblical Judaism? What a question!
It was therefore to these men and by these means and at that time that the entire structure of Christian belief was lain! The sad fact is that almost the entire structure of Christian belief was lain in error when you compare what they wrote with the source texts from which they supposedly drew in the Hebrew Scriptures.
Paul urged the young evangelist Timothy to entrust to reliable men the same teachings Paul had imparted (II Timothy 2:2).
2 Tim 2:2 2 And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also. (KJV)
Having seen previously that Paul taught the Old Testament, then there was no room for variety of belief in the fundamentals of the faith!
Answer for yourself: But can that be said for today, and is the New Testament responsible for such chaos and confusion that exits today in the over 2000 different denominations which all claim to follow the "one and same Jesus"?
Let us never forget that the early church of Jerusalem continued steadfastly in the Apostle's doctrine (the Old Testament and its doctrines...the "One" faith once given to the saints) and not in every wind of doctrine as we see today (Acts 2:42)
Answer for yourself: Do you have and does your church, one of those two thousand conflicting and contrasting denominations, have the Apostle's Doctrine and how can you be sure?
Answer for yourself:
Do you want to know what this Jewish "Christ" taught as opposed
to the replacement religion we so often find in the New Testament
epistles?
Answer for yourself: Have you ever compared what the Jews and the New Testament Jesus believed in the first century and what you have been taught today in your Christian theology? Are there differences, and if so, have you every wondered why the original Gospel of the Jewish Jesus, as compared with the Gospel of the Romanized Paul, changed and who is responsible for the change?
Look to the Old Testament and not to your church's doctrine for truth...because they are not often the same!
Answer for yourself: Ought you to accept a "new" teaching that Christianity has never taught you? Only if it is perfectly in harmony with the writings of the Hebrew Scriptures. This is where you personal study is of such value.
Answer for yourself: And should you, when having what you considered once to be spiritual truths, now upon your personal study are shown to be nothing more than the traditions of men which replaced the commandments of God, abandon your traditional teachings or doctrines of your church when they can be shown to be in error? I surely believe you should.
Only when the change in dogma and doctrine is clearly proven, without a shadow of doubt from your personal study, to be corrupted from what the true Hebrew Scriptures taught, should one repent of their former Christian beliefs and turn to the newly discovered "Divine Truths" from your personal study.
Having said all of that, in our day we need both the Old Testament and the New Testament; even with the many mistakes within it.
There are no living witnesses to the life and words of this Jewish Christ. Not since the death of the apostle John at the end of the first Christian century have there been living apostles whose words are directly inspired by God. The leadership of the churches of God are "inspired" in their words and teachings only as they reflect the written Word of God....the Hebrew Scriptures and the Jewish Old Testament. There are, today, no infallible teachers! Sadly, though, there are many who assume such a role. And many thousands who willingly and gullibly are deceived by their claims!
Too often Christians will flit to a new but
powerfully presented doctrine without thorough examination of the Bible
texts! Paul urged, "Prove all
things. Hold fast to what is good" (I Thessalonians 5:21).
I highly recommend that for that is what I had to do after Seminary having
left there knowing that something was "wrong" and I could not
put my finger on it at that time. In time, after serious personal study,
for a great time, would amass the knowledge necessary to know the problem
thoroughly which was but "blurred" in Seminary. Elsewhere he
said: "For a time is
coming when men will not tolerate wholesome instruction, but, wanting to
have their ears tickled, they will find a multitude of teachers to satisfy
their own fancies, and will close their ears to the truth and will turn
away to fables" (I Timothy 4:3). Wow, what an
indictment on the antisemitic Gentile Christian Church today.
The apostle Paul gave a solemn warning that's of special application today. Writing to the church at Thessalonica about the crisis at the close of this age--our day--he warned of a coming time of worldwide deception perpetrated by a "lawless man." This wretched being "is produced by the spirit of evil and armed with all the force, wonders and signs that falsehood can devise. To those involved in this dying world he will come with evil's undiluted power to deceive, for they have refused to love the truth which could have saved them" (II Thessalonians 2:9,10).
I need but remind you that the Jewish Christ said "Your Word is truth" (John 17:17)!
If we fail to measure our beliefs against the yardstick of the divinely inspired Word of the Living God as found in the Hebrew Scriptures and the Jewish Old Testament, then we are in deep trouble considering the forgery of the Christian Bibles. For the apostle Paul went on to tell the Thessalonian Christians that for those who don't love the truth "God sends upon them, therefore, the full force of evil's delusion so that they put their faith in an utter fraud"!
A fearful warning indeed.
Failure
to love and study God's Word leads to a fatal creeping spiritual dementia
in which we end up believing downright lies.
Answer for yourself: Do you "love the truth"?
Answer for yourself: Are you willing to compare your current Christian religious beliefs with the inspired Word of God as found in the Hebraic Scriptures, the Law, the Writings, and the Prophets?
Answer for yourself: When you hear "new doctrine"--from whatever source--are you, like the Bereans (Acts 17:11), eager to "search the Scriptures, the Hebrew Scriptures, [for the Bereans this meant the Old Testament!] to see if these things were so"?
Answer for yourself: Or do you simply accept your church's teachings without question?
In the Hebrew Scriptures, the Jewish Bible
protected and security by the blood of millions of Jews, God has given us
all we need to know about Himself, about the way of salvation, about how
we ought to behave to assure our acceptance with Him. Admittedly there are
areas where the fine details are cause for legitimate debate. But the
broad brushstrokes of vital truth are clear for all who have the spiritual
eye to see. It is there for us to prove--personally!
Yet
virtually the whole of Christianity feeds off traditional teachings that
are pure falsified and purposefully altered Hebrew Scriptures gift-wrapped
in Christian clothing...never comparing their "traditional religious
beliefs systems" with the true Hebrew Scriptures and the faith of the
Jewish Christ
Answer for yourself: Where do you get your beliefs? the Jewish Hebrew Scriptures, the Bible Jews like this New Testament Jesus would have used or the Bible of Rome which its copious adulterations and forgeries of these Hebrew texts?
Answer for yourself: How do they compare with the Scriptures this Jewish Jesus would have used and considered "infallible"?
Answer for yourself: Are you certain your view of Christian doctrine isn't just a veneer of Bible-sounding words that hide ancient lies? Let all of us who claim to be followers of this "Jewish Jesus" and "the Christ" fine-tune our love for the truth, and earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the church in the Holy Hebrew Scriptures!
And if you are not yet committed to this Jewish Christ and to his teachings, you are invited to investigate further.
True
Biblical Faith is built on the foundation of sound Bible knowledge and not
off hearsay or purposeful mistranslations, misquotations, and
misapplications of the Holy texts of the Old Testament...without this
knowledge and understanding you could "believe" yet be "deceived"
Bet Emet Ministries publishes a wide range of titles which highlight the core teachings of the Hebrew Scripture as free from faulty human tradition as we know how!
Before your proceed any further let me forewarn you that "cherished lies and man's traditions" will be shown in the light of the Hebrew Scripture as understood in the original languages, along with historical and cultural verification, and exposed by the light of the truth for what they truly are….lies which have robbed you of a more authentic Biblical life-style and a life more pleasing before God. May we all commit ourselves before God to contend for the faith once given to the saints. Shalom.