How sweet the sound

If you know me and have talked to me about the Bible then you know that I believe that the whole Bible is authoritative for holy living. In other words, all of God’s commandments in the Torah are still just as authoritative today as they were in Bible times. Some Christians misunderstand and think that this means Believers who are endeavouring to keep the Torah’s commandments are trying to earn their salvation. Recently at work, I’ve been speaking with a woman who is interested in the Torah perspective and has brought up that usually the Torah perspective teachers don’t bring up grace. Additionally, a prominent believing Jewish singer has recently publicly stated that he has left the Messianic movement and even went as far to say that Believers who are trying to keep the Torah might not be saved. His opinions are coming from his reading and misunderstanding of the Apostle Paul’s epistle to the Galatians.

I can’t speak for other Torah submissive Believers; I can only speak for myself. Am I endeavouring to learn and obey Torah to get saved? Am I trying to gain God’s favour by trying to keep the Sabbath? Am I scoring some points with God because I’m trying to keep Kosher? Is there any good work that a person can do to gain merit in God’s eyes?

The reality is that our righteousness is like filthy garments to God. It says in Isaiah:

For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; and all of us wither like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. (Isaiah 64:6)

The Apostle Paul teaches that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”(Romans 3:23). In fact, spiritually speaking, “you were dead in your trespasses and sins”(Ephesians 2:1). There is actually nothing that human beings can do to gain favour with God. When it comes to spiritual matters, we’re as good as dead. So, what’s our hope?

Let me just say, God is completely righteous and perfect in judgement and is not obligated to forgive any of us. God would be completely just in condemning each and every one of us; but this is where God’s grace comes in. To display His grace, God has chosen an elect, in every generation, to be transformed and saved. Paul says in Ephesians:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Master Yeshua the Messiah, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the [heavenlies] in Messiah, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Yeshua the Messiah to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:3-6)

We’re saved because God planned that we would be saved. Our salvation has absolutely nothing to do with our will. It was God’s will that we be saved. Paul says in Romans:

So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. (Romans 9:16)

It’s because God is merciful and transformed our hearts that we accepted the Good News of the Messiah. It’s not just that God only wanted it to happen; it goes well beyond that. Since we were dead in our sins, there was nothing in ourselves to come to life. God had to be the one to bring us to life. It says in Ephesians:

“…and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Messiah Yeshua” (Ephesians 2:6)

The question then might be asked: “once saved, is it possible to lose your salvation?” The quick answer to that is: “no.” Salvation was never something we earned; God graciously gave it to us. Therefore, we can’t lose our salvation either. There are no good works we can do to earn salvation and there are no evil works we can do to lose our salvation. Salvation would not be by grace if either of those were true! Paul says:

For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)

Instead, the salvation God gives us is one that is based on full assurance. Our hope is that despite what our sinful nature wants us to do (and, sometimes, inevitably causes us to do) we can be assured that we will have a share in the World to Come. Paul puts it this way:

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified. (Romans 8:28-30)

God is there orchestrating every step of our salvation. We were dead in our sins but God brought us to life. He worked out the events of our life in such a way that we heard the Good News of the Messiah and because he had brought us to life, we accepted it. This was because He had already predestined that we would accept it. The purpose in God doing all of this is so that we would become conformed to the image of the Messiah. With the ultimate result being that we will be glorified; that is, the resurrection of our bodies in the World to Come.

What does any of this have to do with keeping the Torah? Well, we don’t keep the Torah to be saved or to maintain our salvation. We keep the Torah because God has saved us and because God is our loving Father and we want to obey Him. Every single time we submit to the commandments of God, we’re telling God that we love Him. We are not doing it to gain His favour because we already have His favour. His favour to us is not a result of anything we’ve done, because we don’t deserve any of it. His favour has been bestowed upon us because of Messiah and His work. Furthermore, we do not keep the Torah to maintain His favour. The forgiveness of our sins is based upon the finished work of the Messiah. Messiah’s blood has atoned for all of our sins. There is nothing we can do to add to that.

I ask that those who criticize me about wanting to keep the commandments of Torah to kindly grow up a little bit. Thinking that a Believer has no responsibility to God’s commandments is simply a slippery slope that will just lead to apostasy. God has prepared good works for us to do and they are the commandments of the Torah:

For we are His workmanship, created in the Messiah Yeshua for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10)

For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome. (1 John 5:3)