Meet the new war, same as the old war, by Aaron Hecht

Brothers and sisters, can I be vulnerable with you for a moment?

There are two compulsions I have that are often in conflict. The first is a very powerful drive to provide for my family and the second is a very powerful drive to not be a burden to anyone. 

The reason these two powerful drives within me are often in conflict is that here in Israel, it's REALLY hard to provide for a family all by oneself. 

Most families struggle to pay for everything they need, even with both parents working. That was true even before this war (which shows signs of being close to being over, thank God) and in the last 22 months that the war has continued, it's gotten harder and harder for families to make ends meet. There is every indication that this is going to continue, because the government has warned that it will have to raise taxes and cut services in the months ahead. This war has cost Israel's government money in all kinds of ways, and the costs are going to stay high for a long time. They will filter down to households and individual citizens, far beyond the taxes and cuts to services I've already mentioned. 

Let me tell you a short story that will help you better understand just how difficult the situation already is.

As I said, I have these two compulsions, which are often in conflict, and recently, the first one won out over the other when I finally decided to ask a certain Christian Zionist organization that operates here in Jerusalem for help in paying some of my bills. The person I reached out to is an old friend of mine, and he told me right away that he couldn't give me money, but he COULD give me a pre-paid gift card, which I could use at the grocery store. I could tell he wanted to give me more than that, but I told him, truthfully, that it was a big help. 

However, these cards are mainly used at a store I don't go to very often because the nearest outlet is kind of a long way away from my apartment, and I usually do my shopping at a store that is much closer. But I couldn't use the card at my usual place, so I gratefully took it to the store where I could use it to stock up on essentials.

Now here's where the story gets more interesting and maybe even a little shocking.

There were four checkout lanes operating that evening and I was in the second one from the left. This allowed me to turn around and observe everything that was going on in almost all four lanes, which is something that my training and experience as a journalist compels me to do (I do NOT have a conflicting compulsion to "mind my own business" because journalists who do have that compulsion don't remain journalists very long.)

After a few moments, something clicked in my brain as I watched one person after another pay for their groceries with pre-paid cards just like the one I had in my pocket.

After I'd paid for my stuff, I was on my way out of the store and I saw a manager, who I know from past visits is an English-speaker, being the offspring of parents who made Aliyah from South Africa many years ago. So I caught this individual's eye and when he walked over to me, I asked him about what I'd seen. 

He informed me that this is quite normal to see many people paying for their groceries with these pre-paid cards. He added that there are several organizations in Israel that use donations from around the world to buy enormous numbers of these cards so they can distribute them to people who need help. He had been a checkout clerk for years before being promoted to manager, and he told me that before the war, he would see perhaps one or two shoppers paying with one of these cards in a typical 8-hour shift. But these days, a solid majority of people, probably close to 70%, use them.

I stood there for a moment, taking that in, and then he took a deep breath and blurted out "I don't even want to think about what would be happening in this country right now if people in other countries weren't donating to these organizations so they could give people these cards. I mean, we would be in REALLY big trouble if Israel weren't getting so much help. This store probably would have closed by now, I'd be out of a job, and who knows what else."

He then started on a big, long, meandering rant about all the things he's angry at the politicians for, and I was starting to get nervous because I agreed with some things he was saying and disagreed strongly with others. On top of that, I had some cheese and milk I wanted to get home so I could put them in the refrigerator. 

Happily, before too much time had passed, one of the checkout clerks needed his help with something so I was able to get away and go home. But I have not been able to get what he said out of my mind for the last few days. 

So, this afternoon, I sat down to write this blog to let my readers know about this situation, which most of you probably have some idea about, but I doubt most of you have any real idea of just how severe the problems have become.

If you're a supporter of Israel, I'm sure you're happy to see how successful the IDF has been in this war. It is miraculous, and even very secular people are acknowledging that. I am hopeful that it will lead to some spiritual breakthroughs in Israel and there are many other positive things that are in the pipeline.

One positive thing we're looking forward to is a large number of Jewish people making Aliyah to Israel from Western countries, where anti-Semitism is on the rise. This will bring a lot of blessings into the country, but it will also require the government to spend a lot of money, adding to the strain on the economy that I mentioned earlier.

All of that is to say, brothers and sisters, that Israel needs your help. Please continue to pray for us and if you are contributing financially to a ministry or charity organization that operates here, please don't stop. If you can, increase the amount you're giving. Remember what you've read in this blog, that there are many families who would be underwater already if it wasn't for all the help these organizations are able to give to people, because they're receiving donations from other countries.

The kinetic war to defeat Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, and all the other enemies that have come against Israel in the last 22 months is almost over. The war at home, to simply put food on the table and otherwise live in dignity here in the Land of Israel, is just beginning, and Israel is going to need all the help it can get for a very long time.

I released a worship song! Break Forth in Joy

Dear Kineti readers, I'm pleased to announce the release of my first worship song. Give it a listen?

It's a cover of a 1970s song by the pioneering Messianic music group, Lamb. It's one of my personal favorites that has inspired me in life and drawn me closer to God.

This song is a collaboration between my old friend Troy Mitchell and a new friend from Israel, Eli Ben Moshe. Troy is a veteran Messianic musician, cantor, and talented songwriter. Eli is a musician himself and audio engineer; his father is Marc Chopinsky from the pioneering Messianic music group Israel's Hope.

For this song, Troy sings the first verse and plays piano and guitar. I sing the second verse, background vocals, and play guitar. Eli is on bass and percussion. Eli also mixed and mastered this track.

A huge thanks to Troy and Eli for adding their skill and talents to this track. A huge thanks to Eli for helping me get started in the recording and audio engineering world.

The song is based on Psalm 98 and Isaiah 52:

All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation [Yeshua] of our God.
Shout joyfully to Adonai, all the earth.
Break forth, sing for joy, and sing praises.
Sing praises to Adonai with the harp,
with the harp and a voice of melody.
With trumpets and sound of the shofar
blast a sound before the King, Adonai.

Break forth in joy, sing together,
you ruins of Jerusalem,
for Adonai has comforted His people.
He has redeemed Jerusalem.
Adonai has bared His holy arm
before the eyes of all the nations.
All the ends of the earth will see
the salvation [Yeshua] of our God

Both command God's people to break forth in joy, sing, and praise God because all humanity will see the salvation of our God. These verses are linked and they are made true only in one person, Yeshua.

The album art is based on a photo I took in Jerusalem a few years ago. A man played guitar, then another man joined on violin. Soon, people gathered around and started dancing. An IDF soldier came by and we lifted him on our shoulders as we danced. It was so joyful, I thought it a fit as album art for this song. 🙏

The album art

The photo I took in Jerusalem, used as an inspiration for the album art

May this song amplify the name of Yeshua, Jesus, the Jewish Messiah and Savior of humanity. "There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved!"

Why I'm Still Torah-Observant

"Judah, why are you still following all that Jewish stuff?"

I attend a Sunday church. While my calling is in the Messianic Jewish movement, I'm currently more involved with the Christian world. My wife is neither Messianic nor Torah observant. One of the contributors to this blog, Aaron Hecht, isn't Torah-observant (yet 😉). 

My kids have sometimes complained that I forbid them eating certain foods. Why can't they have a bacon cheeseburger when they go out with their friends?

And while we as a family make time for erev Shabbat with a special meal, Bible discussion and blessings on each person at the table, Saturdays often fill up with activities, including my own. I'm not leading my family in keeping Shabbat well.

Last week I was talking theology with my father-in-law, and he asked whether my eating kosher is just tradition. He mentioned the vision God gave to Peter, with unclean animals coming down from heaven with a voice saying, "Rise, kill, and eat!" Doesn't that mean all food is clean in the age of Jesus? 

And didn't Jesus say he came to fulfill the Law? If the Law is fulfilled, do we really have to keep it anymore? Isn't the Law written on our hearts, and thus we don't have to work it out in our actions?

I've also witnessed lots of problems among Torah-observant believers: Torah terrorism, demonizing our Christian brothers, conspiracy theories, and lots of nonsense unrelated to Torah-keeping. I used to do those things myself. And because of all that ugly behavior from Torah keepers, some friends have come out as no longer Torah observant. 

One Christian friend keeps asking me why I'm following those old rules anyways when I'm already saved in Jesus. What's the point of following those all those Jewish things when you're already going to heaven?

It'd sure be easier to fit in with my Christian friends if I just gave up pursuit of the Torah. I could join them for Friday nights out on the town. Why am I still following those old rules, anyways? 

I also struggle with sin in my own life. Sometimes, Torah keeping feels like it's putting lipstick on a pig. I am the pig. How can I worry about kosher when I engage in lustful thoughts or lose my temper with my kids or fight with my wife?

And what is Torah observance, anyways? Is it the Orthodox Jewish Torah observance, with separate kitchens for meat and milk, eating only at rabbinically-certified kosher restaurants and growing out your sidelocks? Or is it the Hebrew Roots Torah observance, wearing multicolored tzitzit tied to belt loops and sounding shofars on every upbeat chorus? Or is it Christian Torah observance, feeding the hungry, giving to charity and standing for the unborn?

I've been thinking a lot about these things. 

Why am I still pursuing Torah in my own life and family?

And my answer is this: the Bible.

What I mean is, I'm convinced -- still! -- that the Bible repeatedly demonstrates that God wants his people to keep the Torah as much as we're able.

• The New Testament records Jesus keeping the Torah.
• We have no record of Jesus, the disciples, or the apostles actually breaking the Torah.
• Jesus tells his disciples that anyone who does the Torah will be considered great in the coming age. (And, those who tell others not to keep the Torah will be considered least.)
• The New Testament records Jesus telling his followers to keep the Torah.
• Many of Jesus' commands are above and beyond the Torah. The Torah forbids adultery, but Jesus says even looking at a woman in lust is a kind of adultery. How can we say the Torah is done away with when Jesus' tells us to observe a stronger, more stringent version of it?
• The New Testament records the disciples keeping the Torah.
• After Jesus heals a man with leprosy, he tells the man to observe the Torah's commandment about healed lepers. Why would Jesus do that if the Torah was done away with?
• The New Testament records Paul keeping the Torah in order to publicly put to rest rumors to the contrary. "That way, all will realize there is nothing to the things they have been told about you, but that you yourself walk in an orderly manner, keeping the Torah." (Acts 21:24) How is it that modern Christianity now claims the Paul did not keep the Torah? It's the opposite of the plain meaning of this verse.
• The New Testament explicitly affirms the Torah is good, holy, and righteous.
• God punished Israel for not keeping the Torah. If the Torah is no longer applicable, logically God would need to repent to Jewish people for punishing them for something He no longer requires of them.
• The Torah issues a warning against any prophet or leader who claims the Torah need not be observed.
• Many of the commandments of the Torah have an explicit clause about its eternal nature. "This commandment is for you and your descendants forever, no matter where you live." If the Torah is done away with, parts of the Bible become false.
• By claiming Jesus broke the Torah or teaches his followers to break it, Christians are inadvertently making Jesus into the false prophet of Deuteronomy 13.
• When the Israelites returned from Babylonian captivity, Nehemiah had to correct people breaking the Torah, telling them that their disobedience is the reason God sent them into captivity in the first place. I remain unconvinced God is OK with his people doing things he previously punished us for.
• Jesus tells people that God created the Sabbath for humanity. Why have his followers discarded something God created for our benefit?
• When Jesus is falsely accused of breaking the Torah (e.g. healing on the sabbath), He responds not by saying the Torah is done away with. He responds by saying what God intended for the Law (e.g. it's lawful to do good on the sabbath).
• By claiming Jesus broke the Torah or did away with it, Christians are inadvertently confirming his religious critics.
• When Jesus returns, He will (still) be Jewish; the Lion of Judah. Shouldn't the followers of the Jewish Jesus emulate His way of life?
• A Jewish Jesus will live in a way consistent with his first appearing: an observant Jew who shows us how to properly keep the Torah.
• Jesus is returning to Jerusalem, not to any other city. That implies that Israel, Jews, and Torah still matter to God.
• The Bible says when Messiah returns, He'll require all nations to go up to Jerusalem to keep the Biblical holidays. Anyone who refuses will have no rain. This implies Messiah wants all people to be Torah observant.
• The New Testament commands the Gospel "to the Jew first, then the Gentile". This implies Israel and Jewish people still exist. Jewish people remain because of the Torah.
• I'm unconvinced of the claim that Peter's vision means the food laws have been abolished. I find Peter's own interpretation of the vision more persuasive and powerful: God has made Gentiles clean through Messiah.
• The remaining anti-Torah statements in the New Testament, like Paul in Galatians, appear not to be wholesale rejection of the Torah, but relying on the Torah to be saved. Christianity today claims Paul is rejecting the Torah altogether, but this runs counter to Paul's own actions in Acts 21.
• Christians often appeal to Jesus' statement, "I have come to fulfill the Law", but they don't consider the full quote: "I have not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill the Law." Christianity has not made a practical distinction between abolishing and fulfilling.
• Modern Christianity has thrown out all food laws, even though the apostles ruled that Gentile converts to Christianity must follow certain food prohibitions from the Torah.
• I remain unconvinced of the superficial divisions of the Law into moral, civil, and ceremonial; the division doesn't appear in the Bible itself. How can we say, then, that God abolished two of those three divisions?
• Keeping the 10 commandments but not the other parts of the Law strikes me as inconsistent. On what basis should we keep the 10 but discard the 600+ summarized by the 10?

Another reason I keep the Torah is, I don't trust myself to make better moral judgments than God.

God gave us commandments governing how we live. I can throw those out at my discretion. But, "trust in the LORD wholeheartedly and lean not on your own understanding." 

Part of trusting God is believing He's right even if I don't understand Him. I don't understand some commandments God gave us. But I won't lean on my own understanding. I trust that God is wiser than I am. 

If I throw out the Torah, I'm already taking steps towards a progressive and humanistic religion. Throw out the Torah? Why not throw out the New Testament too? Progressive churches have done exactly this. Pastors of such churches are even free to criticize Jesus's own teachings - and why shouldn't they? If God can do away with the Torah, why can't we do away with things from any part of the Bible we don't like? Don't like the laws prohibiting lesbian and gay relationships? Just discard them. Don't like the laws about preserving life? Just discard them. Don't like the laws prohibiting men pretending to be women? Just discard them. Much of the culture war is a natural outcome of discarding the Torah.

I don't want to go down that path. I think the better option is following God to the best of my ability.

A big part of that is just doing the things God told us to do, including the Torah. And doing those things in light of how Jesus kept the Torah.

There are other reasons to keep the Torah. Jews who follow the Jewish Messiah should not cease being Jewish. God doesn't want Jewish people to disappear, and Jews who do not keep the Torah tend to assimilate and disappear within a generation or two. God has used the Torah to preserve the Jewish people. The Torah is the Constitution of the people of Israel. 

Another reason to keep the Torah is because the early Christian communities did. The Didache, an early Christian writing dated to the late 1st century, tells the believers to fast twice a week, weigh the cost of faith, observe basic Torah morality, forbid abortion. It spends most of its time advocating for the way of life, repeating many of the basic commandments from the Torah.

Those are valid reasons to keep the Torah.

But for me, I come back to the Bible. I cannot in good conscious stop doing what God commanded. I cannot un-convince myself that the Torah is righteous, good, holy, part of the living Word of God. Powerful and sharper than a sword, piercing the soul, judging the thoughts and intentions of the human heart. The Torah is part of the whole counsel of God.

I don 't know how to keep all the Torah. I know I'm not keeping all of it. I'm undoubtedly mistaken in how I'm keeping some of it. I'm not doing the Torah life very well in some areas of my life. 

I don't know which is better: the Hebrew Roots version of Torah observance or the Orthodox Jewish version of Torah observance. I'm failing at many parts of Torah observance in my own life and in my family and home life. And I know lots of people in the Torah-and-Yeshua world are doing things poorly and generally showing that they're just sinful humans.

Despite all this, I'm going to keep pursuing God's Torah. This means keep learning. Keep reading the Scriptures. Keep knocking on the door in prayer for more wisdom. Keep asking the Lord to turn me to Himself. "Enlighten my eyes with Your Torah." Keep asking God to sanctify my life, make it align more with His image.