Colossians 2: Handwriting of Ordinances?
07/08/17 (04/13) Video Broadcast
How many of you when
sharing the things about
the blessing of observing
the feasts of Yahweh and
the enlightenment that we
have had, and the blessing
of the Sabbath, have run
into a little problem with
a particular verse in
the book of Colossians,
chapter two?
Where it says the
following, "Let no one
judge you in food or in
drink or regarding a
festival or a new moon or
a Sabbath" which are a
shadow of things to come"
and this particular
translation says, "But the
substance is of Messiah".
And then we have the NIV,
New International Version
saying, "therefore do not
let any one judge you by
what you eat or drink with
regard to a religious
festival, a new moon
celebration or Sabbath day.
These are a shadow of the
things that were to come.
The reality, however,
is found in Messiah".
How many of you have ever
come across folks who try
to use this text to show
that the festivals; new
moons, Sabbaths, all those
things they have from a
bygone era?
And now the reality is
here, now the Messiah is
here and we no longer need
all those shadowly things
And now that Messiah is
here we don't need the
festivals to point to him
and you know things like that.
How many of you have heard
something like that and
come across this verse,
perhaps in trying to
understand whether or not,
our heavenly father wants
us to observe
the festivals?
Whether it's necessary and
whether or not He wants to
observe the Sabbath and
pay attention to the new
moon and things like that?
Kind of interesting,
because you know, we want
to do the right thing.
I mean, we don't want to
be deceived; we don't want
to be telling people to
do things that are not
necessary for us to do.
And so we need to take a
full examination of this
chapter of Colossians,
Chapter two, but we need
to do so, in context and
that's what I intend on
doing, and the title of
today's message is called;
Colossians 2 handwriting
of ordinances?
hat is this, handwriting
of ordinances?
Other translations
say, "Handwriting of
requirements" and we
saw that this simply...
We'll get to that in a minute, but other translations Colossians 2:14 are going to say, you know "charge of legal indebtedness", and all kinds of... A wide variety of you know translations and attempts to, for the translators to figure out what's going on here. And, so let's take examination here, and try to understand what is really happening in full context, all right. So, let's start first of all with a text in the book of Acts, in chapter 18 it says, "when they ask him", this talking about Paul, "to stay a longer time with them he did not consent, he took leave of them saying, 'I must, by all means, keep this coming feast in Jerusalem, but I will return again to you Elohim willing', and he sailed from Ephesus. And so here is an example of Paul himself observing
the feast days. Now, some people today, if they see you keeping the feast days, they may assume that you have rejected the Messiah.
And others will say, "well, yeah Paul was keeping the feast, you know, he was Jewish. But, you know he was just trying reach out you know to his Jewish brothers and so he just thought he you know would go ahead and keep the feast and kind of hang out with them not like he really needed to or anything. And then the Acts 25 says verse 7, then when he had come, the Jews, who had come down from Jerusalem stood about and laid many serious complaints against Paul, which they could not prove. Well, he answered for himself," Neither against the law of the Jews, nor against the temple, nor against Caesar have I offended anything at all". And so he observed the law of the Jews which is commonly known as the Torah, and he was careful to do that. And they could not find any fault against him because he did believe in keeping the Torah, the law of Yahweh. And so a lot of people say, "Well, he is just doing that to please the Jews, you know if he stopped keeping Torah, he could never reach out to his country man". ow, think about this for a moment, wouldn't he be going against his own advice? Because he would tell people you know, "don't let other people influence you and to get circumcised", and things like that. If he's right he's trying to appease the Jews wouldn't he be acting deceitfully? Because once the Jews find out the Messiah had abolished the law... It would be like Jacob woke up and you know he thought he was married to Rachel but there was Leah. I mean they would be like "wait a minute! You're saying to me that he did away with the law, the Torah??" So Paul would have been acting deceitfully if he would be just pretending if he was only keeping the law out of, you know to be a man pleaser. And so deceit and lies should not be a characteristic of any true believer in Yahweh. Deceit and trickery, is actually a characteristic of the enemy. And in fact, in this very chapter of Colossians chapter 2, Paul warns the people in Coloss to beware of deceitful man, who are trying to pull you into traditions. In verse 8, he says "be aware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of man, according to the basic principles of the world and not according to Messiah". Now if Paul was only keeping the feast to appease the Jews then all of a sudden, he is trying to act deceitfully.
In such a way, to say, "Well you know you don't really have to keep these feasts and yet,
he's out there keeping them. And so he was actually, if that was the case, following ideas that were not sanctioned by Yahweh by keeping feasts but then acting deceitfully.
So I don't believe he was keeping feasts just to appease the Jews that would be deception. The truth is the Jews found out that Yahushua had abolished any part of the law; they would have actually been required by the law itself, by Yahweh himself to reject the Messiah. Isaiah 8:20 says, to the law and to the testimony, If they do not speak according to the word, it's because there is no light in them ". And so by the scriptures, if Paul had taught that we are free to disobey the law of Yahweh there would be no light in Pauls' words. Now that's what Isaiah, said.
And so if Paul came along with Jewish people the laws is done away with, they would say "Nah, that's not according to law and testimony, there's no light in that". In fact, Deuteronomy 13 verses 1 through 2 says, if there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams and he gives you a sign or a wonder and the sign or wonder comes to pass of which he spoke to you saying, let's , in this case, be disobedient, go after other gods which you have not known and let's serve them". You should not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for Yahweh your Elohim is testing you, to know whether you love Yahweh your Elohim with all your heart, with all your soul. You shall walk after Yahweh, your Elohim and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice and you shall serve him and hold fast to him. And so they were required in the law of Yahweh, they were required to cleave to the commandments that Yahweh had given; obey his voice. If anybody came along and say "hey let's worship other god or, let's go do something Yahweh", never commanded or let's go disobey our Father in heaven". They were required to reject such a man. You know what? I think every person faced or faces this kind of a test, and that's the danger of tradition. Are we going to follow Yahweh' words, his commandments, obey his voice, and serve him or are we going to follow the traditions of man?
I think every person will face this test; whether we are going to serve man and do what some guy claiming to be a prophet says or whatever even if did a sign or a wonder. We are going to face it says Elohim is testing you to know whether you keep commandments his commandments or not, whether you love him or not, all one and the same. And this is the great danger of tradition is it pulls us away from the scriptures and toward man. Away from Yahweh words and toward man's words. And the apostles faced this test; in Acts chapter
5 verse 28 it says "Did we not strictly command you not to teach in this name? " Saint Hadrian is saying to the apostles. "And look you filled Jerusalem with your doctrine and intend to bring this man's blood on us." But Peter and the other apostles answered said, " We ought to obey Elohim rather than man."
See that's the danger of tradition, it pulls us away from the commandments of Yahweh and toward the doctrine and commandments of man. Mathew 15:9 says, "I vain, they worship me" talking about scribes and Pharisees, "teaching as doctrines the commandments of man". Let me ask you a question; would it be a sin to
invent some kind of commandment of man and say, everybody, needs to follow that?" Absolutely nd what if that kind of man actually offended up transgressing one of Yahweh's commandments. That's even worse. That we're putting man's word ahead of Yahweh word. Yahweh never commanded that we do some of the things that scribes and Pharisees were doing. And he says,"in vain they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of man. When man invents the commandments, now all the attention is on what man says, not what Yahweh says. And that's where the enemy can come in and do his nasty, nasty work. Interestingly, look at Proverbs 30 in verse 4 for a minute. It says, who has ascended into heaven or descended? Who has gathered the wind in his fists? Who has bound the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name and what is his son's name if you know? That's an important question. We know his name is Yahweh his son's name is Yahushua and this is an Old Testament proverb here before Yahushua ever came on the earth. And it's asking the question what's his name and what is his son's name if you know? Now, we know based on study, that man has taken the name of Yahweh, and the name of his son Yahushua out of the scriptures or altered the Messiah's name, in that case. And they have put a title on this place known as "the Lord". And so here's he's asking what his name is and what's his son's name, if you know? And then the very next verse says, every word of Elohim is pure, he has his shield to those who put their trust in him. Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar. And what they have done with their tradition is that they have taken the name of our heavenly father out of the scriptures, because of tradition not because he commanded it. And put in "the lord" instead, or "God" instead.
And now, please pray tell if anybody was to go around and eliminate the name of an author of any book, I mean the author would be pretty upset and other people would be upset too. "Who wrote this? Who wrote this! Who wrote this! Take the name of Yahweh out of his own book, and oh, nobody minds that. Of course, Satan's name, Satan or ha Satan, it's still in the book but not Yahweh's name. This is an example of cleaving to commandments of man. Of adding to the word Elohim and holding fast to
man's traditions instead of Yahweh' word. And so I don't do that, I restore our father's name into the text. I don't want to add to his words, lest I be rebuked and he calls me a liar. And for this reason we have many traditions today, people like tradition, they like their own ways. They like their own ways versus Yahweh's ways. But you see, Yahushua really did not come to abolish the law. He did not come to destroy the law, he came to fulfill it. Now if I said to m daughter, " will you please bring me a glass of water?" And she did it, then she fulfilled my commandment, right? So the Messiah he didn't come to destroy, he came to actually do the commandments and fulfill it. So the setting aside of key elements of Yahweh's law such as the feast days, and setting up sadly alternative holidays invented by man such as Christmas and Easter; are traditions of man
replacing the commandments of Yahweh. Now, there was this prophet of Yahweh who fell into the trap of choosing to disobey Yahweh's command. You know what he paid for it with his life? After Jeroboam became the king of Israel he changed the law of Yahweh, he changed the feast days and instead set up his own feasts days, his own priesthoods and he led Israel into disobedience and into idolatry. Why? Jeroboam said this heart, "now the kingdom may return to house of David if these people go up and to offer to sacrifices in the house of Yahweh in Jerusalem. Then the heart of these people will turn back to their master Rehoboam, king of Judah and they will kill me and go back to Rehoboam king of Judah." He was afraid for political reasons, much like the scribes and Pharisees, they wanted the attention on themselves, they were afraid Yahweh would be their king, maybe not consciously. There are political reasons why they rejected the Messiah, they wanted power. And Jeroboam wants power; he does not want to lose his position of power. Therefore the king asked advice, made two calves of gold and then said to the people "it is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods of Israel who brought you up out of the land of Egypt". And he set up one in Bethel and the other he put in Dan. Two calves of gold, golden calf making a comeback.
Now, this thing became sin for the people went to worship for the one, as far as Dan.
He made shrines on the high places made priests from every class of people who were not the sons of Levi. Jeroboam ordained a feast on the 15th day of the 8th month instead of the 7th month, like the feast that was in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar so he did it in Bethel sacrificing the calves he had made. And in Bethel, he installed priests of the high places which he had made.
So he made offerings on the altar which he made at Bethel on the 15th day of 8th month in the month in which he devised in his own heart and he ordained his feast for the children of Israel and offered sacrifices on the altar and burned incense. ig mistake! Taking away the commandments Yahweh and setting up your own commandments. Yahushua says it all too well, "you reject the commandment of Elohim, that you may keep your tradition". So for political purposes, Jeroboam established an alternative worship system. Israel should've cleaved to what the law of Yahweh told them. They should've refused to obey the commandment that was contrary to the one that Yahweh had ordained.
And I say to you; this has what has also happened today. We have alternative holidays, we have an alternative Thanksgiving feast, we have alternatives.
nd traditions of man are observed rather than Commandments of Elohim. So let's take a look here, what's going on?
First Kings, chapter 13 in verse 1, " Behold a man of Elohim went from Judah to Bethel by the word of Yahweh and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense." So it's the same king, he's hanging out over here by the altar, burning incense himself. "and he cried out against the altar by the word of Yahweh, and says, Oh, alter, alter thus says Yahweh, behold a child, Josiah by name, shall be born to the house of David; and on you he shall sacrifice the priests of the high places who burn incense on you, and men's bones shall be burned on you.'" And he gave a sign the same day, saying, "This is the sign which Yahweh has spoken. Surely the altar shall split apart and the ashes on it shall be poured out". And it came to pass when king Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of the Elohim, who cried out against the altar in Bethel, he stretched out his hand from the altar saying "Arrest him!!" and then his hand which he stretched out toward him withered, so that he could not pull it back to himself. The altar also was split apart and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of Elohim was given by the word of Yahweh. hen the king answered and said to the man of Elohim, " please entreat the favor of Yahweh your Elohim and pray for me that my hand may be restored to me". So the man of Elohim entreated Yahweh and the king's hand was restored to him and became as before. Now you would think Jeroboam would repent, just like you would think, those in the century of Judaism after having seen withered man's hands being restored and miracles being done, that that man would repent and listen to Yahushua. That's not what happened. So the king said to the man of Elohim "come home with me and refresh yourself and I will give you a reward". But the man of Elohim said to the king, "if you were ready to give me half of your house I would not go with you, nor I will eat bread or drink water in this place. For so is commanded to me by the word of Yahweh; ' you shall not eat bread nor shall you drink water nor return by the same way you came'. So he went another way and did not return by the way he came to Bethel. Now Jeroboam never did repent, even though the power of Yahweh that was on the prophet. But then guess what happens? The prophet himself gets tested.
Now an old prophet dwelled in Bethel and his sons came and told him all the works the man of Elohim had done, that day in Bethel. They also told their father the words which he had spoken to the king.
And their father said to them, "which way did he go?" For his sons had seen which way the man of Elohim went who o came from Judah. So he said to his sons, "Saddle the donkey for me." So they saddled the donkey for him and he rode on it and went after the man of Elohim and found him sitting under an oak. And he said to him, " Are you the man of Elohim who came from Judah ?" And he said "I am", then he said to him, "Come home with me and eat bread". and he said, " I cannot return with you nor go in with you neither can I eat bread nor drink water with you in this place for I have been told by the word of Yahweh,' you shall not eat bread nor drink water there nor return by going the way you came''. He said to him," I, too, am a prophet as you are an angel came and spoke to me by the word of Yahweh saying, 'bring him back with you to your house that he may eat bread and drink water". He was lying to him. So he went back with him, ate bread in his house and drank water. Now it happened as they sat at the table that the
word of Yahweh came to prophet who had brought him back and he cried out at the man of Elohim who came from Judah saying, "thus says Yahweh 'because you have disobeyed the word of Yahweh, and not kept the commandment which Yahweh, Elohim commanded you. But you came back ate bread and drank water in the place of which Yahweh said to you, eat no bread drink no water, your corpse shall not come to the tomb of your fathers." So it was after he had eaten bread and after he had drunk water, he saddled the donkey for him, the prophet whom he had brought back when he was on his way a lion met him on the road and killed him.
You see what happens here is, a prophet became a hypocrite in that he was telling others to keep the
word of Yahweh and to not depart from it. And he himself was cleaving to a commandment of man. And so he was guilty of the very thing he was condemning Jeroboam for and not only guilty but guilty within hours perhaps of you know a miracle being done to correct Jeroboam and his erroneous ways of departing from the commandments of Yahweh creating his own traditions of men. So Yahweh allowed Jeroboam to be tested, he allowed Israel to be tested; are they going to go after calves in Dan and Bethel or are they going to go and worship Yahweh in Jerusalem the way commanded the worshipped? He allowed even the prophet who came and condemned Jeroboam's actions to be tested. This Deuteronomy 13 test and everyone was judged.
And let me tell you today, you are being tested, I am being tested, will we keep the commandments of men or keep the commandments of Yahweh because traditional Christianity teaches Messiah has done away with the Torah, commandments to the feast days. And now we have our own man made holidays instead. So when Paul is presented as a man who pretends to observe the law but really teaches that Messiah did away with a law, that's an awful thing to say about him, about that man because he's...You're saying he is being deceptive. And we are not called to use deception but to speak in the share the truth, to be straight forward and up right and clear, in what we believe. Now in Paul's day, there was another kind of deception that was creeping in, it was still based on the commandments and doctrines of man, and he warned them he said: "be aware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy". Philosophy, what's philosophy?
The Greek world and Roman world was filled with these philosophers, who were teaching all kinds of different ideas that were contrary to the way Yahweh himself had commanded. They were according to their tradition of man, according to the basic principles of the world; they were not according to Messiah. And so they were contrary to the Messiah. He says, "Be aware! Look out! Watch out! Be careful! Lest anyone cheat you, deceive you, trick you, into the following tradition of man and not following Messiah." Things that are worldly, according to the basic principle of the world, things that are traditions, they are empty, they have no power and they are deceptive.
Let me tell you something; we have a philosophy today that has been embraced by many. The philosophy says, "The Messiah came to do away with the feast days, do away with the Sabbath day, to do away with Yahweh's own calendar and our need to follow his calendar that's based on traditions of man, not based on the scriptures. I mean think about it? Why would Yahweh create a standard of righteousness that he expects all mankind to follow because he said Exodus 12:49 and other verses, "one law shall be for the Jew and the Gentile, for Israel, and strangers among you", one law. Why would he expect all of the mankind follow this law and then dismantle it later? Not only that but why would he command everyone to keep this law and if you disobey it, you've sinned and you need a savior and then now the savior came and died so that you could be cleansed of all your sin and then free you to disobey the law again. Does that really make any sense? I mean if you really think about it? No, you see on judgment day you are gonna say, "let's see you died in the year 2880 well, Messiah has not died for your sins and you disobeyed the commandment to keep the feats and therefore you're going to hell". And then 5 years later, Yahushua died for your sins, "oh you disobey the feasts? No problem. Enter into the joy of your master". Yeah, 5-year difference, does that make any sense?
I mean it doesn't make any sense to me. I mean it makes much more sense if there's one standard given for everybody for, you know, for all time. Otherwise, we have Yahweh sort of being respected of persons, does not have a double standard.
Or do you not believe Yahushua came here to save us from our sins? What is sin? What's the New Testament definition of sin? "Whoever commits sin transgresses also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law" 1 John 3:4, "Sin is a transgression of the law". Look up this word in your Strong's Lexicon, you'll see it means 'violation of the law'. nd therefore if one were to transgress Yahweh's law which commands us to keep the Sabbath day and the feasts days, we will be sinning, if we choose to disobey those commands. Philosophy of man says, "No, that's not so. You can disobey the commands and it's okay, no sin." Scriptures say, "It is a sin".
Now they start well in that they say, "yeah, we have all sinned if we say we haven't sin we make him a liar and his word is not in us". That's very true. 1 John 1:1,0, "except one, Yahushua, who was without sin, for we do not have a high priest, we cannot sympathize our weaknesses but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without transgression of the law". He never transgressed the law, one time. Now Yahushua came, lived the perfect life knowing
what he would endure, and the prophets for told that he would endure much. But why was that necessary for him to die? Was it so he could do away with the law so that that we don't have to do it anymore? Was it so that we could live a life of disobedience? Is Yahushua no longer concerned about our works? The truth is Yahushua came and died, because we broke the law in the first place, how can now return to the same condition that caused Yahushua's death to begin with? And say, "now we can disobey the law", that doesn't make any sense. To say "we can willfully now disobey the law".
Doesn't make any sense, all right. So Romans chapter 6, verse 1, "what shall we say
then, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" Shall we continue to transgress the law of Yahweh so that we can all the grace we need? Certainly not, absolutely not, it's the strongest possible objection in the Greek language. How shall we, who died to sin, live any longer in it? How is it even possible to live in transgression of the law? 2 Peter 2:22, as it happened to them according to the true proverb, a dog returns to his own vomit, the sow having washed to her wallowing in the mire.
You know last night we were laying there in bed and me and my wife and I heard the dog at the foot of the bed throwing up and swallowing it, throwing up and swallowing it, that's gross. But that's sort of like really what it's like when you say you we can return to the vomit, we threw up all the sin, the vomit, it exited our mouth. But now we can go and lick it back up and do all the sin we want, like a dog. ut if we love Yahweh, we should want this refrain from sin. We should be pursuing a life that is walking away from sin. Yahushua said, " If you love me, keep my commandments, I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another helper that he may abide by you forever. The spirit of truth in the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him for he dwells with you and will be in you".So if you really love him, keep his commandments. Yahushua's commandments are not limited to Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John, it was through him that Yahweh gave the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, through exodus. Through him, he being the word that became flesh and dwelled among us, his commandments stretch across the ages of time.
There's not distention between Yahweh commandments and Yahushua's commandments as if they are different. They are all the same. And so we are warned in scripture not to follow philosophies and ideas of man that are not according to Messiah and what he tells us to do. Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and through deceit. And ironically they use this very chapter of Colossians 2, to promote their mistaken ideas.
Their mistaken idea is, "Yahweh gave this law he was so, so, harsh. And anybody who disobeyed it were immediately destroyed and stoned. And along came Messiah, kind and friendly gent,
and he kinda calmed Yahweh down a little bit, died for us. And now we can live, you know, be a little lax about our walk if you want to and it's all okay, Yahushua came and died for you. Hey, that's what grace is for, right? It's okay. Once you are saved, that means you're always saved, you made the confession, you got your ticket, you got your get out of hell free card. Just hand it to him at the pearly gates and in you go." That's philosophies and traditions to man, it's not according to the scriptures. Yahushua didn't die so that you could live a life of willful sin; he died to free you from sin, to cleanse you of all your sins, and empower you to walk as he walked. That life of obedience he didn't come to take away. Yahweh didn't take away the law so your sin could be no longer be a sin, he took away your sin and cleansed you of all your sin. so that you would not be held guilty for having broken the law, on the condition that you repent and turn toward righteousness and away from unrighteousness, and begin your journey, of developing new habits of obedience. Romans chapter 2 teaches us, that unless you repent there is no salvation, period. Now a lot of mainstream believers believe that, yeah you should repent. But the question is what are you repenting of? Do you have to repent of feast breaking, Sabbath breaking? Do you have to repent of those? By and large, most churches today do not teach that you need to observe this thing because of traditions, that they have developed? And so they don't believe that the violation of the Sabbath on the seventh day of the week or the holy days Yahweh has given us, they don't believe that you are sinning by violating those commands to observe them. The way I look at it is man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that precedes from the mouth of Elohim. So let's take a look at the two competing ideas, one is you can disobey the commands, one is you should obey the commands. Let's take a closer look. For in him, that means in Messiah, dwells all the fullness of Elohim bodily and you are complete in him, who is the head of all the principality and power. We don't need other doctrines and ideas and traditions because we are complete in Messiah Yahushua who is the head of all principality and power. The enemy has no power over us. One of the things that was common to pagan religions was the fear of demons. All you are gotta do is go into some third world country where they are you know banging on drums and doing all kinds of things, going to witch doctors because they are scared of the oppression of demons. And they are trying to appease evil spirits that afflict them. The druids were said to be fearful of demons and gave gifts and set them out on October 31st, lest the evil spirit which was said to be roaming about on that night would go to their homes and harm them. And that's the reason why to this day people go out trick or treating on the Halloween observance. Well, Yahushua says, " you don't have to fear any of that". Yahushua is the head of principality and power, no reason to be afraid, he disarmed the enemy and triumphed over the enemy.
And so it says beware, lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and deceit according to the tradition of the man, according to basic principles of the world, not according to Messiah. So, in him, in Messiah, you also were circumcised with the circumcision made without hands [? ], by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Messiah. Now circumcision, is that a tradition of man?
Is that something that's not according to Messiah? He is actually describing how there is a parallel between bodily circumcision and circumcision, of Messiah by putting off the body and the sins of the flesh. It's a biblical principle, we are spiritually circumcised by casting away the sins of the flesh from our bodies, let's call the circumcision of Messiah. And so circumcision would not qualify as a doctrine of man, that's not according to Messiah. There is a physical representing of the spiritual. And so according to the Messiah, we have circumcision picturing Messiah's work. And something that's contrary to Messiah are philosophies or vain deceit and dogmas or traditions, of man.
Bury with him that means bury with Messiah in baptism in which you also were raised with him through faith in the working of Elohim who raised him from the dead. We bury the old man and we are now a new creation, we don't have to be going back to any old ways of trying to get free from our sins. Messiah has put off our bodies from sins of the flesh.' And you being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us which is contrary to us and he has taken out of the way having nailed it to the stauros or cross or stake. Now when we are forgiven for our sins those old traditions, doctrines, and ordinances of man which were against us, are taken out of the way. This word translated ordinances comes from the Greek word "dogmas" or a dogma. A dogma is not a commandment of Yahweh. A dogma is an ordinance of man. And there are ordinances of men or tradition of men being discussed here and those things are against us, they are not for us. They are sinful in that they are sinful in that they are replacing, the commandment of Elohim. Now the word "dogma" means a law civil, ceremonial, they say. Now the word "ceremonial." There is no such word as "ceremonial" in scripture. But they are deriving this term, "ceremonial" by their interpretation of Colossians chapter two. But the word "ceremonial law" is nowhere in the bible, okay? The Friberg Lexicon, I think, is more accurate. It's "as a fixed an authoritative decision or requirement to create a rule, fixed rules or a set rules, law, ordinance. Now the examples that are used where we have this word "dogma", can be found... Oh, here is another Lexicon LS Greek Lexicon, "that which seems to want an opinion a dogma, a public decree, and ordinance". Now the word "nomos," is the word that's translated law in reference to the law of Yahweh. The word dogma is never used to describe the law of Yahweh, it's used to describe opinions and judgments and decrees of man. Examples: Luke chapter 2 verse 1, it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. The word translates "decree" is the word dogma. Did he say some kind of Yahweh authority? No, he said a decision or a commandment of man.
Acts 17: 7 Jason has harbored them and these are all acting contrary to the decrees o Caesar. And it's the word dogma once again. Saying that there is another king Yahushua. Now, Acts 16, it says "as they went through the city", verse 4. "They delivered to them the decrees to keep, which were determined by the apostles and elders at Jerusalem. Now the word decree is once again this is a commandant of man because it was determined by apostles and elders at Jerusalem. It was a diction that they had made in Acts 15 . However, yes, it was a decree that was in agreement with Yahweh's decisions; in other words, the decision that they made was in agreement with Yahweh's decision. It was still a dogma because it was something that the apostles themselves had come together and made a judge met and gave an opinion. Yes, that opinion was influenced by the Holy Spirit, but it was dogma or a decree none the less.
All right, now there are other decrees and dogmas and things that are not according to the law of Yahweh, that are contrary to the law of Yahweh, and it is the ordinances that are the contrary to the law of Yahweh and contrary to Messiah, that are singul. But we are talking about earlier, we have a contrast we got commandments of man, we got commandments of Yahweh, commandments of man that seek to pull you away from the commandments of Yahweh, are the ones that are sinful, or commandments of man that you try to treat like it really is, a commandment of Yahweh and it's not anything that He ever inspired. That is also a sin. But, if I made a decision, on something and that decision was biblical then that would be not a sinful ordinance, right? Okay. So we have to make this distinction and what he is actually talking about here are traditions of man, Colossians 2, verse 8 traditions of man that are not according to the Messiah and those ordinances, are a sin, and therefore, sinful ordinances would be among the many different sins that would have been laid upon, Yahushua the Messiah as predicted in Isaiah 53:6, all we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way and Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all. And in 2 Corinthians 5:21, he made him who knew no sin to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of Elohim, in him. And so, Yahushua became sin for us, or all of our sins was laid on him so that we might have his righteousness laid on us. All right and that would be sinful ordinances of man, and the many another sin, that man may commit adulteries, thefts, fornications what have you. But the ordinances are things that he is specifically zeroing in on here in Colossians 2. And so you being dead in your trespasses, and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of dogmas, ordinances of man, which was against us, which is contrary to us, he has taken out of the way, having nailed it to the cross or the stake.
And so it is his... it is our sin that he took out of the way, right? He didn't take the law out the way, he took sin out of the way, the law did not need to be taken out of the way, our sin needed to be taken out of the way. And that's why he's saying handwriting of dogmas, sinful philosophies and traditions of man, are taken out of the way. Yahushua is the head of all principality and power, he put off your body, to sins of the flesh, by his circumcision. And he has made you alive forgiving you of all those sinful things, and including yielding yourself, to sinful ordinances of man that are not according to the Messiah. He has taken all those things out of the way, and they are nailed to the tree because Yahushua himself was nailed to the tree and if he was nailed to the tree and our sins were laid on him, then our sins were nailed to the tree, right? I'm gonna repeat myself one more time; if Yahushua was nailed to the tree, the cross, the stake, however, you want to say it. And our sin was laid on him, these trespasses were laid on him; one of those sins would have been yielding ourselves to the ideas of man, rather than the commitments of Yahweh. Isn't that pretty much what every sin really is? You deciding to your own way, you decide to follow your own ordinances, your own commandments, your own precepts, your own ideas of how you're going to live your life. And not yielding yourself to the way Yahweh says to live life. That's really what all sin really is., following your own ways, your own paths, your own ideas, your own personal little set of ordinances that you wanna follow your own standard of righteousness while ignoring Yahweh standard of righteousness. hat's what all sin really is and particularly the philosophies and vain deceit spoken of in verse 8 which were according to the traditions of man would be among the sins that were nailed to the tree, "the stauros". The sins were taken out of the way, I again Yahweh did not need to take his law out of the way so that you would no longer be a sinner. No, his law stands. What he did was, he took your sin out of the way, so that even though you violated that law, he can still look at you because of Yahushua who bore that sin on the tree, allowing his righteousness to be placed on you and your sin to be placed on him. And so the law of Yahweh did not need to be nailed to the tree, it was not something that needed to be condemned, it was the laws of man that needed to be condemned. It was man going his own way that needed to be condemned. So he is not talking about nailing the Sabbath or the feats days to the tree. It's impossible. I mean think about this for a moment, If he really did that, you're going to have a real problem because if that's all been nailed to the tree that means you're not going to have to keep those commandments anymore and no one ever again will ever have to keep those commandments ever again. ow, if that is really true, if that's really what Yahweh his plan is you got real problem when we come across verses like this one here in ... Just a minute... Isaiah 66 says for as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me says Yahweh, so shall your decedents and your name remain. It shall come to pass that from one new moon to another and one Sabbath to another all flesh will come and worship before me says, Yahweh. All flesh will come and worship before me and now wait a minute, wasn't that nailed to the cross? I mean if that all been nailed to the cross that means this is history man its toasts and here we are new moon, Sabbath, This was all futuristic.
This has never been fulfilled as a prophecy, we're still waiting on this to be fulfilled. If he nailed the Sabbath and the new moon, the tree then why is it alive and well here in a future day? You see their philosophies and their vain deceit falls apart. And then, as far as the feast days are concerned, all you gotta do is look at Zachariah chapter 14. And it says by the same notion, let me put this up on the screen here. It says, " It shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came up against Jerusalem, shall go up from year to year to worship the King Yahweh of hosts and to keep the feast of tabernacle. I thought that was all nailed to the cross. No, it wasn't, it was man's laws, his law, man's ideas his thoughts that was nailed to the cross or the stake. I hope you see what I'm saying here.
Their philosophy their idea, their own idea, their own way of understanding Colossians is wrong, quite simply. It's just wrong, Verse 15, having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. He had disarmed the enemy. Who is the one who is teaching man to go their own way? It is the enemy who is teaching men to do their own thing, or ultimately to do the thing that Yahweh did not inspire but the enemy himself DID inspire. All right. And made a public spectacle of them triumphing over the enemy. He defeated the enemy. And so we don't have to listen to what the enemy teaches us through man and their philosophies and their vain deceit or otherwise. So continuing; so let no one judge you in food or in drink or regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come, but the body ... This translation says " is of messiah" or substances of Messiah, other translations have, okay. Now pay very, very close attention to what's being said here. First of all these things feast days, new moons, food and drink talking about, clean or unclean whether eat pork or not eat pork, all right. It says these things are a shadow of things to come, are not were but are. Now if they are that means the new moon, the feast days, the food and drink, if these things, these principles are as in Paul's day when he is writing to the Colossians that they are a shadow of things to come. That means they are not nailed to the tree. They are alive and well, they are alive and well. They are not nailed to anything they are alive and well. And so, today he is saying, these things right now, today, people of Coloss, listen, these things today, these feast days we are keeping, the new moon days were are keeping and the food and the drink and the festivals and all these things. These today are a shadow of things to come.
When we just read about that, it shall come to pass that one who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King Yahweh of hosts and to keep the feast of tabernacles. See he didn't make this up on his own, it wasn't his own idea he was coming up with here. He got it right out of the pages of scripture. We are all gonna be keeping these one day. One new moon to another, one Sabbath to another, Yup. What we are doing now is just for shadowing what we're hoping to do in the future. He wasn't making it up. So, these are today, a shadow of things coming. HalleluYah, we will be looking forward to it, I mean everybody, every nation will keep the new moons, feast days, Sabbaths, everybody. And these are a shadow of things to come. All right. So what's going on here with this phrase, "body is of Messiah? What's going on there? Well, let's looks at some other translations the New King James has, "which are a shadow of things to come. But the substance is of Messiah." The New American Standards version. Oh, yeah this super literal translation, right? I don't believe it is, "these things which are a mere shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Messiah". okay, New International Version, the butcher this one completely," these are a shadow of the things that were to come". To add the little " were" thing even though where there is nowhere in the text. "The reality, however, is found in Messiah". Reality? They are not being honest with the text. The word translated " substance ".
The King James folks had it right, I mean they had it correct. The word translated "body" or "substance," this simply means "the body" Okay. And every single time this Greek word is used in the
King James and other translations, they translate it " body". But not there, not Colossians 2:17, nope,
they gotta change it, they gotta translate it substance or reality. There is only one place where the King James does
not translate that word " body", only in one place and that's here, Revelation 18: 13 where they translate this word bodies and souls of man, you know, the King James in that particular translation, they translated as "slaves and soul of man." But, it's still a body and soul, I mean they translated slave. I don't know why they did that, but bodies and souls of man. All right. So, the word obviously means body. 145 out of 146 times the word is used, its translated body. Only this one place in the King James Version did it translates slave. It still means body, okay. So the word, I mean there is no question whatsoever the word means body. And so why are they going over here and substance, reality, why are they doing this? It's because they don't understand the text, they don't. And they are trying to put their philosophies and vain deceit and deceptions and ideas into a text to try and understand whats being said, all right. But here is what it's really saying. First of all, I want you know notice when we go back here and the King James Version the word " is " happens to be in italics, the word is happens to be in italics. What does that mean? It means that word is nowhere in the Greek, they added it. The translators acknowledged they added that particular word to the translation, okay. And just like her in NIS they admit they add the word " near" there, but then they ignore the fact that they added this word "belongs." So anyone who tells me the NIS is the most literal translation I would beg to differ with that. Now the New International Version, they add all kinds of stuff. And you never what they're gonna add or what they are going to ignore, what they are going to add. Okay. But the word absolutely means body, okay either like a body of Messiah or a physical body, okay. So what this word mean? If we take out the word "is", take it out. He is saying " so that no one judge in food, drink, festivals, new moons, Sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come but the body of messiah". In other words, do not let the world judge you in these matters. Only allow the body of Messiah to judge you in these matters. Let no one judge you in food and drink, regarding a festival, new moon or Sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come, but the body of Messiah. We alone are worthy to judge such matters. Now some say "we are not supposed to judge each other," no that's wrong, that's wrong, you shouldn't judge each other. Wrong, 1 Corinthians 5:12 says, for what have I to do with judging those who are on the outside? Do you not judge those who are in side? Talking about those who are in the body. We are permitted to judge those...outside Elohim judges. Now we judge those who are in the body. We are not judging them in the sense of condemning we are judging them in the sense of making a proper judgment as to what's right and what's wrong in particular circumstances. And so we aren't permitted to judge whether we are each other are living the way the Messiah taught us to leave or not. but those who are on the outside we let Yahweh judge them and decide whether or not they are going to live or die or go to hell or whatever. That's Yahweh's job to take care of that. All right. So, looking here at the text again, it's not saying "don't let anyone judge you for not keeping them," he is saying "don't let anyone judge you for keeping them". Huge, huge, colossal difference. Ironically, the colossal difference, right. So don't let anyone cheat you through philosophy and through deceit according to the tradition of man according to basic principles of the world, not according to Messiah. These festivals, I want to tell you right now, they are all about Yahushua, they are all about him, the Passover represents his death when we partake of the lamb, we are partaking of the Passover, partaking of the communion, you are partaking of the Passover lamb. Just as Israel was commanded to partake of the Passover lamb and when you are unleavened as a result of Messiah's body being a part of you now and his blood cleansing you of all sin, you're unleavened. Feast of unleavened bread, 76 days representing 7000 years of man on the earth who are in need of Messiah's cleansing. Feast of Pentecost. The time when the law of Yahweh was given in Exodus, also the time when the Holy Spirit was given in the book of Acts. he feast of trumpets is, a feast that has never been fulfilled in the sense of Yahushua you know, fulfilling that picture of what it's all about. Heralding the Messiah's return.
The day of atonement, the day will come when we are gonna access to the holy of holy's and we will enter the temple of Yahweh in heaven and it's the Messiahs blood that will enable us to approach the holy place. The feast of Tabernacles representing 7000 years of man being on the earth in the earthly tabernacle but will dwell with Yahweh in the heavenly tabernacle one day during that last great day. There is many beautiful things and I don't have the time to go over them. But these feast days are all about Yahushua and so when verse 8 tells us to avoid things that are not according to the Messiah that cannot be feasts, they are all about Messiah. Even the Sabbath is all about Messiah because he is the one that causes us to enter into an eternal rest during that last 1000 years. The 1000 year reign of Messiah on the earth, it will be the 7th day, the 7000th year and then we will rest with him and we will reign with him. So, you know these feasts, they are all about Yahushua, they are not contrary to him, they are not against him unlike what people may think, they are displaying him, they are glorifying him,
And people get so caught up and they wanna keep Christmas and Easter because it pictures the time that Messiah came and was born and when he was resurrected. The feats days already have, his resurrection day is the day of first fruits. And he never said anywhere in the Bible, " commemorate my birthday", he said to commemorate the day of his death; that's Passover and the giving of the Holy Spirit; that's Pentecost and the giving of the law that's Pentecost. And so these air actual holidays that Yahweh himself invented to commemorate certain events that the scriptures you know talk about happening. The Messiah coming, dying for us, resurrecting, giving of the holy spirit, he returns, he cleanses the holy place in heaven so that we could enter in and the sins...that we would defile it otherwise. We would defile the holy place otherwise, but because his blood is covering the whole place, his life we are able to enter the holy place, his life we are able to enter the holy of holies. We are able to dwell with him forever and tabernacle with him forever. I mean there is already good things that Yahweh commanded and the feast days that commemorate important biblical events. What do you need this Christmas for? What do you need Easter for? Those are all pagan rooted holidays and here is holidays that Yahweh himself invented, to commemorate biblical events that are according to the Messiah, that have nothing to do with the world. Unlike Christmas and Easter which if you study the roots of those holidays, are all rooted in worldly holidays., worldly traditions that really were never according to Messiah. So, continuing on here another possible
translation I have heard recently I have not fully investigated it to find out whether it's true. but I'm gonna throw it out there, it says, verse 17 let no one judge you in food or drink regarding a festival a new moon or Sabbath which are a shadow of things to come. This word, " and ', and the body of Messiah.
So it could be a shadow of things coming, it could be a shadow of the body of the Messiah. Now, the reason I say "and" is because this Greek word [inaudible 01:15:29.22] is a very subjective way of translating it depending on context. It's translated," but". 1237 times it's translated, " and". And so if you put " and " in the picture here that's another way of translating it. Personally, I'm not sure which one it is. But either one will work with under the framework that the festivals and stuff are presently something we are supposed to be observing and don't let anyone judge you for not observing them. So, all right. So, continuing on here, let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility
and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind and not holding fast to the head , that's the Messiah continuing the theme from verse 8 where it says, not according to Messiah the traditions of man from whom all the body, there is the same word, "soma" in the New International Version, in the New American Standard Version and every other version they translate that word, body". In verse 19 which is only a few verses away, from the place where they refuse to translate the word, "body", they willingly translate it body here nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments grows with the increases from Elohim. What's he contrasting here? He is contrasting traditions of man, worship of angels, false humility to the things that are of Messiah. That's what he is contrasting. and so what are the ordinances of man that are stuff you are not supposed to be looking into, worship of angels would be one of them. Where in the bible does it ever say, "hey, go and worship the angels, hey you can have false humility that's okay"? Nowhere. So verse 20 through 21, therefore if you die with Messiah from the basic principles of the world, why is the living in the world do you subject yourselves to dogmatisal, that's how it says in the Greek? Dogmatisal, do not touch, do not taste, do not handle. Now there were a set of practices in ancient times where they, you know avoided certain things through trying to avoid anything that would be any food or anything like that, the set of practices are, you know, referenced to denying the flesh, okay. And these were not things that were commanded in scripture, all right? Having wiped out of the handwriting of requirements, the word requirements is a New King James Version of "dogma" or "ordinances" in the King James. But these two words this is "dogma" and this is "dogmatisal". And so the commandments and ordinances of man would be; false humility, worship of angels not touching, tasting and handling different things that Yahweh never even governed, and said you can't touch, taste and handle you see the Jews also come up with their own list of things you couldn't touch taste and handle, things that were not like when Yahushua tried to eat with unwashed hands , you know and Yahushua said that they do many other things like that where they add all kinds of things to Yahweh's commandments that are never commanded. He said, " in vain you worship me, teaching for doctrines and commandments of man". And so, those are that kinds of things that he is speaking of here. He is not speaking of, you know, do not eat pork and things like that because he is contrasting the things of the world with the things of Messiah. Things of Messiah are things that are according to him, that picture him, that glorify him, that lift him up and show the world that he is worthy and he is the one through whom we receive salvation. And so the dogmas are not commandments of Yahweh. They are decrees and commandments of man. And that's consistent a, in fact, verse 22 says, "which all concerning things which perish with the using, according to the commandments and doctrines of man." And, so, he is contrasting all the commandments and doctrines of man with the things that are of Messiah, the commandments, and doctrines of Messiah. The feast days, the Sabbath, the new moons, those are commandments and doctrines of Yahweh and then there is alternative doctrines. False humility, neglect of the body. The Essenes, for instance, taught you know if you experienced any pleasurable food, that was wrong, that was a sin. The Greeks also had these kinds of practices. It says these are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh. And so again, it's a contrast, the whole from verse 8 all the way down is a contrast between the things of Yahweh and the things of the world, the commandments and doctrines of man. So what do we have? The colossal contrast here, according to the Messiah, you got circumcision picturing Messiah's work, the separation of the clean and the unclean, the Sabbath, the feast days and new moons. Those are all things that Yahushua himself gave us in the book of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Things that are contrary to the Messiah are philosophies, vain deceit, and these other things; worshipping angels, don't touch taste and handle false humility and neglecting the body. But the other things are according to Messiah. Circumcision is picturing Yahushua and his work, and so everything, the things of Yahweh are going to represent and picture our savior, the things of the world are not. All right, if then you were raised with Messiah, seek those things which are above. Where Messiah is sitting at the right hand of Elohim, set your mind on things above not on things on the earth. For you died and your life is hidden with Messiah and Elohim. And so in conclusion, Paul is saying, we should beware lest any man spoils us through false commandments, philosophy, and doctrines of man. Because Yahushua took them out of the way, nailed them to the tree, along with all the other sins that we have commanded. Thereby forgiving us for having accepted doctrines and principles to live by that are contrary to his word. And because of that, we should let no one judge is for keeping the commandments of Yahweh. Unless they are part of the body of the Messiah and judging us in terms of how we keep him, perhaps we are keeping them the wrong way, and things of that nature. And so therefore we should hold fast to the head of the body, namely Yahushua, from whom we are nourished and again we should refuse to subject ourselves to pagan ordinances because even though they may have an appearance of wisdom, they are of no value and so we should set our minds on things above, not on the things of this world. And so don't let anyone judge us for keeping these feast days and these holidays, the Sabbath, the clean and the unclean because the rewards from Yahweh are not in being disobedient, they are being obedient. And so let's be wise, and not subject ourselves to the alternative ways, alternatives, pagan holidays instead of Yahweh's holidays. And let's walk in the law of Yahweh, blessed are the undefiled in the way that walks in the law of Yahweh. Blessed are those who keep his testimonies who seek with the whole heart. I do not believe these verse s are lies, it's the doctrines of man that are lies. Therefore, let's seek Yahweh, he says if you will seek me and find me , you will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart.
Let's truly seek to live by every word that precedes out of the mouth of Yahweh, not gauging ourselves by what other people do by what messiah has done. That's how we should compare ourselves, we know Yahushua himself kept the festival, we know that we are told to walk as he walked.
And be doers of the word, rejecting vain philosophies of man, holding fast to the head of the body, the Messiah Yahushua who is the same yesterday, today and forever. And he is the same yesterday, today and forever, he who dwells in us wants to do in us what he did yesterday, that we might do them today. And as we saw in Isaiah and Zachariah we will do forever and that includes the keeping of the Sabbath and the feast days. For which when we do that that we ultimately demonstrate our savior's life to the whole world. Let us pray; Oh thank you, Yahweh, for your wonderful
word, thank you for clarity, thank you, Father, for revealing to us the things that you have revealed to us. Father, we are not worthy of the least of the mercy and truth that you have shown us. Father, yet we know that you love us, you value us and you looked upon us with mercy and grace and revealed to us the truth for that we thank you. We pray for our brethren who may be very, very
sincere and yet they misunderstand the second chapter of Colossians. And so I just pray for father that you would open up the eyes of many, if you are willing to use, to study, to open up the eyes of others. I pray That you will use it, father use it however you decide to use it, all for the praise of your glory, all for the revelation of the truth. That we might walk a perfect walk and live the Yahushua truly showed us, to live.
And in Yahushua's great name we praise you and we thank you for your word. For truly yours is the kingdom and power and glory forever and ever, in Yahushua's name, amein.
We'll get to that in a minute, but other translations Colossians 2:14 are going to say, you know "charge of legal indebtedness", and all kinds of... A wide variety of you know translations and attempts to, for the translators to figure out what's going on here. And, so let's take examination here, and try to understand what is really happening in full context, all right. So, let's start first of all with a text in the book of Acts, in chapter 18 it says, "when they ask him", this talking about Paul, "to stay a longer time with them he did not consent, he took leave of them saying, 'I must, by all means, keep this coming feast in Jerusalem, but I will return again to you Elohim willing', and he sailed from Ephesus. And so here is an example of Paul himself observing
the feast days. Now, some people today, if they see you keeping the feast days, they may assume that you have rejected the Messiah.
And others will say, "well, yeah Paul was keeping the feast, you know, he was Jewish. But, you know he was just trying reach out you know to his Jewish brothers and so he just thought he you know would go ahead and keep the feast and kind of hang out with them not like he really needed to or anything. And then the Acts 25 says verse 7, then when he had come, the Jews, who had come down from Jerusalem stood about and laid many serious complaints against Paul, which they could not prove. Well, he answered for himself," Neither against the law of the Jews, nor against the temple, nor against Caesar have I offended anything at all". And so he observed the law of the Jews which is commonly known as the Torah, and he was careful to do that. And they could not find any fault against him because he did believe in keeping the Torah, the law of Yahweh. And so a lot of people say, "Well, he is just doing that to please the Jews, you know if he stopped keeping Torah, he could never reach out to his country man". ow, think about this for a moment, wouldn't he be going against his own advice? Because he would tell people you know, "don't let other people influence you and to get circumcised", and things like that. If he's right he's trying to appease the Jews wouldn't he be acting deceitfully? Because once the Jews find out the Messiah had abolished the law... It would be like Jacob woke up and you know he thought he was married to Rachel but there was Leah. I mean they would be like "wait a minute! You're saying to me that he did away with the law, the Torah??" So Paul would have been acting deceitfully if he would be just pretending if he was only keeping the law out of, you know to be a man pleaser. And so deceit and lies should not be a characteristic of any true believer in Yahweh. Deceit and trickery, is actually a characteristic of the enemy. And in fact, in this very chapter of Colossians chapter 2, Paul warns the people in Coloss to beware of deceitful man, who are trying to pull you into traditions. In verse 8, he says "be aware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of man, according to the basic principles of the world and not according to Messiah". Now if Paul was only keeping the feast to appease the Jews then all of a sudden, he is trying to act deceitfully.
In such a way, to say, "Well you know you don't really have to keep these feasts and yet,
he's out there keeping them. And so he was actually, if that was the case, following ideas that were not sanctioned by Yahweh by keeping feasts but then acting deceitfully.
So I don't believe he was keeping feasts just to appease the Jews that would be deception. The truth is the Jews found out that Yahushua had abolished any part of the law; they would have actually been required by the law itself, by Yahweh himself to reject the Messiah. Isaiah 8:20 says, to the law and to the testimony, If they do not speak according to the word, it's because there is no light in them ". And so by the scriptures, if Paul had taught that we are free to disobey the law of Yahweh there would be no light in Pauls' words. Now that's what Isaiah, said.
And so if Paul came along with Jewish people the laws is done away with, they would say "Nah, that's not according to law and testimony, there's no light in that". In fact, Deuteronomy 13 verses 1 through 2 says, if there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams and he gives you a sign or a wonder and the sign or wonder comes to pass of which he spoke to you saying, let's , in this case, be disobedient, go after other gods which you have not known and let's serve them". You should not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for Yahweh your Elohim is testing you, to know whether you love Yahweh your Elohim with all your heart, with all your soul. You shall walk after Yahweh, your Elohim and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice and you shall serve him and hold fast to him. And so they were required in the law of Yahweh, they were required to cleave to the commandments that Yahweh had given; obey his voice. If anybody came along and say "hey let's worship other god or, let's go do something Yahweh", never commanded or let's go disobey our Father in heaven". They were required to reject such a man. You know what? I think every person faced or faces this kind of a test, and that's the danger of tradition. Are we going to follow Yahweh' words, his commandments, obey his voice, and serve him or are we going to follow the traditions of man?
I think every person will face this test; whether we are going to serve man and do what some guy claiming to be a prophet says or whatever even if did a sign or a wonder. We are going to face it says Elohim is testing you to know whether you keep commandments his commandments or not, whether you love him or not, all one and the same. And this is the great danger of tradition is it pulls us away from the scriptures and toward man. Away from Yahweh words and toward man's words. And the apostles faced this test; in Acts chapter
5 verse 28 it says "Did we not strictly command you not to teach in this name? " Saint Hadrian is saying to the apostles. "And look you filled Jerusalem with your doctrine and intend to bring this man's blood on us." But Peter and the other apostles answered said, " We ought to obey Elohim rather than man."
See that's the danger of tradition, it pulls us away from the commandments of Yahweh and toward the doctrine and commandments of man. Mathew 15:9 says, "I vain, they worship me" talking about scribes and Pharisees, "teaching as doctrines the commandments of man". Let me ask you a question; would it be a sin to
invent some kind of commandment of man and say, everybody, needs to follow that?" Absolutely nd what if that kind of man actually offended up transgressing one of Yahweh's commandments. That's even worse. That we're putting man's word ahead of Yahweh word. Yahweh never commanded that we do some of the things that scribes and Pharisees were doing. And he says,"in vain they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of man. When man invents the commandments, now all the attention is on what man says, not what Yahweh says. And that's where the enemy can come in and do his nasty, nasty work. Interestingly, look at Proverbs 30 in verse 4 for a minute. It says, who has ascended into heaven or descended? Who has gathered the wind in his fists? Who has bound the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name and what is his son's name if you know? That's an important question. We know his name is Yahweh his son's name is Yahushua and this is an Old Testament proverb here before Yahushua ever came on the earth. And it's asking the question what's his name and what is his son's name if you know? Now, we know based on study, that man has taken the name of Yahweh, and the name of his son Yahushua out of the scriptures or altered the Messiah's name, in that case. And they have put a title on this place known as "the Lord". And so here's he's asking what his name is and what's his son's name, if you know? And then the very next verse says, every word of Elohim is pure, he has his shield to those who put their trust in him. Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar. And what they have done with their tradition is that they have taken the name of our heavenly father out of the scriptures, because of tradition not because he commanded it. And put in "the lord" instead, or "God" instead.
And now, please pray tell if anybody was to go around and eliminate the name of an author of any book, I mean the author would be pretty upset and other people would be upset too. "Who wrote this? Who wrote this! Who wrote this! Take the name of Yahweh out of his own book, and oh, nobody minds that. Of course, Satan's name, Satan or ha Satan, it's still in the book but not Yahweh's name. This is an example of cleaving to commandments of man. Of adding to the word Elohim and holding fast to
man's traditions instead of Yahweh' word. And so I don't do that, I restore our father's name into the text. I don't want to add to his words, lest I be rebuked and he calls me a liar. And for this reason we have many traditions today, people like tradition, they like their own ways. They like their own ways versus Yahweh's ways. But you see, Yahushua really did not come to abolish the law. He did not come to destroy the law, he came to fulfill it. Now if I said to m daughter, " will you please bring me a glass of water?" And she did it, then she fulfilled my commandment, right? So the Messiah he didn't come to destroy, he came to actually do the commandments and fulfill it. So the setting aside of key elements of Yahweh's law such as the feast days, and setting up sadly alternative holidays invented by man such as Christmas and Easter; are traditions of man
replacing the commandments of Yahweh. Now, there was this prophet of Yahweh who fell into the trap of choosing to disobey Yahweh's command. You know what he paid for it with his life? After Jeroboam became the king of Israel he changed the law of Yahweh, he changed the feast days and instead set up his own feasts days, his own priesthoods and he led Israel into disobedience and into idolatry. Why? Jeroboam said this heart, "now the kingdom may return to house of David if these people go up and to offer to sacrifices in the house of Yahweh in Jerusalem. Then the heart of these people will turn back to their master Rehoboam, king of Judah and they will kill me and go back to Rehoboam king of Judah." He was afraid for political reasons, much like the scribes and Pharisees, they wanted the attention on themselves, they were afraid Yahweh would be their king, maybe not consciously. There are political reasons why they rejected the Messiah, they wanted power. And Jeroboam wants power; he does not want to lose his position of power. Therefore the king asked advice, made two calves of gold and then said to the people "it is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods of Israel who brought you up out of the land of Egypt". And he set up one in Bethel and the other he put in Dan. Two calves of gold, golden calf making a comeback.
Now, this thing became sin for the people went to worship for the one, as far as Dan.
He made shrines on the high places made priests from every class of people who were not the sons of Levi. Jeroboam ordained a feast on the 15th day of the 8th month instead of the 7th month, like the feast that was in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar so he did it in Bethel sacrificing the calves he had made. And in Bethel, he installed priests of the high places which he had made.
So he made offerings on the altar which he made at Bethel on the 15th day of 8th month in the month in which he devised in his own heart and he ordained his feast for the children of Israel and offered sacrifices on the altar and burned incense. ig mistake! Taking away the commandments Yahweh and setting up your own commandments. Yahushua says it all too well, "you reject the commandment of Elohim, that you may keep your tradition". So for political purposes, Jeroboam established an alternative worship system. Israel should've cleaved to what the law of Yahweh told them. They should've refused to obey the commandment that was contrary to the one that Yahweh had ordained.
And I say to you; this has what has also happened today. We have alternative holidays, we have an alternative Thanksgiving feast, we have alternatives.
nd traditions of man are observed rather than Commandments of Elohim. So let's take a look here, what's going on?
First Kings, chapter 13 in verse 1, " Behold a man of Elohim went from Judah to Bethel by the word of Yahweh and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense." So it's the same king, he's hanging out over here by the altar, burning incense himself. "and he cried out against the altar by the word of Yahweh, and says, Oh, alter, alter thus says Yahweh, behold a child, Josiah by name, shall be born to the house of David; and on you he shall sacrifice the priests of the high places who burn incense on you, and men's bones shall be burned on you.'" And he gave a sign the same day, saying, "This is the sign which Yahweh has spoken. Surely the altar shall split apart and the ashes on it shall be poured out". And it came to pass when king Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of the Elohim, who cried out against the altar in Bethel, he stretched out his hand from the altar saying "Arrest him!!" and then his hand which he stretched out toward him withered, so that he could not pull it back to himself. The altar also was split apart and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of Elohim was given by the word of Yahweh. hen the king answered and said to the man of Elohim, " please entreat the favor of Yahweh your Elohim and pray for me that my hand may be restored to me". So the man of Elohim entreated Yahweh and the king's hand was restored to him and became as before. Now you would think Jeroboam would repent, just like you would think, those in the century of Judaism after having seen withered man's hands being restored and miracles being done, that that man would repent and listen to Yahushua. That's not what happened. So the king said to the man of Elohim "come home with me and refresh yourself and I will give you a reward". But the man of Elohim said to the king, "if you were ready to give me half of your house I would not go with you, nor I will eat bread or drink water in this place. For so is commanded to me by the word of Yahweh; ' you shall not eat bread nor shall you drink water nor return by the same way you came'. So he went another way and did not return by the way he came to Bethel. Now Jeroboam never did repent, even though the power of Yahweh that was on the prophet. But then guess what happens? The prophet himself gets tested.
Now an old prophet dwelled in Bethel and his sons came and told him all the works the man of Elohim had done, that day in Bethel. They also told their father the words which he had spoken to the king.
And their father said to them, "which way did he go?" For his sons had seen which way the man of Elohim went who o came from Judah. So he said to his sons, "Saddle the donkey for me." So they saddled the donkey for him and he rode on it and went after the man of Elohim and found him sitting under an oak. And he said to him, " Are you the man of Elohim who came from Judah ?" And he said "I am", then he said to him, "Come home with me and eat bread". and he said, " I cannot return with you nor go in with you neither can I eat bread nor drink water with you in this place for I have been told by the word of Yahweh,' you shall not eat bread nor drink water there nor return by going the way you came''. He said to him," I, too, am a prophet as you are an angel came and spoke to me by the word of Yahweh saying, 'bring him back with you to your house that he may eat bread and drink water". He was lying to him. So he went back with him, ate bread in his house and drank water. Now it happened as they sat at the table that the
word of Yahweh came to prophet who had brought him back and he cried out at the man of Elohim who came from Judah saying, "thus says Yahweh 'because you have disobeyed the word of Yahweh, and not kept the commandment which Yahweh, Elohim commanded you. But you came back ate bread and drank water in the place of which Yahweh said to you, eat no bread drink no water, your corpse shall not come to the tomb of your fathers." So it was after he had eaten bread and after he had drunk water, he saddled the donkey for him, the prophet whom he had brought back when he was on his way a lion met him on the road and killed him.
You see what happens here is, a prophet became a hypocrite in that he was telling others to keep the
word of Yahweh and to not depart from it. And he himself was cleaving to a commandment of man. And so he was guilty of the very thing he was condemning Jeroboam for and not only guilty but guilty within hours perhaps of you know a miracle being done to correct Jeroboam and his erroneous ways of departing from the commandments of Yahweh creating his own traditions of men. So Yahweh allowed Jeroboam to be tested, he allowed Israel to be tested; are they going to go after calves in Dan and Bethel or are they going to go and worship Yahweh in Jerusalem the way commanded the worshipped? He allowed even the prophet who came and condemned Jeroboam's actions to be tested. This Deuteronomy 13 test and everyone was judged.
And let me tell you today, you are being tested, I am being tested, will we keep the commandments of men or keep the commandments of Yahweh because traditional Christianity teaches Messiah has done away with the Torah, commandments to the feast days. And now we have our own man made holidays instead. So when Paul is presented as a man who pretends to observe the law but really teaches that Messiah did away with a law, that's an awful thing to say about him, about that man because he's...You're saying he is being deceptive. And we are not called to use deception but to speak in the share the truth, to be straight forward and up right and clear, in what we believe. Now in Paul's day, there was another kind of deception that was creeping in, it was still based on the commandments and doctrines of man, and he warned them he said: "be aware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy". Philosophy, what's philosophy?
The Greek world and Roman world was filled with these philosophers, who were teaching all kinds of different ideas that were contrary to the way Yahweh himself had commanded. They were according to their tradition of man, according to the basic principles of the world; they were not according to Messiah. And so they were contrary to the Messiah. He says, "Be aware! Look out! Watch out! Be careful! Lest anyone cheat you, deceive you, trick you, into the following tradition of man and not following Messiah." Things that are worldly, according to the basic principle of the world, things that are traditions, they are empty, they have no power and they are deceptive.
Let me tell you something; we have a philosophy today that has been embraced by many. The philosophy says, "The Messiah came to do away with the feast days, do away with the Sabbath day, to do away with Yahweh's own calendar and our need to follow his calendar that's based on traditions of man, not based on the scriptures. I mean think about it? Why would Yahweh create a standard of righteousness that he expects all mankind to follow because he said Exodus 12:49 and other verses, "one law shall be for the Jew and the Gentile, for Israel, and strangers among you", one law. Why would he expect all of the mankind follow this law and then dismantle it later? Not only that but why would he command everyone to keep this law and if you disobey it, you've sinned and you need a savior and then now the savior came and died so that you could be cleansed of all your sin and then free you to disobey the law again. Does that really make any sense? I mean if you really think about it? No, you see on judgment day you are gonna say, "let's see you died in the year 2880 well, Messiah has not died for your sins and you disobeyed the commandment to keep the feats and therefore you're going to hell". And then 5 years later, Yahushua died for your sins, "oh you disobey the feasts? No problem. Enter into the joy of your master". Yeah, 5-year difference, does that make any sense?
I mean it doesn't make any sense to me. I mean it makes much more sense if there's one standard given for everybody for, you know, for all time. Otherwise, we have Yahweh sort of being respected of persons, does not have a double standard.
Or do you not believe Yahushua came here to save us from our sins? What is sin? What's the New Testament definition of sin? "Whoever commits sin transgresses also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law" 1 John 3:4, "Sin is a transgression of the law". Look up this word in your Strong's Lexicon, you'll see it means 'violation of the law'. nd therefore if one were to transgress Yahweh's law which commands us to keep the Sabbath day and the feasts days, we will be sinning, if we choose to disobey those commands. Philosophy of man says, "No, that's not so. You can disobey the commands and it's okay, no sin." Scriptures say, "It is a sin".
Now they start well in that they say, "yeah, we have all sinned if we say we haven't sin we make him a liar and his word is not in us". That's very true. 1 John 1:1,0, "except one, Yahushua, who was without sin, for we do not have a high priest, we cannot sympathize our weaknesses but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without transgression of the law". He never transgressed the law, one time. Now Yahushua came, lived the perfect life knowing
what he would endure, and the prophets for told that he would endure much. But why was that necessary for him to die? Was it so he could do away with the law so that that we don't have to do it anymore? Was it so that we could live a life of disobedience? Is Yahushua no longer concerned about our works? The truth is Yahushua came and died, because we broke the law in the first place, how can now return to the same condition that caused Yahushua's death to begin with? And say, "now we can disobey the law", that doesn't make any sense. To say "we can willfully now disobey the law".
Doesn't make any sense, all right. So Romans chapter 6, verse 1, "what shall we say
then, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?" Shall we continue to transgress the law of Yahweh so that we can all the grace we need? Certainly not, absolutely not, it's the strongest possible objection in the Greek language. How shall we, who died to sin, live any longer in it? How is it even possible to live in transgression of the law? 2 Peter 2:22, as it happened to them according to the true proverb, a dog returns to his own vomit, the sow having washed to her wallowing in the mire.
You know last night we were laying there in bed and me and my wife and I heard the dog at the foot of the bed throwing up and swallowing it, throwing up and swallowing it, that's gross. But that's sort of like really what it's like when you say you we can return to the vomit, we threw up all the sin, the vomit, it exited our mouth. But now we can go and lick it back up and do all the sin we want, like a dog. ut if we love Yahweh, we should want this refrain from sin. We should be pursuing a life that is walking away from sin. Yahushua said, " If you love me, keep my commandments, I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another helper that he may abide by you forever. The spirit of truth in the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him for he dwells with you and will be in you".So if you really love him, keep his commandments. Yahushua's commandments are not limited to Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John, it was through him that Yahweh gave the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, through exodus. Through him, he being the word that became flesh and dwelled among us, his commandments stretch across the ages of time.
There's not distention between Yahweh commandments and Yahushua's commandments as if they are different. They are all the same. And so we are warned in scripture not to follow philosophies and ideas of man that are not according to Messiah and what he tells us to do. Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and through deceit. And ironically they use this very chapter of Colossians 2, to promote their mistaken ideas.
Their mistaken idea is, "Yahweh gave this law he was so, so, harsh. And anybody who disobeyed it were immediately destroyed and stoned. And along came Messiah, kind and friendly gent,
and he kinda calmed Yahweh down a little bit, died for us. And now we can live, you know, be a little lax about our walk if you want to and it's all okay, Yahushua came and died for you. Hey, that's what grace is for, right? It's okay. Once you are saved, that means you're always saved, you made the confession, you got your ticket, you got your get out of hell free card. Just hand it to him at the pearly gates and in you go." That's philosophies and traditions to man, it's not according to the scriptures. Yahushua didn't die so that you could live a life of willful sin; he died to free you from sin, to cleanse you of all your sins, and empower you to walk as he walked. That life of obedience he didn't come to take away. Yahweh didn't take away the law so your sin could be no longer be a sin, he took away your sin and cleansed you of all your sin. so that you would not be held guilty for having broken the law, on the condition that you repent and turn toward righteousness and away from unrighteousness, and begin your journey, of developing new habits of obedience. Romans chapter 2 teaches us, that unless you repent there is no salvation, period. Now a lot of mainstream believers believe that, yeah you should repent. But the question is what are you repenting of? Do you have to repent of feast breaking, Sabbath breaking? Do you have to repent of those? By and large, most churches today do not teach that you need to observe this thing because of traditions, that they have developed? And so they don't believe that the violation of the Sabbath on the seventh day of the week or the holy days Yahweh has given us, they don't believe that you are sinning by violating those commands to observe them. The way I look at it is man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that precedes from the mouth of Elohim. So let's take a look at the two competing ideas, one is you can disobey the commands, one is you should obey the commands. Let's take a closer look. For in him, that means in Messiah, dwells all the fullness of Elohim bodily and you are complete in him, who is the head of all the principality and power. We don't need other doctrines and ideas and traditions because we are complete in Messiah Yahushua who is the head of all principality and power. The enemy has no power over us. One of the things that was common to pagan religions was the fear of demons. All you are gotta do is go into some third world country where they are you know banging on drums and doing all kinds of things, going to witch doctors because they are scared of the oppression of demons. And they are trying to appease evil spirits that afflict them. The druids were said to be fearful of demons and gave gifts and set them out on October 31st, lest the evil spirit which was said to be roaming about on that night would go to their homes and harm them. And that's the reason why to this day people go out trick or treating on the Halloween observance. Well, Yahushua says, " you don't have to fear any of that". Yahushua is the head of principality and power, no reason to be afraid, he disarmed the enemy and triumphed over the enemy.
And so it says beware, lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and deceit according to the tradition of the man, according to basic principles of the world, not according to Messiah. So, in him, in Messiah, you also were circumcised with the circumcision made without hands [? ], by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Messiah. Now circumcision, is that a tradition of man?
Is that something that's not according to Messiah? He is actually describing how there is a parallel between bodily circumcision and circumcision, of Messiah by putting off the body and the sins of the flesh. It's a biblical principle, we are spiritually circumcised by casting away the sins of the flesh from our bodies, let's call the circumcision of Messiah. And so circumcision would not qualify as a doctrine of man, that's not according to Messiah. There is a physical representing of the spiritual. And so according to the Messiah, we have circumcision picturing Messiah's work. And something that's contrary to Messiah are philosophies or vain deceit and dogmas or traditions, of man.
Bury with him that means bury with Messiah in baptism in which you also were raised with him through faith in the working of Elohim who raised him from the dead. We bury the old man and we are now a new creation, we don't have to be going back to any old ways of trying to get free from our sins. Messiah has put off our bodies from sins of the flesh.' And you being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us which is contrary to us and he has taken out of the way having nailed it to the stauros or cross or stake. Now when we are forgiven for our sins those old traditions, doctrines, and ordinances of man which were against us, are taken out of the way. This word translated ordinances comes from the Greek word "dogmas" or a dogma. A dogma is not a commandment of Yahweh. A dogma is an ordinance of man. And there are ordinances of men or tradition of men being discussed here and those things are against us, they are not for us. They are sinful in that they are sinful in that they are replacing, the commandment of Elohim. Now the word "dogma" means a law civil, ceremonial, they say. Now the word "ceremonial." There is no such word as "ceremonial" in scripture. But they are deriving this term, "ceremonial" by their interpretation of Colossians chapter two. But the word "ceremonial law" is nowhere in the bible, okay? The Friberg Lexicon, I think, is more accurate. It's "as a fixed an authoritative decision or requirement to create a rule, fixed rules or a set rules, law, ordinance. Now the examples that are used where we have this word "dogma", can be found... Oh, here is another Lexicon LS Greek Lexicon, "that which seems to want an opinion a dogma, a public decree, and ordinance". Now the word "nomos," is the word that's translated law in reference to the law of Yahweh. The word dogma is never used to describe the law of Yahweh, it's used to describe opinions and judgments and decrees of man. Examples: Luke chapter 2 verse 1, it came to pass in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. The word translates "decree" is the word dogma. Did he say some kind of Yahweh authority? No, he said a decision or a commandment of man.
Acts 17: 7 Jason has harbored them and these are all acting contrary to the decrees o Caesar. And it's the word dogma once again. Saying that there is another king Yahushua. Now, Acts 16, it says "as they went through the city", verse 4. "They delivered to them the decrees to keep, which were determined by the apostles and elders at Jerusalem. Now the word decree is once again this is a commandant of man because it was determined by apostles and elders at Jerusalem. It was a diction that they had made in Acts 15 . However, yes, it was a decree that was in agreement with Yahweh's decisions; in other words, the decision that they made was in agreement with Yahweh's decision. It was still a dogma because it was something that the apostles themselves had come together and made a judge met and gave an opinion. Yes, that opinion was influenced by the Holy Spirit, but it was dogma or a decree none the less.
All right, now there are other decrees and dogmas and things that are not according to the law of Yahweh, that are contrary to the law of Yahweh, and it is the ordinances that are the contrary to the law of Yahweh and contrary to Messiah, that are singul. But we are talking about earlier, we have a contrast we got commandments of man, we got commandments of Yahweh, commandments of man that seek to pull you away from the commandments of Yahweh, are the ones that are sinful, or commandments of man that you try to treat like it really is, a commandment of Yahweh and it's not anything that He ever inspired. That is also a sin. But, if I made a decision, on something and that decision was biblical then that would be not a sinful ordinance, right? Okay. So we have to make this distinction and what he is actually talking about here are traditions of man, Colossians 2, verse 8 traditions of man that are not according to the Messiah and those ordinances, are a sin, and therefore, sinful ordinances would be among the many different sins that would have been laid upon, Yahushua the Messiah as predicted in Isaiah 53:6, all we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way and Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all. And in 2 Corinthians 5:21, he made him who knew no sin to be sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of Elohim, in him. And so, Yahushua became sin for us, or all of our sins was laid on him so that we might have his righteousness laid on us. All right and that would be sinful ordinances of man, and the many another sin, that man may commit adulteries, thefts, fornications what have you. But the ordinances are things that he is specifically zeroing in on here in Colossians 2. And so you being dead in your trespasses, and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of dogmas, ordinances of man, which was against us, which is contrary to us, he has taken out of the way, having nailed it to the cross or the stake.
And so it is his... it is our sin that he took out of the way, right? He didn't take the law out the way, he took sin out of the way, the law did not need to be taken out of the way, our sin needed to be taken out of the way. And that's why he's saying handwriting of dogmas, sinful philosophies and traditions of man, are taken out of the way. Yahushua is the head of all principality and power, he put off your body, to sins of the flesh, by his circumcision. And he has made you alive forgiving you of all those sinful things, and including yielding yourself, to sinful ordinances of man that are not according to the Messiah. He has taken all those things out of the way, and they are nailed to the tree because Yahushua himself was nailed to the tree and if he was nailed to the tree and our sins were laid on him, then our sins were nailed to the tree, right? I'm gonna repeat myself one more time; if Yahushua was nailed to the tree, the cross, the stake, however, you want to say it. And our sin was laid on him, these trespasses were laid on him; one of those sins would have been yielding ourselves to the ideas of man, rather than the commitments of Yahweh. Isn't that pretty much what every sin really is? You deciding to your own way, you decide to follow your own ordinances, your own commandments, your own precepts, your own ideas of how you're going to live your life. And not yielding yourself to the way Yahweh says to live life. That's really what all sin really is., following your own ways, your own paths, your own ideas, your own personal little set of ordinances that you wanna follow your own standard of righteousness while ignoring Yahweh standard of righteousness. hat's what all sin really is and particularly the philosophies and vain deceit spoken of in verse 8 which were according to the traditions of man would be among the sins that were nailed to the tree, "the stauros". The sins were taken out of the way, I again Yahweh did not need to take his law out of the way so that you would no longer be a sinner. No, his law stands. What he did was, he took your sin out of the way, so that even though you violated that law, he can still look at you because of Yahushua who bore that sin on the tree, allowing his righteousness to be placed on you and your sin to be placed on him. And so the law of Yahweh did not need to be nailed to the tree, it was not something that needed to be condemned, it was the laws of man that needed to be condemned. It was man going his own way that needed to be condemned. So he is not talking about nailing the Sabbath or the feats days to the tree. It's impossible. I mean think about this for a moment, If he really did that, you're going to have a real problem because if that's all been nailed to the tree that means you're not going to have to keep those commandments anymore and no one ever again will ever have to keep those commandments ever again. ow, if that is really true, if that's really what Yahweh his plan is you got real problem when we come across verses like this one here in ... Just a minute... Isaiah 66 says for as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me says Yahweh, so shall your decedents and your name remain. It shall come to pass that from one new moon to another and one Sabbath to another all flesh will come and worship before me says, Yahweh. All flesh will come and worship before me and now wait a minute, wasn't that nailed to the cross? I mean if that all been nailed to the cross that means this is history man its toasts and here we are new moon, Sabbath, This was all futuristic.
This has never been fulfilled as a prophecy, we're still waiting on this to be fulfilled. If he nailed the Sabbath and the new moon, the tree then why is it alive and well here in a future day? You see their philosophies and their vain deceit falls apart. And then, as far as the feast days are concerned, all you gotta do is look at Zachariah chapter 14. And it says by the same notion, let me put this up on the screen here. It says, " It shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came up against Jerusalem, shall go up from year to year to worship the King Yahweh of hosts and to keep the feast of tabernacle. I thought that was all nailed to the cross. No, it wasn't, it was man's laws, his law, man's ideas his thoughts that was nailed to the cross or the stake. I hope you see what I'm saying here.
Their philosophy their idea, their own idea, their own way of understanding Colossians is wrong, quite simply. It's just wrong, Verse 15, having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. He had disarmed the enemy. Who is the one who is teaching man to go their own way? It is the enemy who is teaching men to do their own thing, or ultimately to do the thing that Yahweh did not inspire but the enemy himself DID inspire. All right. And made a public spectacle of them triumphing over the enemy. He defeated the enemy. And so we don't have to listen to what the enemy teaches us through man and their philosophies and their vain deceit or otherwise. So continuing; so let no one judge you in food or in drink or regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come, but the body ... This translation says " is of messiah" or substances of Messiah, other translations have, okay. Now pay very, very close attention to what's being said here. First of all these things feast days, new moons, food and drink talking about, clean or unclean whether eat pork or not eat pork, all right. It says these things are a shadow of things to come, are not were but are. Now if they are that means the new moon, the feast days, the food and drink, if these things, these principles are as in Paul's day when he is writing to the Colossians that they are a shadow of things to come. That means they are not nailed to the tree. They are alive and well, they are alive and well. They are not nailed to anything they are alive and well. And so, today he is saying, these things right now, today, people of Coloss, listen, these things today, these feast days we are keeping, the new moon days were are keeping and the food and the drink and the festivals and all these things. These today are a shadow of things to come.
When we just read about that, it shall come to pass that one who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King Yahweh of hosts and to keep the feast of tabernacles. See he didn't make this up on his own, it wasn't his own idea he was coming up with here. He got it right out of the pages of scripture. We are all gonna be keeping these one day. One new moon to another, one Sabbath to another, Yup. What we are doing now is just for shadowing what we're hoping to do in the future. He wasn't making it up. So, these are today, a shadow of things coming. HalleluYah, we will be looking forward to it, I mean everybody, every nation will keep the new moons, feast days, Sabbaths, everybody. And these are a shadow of things to come. All right. So what's going on here with this phrase, "body is of Messiah? What's going on there? Well, let's looks at some other translations the New King James has, "which are a shadow of things to come. But the substance is of Messiah." The New American Standards version. Oh, yeah this super literal translation, right? I don't believe it is, "these things which are a mere shadow of what is to come, but the substance belongs to Messiah". okay, New International Version, the butcher this one completely," these are a shadow of the things that were to come". To add the little " were" thing even though where there is nowhere in the text. "The reality, however, is found in Messiah". Reality? They are not being honest with the text. The word translated " substance ".
The King James folks had it right, I mean they had it correct. The word translated "body" or "substance," this simply means "the body" Okay. And every single time this Greek word is used in the
King James and other translations, they translate it " body". But not there, not Colossians 2:17, nope,
they gotta change it, they gotta translate it substance or reality. There is only one place where the King James does
not translate that word " body", only in one place and that's here, Revelation 18: 13 where they translate this word bodies and souls of man, you know, the King James in that particular translation, they translated as "slaves and soul of man." But, it's still a body and soul, I mean they translated slave. I don't know why they did that, but bodies and souls of man. All right. So, the word obviously means body. 145 out of 146 times the word is used, its translated body. Only this one place in the King James Version did it translates slave. It still means body, okay. So the word, I mean there is no question whatsoever the word means body. And so why are they going over here and substance, reality, why are they doing this? It's because they don't understand the text, they don't. And they are trying to put their philosophies and vain deceit and deceptions and ideas into a text to try and understand whats being said, all right. But here is what it's really saying. First of all, I want you know notice when we go back here and the King James Version the word " is " happens to be in italics, the word is happens to be in italics. What does that mean? It means that word is nowhere in the Greek, they added it. The translators acknowledged they added that particular word to the translation, okay. And just like her in NIS they admit they add the word " near" there, but then they ignore the fact that they added this word "belongs." So anyone who tells me the NIS is the most literal translation I would beg to differ with that. Now the New International Version, they add all kinds of stuff. And you never what they're gonna add or what they are going to ignore, what they are going to add. Okay. But the word absolutely means body, okay either like a body of Messiah or a physical body, okay. So what this word mean? If we take out the word "is", take it out. He is saying " so that no one judge in food, drink, festivals, new moons, Sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come but the body of messiah". In other words, do not let the world judge you in these matters. Only allow the body of Messiah to judge you in these matters. Let no one judge you in food and drink, regarding a festival, new moon or Sabbaths which are a shadow of things to come, but the body of Messiah. We alone are worthy to judge such matters. Now some say "we are not supposed to judge each other," no that's wrong, that's wrong, you shouldn't judge each other. Wrong, 1 Corinthians 5:12 says, for what have I to do with judging those who are on the outside? Do you not judge those who are in side? Talking about those who are in the body. We are permitted to judge those...outside Elohim judges. Now we judge those who are in the body. We are not judging them in the sense of condemning we are judging them in the sense of making a proper judgment as to what's right and what's wrong in particular circumstances. And so we aren't permitted to judge whether we are each other are living the way the Messiah taught us to leave or not. but those who are on the outside we let Yahweh judge them and decide whether or not they are going to live or die or go to hell or whatever. That's Yahweh's job to take care of that. All right. So, looking here at the text again, it's not saying "don't let anyone judge you for not keeping them," he is saying "don't let anyone judge you for keeping them". Huge, huge, colossal difference. Ironically, the colossal difference, right. So don't let anyone cheat you through philosophy and through deceit according to the tradition of man according to basic principles of the world, not according to Messiah. These festivals, I want to tell you right now, they are all about Yahushua, they are all about him, the Passover represents his death when we partake of the lamb, we are partaking of the Passover, partaking of the communion, you are partaking of the Passover lamb. Just as Israel was commanded to partake of the Passover lamb and when you are unleavened as a result of Messiah's body being a part of you now and his blood cleansing you of all sin, you're unleavened. Feast of unleavened bread, 76 days representing 7000 years of man on the earth who are in need of Messiah's cleansing. Feast of Pentecost. The time when the law of Yahweh was given in Exodus, also the time when the Holy Spirit was given in the book of Acts. he feast of trumpets is, a feast that has never been fulfilled in the sense of Yahushua you know, fulfilling that picture of what it's all about. Heralding the Messiah's return.
The day of atonement, the day will come when we are gonna access to the holy of holy's and we will enter the temple of Yahweh in heaven and it's the Messiahs blood that will enable us to approach the holy place. The feast of Tabernacles representing 7000 years of man being on the earth in the earthly tabernacle but will dwell with Yahweh in the heavenly tabernacle one day during that last great day. There is many beautiful things and I don't have the time to go over them. But these feast days are all about Yahushua and so when verse 8 tells us to avoid things that are not according to the Messiah that cannot be feasts, they are all about Messiah. Even the Sabbath is all about Messiah because he is the one that causes us to enter into an eternal rest during that last 1000 years. The 1000 year reign of Messiah on the earth, it will be the 7th day, the 7000th year and then we will rest with him and we will reign with him. So, you know these feasts, they are all about Yahushua, they are not contrary to him, they are not against him unlike what people may think, they are displaying him, they are glorifying him,
And people get so caught up and they wanna keep Christmas and Easter because it pictures the time that Messiah came and was born and when he was resurrected. The feats days already have, his resurrection day is the day of first fruits. And he never said anywhere in the Bible, " commemorate my birthday", he said to commemorate the day of his death; that's Passover and the giving of the Holy Spirit; that's Pentecost and the giving of the law that's Pentecost. And so these air actual holidays that Yahweh himself invented to commemorate certain events that the scriptures you know talk about happening. The Messiah coming, dying for us, resurrecting, giving of the holy spirit, he returns, he cleanses the holy place in heaven so that we could enter in and the sins...that we would defile it otherwise. We would defile the holy place otherwise, but because his blood is covering the whole place, his life we are able to enter the holy place, his life we are able to enter the holy of holies. We are able to dwell with him forever and tabernacle with him forever. I mean there is already good things that Yahweh commanded and the feast days that commemorate important biblical events. What do you need this Christmas for? What do you need Easter for? Those are all pagan rooted holidays and here is holidays that Yahweh himself invented, to commemorate biblical events that are according to the Messiah, that have nothing to do with the world. Unlike Christmas and Easter which if you study the roots of those holidays, are all rooted in worldly holidays., worldly traditions that really were never according to Messiah. So, continuing on here another possible
translation I have heard recently I have not fully investigated it to find out whether it's true. but I'm gonna throw it out there, it says, verse 17 let no one judge you in food or drink regarding a festival a new moon or Sabbath which are a shadow of things to come. This word, " and ', and the body of Messiah.
So it could be a shadow of things coming, it could be a shadow of the body of the Messiah. Now, the reason I say "and" is because this Greek word [inaudible 01:15:29.22] is a very subjective way of translating it depending on context. It's translated," but". 1237 times it's translated, " and". And so if you put " and " in the picture here that's another way of translating it. Personally, I'm not sure which one it is. But either one will work with under the framework that the festivals and stuff are presently something we are supposed to be observing and don't let anyone judge you for not observing them. So, all right. So, continuing on here, let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility
and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind and not holding fast to the head , that's the Messiah continuing the theme from verse 8 where it says, not according to Messiah the traditions of man from whom all the body, there is the same word, "soma" in the New International Version, in the New American Standard Version and every other version they translate that word, body". In verse 19 which is only a few verses away, from the place where they refuse to translate the word, "body", they willingly translate it body here nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments grows with the increases from Elohim. What's he contrasting here? He is contrasting traditions of man, worship of angels, false humility to the things that are of Messiah. That's what he is contrasting. and so what are the ordinances of man that are stuff you are not supposed to be looking into, worship of angels would be one of them. Where in the bible does it ever say, "hey, go and worship the angels, hey you can have false humility that's okay"? Nowhere. So verse 20 through 21, therefore if you die with Messiah from the basic principles of the world, why is the living in the world do you subject yourselves to dogmatisal, that's how it says in the Greek? Dogmatisal, do not touch, do not taste, do not handle. Now there were a set of practices in ancient times where they, you know avoided certain things through trying to avoid anything that would be any food or anything like that, the set of practices are, you know, referenced to denying the flesh, okay. And these were not things that were commanded in scripture, all right? Having wiped out of the handwriting of requirements, the word requirements is a New King James Version of "dogma" or "ordinances" in the King James. But these two words this is "dogma" and this is "dogmatisal". And so the commandments and ordinances of man would be; false humility, worship of angels not touching, tasting and handling different things that Yahweh never even governed, and said you can't touch, taste and handle you see the Jews also come up with their own list of things you couldn't touch taste and handle, things that were not like when Yahushua tried to eat with unwashed hands , you know and Yahushua said that they do many other things like that where they add all kinds of things to Yahweh's commandments that are never commanded. He said, " in vain you worship me, teaching for doctrines and commandments of man". And so, those are that kinds of things that he is speaking of here. He is not speaking of, you know, do not eat pork and things like that because he is contrasting the things of the world with the things of Messiah. Things of Messiah are things that are according to him, that picture him, that glorify him, that lift him up and show the world that he is worthy and he is the one through whom we receive salvation. And so the dogmas are not commandments of Yahweh. They are decrees and commandments of man. And that's consistent a, in fact, verse 22 says, "which all concerning things which perish with the using, according to the commandments and doctrines of man." And, so, he is contrasting all the commandments and doctrines of man with the things that are of Messiah, the commandments, and doctrines of Messiah. The feast days, the Sabbath, the new moons, those are commandments and doctrines of Yahweh and then there is alternative doctrines. False humility, neglect of the body. The Essenes, for instance, taught you know if you experienced any pleasurable food, that was wrong, that was a sin. The Greeks also had these kinds of practices. It says these are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh. And so again, it's a contrast, the whole from verse 8 all the way down is a contrast between the things of Yahweh and the things of the world, the commandments and doctrines of man. So what do we have? The colossal contrast here, according to the Messiah, you got circumcision picturing Messiah's work, the separation of the clean and the unclean, the Sabbath, the feast days and new moons. Those are all things that Yahushua himself gave us in the book of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Things that are contrary to the Messiah are philosophies, vain deceit, and these other things; worshipping angels, don't touch taste and handle false humility and neglecting the body. But the other things are according to Messiah. Circumcision is picturing Yahushua and his work, and so everything, the things of Yahweh are going to represent and picture our savior, the things of the world are not. All right, if then you were raised with Messiah, seek those things which are above. Where Messiah is sitting at the right hand of Elohim, set your mind on things above not on things on the earth. For you died and your life is hidden with Messiah and Elohim. And so in conclusion, Paul is saying, we should beware lest any man spoils us through false commandments, philosophy, and doctrines of man. Because Yahushua took them out of the way, nailed them to the tree, along with all the other sins that we have commanded. Thereby forgiving us for having accepted doctrines and principles to live by that are contrary to his word. And because of that, we should let no one judge is for keeping the commandments of Yahweh. Unless they are part of the body of the Messiah and judging us in terms of how we keep him, perhaps we are keeping them the wrong way, and things of that nature. And so therefore we should hold fast to the head of the body, namely Yahushua, from whom we are nourished and again we should refuse to subject ourselves to pagan ordinances because even though they may have an appearance of wisdom, they are of no value and so we should set our minds on things above, not on the things of this world. And so don't let anyone judge us for keeping these feast days and these holidays, the Sabbath, the clean and the unclean because the rewards from Yahweh are not in being disobedient, they are being obedient. And so let's be wise, and not subject ourselves to the alternative ways, alternatives, pagan holidays instead of Yahweh's holidays. And let's walk in the law of Yahweh, blessed are the undefiled in the way that walks in the law of Yahweh. Blessed are those who keep his testimonies who seek with the whole heart. I do not believe these verse s are lies, it's the doctrines of man that are lies. Therefore, let's seek Yahweh, he says if you will seek me and find me , you will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart.
Let's truly seek to live by every word that precedes out of the mouth of Yahweh, not gauging ourselves by what other people do by what messiah has done. That's how we should compare ourselves, we know Yahushua himself kept the festival, we know that we are told to walk as he walked.
And be doers of the word, rejecting vain philosophies of man, holding fast to the head of the body, the Messiah Yahushua who is the same yesterday, today and forever. And he is the same yesterday, today and forever, he who dwells in us wants to do in us what he did yesterday, that we might do them today. And as we saw in Isaiah and Zachariah we will do forever and that includes the keeping of the Sabbath and the feast days. For which when we do that that we ultimately demonstrate our savior's life to the whole world. Let us pray; Oh thank you, Yahweh, for your wonderful
word, thank you for clarity, thank you, Father, for revealing to us the things that you have revealed to us. Father, we are not worthy of the least of the mercy and truth that you have shown us. Father, yet we know that you love us, you value us and you looked upon us with mercy and grace and revealed to us the truth for that we thank you. We pray for our brethren who may be very, very
sincere and yet they misunderstand the second chapter of Colossians. And so I just pray for father that you would open up the eyes of many, if you are willing to use, to study, to open up the eyes of others. I pray That you will use it, father use it however you decide to use it, all for the praise of your glory, all for the revelation of the truth. That we might walk a perfect walk and live the Yahushua truly showed us, to live.
And in Yahushua's great name we praise you and we thank you for your word. For truly yours is the kingdom and power and glory forever and ever, in Yahushua's name, amein.