The teaching of the Messianic Jews. / Letter of Instruction by Jacob Damkani, Messianic Jews)
Christianity: a fulfillment of the Jewish religion? / Comment by Daniel, Trumpet of Salvation to Israel, 2020-04-30
rom a Messianic point of view, Christianity is not a religion for the Jews.F / "God’s covenants", by Jacob Damkani, preacher of the Messianic Jews.
Time in the sight of God is an important element. In the fullness of time He
comes again. This time it is not about another Moses or another Isaiah; this
time the Messiah Himself comes and offers them the Kingdom. From the beginning
of His ministry until the end of it, Yeshua speaks about the Kingdom. The
parables have to do with the Kingdom and His teaching has to do with the
Kingdom. From the beginning till the end He offers Israel is the Kingdom of God
on earth. And as you well know, once again, they refuse Him. They refuse God,
who brought them out of Egypt and they ask for a king; they refuse Him when
Messiah comes and offers them the Kingdom. But did God give up on His people?
Did He tell them He would replace them with Gentiles, with a bunch of
Christians? Did He do that? No, God forbid! If that had happened, maybe one day
He would have come to these Christians to tell them they were not good enough
and would have passed on to Muslims instead.
(God’s covenants,
by Jacob Damkani, New covenant/22)
The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it.
Mt 21,42 Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in
the Scriptures, ‘the stone which the builders rejected, this became the chief
corner stone; this came about from the Lord, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?
21,43 "Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people, producing the fruit of it." Mt 21,42-43;
The sons of the kingdom (Jews without Jesus) will be cast out into the outer darkness.
Mt 8,11 "I say to you that many will come from
east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the
kingdom of heaven; 8,12 but the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into
the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of
teeth." Mt 8,11-12;
(See also discourse 94: "The
Kingdom of God and its Heirs: The Heirs.")
The kingdom of God was taken away from the Jews and given to the
biblical Christians (Mt 21,43). Because of this and because there is neither a
temple nor a burnt altar (sin offering) in Jerusalem – and only
in Jerusalem – , the Mosaic faith cannot be practiced – the Mosaic
laws cannot be fulfilled.
Be careful that you do not offer your burnt offerings in every cultic place you see, but in the place which the LORD chooses in one of your tribes (the temple of Jerusalem), there you shall offer your burnt offerings.
Deut 12,10 "When you cross the Jordan and live in
the land which the LORD your God is giving you to inherit, and He gives you rest
from all your enemies around you so that you live in security, 12,11 then it
shall come about that the place in which the LORD your God will choose
for His name to dwell, there you shall bring all that I command you: your burnt
offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution of your
hand, and all your choice votive offerings which you will vow to the LORD. 12,12
"And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God, you and your sons and
daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levite who is within your
gates, since he has no portion or inheritance with you. 12,13 "Be
careful that you do not offer your burnt offerings in every cultic place you
see, 12,14 but in the place which the LORD chooses in one of your tribes,
there you shall offer your burnt offerings, and there you shall do all that I
command you. Deut 12,10-14;
Unless you believe that I am He (the Messiah), you will die in your sins.
Jn 8,21 Then He said again to them, "I go away, and you will seek
Me, and will die in your sin; where I am going, you cannot come." 8,22 So the Jews were saying,
"Surely He will not kill Himself, will He, since He says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?"
8,23 And He was saying to them, "You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I
am not of this world. 8,24 "Therefore I said to you that you will die in
your sins; for unless you believe that I am He (the Messiah), you will
die in your sins." Jn 8,21-24;
He who believes in Him (Jesus Christ) is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already.
Jn 3,17 "For God did not send the Son into the
world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. 3,18 "He
who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged
already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of
God. Jn 3,17-18;
Therefore, the Jews have no forgiveness of sins. They have been
dying in their sins since two thousand years and will go to damnation if they have
not converted to Jesus Christ.
So, there is only one biblical faith:
the faith in Jesus Christ.
And so Jacob Damkani is wrong to say to the Jews that they do not have to change
to a new religion:
"And Yeshua never meant the church to be what
it is in the most parts of the world today. Praise God for people like you who
really have the understanding of the true revelation of God in Yeshua haMashiach
who have not come to bring a new religion to the world."
(God’s covenants, by Jacob Damkani, New covenant/24)
The Jews have to become biblical Christians! There is no other way.
As Jews they do not have eternal life, they have to convert to a new religion:
not Catholicism but biblical Christianity.
The narrow gate.Faith in Jesus Christ is the
"narrow gate". |
Shalom,
I agree
wholly with everything you wrote. There is only one way to God, and that is
solely through Jesus Christ. Yes, the Jews have to pass over from the Mosaic
covenant into a saving faith in Jesus Christ, or they will indeed die in their
sins.
What Jacob (Damkani / FH) meant was this: Christianity is not a new religion that
began two thousand years ago. It is a fulfillment of the Jewish religion. It is a
fulfillment of the Old Testament, as God purposed and promised to His people in
the Old Testament
There is a remnant of Jewish believers that have
crossed over to the new covenant, to faith in Jesus. Jacob is one such, and now
he calls his Jewish brothers and sisters to faith in the Lord and Savior, the
Messiah Jesus Christ. That is the message and work of this ministry – that the
Jews should unite with the Gentile church, through faith and forgiveness of
sins, with Jesus Christ as Head of the one body, the Lamb Who came to take away
our sins through death on the cross.
He is risen. He is Lord.
I hope I have helped clarify somewhat.
Please feel free to correct, add or comment, as you see it.
Daniel (Info Trumpet of Salvation – info@trumpetofsalvation.org)
Thank you very much for your mail and your willingness to engage
in further discussion. In fact, I am delighted to find such agreement with you,
as a Messianic Jew. But of course some questions do keep coming up.
We both proclaim the ‘saving faith in Jesus Christ’. And just so as to establish
what this faith actually saves us from: the ‘saving faith in Jesus Christ’
naturally saves us from condemnation at the Last Judgment because of our sins
and from eternal damnation in hell (the lake of fire).
And when the Lord says to the Jews, in Jn 8,24 above, that they will die in
their sins – that is to say, without forgiveness – if they do not believe that
he is the Messiah, then he means just that: they will be condemned to eternal
damnation at the Last Judgment.
But this is the biblical proof that this Jewish religion has had no significance
whatsoever since that time, as it can no longer offer the only goal that a
religion can have in this world, namely the promise of eternal life. – The same
goes for every other religion in this world, by the way, including Catholicism
(because of its idolatry) and Protestantism (because of the homosexual
superintendents).
So there is now only this one and only access to eternal life: the saving faith
in Jesus Christ, and here of course we both agree. But it follows from this that
this faith cannot be a "fulfillment of the Jewish religion", as you write.
"The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John; since that time the gospel
of the kingdom of God has been preached" also said our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Jewish religion lost its meaning with the rejection of the Jewish Messiah by
the Jews two thousand years ago. Until then, God had dwelt in the Temple in
Jerusalem. In the ‘holy of holies’ of the Temple, which was separated from the
‘holy’ by a curtain, God was constantly present with His people Israel.
On the death of his Son, God left the holy of holies, the Temple and the people
of Israel.
And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom (God left the temple).
Mt 27,50 And Jesus cried out again with a loud
voice, and yielded up His spirit. 27,51 And behold, the veil of the temple
was torn in two from top to bottom; and the earth shook and the rocks were
split. Mt 27,50-51;
God sent his Son to the people of Israel as their Messiah for
their salvation. This was the prophecy from the Old Testament, and it applied
solely and exclusively to the people of God from Israel.
But He answered and said, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.".
Mt 15,21 Jesus went away from there, and withdrew
into the district of Tyre and Sidon. 15,22 And a Canaanite woman from that
region came out and began to cry out, saying, "Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of
David; my daughter is cruelly demon-possessed." 15,23 But He did not answer
her a word. And His disciples came and implored Him, saying, "Send her away,
because she keeps shouting at us." 15,24 But He answered and said, "I was
sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." Mt 15,21-24;
UAnd then again, when the Lord sent out his disciples to preach
this Good News of the kingdom to the Israelites, he expressly sent them only to
the Israelites and forbade them to go to the nations or even to the Samaritans.
Go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel And preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’
Mt 10,5 These twelve Jesus sent out after
instructing them: "Do not go in the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter any
city of the Samaritans; 10,6 but rather go to the lost sheep of the house
of Israel. 10,7 "And as you go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven
is at hand’. 10,8 "Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers,
cast out demons. Freely you received, freely give. 10,9 "Do not acquire gold,
or silver, or copper for your money belts, 10,10 or a bag for your
journey, or even two coats, or sandals, or a staff; for the worker is worthy
of his support. Mt 10, 5-10;
Only when the Jews had rejected him and it was clear that they
would not accept his message did God order the proclamation of the gospel to all
people:
Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.
Mk 16,15 And He said to them, "Go into all the
world and preach the gospel to all creation. 16,16 "He who has believed and
has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned.
Mt 16,15-16;
But by rejecting the Messiah, Israel broke the covenant with its
God, and God dissolved this covenant and 40 years later had the temple in
Jerusalem, including the altar of burnt offering, destroyed. So, according to
the Mosaic rite, no more sin offerings could be made and the Israelites could no
longer be forgiven for their sins.
The covenant which I made with their fathers, My covenant which they broke.
Jer 31,32 not like the covenant which I made
with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the
land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband
to them," declares the LORD. Jer 31,32;
(See also discourse 140: "The
destruction of the Temple.")
In his Son Jesus Christ, God made a New Covenant with
all people: every person of this world – including every Jew – who
comes to the saving faith in Jesus Christ and his sacrifice on the cross for our
sins is saved, and will inherit eternal life at the Last Judgment (by grace –
not by righteousness!).
(See also discourse 103: "God’s
New Covenant with all human beings.")
But the kingdom of God (‘the kingdom’) that was promised to them
was thus lost once and for all by the Israelites when they rejected the Son of
God and so broke their covenant with God. The Son of God actually confirms this
to them in the following parable.
The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it.(Mt 21:33-46)Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard and put a wall around it and dug a wine press in it, and built a tower, and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey. When the harvest time approached, he sent his slaves to the vine-growers to receive his produce The vine-growers took his slaves and beat one, and killed another, and stoned a third. Again he sent another group of slaves larger than the first; and they did the same thing to them. ~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~ Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-growers?" They said to Him, "He will bring those wretches to a wretched end, and will rent out the vineyard to other vine-growers who will pay him the proceeds at the proper seasons." Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in the Scriptures, ‘The stone which the builders rejected, this became the chief corner stone; Those came about from the Lord, and it is marvelous in our eyes’ ? ~~~~~~~~~~~
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was speaking about them. When they sought to seize Him, they feared the people, because they considered Him to be a prophet. ~~~~~~~~~~~ |
"To my sorrow, a lot of Christians do not
really understand that Jews do not have to be converted to any other
religion; they do not have to leave their heritage and their Jewish faith,
because if God gave identity to any group of people, He gave a really clear
identity to Jewish people. It is not meant for them to leave their
identity and to become something else, to become Christians. In the mind
of Jewish people the Christianity is something else than what you think that
the Christianity is."
(God’s Covenants,
by Jacob Damkani, covenant Abraham/04)
"It is not about a new religion, Christianity that the Lord wanted to bring upon the earth, religion
that will be against His own people. The cry of the Prophets, the cry of the Apostles and now,
praise God, your cry for the return of these people back to God is awesome. The Almighty God is so
thrilled for everyone in the Church who wakes up to the reality of salvation – to the Jew first,
Romans 1:16. We praise God that you have come to really share the gospel with this nation. Blessed
is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. The Almighty God is going to bring this nation face to
face with the reality of Yeshua in His Jewish Context, thanks to people like you who care, who love,
who are willing to fight the good fight. This takes the revelation; we cannot really be bitter or
resentful towards the rest of the Church. They simple did not have the privilege and the grace to
have this revelation. Here you are taught things that very few in the Church really understand. You
are taught things that are far away from the Church. They are so many doctrines in the Church, but
there is only one truth. We are touching the heart of the truth as we study the Word here and as we
look into the plan of God concerning this nation and the salvation that finally will come, the of on
earth. Come, Lord Yeshua.."
(God’s Covenants,
by Jacob Damkani, The Day/15)
First of all here we would like to correct the statement on
which Damkani and his fellow workers are always placing such emphasis. We are
always being told, "The Jew first!" – and that is precisely what we read in the
above extract from his letter of instruction. He appeals to Rom 1,16, so let us
just take a look at the passage:
Rom 1,16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it
is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first
and also to the Greek. Rom 1,16;
With his statement here –
"The Almighty God is so thrilled for everyone in the
Church who wakes up to the reality of salvation to the Jew first"
Damkani would like to interpret Paul’s statement in such a way
that the gospel must first be preached to the Jews – as he does – and only then
to the ‘Greeks’, that is to say to the nations.
Now the gospel may very well be ‘the power of God for salvation to everyone who
believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.’ But as we can see from the
biblical quotations quoted earlier, the Jews already had this opportunity when
their Messiah appeared. – And they did not use it, they actually rejected it.
So this statement of Paul’s does not mean, then, that ‘the gospel must
first be preached to the Jews, and only then to the
Gentiles’, but rather it means that the gospel was first
preached to the Jews, and if they had believed, they would have been saved. But
now the gospel is preached to all nations (the Greek) – including the Jews
– so that all may be saved.
But also from the rest of the above extract from Jakob Damkani’s Letter of
Instruction we can see that although Messianic Judaism believes in Yeshua as its
Messiah, it has still not been able to separate itself from the orthodox Jewish
religion, and has not yet correctly recognized the actual meaning of
Christianity. When Damkani writes:
"To my sorrow, a lot of Christians do not
really understand that Jews do not have to be converted to any other
religion" and
"It is not about a new religion, Christianity that the Lord wanted to bring
upon the earth, religion that will be against His own people."
he has clearly forgotten that it was the representatives of this
orthodox Jewish religion who swore two thousand years ago: "His blood shall be
upon us and upon our children!" (Mt 27:25). What the Jews therefore need is a
different faith. The new faith in the New Covenant with God for all
people – including the Jews – through the blood of the Son of God,
Jesus Christ!
This is what the Jews urgently need if they do not want to go to hell, otherwise
they cannot obtain forgiveness for their sins. Our Lord Jesus Christ did not
bring a new religion – for Christianity is not a religion, but, better still, a
New Covenant with God (Lk 22:20).
The Old Covenant of God with
Israel was broken by the Jews through their condemnation of the Son of God to
die on the cross, and God consequently dissolved this covenant and left the
Temple in Jerusalem (Matthew 27:51). And whereas the Old Covenant had commanded
regular animal sacrifices so that the Jews could be forgiven for their sins, in
the New Covenant the sacrifice has already been offered once and for all. It is
the redeeming sacrifice of the Son of God on the cross for the sins of the whole
world.
So when Jacob Damkani suggests that the Lord Jesus might have brought a new
religion, ‘a religion that would be against his own people’, this is a reversal
of the facts. It was not our Lord who brought a new religion against his own
people, but his own people who, out of stubbornness and lack of knowledge of
Scripture (Matthew 21:42, 19:4, 12:3, 22:31 etc.), interpreted this new religion
– faith in him as their Savior – against their own Messiah.
Although now the Messianic Jews – just like the biblical Christians – believe in
Jesus of Nazareth as their Savior, they run the risk, as a result of their not
being completely separated from the Jewish religion, of actually believing in a
false Messiah in the future, just like many Catholic Christians and of course
also Orthodox Judaism (Jn 5:43).
In the Last Days the Antichrist will pretend to be the true ‘Messiah’ and,
through the demonic powers given to him by Satan (2The 2:9-12), will tempt not
only all the Jews, but even many Christians to worship him as the ‘returned
Jesus’.
While the Christians will then have to be accused of a lack of knowledge of
Scripture in those future Last Days, the Orthodox Jews will boast that of course
they have always known that this Yeshua from Nazareth was a deceiver and
blasphemer.
Only after the Last Days, at the beginning of the Millennium, when the Son of
God begins his millennial reign of peace in Jerusalem, will the Jews realize
that historically they have mistaken the right Messiah for the wrong Messiah and
the wrong Messiah for the right Messiah, and will convert to Jesus Christ being
filled with contrition. (Rev 1:7; Mt 24:30; Zech 12:10).
(See also discourse 132: "Biblical Christianity
and the Jewish Messiah.")
The Messianic Jews of today can only be advised to examine the
Bible carefully and to separate themselves from the Jewish religion (not from
the Bible!!). The statement of Jacob Damkani in above his letter of instruction
"that Jews do not have to be converted to any other religion; they do
not have to leave their heritage and their Jewish faith" is in
contradiction of any biblical Christian understanding of the faith.
You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law (Tora); you have fallen from grace.
Gal 5,3 And I testify again to every man who receives
circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law. 5,4 You
have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you
have fallen from grace. Gal 5, 3- 4;
All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.
Mt 28,18 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, "All
authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Mt 28,18;
He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father.
Jn 5,22 "For not even the Father judges anyone, but He
has given all judgment to the Son, 5,23 so that all will honor
the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor
the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. Jn 5,22-23;
On the contrary, it is altogether comparable with the ⁅veneration of saints’ in the Catholic Church. Only with the difference that in Catholicism a person (Mary, the saints) is ‘idolized’ and with the Messianic Jews it is ‘Judaism’. In both religions – Judaism and Catholicism – over the past centuries the lying pens of theological scribes (rabbis or church fathers – cf. Jer 8:8) have falsified the authentic biblical faith beyond recognition with their writings (Talmud instead of Torah [Old Testament] or tradition and the catechism instead of the New Testament).
The well-known English author and Bible connoisseur Michael Marlowe
documents these events in Judaism as follows:
And so the Talmud holds sway over the Torah as the primary
authoritative source for modern Jewry. This is even seen in the Talmud
itself. For example, in one edition of the Talmud, we find the words: ‘My
son, be more careful in the observance of the words of the Scribes than in
the words of the Torah’. Accordingly, we find the statement in an article in
the Jewish Chronicle that in true yeshiva (religious teaching), Jews are
‘devoted to the Talmud to the exclusion of everything else’. In the
authoritative Jewish Encyclopedia it is stated: ‘Those who professed Judaism
felt no doubt that the Talmud was equal to the Bible as a source of
instruction and decision in problems of religion’. And it goes on to say even
more explicitly: ‘For the majority of Jews [the Talmud] is still the supreme
authority in religion.’
(Extract
from: "Abraham our Father
– Jerusalem our Mother / by Michael Marlowe, Dec. 2004.")
The beginning of a conversion could be, for example, that the Messianic Jews
change the name of their organization. Instead of
"Trumpet of Salvation to Israel"
"Trumpet of Salvation to all people".
PS: To my chagrin, Daniel of Info Trumpet of Salvation – info@trumpetofsalvation.org
has not replied to my comment despite his request, "Please feel free to correct,
add or comment as you see fit."