Acts15:19-21 “Therefore I judge that we should not trouble those from among the gentiles who are turning to Elohim, but that we write to them to abstain from the defilement of idols, from whoring and from all that is strangled and from blood. “For from ancient generations Moshe has, in every city, those proclaiming him – being read in the congregation every Sabbath””
They have to abstain from these four things, idol worship, incest/fornication, blood and all things strangled. He then tells them if they do not know these rules, they should go and listen to the teaching of Moshe in the synagogue on a Sabbath.
How could they 'not know', he just listed them....It is because it refers to passages in the Torah!
Where do Moshe speak of these things? Lev 17+18
This is called the heart of the Torah. These are things that measure your heart: So it is important to know what these things mean. Do you know what each of these things mean? Go read in Leviticus to understand, I will try to explain the concepts. Now remember this was written for the gentiles, the new believers, like you and me.
Meat sacrificed to idols / idol worship:
The Torah teaches that if you built an altar for Elohim at a place He did not instruct you to, even though you mean good, He will see it as idol worship. He will see it as the golden calf.
You will worship Him like He tells you to, not the way you want to. And Torah teaches us how to worship Him His way.
There is a group of people who worship naked! They feel it is their way to worship! But the Torah says you shall not come and show any nakedness or immodesty in His presence. Even the priests had to build a ramp and not stairs to prevent any immodesty in His presence. It makes you think of how people, especially women and girls, dress these days? To see a woman in underwear on the side of a bus is common and acceptable to most.
If you compromise one principle of your faith, it is called meat sacrificed to Idols.
Fornication:
Torah gives more detail on this, it includes incest, homosexuality, sex with animals etc. (Lev 18) It is very straight forward, and again it begins with lust.
Things strangled and blood:
This is kosher food. The Torah gives you detail about what to and what not to eat. Does this mean the Brit Hadashah (the New Covenant) say we must eat Kosher? Yes.
Remember we discussed in the first lesson the difference between faith and obedience?
Faith = righteousness = salvation
Obedience = Blessing
To eat Kosher is obedience and out of that will flow health and blessing. It will not determine your salvation! Follow the Scripture’s definition of Kosher and not the Jew’s!
Again, I do not want to convince you to do anything, I just want to show you what the Scripture says.
Mark 7:14 in some bibles it is added in Italics “And thus he declared all food clean”. It is written in italics, because it was not found in the original manuscripts! Men added this to justify their own going astray. If you read this whole chapter you will see it does not speak about food at all but about the pureness of ones heart.
Torah says it does not qualify as food if it was not a clean animal to begin with and if it was not slaughtered in a kosher way. Ex: a cow standing out in a field does not qualify as food! If a truck hits it, you can’t eat it. It is road kill!
Look at the animals listed in the Scriptures that are classified as unclean - you will notice that scientifically they are proven to be bad for your health. They either contain high quantities of certain chemicals that are bad for you, parasites and or diseases. These food guidelines were only given to us to protect us!
To eat kosher:
1. Has to be a clean animal
2. Slaughtered correctly – The life of the animal has to be ended mercifully. He shouldn’t struggle in his death.
You allow the honour of the life of the animal to be given back to Elohim quickly, not tortuously.
If you torture it, you make the animal suffer and it is not kosher any more. If you beat the animal to death with a hammer, he is not kosher. You have to spill his blood; you must let the blood of the animal evacuate the body quickly and allow it to return to Elohim, because Torah teaches us that the life is in the blood.
This is spiritual law. Respect the life of the animal; kosher law has to do with the sanctity of life. When we eat meat, we eat flesh; the life of the animal was given to us so that we might have life!
Torah also teaches that if you were to walk in a path and find a nest that has fallen out of a tree, you MUST put it back. You must respect the life YHWH made. If an animal has fallen into a pit, you are commanded to rescue it!
The preferred ancient method for killing pigs was by means of strangulation. First it is not a clean animal and secondly it was strangled! Thus the blood is still in the flesh.
One of the biggest causes of cancer is blood and red meat.
Remember we discussed in the first lesson the difference between faith and obedience?
Faith = righteousness = salvation
Obedience = Blessing
To eat Kosher is obedience and out of that will flow health and blessing. It will not determine your salvation!
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