In this 4th message on Keeping the feasts I plan on offering first a perspective into the link between the Church and Holy Worship according to the Law of God, which has been mostly abandoned today.
I plan on covering this subject of ‘Why should we Keep the Feasts’ through’t this 8th Moonth and starting a new subject come this 9th moonth.

Here in the future I will be covering some commonly used verses, abused in arguement against the keeping of feasts from the ‘New Testament, particularly Col_2:16 and Gal_4:10, in the exposition of those verses it will be provided that they too are in agreement with the Law of God, and that what is being taught in those verse by Paul when read first with a firm faith in the inerrancy and inspiration of the Law and Prophets will bond the teachings of Paul to that of the Law of God found in the code of Moses as a seamless testimony, which will naturaly stand as an objection to the doctrine of anti-nomianism (against law) and that of a-nomianism (no law) which is the norm in interpreting these epistles by today’s standards. In the life of Paul and the Apostles the Churches of Christ believed the the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. (2Ti_3:15-17) , this element faith which is in Christ concerning the function of the God breathed holy Scriptures is what is lacking in the lense needed to tie the Epistles in any regard to the Law of God, both of which we believe as Christians were inspired by YHWH God’s Spirit; This is the elements of the epistemology upon which the understanding of why we should keep the feasts as the times of convocation for Church assembly, that is the ‘Kaleos of the Ek-Klesia or in English ‘the Call to the called-out who are called into One calling’ that is it’s base or foundation. When we read about the Church or Ekklasia in the New Testament and it’s place, there is no definitive or authoritive text where Christ redefines the Ecclesia / Church of God as to be redefined for a new people with a new system and new code of worship separate or different from the Ecclesia of the Law established by the simplicity of the WORDs : “And the LORD spake or And the LORD commanded or This is what the LORD has Spoken”: not surprisingly Law which claims to be Law is easy to identify as Law, but socalled indirect and direct inferences are easy to identify as what they are inferences, which man must infer.
Nevertheless, a clear statement we do have from our Lord in the flesh is in Mat_16:16-19, where:
…Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock (Petra) I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
Here is a volatile verse, historically, now surrounded with inference, which the RC church claims as it’s right to the title ‘The Church’, circular in reasoning because The RCC sites this verse as it’s authority, but as well sites it’s claim as ‘The Church’ having the power of binding and loosing as it’s ability to determine what the Word of God really is, thus laying the foundation for ‘The Church’ having sole authority even over this scripture and it’s meaning, including the meaning of this verse too!
The Roman Papal claim to Peter as the foundation of the Papal key to the kingdom of God is by this verse and has been since the 2nd century in the schism between Polycreates Bisop of Ephesus and Victor Bishop of Rome has referenced.
A Quick history (you can find more on this subject in the message “THE LORD’S SUPPER: Christian Pascha, Sacrament of the Faith of Jesus Christ” which was given last Passover season)
But the schism is founded upon this subject, of both who is the Rock of the Church? and how does the church worship? In other words “Why do we keep the feasts?”, it boils down to Church authority, Is that authority being derived from the Word of God as it’s inspired source? or Is it derived from so called apostolic or historic christian tradition?
In the 2nd century, The churches who sided with the Patriarchal Bishop Polycrates who was the 8th in succession of a Bishopric which was Familial, who knew the Apostles and who spoke with John and Philip and who knew the children of the Apostles and who claimed with biblical authority that the Apostles kept Feasts by the moon according to the “Rule of Faith” was against Victor Bishop of Rome who claimed the keeping of Easter Sunday (which at that time was still called Pascha or Passover, even though it had no resemblance to the festival law, but Victor claimed Peter and Paul as his authority.
Yet we already covered the Scriptures of Peter where he claims
1Pe 2:5 Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.
1Pe 2:6 Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded.
1Pe 2:7 Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner,
1Pe 2:8 And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed.
1Pe 2:9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:
1Pe 2:10 Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.
Thus Peter himself seats the Apostolic traditions upon the Word of God found in the Law and Prophets as well as in the manifestation of the Man Jesus Christ the word made flesh as a package deal which he directly links to the words of the Prophet Hosea who is calling those Gentiles of the scattered house of Israel who had gone in the way of Jeroboam and his worship back to the holy Nation and Royal priesthood founded in God’s law of Exo_19:5-6, and he does not found the Ekklasia upon himself, rather we clearly hear Simeon Peter declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. And to this agree the words of the prophets…Act_15:14-15 (also see Act_10:1-48).
The point being that when the church is being built upon Peter whose name lit. means a rock, the true foundation is nevertheless the WORD of God and He made flesh, and the Papal ascension of Peter claim is thwarted in the very nature of the fact that all authority in heaven and in earth belongs to the WORD of GOD and the only claim which is rightful is that claim which hails the Christ, the Son of the living God. as the rock his church is built on which the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. This Rock has the key of the kingdom of heaven which is alone able to be bound on earth is what is bound in heaven: and whatsoever is to be loosed on earth is loosed in heaven.
The Papal and reformed protestant churches use this verse as the substance of their claim as they legislate clear cut sin into common practice today, such as the rampant Sexual immorality ushered in today… It was no different in Aaron’s day, in Jeroboam’s day, and in Polycrates day it started with the churches divine worship, will you worship when I tell you or not? Will you listen to GOD or man? The Church Christ is building is a resurrected body of people a regathered Holy Nation and Royal Priesthood who does not stumble at the WORD, being disobedient, nay we are to be lively stones, living stones showing forth the praises of he who calls us, that is his church, out of darkness and into his marvelous light!
We as GOD’s particular people are not called to a new form of Worship unmentioned or described by the word of God, nor are we called to invent justification by laws which can never justify, rather we like our fathers whom YHWH GOD lead by hand out of Egypt we are called to Serve Him according to his WORD, a WORD of solid Rock that able to be made flesh like our stony hearts full of selfish Idolatry, taught by a land and mind set on Self preservation in disregard of all else, it is of necessity that it is realized the the rock which grinds to powder is the rock that is needed to soften our heart as well by the mere magnitude of His nature. If we as a church will not be founded upon the Rock, the Rock will grind us to powder, and some of us will in the midst of being ground will become soft enough to beg for mercy and be justified by the faith which come by Jesus Christ, what is to be bound on earth has been declaired from heaven, and that which was loosed has been loosed, if we do not bind according to the laws of God, and if we do not loose according to the mercies of God we are not the church .
Rom 6:3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
Rom 6:4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
Rom 6:5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
Rom 6:6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
Rom 6:15 What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.
Rom 6:16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?
Rom 6:17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.
Consider this call to service from our History, as the key to understanding the what YHWH’s service is:
Exo_5:1 Moses and Aaron… told Pharaoh, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast unto me in the wilderness.
and Pharaoh interprets this as the Hebrew text clearly showes us, as in relation to The Sabbath / Eh-SBaThiM
Exo 5:5 And Pharaoh said, Behold, the people of the land now are many, and ye make them rest from their burdens. or literaly, ‘and the sabbaths you give them for their burdens.’
.והשׁבתם H7673
Not only does the literal reading of the Hebrew text show that the Sabbaths (plural) were known to Pharaoh as part of the feast worship before the passover is ever spoken of by name, but the nature of the Sabbath as being in opposition to Burdens or works was well known as well, when this word is chosen to convey the type of feast Moses is speaking of to the king.
Let MY PEOPLE go that they may hold a feast to Me and 6 times hereafter Moses says,
Let MY PEOPLE go that they may SERVE ME!
A call spoken 7 times to Pharaoh… not by accident. And two more times spoken by threat of curse.
Serve ME? I hope this raises the thought again into the mind of the mention in the first part of this message, the link established between the Services of YHWH GOD and how those services were based on YHWH’s holy or sanctified worship, worship ordained his way, particularly that of the Hatred of Idolatry by Image worship or by replacement worship with that which was not commanded, again as said before YHWH’s system, his culture is a package deal, you can’t remove any one element from it’s design without disrupting or destroying the whole.
Consider in looking at a summary of the 10 commandments:
1 YHWH and no other god,
2 not worshiping through Idols or to idols or to creations of men’s in replacement of God’s Word whereby service is divided as to belong to YHWH God by His word or if it be another service, either to YHWH by name or not
3 The verity of having been given the name of YHWH as a covenant people, that is his bride or Child whereby in forsaking His Word we dishonor our head Father and / or husband in the symbolic relationship…let my son go, let my people go that they may serve me!
4 and directly after the Remembering of the Sabbaths to keep them holy
as well as the :
5th in how the Sabbath, New Moons and Feasts honor and encourage the family structure of worship in the home, family, kindred, ethnic group, nation and Race.
Then the next 5 commandments keep that YHWH alone people called by his name in holy worship as a family from killing, adulterating, stealing, falsifying and lusting that people to death. That is the summary of the 10 commandments in practical use as a collective whole, if you remove one part of that Code of National law it does not establish a code of law for a Nation it only establishes a code for individual families and in some ways as code for the individual sitting in his apartment alone fretting the future destruction of his people whom he has no dealings with.
When YHWH gave his law on Mt. Sinai He took his Eternal Law from his everlasting righteousness and put into the most perfect Code of Law for justice and worship the world had ever beheld in the national form, yet I believe, and am persuaded that the pattern Moses was shown in the mount from which all the worship of God was established was as well Eternal and everlasting (I am not admitting to perfect knowledge of this heavenly system, yet I am acknowledging it’s place as the very image of what types we are commanded to serve in time, and in practice.) Sola scriptora by the new Covenant does not take out faith to unseen spiritual levels but it shows us that the mystery in heaven is revealed to men in obedience to the word of God which is able to make one wise unto salvation, and that even applies to the feasts commanded in the law.

It’s curious how so much Law language is cited in the Epistles of the apostles yet it is often ignored or totally unnoticed and how the meanings of those terms when they are noticed are never defined by the prior revelation as found in the law and prophet also contained in the wisdom-writings and the histories, yet that is the definition book for what the New Testament Scriptures which the Apostles are teaching us. The Apostles had by the providence of YHWH a convenient publication of the Scriptures of Israel in the Greek language, the Septuagint or the LXX, it was available to the Greek speaking world, preceding the revelation of Christ found in the New Testament. So when the Apostle wrote a very limited letter, concerning a limited subject matter he was offering divine revelation through his inspiration on the understanding of a limited matter for the reader in a specific context to specific people; yet for the this revelation to be transcendent for generations to come it must be definable in a general way (General is in opposition to the limited), or even definable in general to those who will firsthand apply the knowledge to their limited and specific situation, this can only be done by use of the broad commands prior ordained by the Law of God or pronounced by the Prophets, or found in the wisdom-writings and History of Israel: the Septuagint is the only book available which is transcendent to this day which allows this to happen, we can find whole quotes word for word from the LXX particularly the Law, which is the definitive portion of Israel’s scriptures to understand the logic the God of Israel uses in dispencing judgment as seen in the recorded and proceeding history.
Therefore the limited subject matter in the New Testament, particularly the Epistles, in order to be generally applicable in their limited context the subject matter must be generally defined by a source of divine revelation as is only found in and claimed by the Law of God.
If this were not the case we could define the Greek text of the NT by use of the Judgment of Greek mythology, perhaps in the case of how the word Ekklasia is used in ancient Greek religious ritual, that is even if a common thread of ‘general citizenship’ were to accompany this ‘out calling’, if this Ekklasia status in a Greek city state is obtained by a certain oath of allegiance to the idol of zeus or of athenian or what ever oath was necessary to be part of the assembly in Greece at that time, that is not the definition we import into our understanding of Ekklasia as worshipers of YHWH, rather we definitively use the Greek copy of the law to understand that meaning and we import that meaning into all the proceeding revelation of scripture thereafter, and at times we may have need of breaking those compound words down and defining them from other places in scripture and seeing a whole, which is what I’ve tried t offer.
It is by using scripture to define scripture a concreate base is layed for the 12 tribes of Jam_1:1 as well as the many references of Jew and Gentile through’t the writtings of Paul, as being the Gentiles or Nations of Israel in scattering (diaspora). This fact of Pauls mission is firmly lifted out of Scripture by the use of the quotes of Hos_1:10-11 and Hos_2:23.(Rom_9:25-26, Rom_11:30-31, 1Pe_2:9-10).
This is as well why I feel confident in forwarding to all who hear that part of the scattering and punishment of Israel as a Nation for their whoredom against YHWH GOD’s great love is Generally a lack of Faith, and specifically a huge part of it started when Jeroboam devised worship in his own heart his own way and Israel went with it, and became the people of Romans 1 and Judah became the people of Romans 2, Yet YHWH in his great love for his Ethnic-Covenant people says
Jer 3:1 … If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man’s, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the LORD…
The whoredom that was discussed as the manifestation of Israel’s faithlessness was in her following her king Jeroboam in abandoning divine worship according to YHWH God’s law as given to Moses in the codified national Law of Israel which we call the Law of Moses. Jeroboam lead Israel astray by 1st ordaining places to worship in order to avoid the temple, 2nd making Images to worship YHWH the golden calves, 3rd by then moving the times of the feasts, 4th by ordaining priests who were not of the sons of Levi but rather from the lowest of the people.
While we undoubtedly now may worship YHWH not in one mountain or the other but according to the Law giver Christ ‘in spirit and in truth’, that is in no specific place and that due to YHWH GOD’s personal removal of the temple and it’s altar according to Dan_9:24-26 in conjunction with John 4, yet nothing in John or Daniel speak to the changing of the allowance of Images and or Idols, or the change of the timing or the abandonment of the Sabbaths and it’s related feastivals, nor has the Expiation of Christ’s blood allowed for us to preserve the Godforsaken ordination of priest’s of the lowest of the people.

Subscribe to R N C M via Email

Why Should MY PEOPLE Keep the Feasts? Pt. 4 BECAUSE IT’S YHWH’s SERVICE

SABBATH BIBLE STUDY

8-8
(2018)
ReNEWed COVENANT Ministry

Subscribe to RNCM Podcast Feed

iTunes • Other

MP3 AUDIO MESSAGE DOWN LOAD-Listen any time!

OR

Page for Streaming Message – Follow along with study notes below!

Compiled by JS LOWTHER

renewedcovenantministry.com

servant@renewedcovenantministry.com

Why Should MY PEOPLE Keep the Feasts?

Part 4

BECAUSE IT’S YHWH’s SERVICE

Like this:

Related

About JS Lowther

Audio Studies

R N C M Podcast

Search RNCM for Studies and Biblical info

Recent Activity: Posts, Bible Study Notes, Podcast links

Archives