Keys. To understand The Good Book.

Here is something for your study and prayer:

Celtic Christianity is familiar to some of us and not to others.  I joined a Celtic Christian community in 1992.  Through this community I met my wife and set off on a wilderness journey which has led us into Torah and Israelite identity.   I believe this ‘stepping stone’ has enabled us to go deeper into that life, benefitting from the efforts of the Celtic ‘saints’.  I am not say that the Celtic ‘church’ had it all right, however much of the British Isles and beyond were reached by these pioneers and therefore the subject is of significance.

When I heard about our early christian history I found it felt familiar and a reconnection rather than an introduction.  It was so different from the christianity I had experienced so far.   The Celtic believers loved nature and were very connected to the seasons.  Their authority structures we much less hierarchical.  They loved to study scripture for themselves. They were at first free from the influence of the Romanised ‘church’.   They kept Shabbat and much of Torah, but the christian community we were part of, under-stated this truth; they were still projecting modern christian anti-torah bias back onto these people.  

After a few centuries Celtic believers (and the Anglo-Saxons who joined them) were bullied and threatened about many of these things because they were at odds with Rome who “earnestly warned them not to imagine that their little community, isolated at the uttermost ends of the earth, had a monopoly of wisdom over all the….churches of the world”.  They resisted the pressure to submit to Rome for a few more centuries, though they tried to accommodate the differences.  Generally they kept themselves to themselves.  Eventually at the synod of Whitby in 664, this Torah friendly pocket of believers who understood themselves to be: “we are Your folk, the nation of Elohim and the people of Elohim” (The Celtic Church in Britain - Leslie Hardinge p157) submitted to Romanism and lost the treasure of Torah.

We have seen and known of many who have sought to undo the Whitby mistake through much intercession without success.  The reason for their failure I now see clearly.  These people didn’t/don’t see that Torah was the core loss and it was not that we had lost just another flavour or expression of the faith.

This year Nathan and Grant, who we met about two years ago, are calling a gathering at Whitby on Yom Kippur to pray T’shuvah / turning back from this key moment when we let go of Torah for the sake of unity with a big bully.  I believe this time, those interceding will have understood what is needed to break this curse off Britain!  If you see the need to turn back to Torah and understand how the past effects the present perhaps you would like to be involved with this initiative to whatever degree?  Please ask me and I’ll send a copy of their letter.  I may also be able to help point those who are interested in the subject generally in the right direction.  

In Yeshua HaDerech

His Beauty is Our Beauty

Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!   Psa 133;1

And let the beauty of Adonai Eloheynu be upon us: and establish the work of our hands upon us; yes, 

establish the work of our hands.  Psa 90;17

 The same word; נָּעִים - נֹעַם is translated as pleasant and as beauty.  

Romans chapters nine to eleven are about the reunion of the two houses of Israel.  Romans chapter twelve leads us then deeper into that Beauty-Pleasantness with the seven types of people who only find their true place together; a reflection of The Maker's face on earth. 

Seven types; compared to parts of the body, these teach dependancy for unity (Beauty and Pleasantness).  He has not put all of His abilities/attributes into each of us but spread them out; none with the monopoly.  For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same “function”.   (Please note this is not Paul’s list of Jobs/Ministries which any of us may be called to do at one time or another.  Nor is it Paul’s list of tools of the Ruach we may all learn to use.  Instead it is “who we are”.)  

Some are elevated in certain cultures or circles and some despised, but all have their place and the goal is to have each part working as one.  As in the cursed-creation, there are some more prey-like and some are predator-like which will only find the Isaiah 11-peace in the restoration.

This unity is not possible while ignorance of these differences remain.  Where ambition and fear rule there will be no beauty.  

Therefore, I beseech you brethren, that you present yourselves sacrificially.........Romans 12;1

To deny the differences is to surely persecute the differences. 

To perpetuate the domination of certain “types” of people who think they have a monopoly on truth and understanding will mean more trouble and ugliness inevitably.  In this ignorance we either project our own weaknesses onto others or presume we understand when we don’t.  Like at the tower of Babel we would be left in confusion repeating the same old “church” or “business” traditions and patterns, alienating members of our own body.  

Most don’t yet know that Romans chapter twelve lists the seven gifts (verses 6-8), then their strengths (9-15) and then their potential weaknesses (16-21).  This revelation gives us the wisdom to partly explain and deal with the tensions that exist between us.  This is a key placed in the right spot to bring good fruit in our Nation and in our families.  

“For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function”...............differences. 

There are differences that exist in the body of messiah.  The unity of that body is hindered by those who “think of themselves more highly than they ought”.   Instead if we each think ourselves “with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of trust YHWH has distributed to each of us”, we will see the “behold how beautiful it is when brethren dwell together in heavenly unity”.

It has been tradition for those trying to be the “body of messiah” to make frankensteins.   Parts of the body missing or deformed.  It is as if “self-harm” has been decreed up till now as part of the curses for not listening and doing YHWH’s torah.  When the enemy comes to us, we flee in seven different directions.  The disunity is when a “group” dominates, even with the best intensions, from ignorance of these seven differences Paul is teaching us. 

1 Corinthians 12;15   If the foot says, “Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body”; is it therefore not of the body?

Exodus 34;6-7  And YHWH passed by before him, and proclaimed, YHWH, YHWH El merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, till the third and to the fourth generation.

• YHWH-Yireh —  ....will Provide (Genesis 22:13–14)
• YHWH-Rapha —  ....that Heals (Exodus 15:26)
• YHWH-Niss"i — ....our Banner (Exodus 17:8–15)
• YHWH-Shalom — ....our Peace (Judges 6:24)
• YHWH-Ro'i — ....my Shepherd (Psalm 23)
• YHWH-Tsidkenu — ....our Righteousness (Jeremiah 23:6)

• YHWH-Shammah — ....is Present (Ezekiel 48:35)

The beauty of the living Elohim is in the perfect tension between All His Attributes.   

May that beauty be upon us!