Late last year I completed Torah Club Volume 2 : Shadows of the Messiah, available from First Fruits of Zion. It is a once a week study of the Torah ( first 5 books of the Bible ) that goes for a year, and will probably reveal more in that time than you have known your entire Christian life. It also has an option to purchase an audio package, but since I did not get it this will focus solely on the written materials.
Well, unless you’ve been one for less than a year. Don’t screw with me okay, it’s been a long day for me!
First off, I should qualify that I am not a full fledged gung-ho Messianic Christian. Let’s just say for simplicities sake that I am a garden variety evangelical, with a good dose of Hebraic Roots blended in. It’s unfortunate that I need to even state my defense, but such is always the case whenever this subject comes up.
So what is the gist of this package? For a year you will read through the Torah and for possible the first time you will see what Jesus meant when he said “search the scriptures” to find him. He was talking about the Old Testament, but few of us have ever understood that reality. We instead think he must have been referring to Paul somehow.
Is Jesus in the Torah like he said, or is it just symbolic hypothesis that is read into the text? I was amazed at just how much of him is there. The story of Messiah is not some idea that began two thousand years ago, it begins at day one.
Torah Club is not your typical Bible study. You will read thorough old sages, some who have amazing insight, and some who I must admit are just plain fruitcakes. The study makes it clear that the old Jewish sages offer interesting historical insight, but to be sure to take their views no further.
There can be some difficulty for the average Christian in the sense that many names can be confusing. Jesus is Yeshua, Moses is Moshe, etc. It doesn’t take long to get up to speed, but the first-comer might wonder who the writer is talking about. Yet at the same time, there’s no harm in knowing the proper pronunciation either!
In a modern church that has all but purged Jesus of his Jewishness, we have more or less fulfilled the Genesis story of Joseph, where we have made our master so “Egyptian” that his own brothers, Israel, do not recognize him anymore as one of their own. He’s now a blue eyed European, and in what is becoming all too common, he now resembles a North American social activist. Shame on us.
Doing Torah Club does not mean that you must become part of some Christian fringe group. But it does mean you may have to put long held beliefs to the test. Currently I am involved in Volume 3, and will post a review in November when it is complete. Thus far, it is very promising!
I give this 4.5 Feathers out of 5. Do yourself a favor, and get this Bible study that has teeth!
No comments:
Post a Comment