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155 | Do Christians Need to Obey Old Testament Law?
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Salvation is found through faith in Jesus Christ alone—a truth that stands in contrast to a growing movement in the West of “Torah Observant Christians” who argue that Gentile believers must follow Old Testament laws to secure salvation. Phylicia, however, emphasizes a key distinction: while Jewish Christians may observe these laws as part of their cultural heritage and historical connection, such practices are not necessary for salvation. ————————————————
Mentioned in this episode
⭐️ Understanding the Old Testament Course: https://phyliciamasonheimer.com/product/understanding-the-old-testament-course/
⭐️ Freedom from Legalism Course: https://phyliciamasonheimer.com/product/freedom-from-legalism-course/
⭐️ Who the Son Sets Free | Galatians Bible Study: https://phyliciamasonheimer.com/product/galatians-bible-study/
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👩💻 Watch the entire Series on How to Discern False Teaching: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLybB3dkK5l8kNmt90OhxUDmJ0uoFQ5NXV
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Transcript
Jesus' Jewish Context and Teachings
00:00:00
Speaker
Jesus was Jewish and so understanding the Jewish context, the Jewish setting, how he fulfilled the Old Testament, how he was teaching the Old Testament is so important and vital.
00:00:11
Speaker
But we must be cautious if we start to say things about the gospel that Jesus did not say.
Introduction and Series Overview
00:00:23
Speaker
Hello friends and welcome back to Verity Podcast. I'm Felicia Masonheimer, your host, and we are in the middle of our series on ancient heresies, how they've been repackaged and brought to new light in modern times.
00:00:37
Speaker
I hope you've enjoyed this series. If you're new here, this is your first time watching or listening. Thank you for being here. You can head back a few episodes to the beginning of this series, or if you'd like to check out our Beginner Believer series, that one is also available, 20 episodes on the basics of Christian theology.
Judaizers and Torah Observance
00:00:54
Speaker
This week we're going to talk about a specific false teaching that is addressed in the book of Galatians and elsewhere. This is in Galatians called the Judaizers. So that's the name of the group that was um teaching this doctrine.
00:01:11
Speaker
And how we talk about this is is a little nuanced because the reason that this is so dangerous is because it teaches that Christians, so those who believe in Jesus Christ as their Savior, whether they are Jewish or non-Jewish, must follow the Old Testament Torah law to be fully saved. And so that would include what's taught in Leviticus, but then also observing the holidays, observing a Jewish Saturday Sabbath, and so on.
00:01:45
Speaker
This was being taught to the Galatian church and Paul confronts it in the book of Galatians. We're going to address that in a moment. But it is also rising today in something called the Torah observant movement.
00:01:56
Speaker
And the reason this is a nuanced conversation is because... If you are ethnically Jewish and you are a believer, I truly believe that the Old Testament law is your legacy. It is your privilege to participate in these holidays, to participate in the beautiful law that God gave to the nation of Israel.
00:02:20
Speaker
And when I'm talking about this, I am speaking to non-Jewish Christians. So i don't believe that any Christian is required to follow the Old Testament ceremonial, civil law, the festivals.
00:02:35
Speaker
don't believe we're required to do that. But I believe that if you are Jewish and you wish to celebrate and participate in these things um and you are a Messianic Jew, that I honor that and I want to respect that.
00:02:49
Speaker
So I want to make a distinction here between um requiring someone to observe the law, to observe the festivals, and participating in them of your own free will not to prove that you are a true Christian or that you are fully saved, um but simply out of joy or interest or your legacy as a Jewish believer.
00:03:17
Speaker
So that's the distinction that I want to make here. And even, you know, there are several Messianic Jewish teachers that I follow who would say the same thing, that if you are not Jewish, if you are Gentile like myself, I'm Polish and Swedish, you are not required to participate in the Old Testament festivals.
00:03:37
Speaker
But the Torah observant movement today is teaching something very different. And it is teaching that even Gentile Christians, um even Christians who are not Jewish, need to observe Old Testament law and particularly Old Testament Sabbaths and festivals in order to be fully participatory in God's salvation.
00:04:02
Speaker
And there's a lot there that we can't get into in this episode. Like, like where did this come from? And, you know, it has a lot of connections to dispensationalism and dispensationalism's um view of prophecy and the fulfillment of prophecy through the nation of Israel.
00:04:20
Speaker
That's connected to this. But there's also other movements and groups that are adjacent and and part of this too. So um It's not such a it's not a binary topic where we can just say it's cut and dried and super easy to understand.
00:04:34
Speaker
But for those who have been adjacent to or in the Torah observant movement, I have been um adjacent to it. I have been in studies that were similar to the Torah observant movement.
00:04:46
Speaker
What's really attractive about it is the context that it gives to the Old Testament.
Attraction to Jewish Traditions Among Evangelicals
00:04:53
Speaker
That's what's so helpful, so interesting. And I think for a lot of evangelical Christians, the Torah observant movement and, um you know, what Paul's talking about here, the Judaizers, the appeal um today, not in Galatians, but in today's time, is because many evangelical Christians have what I call a hole in their liturgy.
00:05:19
Speaker
So we generally, as evangelicals, don't celebrate the full range of Christian holidays. We do Christmas and Easter. Our services are what's called low church. So high church would be like Anglican, Catholic, Orthodox, very liturgical,
00:05:37
Speaker
um In low church is more what you see in the evangelical tradition. So in your Baptist Church of Christ, Church of God, Pentecostal, Ephraim, etc.
00:05:49
Speaker
And in low church tradition, not only do you not have the full range of church holidays observed, you also don't have as involved of a liturgy. We have some forms of it. You know, if you stand to read the Bible, that's a form of liturgy.
00:06:03
Speaker
um our worship services and how we do those, when the sermon starts, how you do communion. Those are all forms of liturgy, but they're much less formal. And a lot of times um evangelicals are also taught very little about church history.
00:06:19
Speaker
So they don't even know where their traditions come from or why they don't observe certain traditions. They don't know how their you know, denomination formed. Oftentimes they don't, they just don't know.
00:06:32
Speaker
And so because of all of this, when someone offers the idea of one, understanding the context of the Old Testament, it's like, yes, I need help with that.
00:06:42
Speaker
And then two says, and there are these holidays given to Israel, these festivals and these Sabbaths given to Israel. Those things are very attractive to someone who has that void in their liturgy. They don't have this rhythm of seasonal faith-based holidays. They don't have um a litury a strong sense of liturgy in their church environment.
00:07:08
Speaker
And so they get this like trifecta of, you know, understanding the Bible's context, the Jewish context of the Bible, understanding um they the holidays, having more rest and through Sabbath. And it's like, well, this is fantastic.
00:07:23
Speaker
But what often happens, and you if you talk to people who've come out of the Torah observant movement, they will tell you this. so What often happens is it starts with the holidays. It starts with mandating a Saturday Sabbath.
00:07:37
Speaker
And then now you can't eat pork. and and then And then you can't mix fibers. And then some people, I've seen this happen, completely walk away from Christianity and convert to Judaism.
00:07:50
Speaker
Because it is path that is, it can be very deceptive. And I want to be so careful how I talk about this because so often people, when I confront this ideology, people will accuse, accuse me of antisemitism. And that is not what's happening here.
00:08:11
Speaker
I am not being antisemitic. I said at the beginning that I honor the Jewish culture, legacy, and faith.
Paul's Teachings in Galatians
00:08:20
Speaker
And yet Christianity is not the same as Judaism.
00:08:27
Speaker
And the new covenant that was cut in Christ's blood as he observed at the Last Supper did something new. Now, the Old Testament did not pass away. It's not obsolete. It's not like we don't need it anymore. In fact, those of you who have followed me for any span of time, listen to this podcast for any span of time, know that I lead people through the whole Bible in a year. Every year we spend nine months in the Old Testament.
00:08:51
Speaker
And at the end of March, 2025, we're releasing an entire course on understanding the Old Testament. It's so vital and so important. But the problem is when we begin to go backwards.
00:09:05
Speaker
And especially as non-Jewish Christians, Gentiles, we begin to think in order to fully experience Christ, I must do these things.
00:09:17
Speaker
And what happens when we do that is now our salvation is ah no longer by faith and grace. Now there's works on top of it. And that's what Paul was confronting. So what I'm going to read to you now is the introduction to our Galatians study. This is Who the Sun Sets Free, Exploring the Freedom of Christ in Galatians.
00:09:34
Speaker
I'm going to read you part of the introduction passage that kind of sets the stage for what is happening. in the book of Galatians. During Paul's time in Galatia, he taught the true gospel, a salvation given by grace through faith.
00:09:46
Speaker
But in his absence, a new teaching took hold. Missionaries who arrived after Paul were known as Judaizers. Judaizers were Jewish Christians who desired all Christian converts, including Gentiles, to observe Jewish customs such as Saturday Sabbaths, festivals, and Torah law.
00:10:01
Speaker
They taught that salvation required faith in Jesus plus obedience to Jewish custom. Paul's letter comes against that teaching and answers the underlying question, how do I receive the favor and the acceptance of God?
00:10:14
Speaker
So as you're reading through this letter, you'll observe Paul breaking down the Judaizers' points and countering them with the truth of our acceptance in Christ Jesus. This provides a firm clarification of the gospel, holiness, and how to live as a Christian under the pressures of legalistic religion and a hedonistic world.
00:10:32
Speaker
So what we learn through this is that salvation is not accomplished through the works of the law, whether that's Jewish custom, personal good deeds, or cultural morals. Our salvation is accomplished through Jesus Christ alone.
00:10:45
Speaker
It is only through him.
Universal Message of the Gospel
00:10:47
Speaker
And Jesus was Jewish. And so understanding the Jewish context, the Jewish setting, how he fulfilled the Old Testament, how he was teaching the Old Testament is so important and vital.
00:10:59
Speaker
But we must be cautious if we start to say things about the gospel that Jesus did not say. And we know that the gospel was to go out into the world to all nations.
00:11:13
Speaker
And not all nations are going to observe gospel. the Jewish customs. And we have to ask, is in 2000 years of church history, were Christians missing out on the fullness of God because they didn't know that they needed to observe a Saturday Sabbath?
Sunday Worship Origins
00:11:32
Speaker
want to talk a little bit more about the Sabbath idea because one of the things, again, many evangelicals don't realize is the history of how Christians came to celebrate on Sunday.
00:11:45
Speaker
Now, in Torah observant circles, there's a lot of rewriting of of church history. And some of it's a reaction to abusive Catholicism, which is, I think, understandable.
00:12:00
Speaker
um And it's even a sensitivity to the persecution of the Catholic Church on the Jews. Again, understandable. At the same time, there are aspects of the early church of early church history that are easily discoverable that prove that early Christians were celebrating their lives.
00:12:23
Speaker
worship day on Sunday. Here is why. At the very beginning of the early church, it was predominantly Jewish. The apostles were Jewish. The Jerusalem church, predominantly Jewish.
00:12:35
Speaker
Acts 2 happens. So this is at Pentecost. Everyone has come um to the city, which is an opportunity for all of the Jews who'd been dispersed all around the nations to come back to the city.
00:12:49
Speaker
And that's when Peter preaches the gospel and 3000 people get saved. Well, those people leave from the festival as believers, they go back to their countries and then they are teaching people about Jesus.
00:13:00
Speaker
But the ones who came were most likely Jewish because they're coming specifically for that festival. Now, as the church grows, it begins to be more and more Gentile.
00:13:10
Speaker
more and more Greek. And especially this divide happened because the first persecutors of the Christians were the Jews. And so as this this split begins to happen, there there are more and more Gentile Christians coming into the church, and there are less and less Jewish Christians in the church. So it it swiftly becomes, by the second century, predominantly non-Jewish.
00:13:36
Speaker
Well, here's the problem. um Rome had certain protections in place for the Jews. They had worked out kind of ah an agreement, if you will, where the the Jews could have um their Sabbath.
00:13:52
Speaker
protected because they had all of their own markets. Everything in their society was built around the Sabbath. And so the Romans allowed this. And they thought at first that Christianity was just some subset of Judaism.
00:14:08
Speaker
When they saw that the Jews were persecuting the Christians, the Romans realized that the Christians were not actually Jews. Okay. They were a whole other type of thing.
00:14:20
Speaker
And what this then eventually led to was the persecution of Christians by Rome, because then they were seen as subversive and not under those same protections. But one significant thing about the Gentiles is that they did not have, because they're Greek, they did not have the protections over a specific day of the week. They did not have a day of the week that Rome honored as their their day of worship.
00:14:44
Speaker
So to gather together to worship, because most Gentile Christians were poor, they were slaves, they would have to get up either super early Sunday morning or they would gather super late at night after the Sabbath. So after Saturday night, so I mean midnight, Sunday night, um and or early 6 a.m. Sunday morning is when they would gather together.
00:15:09
Speaker
Now, there are a couple reasons for this. Some think that it started out, you know, where the Jews are celebrating, like the Christian Jews are celebrating um through the synagogue. They started in the synagogue and then they have their own worship that that would gather possibly after the Sabbath was over. So the Gentiles are joining in to those celebrations.
00:15:29
Speaker
um But Gentiles, the church becomes predominantly Gentile and moves away from the synagogue structure. Now they're gathering on the day of the Lord, which is the day that Jesus resurrected from the dead.
00:15:40
Speaker
That is Sunday. And so they gathered early in the morning to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, but also because it was the most convenient day time for them to gather, given the fact that they did not have a day off during the week.
00:15:55
Speaker
Now, as time goes on, progressively persecution begins. You know, that's another reason it was gathering in the night. um Sometimes they would gather down in the tombs or gather in private places.
00:16:06
Speaker
My point with sharing this story is that this history is often left out when Torah observant People are talking to Gentile Christians.
00:16:18
Speaker
They often say that Rome instituted the Sunday worship and it was actually the worship of ah of the um unconquerable sun, that it was a worship of a pagan god. And this is simply not true.
00:16:32
Speaker
This was developed by Christians to celebrate the resurrection of their Lord. It had nothing to do with the unconquerable son. And their worship of Jesus was authentic and real.
00:16:43
Speaker
And Gentiles had no other option because of the way their culture worked. And so this kind of history... helps to add context that's missing when people make statements like the Sabbath, you know, should be on Saturday, you should be celebrating it on Saturday.
00:17:02
Speaker
I want to read you a passage in Colossians. So this is not in Galatians, it's in Colossians, but it's addressing a similar issue. And here Paul is talking about how how people are putting Christians under a yoke that Christ has broken.
Paul's Teachings in Colossians
00:17:21
Speaker
Now, Christ breaking the yoke of the law is not because the yoke was bad. It served a purpose for its time. It pointed to Christ.
00:17:32
Speaker
It pointed to who he is. He is the fulfillment of all the festivals. He is the fulfillment of the Old Testament law and everything Jesus taught was was elevating the Old Testament law to its its heart and its spirit. And we never want to diminish the goodness and the grace that is found in the Old Testament.
00:17:52
Speaker
It's very important not to do this whole unhitch from the Old Testament kind of thing, what we call radical discontinuity, where the Old Testament is bad and the new is good. Jesus did not view it that way. It's not like God was different in the Old Testament and he's different in the new.
00:18:08
Speaker
That's not what's happening here. The Old Testament is good. The law is good. And yet when you're a Gentile Christian, here's what Paul says.
00:18:20
Speaker
and colossians too therefore just as you have received christ jesus as lord continue to walk In rooted and built up in him established in the faith as you were taught and overflowing with thankfulness see to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception which are based on human tradition and the spiritual forces of the world rather than on christ pause what he's talking about here is kind of a combination of multiple ideologies that were confronting the church.
00:18:49
Speaker
We've talked about some of these already. Gnosticism is one of them, um which philosophy, empty deception. And then he talks about human tradition, where he'd be mentioning the Judaizers. He's going to get into that in a second.
00:19:02
Speaker
And the spiritual forces of the world. So he's kind of addressing the whole gamut of false teachings that are going to come the way of these Christians, whether that's you know, the teachings of Plato or Gnostic teachings or the teachings of the Judaizers.
00:19:19
Speaker
For in Christ, all the fullness of the deity dwells in bodily form, and you have been made complete in Christ, who is the head over every ruler and authority. This is important. In him, you were also circumcised in the putting off of your sinful nature, with the circumcision performed by Christ and not by human hands.
00:19:37
Speaker
This is another thing that the Judaizers were requiring. They were saying, in order to be part of the covenant family of God, you must be circumcised, because this is our sign of the covenant passed down from Abraham. And... Paul's saying, no, you do not need to be physically circumcised because your heart is the thing that was cut with the blood of the covenant.
00:19:59
Speaker
Your heart has received Christ's blood, the new covenant, and because of his work, verse 12, you have been buried with him in baptism. You were raised with him through your faith in the power of God who raised him from the dead.
00:20:16
Speaker
When you were dead in your trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature. So he's making an equivalency there. Uncircumcision is your sinful nature. It's not a physical uncircumcision.
00:20:28
Speaker
God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our trespasses. Now here's conclusion.
00:20:37
Speaker
he took it away nailing it to the cross and having disarmed the powers and the authorities he made a public spectacle of them triumphing over them by the cross now here's his conclusion Therefore, so because of everything that I've just said, let no one judge you by what you eat or drink with regard to a feast, a new moon or a Sabbath.
00:21:00
Speaker
These are a shadow of the things to come, but the body that casts it belongs to Christ. Do not let anyone who delights in false humility or the worship of angels disqualify you with speculation about what he has seen.
00:21:14
Speaker
Such a person is puffed up without basis by his unspiritual mind. He has lost connection to the head, Jesus Christ, from whom the whole body, supported and knit together by its joints and ligaments, grows as God causes it to grow.
00:21:29
Speaker
And he goes on to say, if you have died with christ to the spiritual forces of the world why as though you still belong to the world do you submit to its regulations do not handle do not taste do not touch these will all perish with use because they are based on human commands and teachings such restrictions indeed have an appearance of wisdom with their self-rescribed worship their false humility their harsh treatment of the body but they are no value against the indulgence of the flesh So Colossians 2 is making this case that all of these ideologies, all these ideas that come to us and say, well, you aren't a truly complete Christian because you haven't done X, Y, and Z. You need to do just a little more to earn God's grace, to stay in his favor, are telling us a lie.
00:22:14
Speaker
And that whether that comes from New Age Gnosticism, whether that comes from having to sign a you know, do work to earn an indulgence to free someone from purgatory, whether that comes from someone saying you need to celebrate the Jewish festivals, all of it, if it is required to keep your favor with God, is diminishing the power of the gospel that is by faith and grace.
00:22:41
Speaker
Now, If out of our love for God, we want to celebrate the life of Christ. So maybe you would like to do that through following Jewish festivals out of the freedom you have.
00:22:54
Speaker
And that is something that will not damage your witness to the Jewish community. That is something to consider. I don't celebrate the Jewish festivals because I have secular Jewish friends, and it would be very offensive for a Christian um to do that. And I celebrate the life of Christ through the Lutheran church calendar.
00:23:15
Speaker
We are not Lutheran, but we follow the Lutheran church calendar. And we celebrate the life of Christ through the the church holidays that began during the early church. Whatever you're called to think carefully.
00:23:27
Speaker
Am I diminishing the gospel by believing what somebody taught me who said that I needed to observe these things in order to be truly saved?
00:23:38
Speaker
i I need to be observing a Saturday Sabbath. I need to observe Passover and I need to observe Pentecost in the Jewish way. This is
Celebrating Christ Through Traditions
00:23:48
Speaker
not required of Gentile Christians.
00:23:50
Speaker
It is not required. And we cannot say that it is. But we have been grafted into a beautiful promise through the Jewish Messiah who fulfilled the Old Testament law in himself and who has made it a beautiful reality that through his Holy Spirit in our hearts, we can walk out with freedom and authority.
Upcoming Courses and Episode Close
00:24:14
Speaker
If you would like to understand the Old Testament on a deeper level, March 28th through 31st, we are launching our Understanding the Old Testament new course. And this course, I'm so excited to launch. I'm co-teaching it with my friend Chad Bird from 1517.org. He's an incredible Bible scholar.
00:24:31
Speaker
We're going to go through all the genres of literature that are in the Old Testament, help you understand how to interpret and read it. These are mini courses. So during the launch, all of our courses will be $45.
00:24:42
Speaker
And after the launch, they will go up to $60. So if you'd like to be alerted to this, you can head to FeliciaMasonheimer.com. Click the news page. bar and under that you'll find a spot to put in your email and you'll receive notifications when we launch this course.
00:24:59
Speaker
You can also follow me on social media. I'm Felicia Masonheimer on Instagram. You can also follow every woman at Theologian there and we will announce it there as well. Our Freedom from Legalism course is also launching that same weekend. So if you want to learn more about walking by grace and faith instead of under the burden of extra rules, that is a great course as well.
00:25:20
Speaker
As always, thank you for joining me listening to this episode. know we only touched on a little bit of this topic, but if you'd like to learn more about it, you can grab Who the Sun Sets Free, our Bible study on Galatians, at feliciamasonheimer.com under books.