What is a proper Christian reaction to the Orlando tragedy?

The first time I remember it happening was on 911, then in the aftermath of Katrina, and now again on the heels of Orlando this so called reaction of these events being a punishment from YHWH. I expect the world to proclaim that YHWH is responsible for tragedy but for true Christians to proclaim these things is blasphemy. If you are simply religious then you are used to justifying your own hate and desires as being the will of YHWH but if you truly desire YHWHs will and life to abide within you then listen to the things I am about to show you.

First understand that death is a result of sin not a punishment for it…for the wages of sin is death. Second YHWH is no respecter of people and if you offend in one transgression of the law you have transgressed the law…for it is one word. Yeshua said I did not come to condemn men but to save men for they are already condemned.

In another place Yeshua asked those listening about a certain tower that fell and killed several people. His question was do you think these men were greater sinners than others; to which He said they were not.

People also like to point to Sodom and Gomora, but in truth YHWH came against these cities because they had given themselves over completely to sin and as such would have destroyed not only themselves but all around them. If they had listened to YHWHs messengers instead of trying to use them for their own desires they would have saved their cities just as YHWH had already told Abraham…if there are ten righteous men I will spare the city for their sakes.

YHWH is not a hypocrite: He does not do evil that good may come. YHWH does not lie and He has proclaimed that He so loved the world.  Through Paul YHWH has described love.

4Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, 5Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; 6Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; 7Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.1 Corinthians 13:4-7

The tragedy of those who were killed in Orlando is the act of a wicked man lost in a wicked world. A man who found his own wicked way and would not repent and place his faith in YHWH and His Messiah. The word wicked while associated with evil deeds is by definition twisted.

 His motive in this act was selfish whether he did this because of a personal temptation he did not morally ascent to or if he was trying to please a god of his own making. Consider Cain who was moved to murder his own brother because he desired to serve a god who would accept him on Cain’s own terms.   

YHWH hates sin because it destroys people and He loves people. Those who died left behind mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters and friends who have suffered a horrible loss. Can anyone believe that Yeshua would be anything but comforting and encouraging to those who are left behind?

Grace of God= works of God

But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.

For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.

 But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.

 If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.

My brethren, have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons. For if there come unto your assembly a man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel, and there come in also a poor man in vile raiment; And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool: Are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil thoughts?

 Hearken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him? But ye have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you, and draw you before the judgment seats? Do not they blaspheme that worthy name by the which ye are called?

 If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well: But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors.

 For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty.

For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath shewed no mercy; and mercy rejoiceth against judgment. What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?

Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. James 1: 22- 2:17

Paul has said much the same thing as James is here saying. Yeshua himself is often recorded as saying him who has ears to hear let him hear. This hearing is not about audible recognition nor is it about understanding of articulation. This hearing is about living out what has been said. To be clear it is not a call to do a thing but instead to become one who does those things as a natural flow from the life within us.

The religious challengers of Messiah where called hypocrites because they were trying to overcome the wicked life within them by acting correctly; Yeshua condemned their actions because in so doing they had made themselves their own makers. YHWH had clearly stated that He alone is our maker, that He alone would place His law in our hearts and minds; the same law which Moses witnessed was the way of life. The living word is the way the truth and the life and so only by becoming one with him in a marriage covenant and taking His name can a man be saved. All others are relegated to simply trying to act right.

For this reason Hosea said the just shall live by faith. Only YHWH’s life in us will give us life. We must repent of the dead works of our own attempts to possess life and place complete trust, dependence, and expectation in YHWY to live in us through His Messiah Yeshua. Only when we are one with Yeshua can our old man die in His cross and then our mortal bodies be given life through YHWH’s breathing His Spirit into us.

When the Father and the Son are living in us through the Spirit then we do by nature the things found in the Law as Paul has said in Romans. In parallel when we are dead in Messiah our old nature no longer dictates our actions. We must understand that what I have just described is the perfection or maturity we are being brought to. In our living we are mixed bags; at times or in certain situations we are trusting in self, or man, or religion, or even faith which is another way of saying we are not putting our complete trust in YHWH. Since YHWH has said He will share His glory with no flesh then when our faith is mixed it receives the same result as the unredeemed man’s trust in man (sin and death).

If we say we have no sin we are a liar and the Truth is not in us… but if we confess our sin He is faithful and just to forgive us. Yeshua is faithful because He trust YHWH to be our maker He is just because we are His spouse and have been made one with Him; both His death and His life.

With this ground work laid out Paul tells the Corinthians to examine themselves whether they be in the faith. James says to understand (hear) the word (Yeshua the living word of whom Moses witnessed to us.) but not have His life living through you is a dead faith. We at times deceive ourselves that we are right because we know what we should be and do. Instead of living in the freedom from sin and death being our life we settle to live in forgiveness alone. Paul referred to such an existence as making Messiah the minister of sin.

Amidst the listing of examples in which James points out the results of living faith in us he mentions an interesting phrase; “they that shall be judged by the law of liberty”. Paul spoke on this same thing when he spoke of the judgment seat of Messiah.

YHWH stands as the judge of the quick (living) and the dead. His very presence is life, light, and righteousness to such a degree that He is a consuming fire; consuming all death, darkness, and wickedness. It is by this fact that on the day that all men stand in His presence they will be judged.

Those who have His life in them by faith in Yeshua will have every work, motive, thought, and intent of their heart judged. Those which are of temporal earthly design (stone, sticks, and clay) shall be purged by fire from the foundation of Messiah’s life in us and those things which are everlasting shall be refined and purified.

The law of liberty is the life of YHWH in us making us one with His life. Making James point simply that if Messiah is living through you then your works will be what he works through you.    

Seeing the truth

 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
 Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.  Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.
Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. JAMES 1: 13-21
 

The world comes to a great many conclusions about why we find ourselves in bad circumstances and why our reaction is often to do what we know is wrong. We steal because we are poor, we kill because we were not cared for, we commit adultery because we were not given what we needed, and so the world says it is not our fault. It says it is our parents fault, our cultures fault, our environments fault, our situations fault, and ultimately concludes it is God’s fault.

James contradicts such nonsense with the truth that sin comes from our own lust and it is this lust within us that causes us to be tempted when situations arise. James and the other authors of the general epistles give us fundamental understandings that are the most vital if we are to ever understand how to live in the new covenant which Paul was used to give to us. Paul himself calls these authors, including James, “the pillars” at Jerusalem.

How can we fully understand Paul’s cry of wretched man that I am who will deliver me from this body of death?  If we do not first understand that James says our own lust makes temptation and when we give our self to it sin is conceived and matures into death then we will think Paul is so humble and pleasing to YHWH. We will go on to say of ourselves since we agree with Paul that we too are wretched then YHWH will also be pleased with us.

However Paul was not lifting himself up as an example of pious asceticism; but was saying we are only delivered through Yeshua YHWH’s Messiah who is our husband and master. James gives us this same basic understanding. Men are made of the earth and James is clear that no good or perfect gift has its source from the earth but instead it comes down from the Father.

All that a man can produce is deadly for though he may do good he also does evil. If I were to kill a man and then spend the rest of my days doing good for his household no amount of good would make up for my evil. If I take a glass and fill it ninety percent full of pure water and ten percent with poison it is all poison and not at all pure.

It is this that makes it necessary for our good and pure life to be only in Messiah who came down from the Father that we might be born new of His Spirit. All men have at some time been mad at themselves and others because of sin but that anger and any action it generates cannot make us or others righteous.  

The prophets of old by witnessing of Messiah have told us that man’s heart is deceitfully wicked and that there is a way that seems right to a man but ends in destruction. This leaves us with our only option to receive by faith the Fathers gift of being made one with Messiah. It is only by this that our old man is carried to his death in Yeshua’s cross and the Fathers life breathed into Messiah becomes our own life.

Faith and Temptation

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.
My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.
But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.
Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.
For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.
Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him. JAMES 1: 1-12
It is said that Martin Luther called the book of James the epistle of straw. Luther is not alone in his misunderstanding of James epistle for many have placed it in opposition to the epistles of Paul. The argument being that while Paul teaches a salvation of grace James teaches a salvation of works.


This is far from anything James has said and in fact both James and Paul's witness of the salvation delivered to believers is without contradiction. The fact that James brings is that as we walk in the faith of YHWH's life living through us by our joining to the messiah Yeshua our actions will reflect that change.
When we say that our faith and trust is in Yeshua it can mean a great many things; forgiveness, providence, wisdom, ability, or anything that may apply to our life and living. The scriptures show us plainly and even our own lives, when we are honest, show us that our trust and reliance is not always in YHWH. Our trust often lies in our self or our what we have come to accept as truth from family, friends, teachers, or ministers. These false trust manifest themselves in our lives through thoughts and actions that are not in line with Paul's proclamation that we are dead in Messiah and by the Spirit The Father's life is our life.
When the believer places faith in Messiah he gains an inheritance of being made one life with YHWH much like the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Joseph were given the promised land. Despite the fact that the land was a gift they could not earn it was necessary for them to possess that land. The strength and ability to possess the land was not present in those who obtained the inheritance but instead it was obtained by faith alone. This faith was not that they could overcome their enemies but instead that if they trusted YHWH, when they went out to battle, YHWH would defeat their enemies.
How often is the believer ready to accept a lesser portion? We easily come to the place where forgiveness, wisdom, or providence is enough. However our Father chastises those He loves.
Yeshua said "And no one, after drinking old wine, wants new, because he says, The old is better." For this very reason we often come into temptations that we are brought to a point of decision. Will we continue to trust our denominations, our education, our own understanding, or will we trust the Spirit of God to reveal by the witness of scripture and righteousness the faith that will make us as He is. we shall become as James has said perfect, entire, and wanting in nothing.
James also gives us the challenge of Elijah (how long will you sit on the fence serve YHWH or the imaginations of men), the wisdom of Messiah (no man can serve two masters without coming to love one and hate the other), and the encouragement of Hebrews (let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us).
Some in the church say if you have trials and temptations it is because your faith is not complete. Only our Messiah walked in perfect faith; the rest of us are being brought to the fullness of His faith. Instead of judging the faith being perfected in the brethren by YHWH through temptations instead judge yourself whether you are in the same working of faith if you have none.

Becoming a disciple of Messiah: the begining and the end

What are the basic principles of becoming and remaining a disciple of Messiah Yeshua? This is an important question for not only those being drawn to the Father, or the new believers, but also for us who have been in this covenant for years. As Paul has encouraged us as we were saved so shall we remain in Messiah.

 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us [our] sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:8-9

This statement of Messiah’s witness is the first place of understanding that both the saved and the unsaved must come to.

There is a difference between the sin and a sin. A sin is an act committed that is in opposition to the very nature of YHWH’s being (His life, Word, and will). The sin goes to the depths of a man’s heart.  It is the nature we have received from Adam which attempts to replace YHWH as our maker with a self-generated being. This is the sin of death; it is the root of all acts of sin. Mankind deceives himself into believing if he acts right God will be pleased with Him not realizing that the very idea that he can make himself right is an act of sin. “Thou shalt have no other God” (maker).

It is as we trust in Messiahs death as a place where our old man (of the self) dies that we are freed to trust YHWH living through us, one with us, making us righteous.

 I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Luke 13:3

 Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; Acts 3:19

To repent is to turn away. How many sincere believers have come to a hatred of their own ways only to find themselves in a life and death struggle to not do those things? It is this very state of being which Paul speaks on when he cries “wretched man that I am who will deliver me from this body of death”.

Our own ways, even if our intension is to do what pleases YHWH, must die. This death of the self willing itself to be formed is only found as we are joined to Messiah by covenant making the two to be one; for His death becomes our death. Messiah becomes the door of the sheep. His atoning death accomplished so much more than forgiveness of sins; it is the way we pass from the death of a self-willed existence into the life of YHWH’s Spirit living in us.  

I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am [he], ye shall die in your sins. John 8:24

He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. John 3:36

If Messiah becomes only a way that our failures are forgiven then we make Him a minister of sin instead of a minister of YHWH’s deliverance from death to life. The act of forgiveness from YHWH will not stop the hurt and death your sin causes in other people. Do we truly belief that YHWH’s purpose and will in striking His Son was to give his children free  license to sin. YHWH is no respecter of persons a believers sin is just as vile as an atheist.

 

And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Matthew 3:2

Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Acts 2:38

For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10:13

Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance: Matthew 3:8

The basic tenant of a disciple’s life according to Hebrews is repentance from dead works and faith toward YHWH. This is the answer to Pauls cry as he has said it is through Yeshua the Messiah of YHWH. Yeshua promised that if we put our faith in Him then He and the Father will live in us and be we will be one.

The idea that Yeshua is living in you to encourage you to do the right thing is a false way. Paul said it is no longer I but Messiah living in me. We must repent from our own works not try to change our works. However a coin with only one side is counterfeit; if our repentance is not joined simultaneously to our trust in YHWH to be our maker and do His will and work through us then it is of no use.

In conclusion the first step in being a disciple of Messiah is to repent of the self-made life of Adam while placing full trust, reliance, dependence, and expectation in YHWH’s Spirit to make you alive with the Fathers life.