Shabbat shalom kol beit Yisra'el and Mishpachah and welcome back to the second part of this series of teachings entitled, Ancient Connections. I pray you have had time to reflect on what we discussed last week and that you are ready to move on!

Last sabbath we started making connections between the phronema (the mind of the Messianic Community), the Davar or Word (the operational power of Yahweh) and what it means to have the Chayim or Life of Messiah within us. We are seeing the importance of connecting to all the true qodeshim (saints, set-apart ones) who are an intimate part of our eternal future as a kind of allegorical bride. To accomplish this we need to know the Name of Elohim (God), not the correct pronunciation, but the Father's true character, and to distinguish that from all the various counterfeits. We made a short case study of Augustine to learn how Gnosticism has infilitrated Christian and Messianic thinking to create a number of false phronema's. We have been stressing again the importance of doing accurate history because in all these areas of potential or actual controversy we have to connect to reality, not fantasy.

We have been looking at hierarchies of scriptural authority, the danger of having a 'canon within a canon' such as elevating Pauline theology above the Gospels, and proving that such hierarchies existed theologically especially in the first century AD koinonia or messianic fellowship. Indeed, the Tanakh (Old Testament) was the only recognised Scripture during the first century though what would later become the Messianic Scriptures (New Testament) had already acquired an important secondary status. Re-establishing these hierarchies is the only way we can safetly do theology and accurately establish doctrine within the context of what various words, concepts and ideas meant in the first century.

Because we are insistant upon doing accurate history, we now know what "Word" meant, and it wasn't primarily written Scripture even though that was regarded as a manifestation or expression of the power of Yahweh in action - His chayim (life). We know from the commentaries of the time that the sages were expecting a Divine Messiah - in other words, that the Christ would be Elohim (God) and that He was Yahweh in a secondary sense, the 'Lesser Yahweh', subject to the Heavenly Father, or the 'Greater Yahweh'.

We know that for the first five centuries of the Messianic Community (Church) the majority of its leaders believed in and taught Universal Salvation and we can trace historically how other positions came to compete with it later, including determinism, eternal punishment in fire, and extermination by fire (annihilationism). We know how the eternal torture doctrine party gained control politically in Rome and came to totally dominate Christian thought and that it was sporadically opposed by the annihilationists, and how this tension created a good cop/bad cop scenario to create even more confusion in the Body of Messiah.

We know that the first century Judeans believed in eternal marriage which is almost certainly why Yah'shua (Jesus) used the allegory of our relationship to Him being like marriage, both because marriage is the most intimate relationship there is between human beings and the fact that when it is Messiah-centered it lasts forever. And all of these things, and more, create what may be termed a Divine Story in which we play a vitally important part, no rôle being insignificant or unimportant because every participant carries this living drama forward to its Grand Conclusion.

Before we get into what I said we would be talking about this week, it's important that we keep all of these things 'in view' - before our eyes - so that we don't unconsciously slip back into old ways of thinking and lose the force of this restored emet (truth). One of the big tasks that faces us is restoring a proper perspective of Scripture and to do that we need to be regularly reminded of just what sacred literature is for. You'd be surprised just how many ways people 'view' sacred writing and how differently people use them in different traditions, not all of which are necessarily valid. The Bible is unique in the annals of religious literature because its writing was a cooperative project between man and Elohim (God), as it contains a mixture of fallible man and infallible Elohim (God).

We must never forget that every author in the Bible had a point-of-view because as humans we all of us look at things in particular ways. Anyone, for instance, who has made a serious study of the Gospels will know that the apostle John is a very different kind of person to Matthew, Mark and Luke. The Gospel Story is written in a totally different way to the others because the target audience was a totally different group of people to those the Synoptists had in mind.

Both the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts were written by Luke for only one person, a man called "the most excellent Theophilus" (Lk.1:3; Ac.1:1), a man holding a highly respected position in society - perhaps a high Roman official (cp. Ac.23:26; 24:2; 26:25) or a wealthy patron who financed the publication of Luke's writings - who himself not only wanted a detailed account of the rise of the Besorah (Gospel) but had particular questions of his own. One thing is clear about Luke the author - he was a highly accurate and orderly historian. It may well be, given how abruptly Luke's account in Acts ends with 28th chapter that Luke meant to continue the account in a 'Luke Part 3' book, or that he actually completed it and it has become lost. A 29th chapter does, in fact, exist, purporting to tell the story Paul's continuing journeys in Spain and Britain, but we can't be sure if it's genuine or not. You will in any case remember, I hope, how the Book of Jonah abruptly ended like Book of Acts, and the remarks I made about that in that series of sermons.

As far as Scripture is concerned, my point is this: human beings look at things in particular ways and from particular angles. The Book of Acts reflects the disciplined mind of a 1st century scientist, which Luke was, being a physician, as you know. The writings of Paul reflect a completely different mind and character, a distinguished scholar, scriptorian, polyglot (multilinguist) and one who intimately knew about cultures other than his own. Peter was a sinmple fisherman, a down-to-earth sort of person, and that is reflected in his two letters and the accounts we have of him in the Gospels and in Acts.

To 'do Scripture' and to do it well, and above all to do it accurately, you have to understand how language works, because we all view and interpret the world around us slightly differently, as we have seen with the four evangelists. A space-traveller, a politician, an historian, and a fisherman will all focus on different 'levels' in the same event. One will focus on the physical actions, one on the repercussions of the actions, one on the significance of the actions (perceived or imagined), and one not detect anything special at all. Moreover, the language used to describe these things from the different perspectives and levels of interest will edify, annoy, amuse, evoke associations, create new possibilities of understanding, and so forth. No two people ever have an identical experience in reading literature, whether sacred or secular, beyond the general sense of a shared unity and encounter with the divine in the case that which has been authentically inspired by the Ruach (Spirit).

Here's the challenge. Religion as a private matter - a one-to-one thing between an individual and Elohim (God) - was an 18th century novelty thanks in large measure to the Reformation and Enlightenment, which we have also discussed. Prior to that the phronema, or the collective spirit, massively shaped human experience, and it's something we have never regained since. For good and ill, the Reformation was responsible for shattering this echadness or unity, with there being no clear demographic line between the two in countries like Germany, Holland and Ireland in particular. Today the Body of Messiah is shattered in a kaleidoscope of 30,000+ fragments, some very jagged, so what you have is thousands of 'phronema's' in a constant state of flux.

Believers are so lost. It's like the anchors have been cut loose and the ships of fellowship cannot find their harbour. There is an artificial, counterfeit phronema forming, led by the ever evolving, mutating Roman Catholic Church that seeks to cobble the pre-Reformation entity together again. It can never succeed because too much water has gone under the bridge. People have changed. Consciousness has changed. Knowledge has changed. And lawlessness has multiplied. All that remains now is for the Remnant to be supernaturally formed against, and separated fully from, the pig-swill as everything else is mixed together into an unholy, foul-smelling, lawless, New World Disorder, One World Religious brown porridge.

That there is, or will be, a separated Remnant is miraculous in itself. The natural entropy of the Old Creation Order tends to powerfully drag lawless people toward and into the pig swill. Danger comes each time we artifically add meaning to Scripture which isn't there by reading in, for example, the assumptions of a different century which the original author knew nothing about. How many times, for instance, have you read apocalyptic prophecy and mentally 'inserted' nuclear bombs, aeroplanes, helicopters and laser beams which were never there - and even if they had been, the navi (prophet) wouldn't have had a clue what he was seeing.

I remember when I was in my 20's gobbling up NASA engineer Josef Blumrich's sensationalist book called The Spaceships of Ezekiel. When it was published in 1974 amidst a great advertising campaign, I remember rushing out to buy it. The author was convinced that the vision of Elohim (God) and malakim (angels) seen by Ezekiel was, in fact, a spaceship. Remember, this was only 5 years after the first moon-landing in 1969. Here's my original copy which is in our library. There are some fasinating diagrams in it which I remember got me all excited at the time.

This was also the time when I was doing a lot of UFO research, including fieldwork, and wasn't sure what the phenomenon was. A year later a Chinese girl I gew up with in Malaysia gave me John Allan's book, The Gospel According to Science Fiction, which was one of the spiritual course corrections leading me to salvation which occurred to years later. Thank you Ysa! Anyway' to make his fascinating theory work, Blumrich had to twist classical Hebrew metaphor into something literal and modern. He took a prophetic book out of its historical context and tried to make it what it isn't. Flat-earthers do exactly the same thing and come up with a totally unreal perception of the world and the heavens. This is the thing: you must always allow a text to speak out of the author's own environment and not try to force your own world into it. Use this rule of thumb and you won't go far wrong.

I guarantee that a poet and an engineer will read their Bibles differently without the proper historical anchors. We also have to be careful not to fall into the trap of viewing Scripture as either a 100 per cent 'God's-eye view' or a 100 per cent 'man's-eye view'. It's both, combined. That's why the cosmology of the Bible is from the vantage point of a man on earth, not the vantage point of Elohim (God) or a 21th century astronaut in outer space and why flat-earthers get so muddled up. Furthermore, the phronema is, as we have seen, vitally important to a proper hermeneutic (interpretation). If you approach the Scriptures angry with Elohim (God) or believing He is an angry Being Himself (maybe because frustrating or terrible things have happened in your life), that hermeneutic will taint everything you read. But if you approach it from the Bible's own hermeneutic that "Elohim is ahavah/chesed/agapé" - "God is love" (1 Jn.4:8,16) - as the volume attests throughout, you will experience it entirely differently from the person who is angry or bitter. This immediately tells you that the Bible is not simply a science textbook containing theological 'facts' but that it actually has a very subjective element too. You can't study it only as you would a school text book, but at the same time you can't approach it only as a collection of poems either. It's actually a very sophisticated book, unlike any other in existence.

As I have been saying for several weeks now, you can't dissect the Bible as you would an animal in a Biology lab and expect it to remain alive because the text isn't - and never was intended to be - the main thing, no more than the physical parts of the body are the 'main thing' for a husband and a wife who love one another. They need their 'physical parts' just like we need the written Bible text but neither are the main thing. Indeed, the 'main thing' for both is love. Always. If you read the Bible with just this one truth uppermost in your mind - that Elohim (God) is love - you will eventually read and understand it as it was supposed to be read and seen, and know Yahweh as He wants to be known ... plus along the way you will get glimpses into the life energy and characters of the authors themselves. Like I said, Scripture is a partnership between Elohim (God) and those of His faithful servants who recorded it, each of whom was a unique personality, whose personality has coloured or flavoured the text itself as Yahweh intended it to.

All writing, both the inspired and uninspired, is the articulation of worldviews. Or to be more accurate, it is the telling of stories which bring worldviews into articulation. And in Scripture, as elsewhere, this is done in a variety of ways: though narrative, through poetry, through parable, through letters, and so on. Some of the books of the Bible are really big (like Isaiah), some are very small (like Titus or 3 John). Some are very theologically 'technical' (like Paul), others are love poems (like the Song of Solomon or Hosea). The thing to realise is this: Yahweh wants the whole soul engaged when you read His Word: your brain, your heart, your body, and your spirit - your will.

Which brings me back to the passage we were studying last time. Let me reflesh your memories as we recall Acts 2:42-47 in our search for a primary reference to the phronema of the first believers:

"And they (the qodeshim, saints, set-apart ones) continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart, praising Elohim (God) and having favour with all the people. And the Master added to the Messianic Community (Church) daily those who were being saved ('given chayim/life' - HRV)" (Acts 2:42-47, NKJV).

One thing that may perhaps have surprised you last week was reading about the spontaneity and and energy of the daily assemblies of those first believers. They lived the apostolic doctrine, they prayed, they freely shared their belongings (as there was need, under apostolic headship) and possessed a simplicity - a sincerity - of heart which was electric. The evidence of their salvation was the life that emerged from the combination all of these things reported here by Luke. Together they demonstrated that the believers had received an unmistakably unique and authentic, heavenly (not psychic) and very personal chayim (life) force that caused them to eat together in a way that people hadn't eaten before! No, this was not some new fantastic dish or recipe - this was ordinary food, the food of the era, the food of the ordinary man and woman. But the way they were experiencing Elohim (God) and each other was both ordinary but other-worldly too, as you would expect of two dimensions interesecting - of New Creation life crashing into the Old Creation world. The meal was very ordinary, yes, but also intensely real - both other-worldly and earthly, a foreshadowing of the resurrection world-to-come. Are you curious to learn what was going on?

How does a spiritual power transform a meal? Whatever this spiritual power or 'Word' was, it was also very physical which is, of course, entirely consistent with the whole Christian/Messianic philosophy - which is intensely anti-Gnostic which you will rermember is very anti this physical world. What we see happening is that in Messiah Yah'shua (Jesus) the physical and the spiritual - the earthly and the heavenly - come together in a new, permanent synthesis. Heaven and earth become echad or one.

Acts 2:42-47 mentions that the talmidim (disciples) were "steadfast...in breaking bread" and then expands further, explaining that they were "breaking bread from house to house". The expression 'to break bread' simply means to 'share a meal' - of itself it is not some code for a mystical sacrament or ordinance. Nevertheless, the regular sharing of meals is evidently very important here, more important than you may at first suspect. And no wonder, because the Master emphasised what we can call, if you like, 'sacred eating', which is something I want to introduce you to today but explore in greater depth next week. So today is by way of an 'appetiser'.

The meal spoken of in this passage of Scripture is what is called in Greek the deípnon or the main meal which, like our own supper time, was held in the latter part of the day in the Greco-Roman world, after work hours and often after sunset. OK, we need to get some terminology straightened out here to avoid confusion. You may be aware of the English word 'dinner' and may not know the difference between that and 'supper'. In the USA, 'supper' and 'dinner' are used interchangeably to refer to the evening meal. However, elsewhere 'dinner' is the midday meal or 'lunch' whereas only 'supper' is the evening meal. So to avoid confusion, I shall not be using the word 'dinner' as it's a more general word that does not specify the time of day. It comes from the Latin disjéjúnáre, like the French déjeuner meaning 'lunch', which literally means 'to break one's fast', like our English word 'breakfast'. Confusing, isn't it? That's why I keep on saying you must do linguistics in order to study Scripture accurately or you can make serious mistakes. The 'Last Supper' is an evening meal, coming from the French word for supper, souper. Oh, and in case you're curious, the English word 'soup' comes from the French word soupe, meaning a 'broth', which comes from the Vulgar Latin suppa (meaning bread soaked in broth), which was in turn borrowed from the Germans from their word, sop, which is a piece of bread used to soak up soup or a thick stew. I thought that might interest the chefs among you!

So here is a vitally important piece of historical information. When celebrated by Christians the deípnon, or evening, main meal of the Romans and Greeks, came to be renamed or known as the agapé meal or 'love feast' because it was an occasion for more than merely consuming food - it was also a spiritual act, a sacred time together, done in the Name of the Son of Elohim (God) - a sacred Name, the Name of Deity - the Name of the One who was fresh in their memories as the One who had risen from the dead and ascended into Heaven! So when the agapé meal came to be abused, Judah (or Jude as we better know him), the half-brother of Yah'shua (Jesus) and a leader in the Messianic Community (Church) had to issue this stern rebuke:

"These men are blemishes at your love (agapé) feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm - shepherds who feed only themselves" (Jude 12, NIV).

What happened? What was Jude so upset about? What were these false believers doing? They were immoral men perverting the grace of Elohim (God) (Jude 4). Specifically, they were teaching an early version of the old gnostic heresy, that came to full maturity in the 2nd century. Amongst other things they taught that being saved by grace gives a person thus saved the licence to sin since their sins would no longer be held against them. The presence of such false brethren at the tables of the qodeshim (saints, set-apart ones) is described as a "blemish" at their "love-feasts". What curious language to use - a "blemish", a "spot" or a "defect". What does that remind you of in the Mosaic system? Let me remind you of what the Torah says:

"When anyone brings from the herd or flock a fellowship offering to Yahweh to fulfill a special vow or as a freewill offering, it must be without defect or blemish to be acceptable" (Lev.22:21, NIV).

Jude is using the language of sacrifice in the Pentateuch! To believe, preach and live such blasphemous gnostic doctrine is likened to presenting a diseased or deformed animal as a sacrifice to Yahweh! Jude doesn't mince his words - listen to how he further describes these people:

"Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed for profit into Balaam's error; they have been destroyed in Korah's rebellion" (Jude 11, NIV).

You don't get much worse than Korah who was swallowed up into the ground for his rebellion!

"They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever" (Jude 13, NIV).

That's not the end of it. But what interests me is Jude's reaction to the polluting of the Agapé Feasts - it's almost as though these false believers had entered the Holy Place in the Temple and polluted the Sanctuary of Yahweh itself. That's how holy Jude views this Meal as being.

And their sin? They were lawless, Torah-disobedient, commandment-breaking men teaching that obedience is no longer a requirement because the presumed, liberal availability of hyper-grace excuses them, since the physical body means nothing to them. But the physical body absolutely means something to Yahweh, so much so that He sent His Son to die so that we might receive our physical bodies back again one day and return to a perfected physical world. And the Sacred Meal of the first believers - which is a physical act - has something to do with this.

Jude calls these proto-gnostic believers "dreamers" (Jude 8) because either they claimed to receive revelations or, more likely, I think, they were out of touch with the emet (truth) and with reality. We're not told exactly what kind of sexual immorality these people were indulging, but we know what their mind-set was: they were "scoffers" and in all likelihood were promoting and practicing the works of the destroyed cities of the valley (1 Cor.6:18), referred to as "selfish lusts", one of the great sins of our own time that is sweeping over our nations like a tsunami. Such people are not supposed to be anywhere near these 'love feasts' - indeed, they're not even supposed to be in fellowship. But these gentile congregations had become lax and liberal, and these perverts were corrupting them just as a blemished animal would have corrupted and rendered null-and-void a Mosaic sacrifice to Yahweh.

So this is what I want you to 'get' by way of an introduction to this subject. When at the very least believers eat together, consecrating their meal with prayer in the Name of the Saviour of the World, they are not only physically nourishing their own bodies but they are feeding each other spiritually - or ought to be - and drawing upon a heavenly power, the Ruach haQodesh (Holy Spirit). When we share a meal with a fellow Christian or Messianic, we're not just resupplying our depleted bodies with vital biochemicals at 'dinner' or 'supper', we are participating in something sacred - our physical eating is simultaneously, by being in right relationship with Messiah and invoking His Name, nourishing or feeding the spirits of those we are sharing a meal with. So something else is going on here that is more than biochemical, more than having a good time together - there's a sacred transference taking place. What does that mean? And what has this to do with what has come to be known in the Messianic Community (Church) as the 'Lord's' or 'Master's Supper', 'Holy Communion', the 'Eucharist' or the 'Sacrament'? Are the 'Lord's Supper' and 'Agapé Feast' the same or completely different things?

Well, this is something we need to explore in depth next week. We need understand why there is so much disagreement between the denominations over this subject, and appreciate why an understanding and implementation of this emet (truth) is vitally important for the restoration of the end-time Remnant, which is Messianic Israel, and for our own spiritual health. This meal is important. Indeed, it was so important to the first believers that they believed that there was no proper worship without it. So until next Sabbath, may Yahweh go with you and bless you. Amen.