It is time for us to get out of slavery and return to YHVH!

It is almost time to celebrate the Passover. The Passover commemorates YHVH’s redemption of His people from slavery in Egypt. Every year when we tell the story of the Exodus, we tell our own story as well; a story of redemption from sin, through the blood of our Passover, Y’shua our Messiah. Do you have such a redemption story to tell? If not, read on and we will show you that you too can choose freedom and life. You also can become free from the burden of sin and experience your own personal exodus.

Some of us may have experienced this freedom but have slipped back and became part of the “nations” again. YHVH calls us to be set apart, for He is set apart. We are to return to Him…

Did you know that you as a believer in the God of Israel are to celebrate this feast? Do you know that if you call yourself a child of God, a believer in the Messiah Y’shua (Jesus) that you are to celebrate ALL the Biblical feasts? Did you know that you are a part of Israel, YHVH’s chosen people? To understand why YOU are also part of Israel, please read “Who is Israel and why you would want to be a part of Israel”

This post is to encourage those who have found YHVH’s way and to warn those who have not yet found His way or have fallen away. There is still time. We are in distress, but it is nothing compared to what is to come upon us. We can still return to YHVH…

Now that you know that you too are a part of Israel, read on to see what YHVH has to say about you and to you.

Scattered among the nations

Before we continue, consider your life and consider the world around you. A world where evil is being called good and good evil. Unwanted unborn babies are being killed; children can by law be euthanized in some countries, same with the elderly, sickly and depressed. Murder has become acceptable, even legislated. Is this good or evil? People say it’s good; they are alleviating the suffering or financial burden of others…really. The Bible says it’s murder. That is just one example, there are many others. What YHVH calls an abomination is being called good and is accepted even by believing individuals. Sodomy and bestiality is on the increase; to be a pedophile will become a lifestyle choice, and it is said that children are not affected by molestation. How absolutely ridiculous!!! I can go on and on…We have lost our way; this was prophesied long ago…

Just before Moses died, he prophesied to Israel. This prophecy came from YHVH and when we read through this passage, and the passages quoted hereafter, we see ourselves. YHVH knew His people would lose their way and do what the nations do. He also told them how He would call them to return to Him. He explained it in Leviticus 26 (we shall go into that later).

We are His people; we are Israel, and we have lost our way. We have been scattered among the nations, lost in our idolatry. Money, status, convenience and ourselves have become more important than YHVH. We have forgotten the covenant of YHVH.

Please read this passage and carefully consider what YHVH is saying here through Moses.

Deuteronomy 4:23–40
²³ “So watch yourselves, that you do not forget the covenant of YHVH your Elohim which He made with you, and make for yourselves a graven image in the form of anything against which YHVH your Elohim has commanded you. ²⁴ “For YHVH your Elohim is a consuming fire, a jealous Elohim. ²⁵ “When you become the father of children and children’s children and have remained long in the land, and act corruptly, and make an idol in the form of anything, and do that which is evil in the sight of YHVH your Elohim so as to provoke Him to anger, ²⁶ I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will surely perish quickly from the land where you are going over the Jordan to possess it. You shall not live long on it, but will be utterly destroyed. ²⁷ “YHVH will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where YHVH drives you. ²⁸ “There you will serve gods, the work of man’s hands, wood and stone, which neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell. ²⁹ “But from there you will seek YHVH your Elohim, and you will find Him if you search for Him with all your heart and all your soul. ³⁰ “When you are in distress and all these things have come upon you, in the latter days you will return to YHVH your Elohim and listen to His voice. ³¹ “For YHVH your Elohim is a compassionate Elohim; He will not fail you nor destroy you nor forget the covenant with your fathers which He swore to them. ³² “Indeed, ask now concerning the former days which were before you, since the day that Elohim created man on the earth, and inquire from one end of the heavens to the other. Has anything been done like this great thing, or has anything been heard like it? ³³ “Has any people heard the voice of Elohim speaking from the midst of the fire, as you have heard it, and survived? ³⁴ “Or has a god tried to go to take for himself a nation from within another nation by trials, by signs and wonders and by war and by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm and by great terrors, as YHVH your Elohim did for you in Egypt before your eyes? ³⁵ “To you it was shown that you might know that YHVH, He is Elohim; there is no other besides Him. ³⁶ “Out of the heavens He let you hear His voice to discipline you; and on earth He let you see His great fire, and you heard His words from the midst of the fire. ³⁷ “Because He loved your fathers, therefore He chose their descendants after them. And He personally brought you from Egypt by His great power, ³⁸ driving out from before you nations greater and mightier than you, to bring you in and to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is today. ³⁹ “Know therefore today, and take it to your heart, that YHVH, He is Elohim in heaven above and on the earth below; there is no other. ⁴⁰ “So you shall keep His statutes and His commandments which I am giving you today, that it may go well with you and with your children after you, and that you may live long on the land which YHVH your Elohim is giving you for all time.”

What would have prevented this scattering among the nations? YHVH said here that if we keep His statutes and His commandments, it would go well with us and with our children, if we don’t we will eventually be scattered and become part of the nations. We, including our ancestors have not obeyed, we have been unfaithful to YHVH’s covenant. For this reason, we are scattered all over the world, and we are experiencing the curses.

The curses of Leviticus 26 and the Sabbatical cycles

So, what does it mean to be experiencing the curses? Leviticus 26 describes the falling away from YHVH and the result it would have. YHVH has chosen Israel, and He will not allow them to become like the other nations without putting measures in place to get them to return to Him. This is like a loving father punishing his child to get him to walk on the right path. These punishments are the curses described in Leviticus 26.

In the first part of Leviticus 26 (Lev 26:1-13)the blessings for obedience are described, and if you read through it carefully, you will see that we as a nation are not living under those blessings. However, when you read from Leviticus 26:14-33 you get a more familiar picture. Every one of these curses runs in accordance to the Sabbatical year cycle. The phrase “seven times” refer to the seven years of each sabbatical cycle. Every seven years a new curse is added to the preceding curse/curses. We have seen and are seeing the first curse, the curse of terror; we are seeing the second curse, the curse of drought, famine, natural disasters; we are seeing the third curse, the curse of pestilence and plaques all over the world. The next curse is war and thereafter captivity. If you would like to understand these curses and how the cycle works, please read “If you will not return to Me.” In this post, we show you in more detail how YHVH warns his people that if they disobey, He will use certain measures to call them to return to Him.

However, it is also prophesied that from here, we will seek YHVH and we will find Him if we search for Him with all our heart and all our soul. This will happen when we are in distress…

Restoration

Deuteronomy 30:1–14
¹ “So it shall be when all of these things have come upon you, the blessing and the curse which I have set before you, and you call them to mind in all nations where YHVH your Elohim has banished you, ² and you return to YHVH your Elohim and obey Him with all your heart and soul according to all that I command you today, you and your sons, ³ then YHVH your Elohim will restore you from captivity, and have compassion on you, and will gather you again from all the peoples where YHVH your Elohim has scattered you. ⁴ “If your outcasts are at the ends of the earth, from there YHVH your Elohim will gather you, and from there He will bring you back. ⁵ “YHVH your Elohim will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed, and you shall possess it; and He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers. ⁶ “Moreover YHVH your Elohim will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love YHVH your Elohim with all your heart and with all your soul, so that you may live. ⁷ “YHVH your Elohim will inflict all these curses on your enemies and on those who hate you, who persecuted you. ⁸ “And you shall again obey YHVH and observe all His commandments which I command you today. ⁹ “Then YHVH your Elohim will prosper you abundantly in all the work of your hand, in the offspring of your body and in the offspring of your cattle and in the produce of your ground, for YHVH will again rejoice over you for good, just as He rejoiced over your fathers; ¹⁰ if you obey YHVH your Elohim to keep His commandments and His statutes which are written in this book of the law, if you turn to YHVH your Elohim with all your heart and soul. ¹¹ “For this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach. ¹² “It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up to heaven for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?’ ¹³ “Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross the sea for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?’ ¹⁴ “But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.

We see this return described in a few other places as well.

2 Chronicles 15:4
⁴ “But in their distress they turned to YHVH Elohim of Israel, and they sought Him, and He let them find Him.

Jeremiah 29:13–14
¹³ ‘You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. ¹⁴ ‘I will be found by you,’ declares YHVH, ‘and I will restore your fortunes and will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you,’ declares YHVH, ‘and I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile.’

We are scattered in the nations, but YHVH has shown us who we are, and we are returning to Him. In returning to Him, we have learned that we are to be obedient to Him. We are to keep His commandments. A spiritual return precedes a physical return. It can be likened to the Exodus from Egypt, Egypt being symbolic of slavery to sin. We see this spiritual return happing all over the world. People are being awakened to their Hebrew roots and understanding that the “we can do anything for we are under grace doctrine” is a wrong one. We realized that YHVH is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow, He did not change His mind about His instructions when He sent Y’shua to redeem us from our sins. Y’shua also kept the commandments and taught us to do the same. He did not come to abolish, but to fulfill.

Matthew 5:17–19
¹⁷ “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. ¹⁸ “For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. ¹⁹ “Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Has this been changed or will this change?

The commandments kept after Y’shua’s return

There are many Scriptures that show us that the commandments will be kept after Y’shua’s return. Think about Ezekiel 40-45, Isaiah 56 and Revelation.

Isaiah 56:6–8
⁶ “Also the foreigners who join themselves to YHVH, To minister to Him, and to love the name of YHVH, To be His servants, every one who keeps from profaning the sabbath And holds fast My covenant; ⁷ Even those I will bring to My holy mountain And make them joyful in My house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on My altar; For My house will be called a house of prayer for all the peoples.” ⁸ YHVH Elohim, who gathers the dispersed of Israel, declares, “Yet others I will gather to them, to those already gathered.”

What is the context?

In the book of Revelation, the saints are described as those who keep the commandments of Elohim and their faith in Y’shua.

Revelation 14:12
¹² Here is the perseverance of the saints who keep the commandments of Elohim and their faith in Y’shua.

From this we learn that the commandments will be kept, including the seventh day sabbath, after the return of Y’shua Messiah. As you see from this, YHVH did not change His mind about what He expects of us. It is still the same.

Conclusion

In this study, we have emphasized the prophecy that was given through Moses just before he died. We have learned that this prophecy is applicable to us too because we are, as believers in Y’shua Messiah part of YHVH’s chosen people Israel. However, as it was prophesied, we have lost our way and have fallen into idolatry. Many things have become more important than YHVH, money, status, convenience, and ourselves to name but a few. That is idolatry! We have been scattered all over the world as a result of this, and we have become as the nations. We have lost our way and our identity. We are living lives of lawlessness.

Nevertheless, YHVH warns us that if we turn away from Him, He will put measures in place to get us to return to Him; this is the cycle of curses described in Leviticus 26. We are currently living under these curses. YHVH also said that we would, when we are in this sad state remember the covenant with Him and return to Him. He will then restore us to Him. We will choose obedience to Him and live according to His instructions. This is a spiritual return and when this happens, the curses would be broken and we will eventually be a part of Israel being gathered back to the land.

However, if we choose to reject YHVH, He will remove our name from the book of life, and we will be a part of the nations being judged at the end.

Luke 13:24–29
²⁴ “Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. ²⁵ “Once the head of the house gets up and shuts the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock on the door, saying, ‘Master, open up to us!’ then He will answer and say to you, ‘I do not know where you are from.’ ²⁶ “Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught in our streets’; ²⁷ and He will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you are from; depart from Me, all you evildoers.’ ²⁸ “In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of Elohim, but yourselves being thrown out. ²⁹ “And they will come from east and west and from north and south, and will recline at the table in the kingdom of Elohim.

The choice is yours, you can return to YHVH and be obedient to Him or you can choose to continue your life in lawlessness. It really is that easy…

Please be encouraged, it is not too late to return to YHVH, there is still time…

Isaiah 55:6
⁶ Seek YHVH while He may be found; Call upon Him while He is near.

Make your own personal exodus from slavery this Passover and return to the God of Israel and experience His blessings. May you be blessed as you read this!

References

1. All quoted passages are from the New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995. We have substituted YHVH for LORD and Y’shua for Jesus.
2. Martin, J. A. (1985). Isaiah. In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures (Vol. 1, p. 1112). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.