A Scripture-centered teaching on Yeshua as the Messiah and Son of God, examining Acts 2, the Trinity, the Nicene Creed, Nicaea, and the first-century gospel proclaimed by the apostles.
What did the apostles actually preach about Yeshua, Yahweh, and the gospel?
In this teaching, we return to the first-century witness of Scripture—especially Acts 2—to examine the identity of Yeshua as the Messiah, the Son of the living God. We also look at the later historical development of the Trinity, the Nicene Creed, and the difference between apostolic faith and fourth-century doctrine.
Rather than beginning with later creeds or councils, this message asks a simple question: what did Peter and the apostles make central when they proclaimed the gospel?
Living Well in Babylon: In Jeremiah 29, God told the exiles in Babylon to build lives: marry, have children, plant gardens, and seek the peace of the city—not to withdraw or stir rebellion. That same wisdom applies today: while we wait for Yeshua’s return (we have signs, not times), we’re called to live faithfully, be productive, and represent God well in the world.
How did the apostle Paul preach Jesus (Yeshua) as the Messiah to Gentiles who had no knowledge of the Torah or the prophets?
In this in‑depth Bible teaching, we explore how the Messiah is revealed throughout the Old Testament, long before the New Testament existed. Paul and the apostles proclaimed the gospel using Genesis, the Psalms, Deuteronomy, and the Prophets, proving that Yeshua is God’s anointed servant‑king promised from the beginning.
This teaching covers:
Why first‑century Gentiles did not understand the concept of a Messiah
How Paul preached the gospel without a New Testament
The true biblical meaning of Messiah (Mashiach) and Christ (Christos)
Why Scripture repeatedly refers to God’s “anointed one”
How Moses, David, Saul, and the prophets foreshadowed the ultimate Messiah
The relationship between Yahweh, the Messiah, and divine authority
Why repentance and accepting the Messiah cannot be separated
Why you cannot fully understand Jesus without the Old Testament
This message restores the Hebrew foundation of faith and demonstrates that the Messiah is not hidden in Scripture—He is revealed everywhere once you know how to read the Bible as one unified story.
If you have ever wondered whether you can truly preach Jesus from the Torah, this teaching provides a clear, scriptural answer.
Your Identity in Messiah. Explaining your identity in the Messiah and how you are connected to the God of Abraham. This video explains the absolute basic tenet of early Christianity while dispelling the doctrines that say gentiles replace Israel or the notion that Christianity was some brand new religion with a brand new God.
Christian Rituals: We must examine ourselves before taking the bread and wine. Take a step back and examine what just happened with Easter Sunday. Look at the rituals and match them against what the Bible really says to do. Did your Easter services mention anything about examining yourselves? Did you take the bread and wine?
Yeshua aka Jesus was saying things the audience already knew in Matthew 24. For instance, the abomination of desolation and the great tribulation were things that had already happened once! Click here for a deeper understanding of events to come!
Yeshua aka Jesus was saying a lot of things the audience already knew about in Matthew 24. The abomination of desolation had already happened once, for instance. Click here for a deeper understanding! pic.twitter.com/mi9ERBAIIa
The continuity of scripture: Genesis to Revelation. The big draw.
Slide 1 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. (Heb 13:8)
I spoke about predestination and free will on Shabbat. This existential topic is so intertwined into our lives. How we receive information is based both on how we were made by Yahweh and how we’ve been raised. We make decisions in life with both of these invisible forces directing traffic. We’re going to go where God wants. He knows how we will choose based on how we’re wired and He knows how to present information so that it is received they way He wants, when He wants.
When I started looking into religion, challenging the doctrines I had been taught growing up, and exposed to through our culture, I had some hard decisions to make. It was clear as a bell that Sunday, Christmas, Easter, and the Trinity were not to be found in scripture. It was also very easy to find out when these things became mandatory. The switch to Sunday starts in about 110AD with the Epistle of Barnabas. Christmas first shows up as a Christian holiday about 355 AD. Prior to that, it was part of Saturnalia. Easter is and ancient holiday to a pagan fertility goddess. We know that the first Christians continued to keep Passover from Paul’s letters and from Polycarp in the second century, who was a disciple of John. The Trinity became a mandate in the late 300s or early 400s as the first Nicene Creed circa 325AD was effectively a Binitarian document at best.
The reason I bring up these four specific doctrines is because they effectively define mainstream Christianity. And they are new. Not new to the New Testament, they came after the New Testament, which means they weren’t part of the faith once delivered to the saints. This means they are contrary to the verse on the screen. By accepting these doctrines as truth, we are accepting that the Messiah can change, which is a different gospel.
Nearly 25 years ago, when I started this walk, I started by reading the New Testament and looking specifically for a change from the Sabbath to Sunday. Because I knew that the Sabbath was on Saturday (Friday sunset to Sunday sunset). Somewhere in my youth I was taught that, or perhaps I just knew it from society. But I was certain the change was in the New Testament. And if it were there, then I’d keep Sunday and continue on with my life. Somehow, though, I knew that either the NT had to record the change or there was no change. I was not looking for the other three doctrines at all. But I knew the faith had to be continuous. Either the worship continued the way it was articulated in the Old Testament (based on my very rudimentary understanding of the OT at the time) or there was no change. Was this belief because God made me that way, because I was raised in America where changes in law have to be documented, because of the Holy Spirit, or form some combination of these things? I do not know. But what I did know then is that the faith has to be continuous or else we don’t know what to believe.
Nowhere in the Bible does it say the Sabbath was either annulled or moved to another day. Nowhere in the Bible does it say to observe Easter or Christmas. Nowhere in the Bible does it mandate we believe in a 3 in one god that nobody can even explain. Those things were added after the close of scripture. If we accept that the four biggest things a person has to believe come from men, and can change, then how do we know when to believe some other mandatory change? And what about the people in the New Testament? None of them believed in any of these doctrines of men. Are they lost because they didn’t accept them?
Obviously, we are much better off if we simply stop kicking against the goads and accept that, from Genesis to Revelation, Yeshua is the same. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
The true outline of prophetical events from the first century until today is profound and very easy to learn. The resurrection of the dead is a key to these truths which were held dear by the first century Christians.
Yeshua told us exactly what we are supposed to do to remember Him. We know it, so let’s get together and do it. His command to remember Him by washing each other’s feet and sharing the bread and wine the night before Passover is also tied into today’s message. This is a big apologetic on why we do what we do.
We are commemorating the death and resurrection of Yeshua, the Messiah, the Son of God. While it’s easy to think this is the end of the road, it’s not. It is the single most important event in history, everything before looking to it and everything after looking from it. Imagine in your head an hourglass on it’s side. Yeshua’s death on the cross is the middle point. Everything from Creation flows to that point in time and everything since flows out of it. Sometimes we have to give credit where credit is due and this is the case with the numbering of years on our Gregorian calendar. Today is March 19, in the year of our Lord 2023. It’s been roughly 2023 years since Yeshua was born. Granted, this distinction doesn’t really exist in the faith once delivered, where it is actually the year 5783, and if they were to begin counting, they should have counted from His death, not His birth, but even with all those caveats, I still like the idea of realizing a starting point/finishing point with the coming of the Messiah. Because that’s literally true. And it’s not CE, the “common era”. That’s just a cop out to try and divorce our calendar from Christianity. If one was to consider a “common era”, it would have to be from the printing press or from some much more modern time. There’s nothing common about the Messiah. In fact, He’s very specific and very holy, the opposite of common. But I digress.
The reason I’m on this tangent is because accepting Yeshua as the Messiah, the Son of God, who died so that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life, is the most important piece of information available since His death. We really did enter a new era when He was crucified, resurrected, and ascended to the right hand of God. In the first century, one of the biggest doctrinal disputes, if not the biggest doctrinal dispute, was the resurrection of the dead.
Slide 2 But perceiving that one group were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, Paul began crying out in the Council, “Brethren, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees; I am on trial for the hope and resurrection of the dead!” As he said this, there occurred a dissension between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and the assembly was divided. For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, nor an angel, nor a spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all. And there occurred a great uproar; and some of the scribes of the Pharisaic party stood up and began to argue heatedly, saying, “We find nothing wrong with this man; suppose a spirit or an angel has spoken to him?” And as a great dissension was developing, the commander was afraid Paul would be torn to pieces by them and ordered the troops to go down and take him away from them by force, and bring him into the barracks. But on the night immediately following, the Lord stood at his side and said, “Take courage; for as you have solemnly witnessed to My cause at Jerusalem, so you must witness at Rome also.” (Act 23:6-11)
Understand that the Jews were more upset about the resurrection being a thing than they were about Paul preaching Yeshua. It’s astonishing to think of, but once Paul made it about the resurrection of the dead, the Pharisees took his side. Paul was a Pharisee himself when he had papers to persecute the Church of Yahweh. But Yeshua being the Messiah, the Son of God, took a backseat to there being a resurrection of the dead. Next month, when we observe the night Yeshua was betrayed and the Spring Holy Days, we will be commemorating just that – that Yeshua was resurrected from the dead. And that’s a key for what is to come later.
Slide 3 Now if Messiah is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Messiah has been raised; and if Messiah has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Messiah, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Messiah has been raised; and if Messiah has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. (1Co 15:12-17)
1st Corinthians 15 is the resurrection chapter. Most of what I am talking about today is summed up in that chapter, which is a remarkably concise and clear outline of what is next to happen in prophecy. This is all founded on the resurrection of the dead, which means that dead people are literally dead, without life, unconscious, and awaiting one of two resurrections. Those two resurrections are separated by 1000 years referred to as “the millennium”.
Slide 4 “Now at that time Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be rescued. Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt.” (Dan 12:1-2)
But now Messiah has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep. For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Messiah all will be made alive. But each in his own order: Messiah the first fruits, after that those who are Messiah’s at His coming, then comes the end, when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority and power. (1Co 15:20-24)
“Do not marvel at this; for an hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment.” (Joh 5:28-29)
I started this with Daniel to show that the resurrection, and the outline of what’s to come, is not all that new to the New Testament. Yeshua is effectively citing Daniel in John 5: 28-29 and Paul is providing more detail. Ezekiel gives the most graphic information about the resurrection, too. This outline was common knowledge to the Pharisees and because central to first century Christianity. Of course we believe in the resurrection of the dead because our Messiah was resurrected from the dead! At some point, though, mainstream Christianity deviated from this and has a very confused look at what is to come. The pagan belief that dead people are alive somewhere else has overtaken a core doctrine of the early church. Instead of looking forward to a resurrection, Christians of almost all denominations talk about dead people as if they are in heaven, hell, or in some sort of third option yet still conscious. But if we just read 1 Cor 15, and other places, we know the truth. And next month we will commemorate the truth.
Slide 5 The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were completed. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who has a part in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Messiah and will reign with Him for a thousand years. (Rev 20:5-6)
Revelation 20 is the place to look for the timing. This is where we learn about the millennium. Today I’m encouraging you to listen and then go read these chapters for yourselves. 1 Corinthians 15, Revelation 20 and the one I’m going to talk about next, Ezekiel 37 and 38. Putting these together shows us the time frame and the details about what’s next in the history of mankind. In fact, this shows us what is next all the way until the end of this era and the beginning of eternity. Which is the first resurrection when Yeshua returns, a 1000 year period of time where mankind gets a break from Satan, who is locked up for the 1000 years, and then the second resurrection, which is called the resurrection of judgment. The second resurrection is where all of mankind who did not get resurrected in the first resurrection are judged, which means decided upon. Some are found written in the book of life, others are not. And at the end of that is when we enter into eternity.
Slide 6 When the thousand years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison, and will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together for the war; the number of them is like the sand of the seashore. And they came up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, and fire came down from heaven and devoured them. (Rev 20:7-9)
And the word of YHVH came to me saying, “Son of man, set your face toward Gog of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him and say, ‘Thus says the YHVH Elohim, “Behold, I am against you, O Gog, prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal. (Eze 38:1-3)
This is showing is the timing of the second resurrection. This goes against the grain of most of Christianity as well, but Ezekiel 37, the chapter prior, talks about the first resurrection then Ezekiel 38 talks about the second, where this great final war, Gog and Magog, are to take place. It’s the end of the 1000 years, at least 1000 years and 1 day from now, when this battle takes place. After Satan is released from being imprisoned for 1000 years, he will go out to deceive the nations again. Unfortunately, many will follow that deceiver and pay the ultimate penalty.
Slide 7 The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has given concerning His Son. And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life. (1Jn 5:10-12)
Brothers and sisters, this knowledge I am talking about today is the knowledge that leads to life – eternal life. That we know the Son, and have accepted Him as the Son of Yahweh, so we have the opportunity to enter into life, a resurrection of life. And for a special few, some will not even need to be resurrected but will rise to meet Him in the air when He returns. As you listen to these messages, and read them, and they hopefully inspire you to search the scriptures to see if they are true, understand this is not knowledge for the sake of knowledge. It’s the knowledge of the plan of salvation laid out at the foundation of the world. That plan relies heavily in the resurrection of the dead, something we will commemorate again this year, as we do each year. And you’re invited to join us.
For those who desire proof Jesus is the Messiah, the destruction of the second temple provides ample. The leaders in Judea at the time of Christ were looking for someone to free them from the Roman occupation. They were looking for a messiah like Judas Maccabeus, who led the successful revolt against the Greeks. The Maccabees were successful in repelling the pagans and restoring Judea. The leaders in the time of Yeshua, aka Jesus, were looking for the same thing. This is why the disciples were constantly ready to fight for Him, because they could not comprehend a different outcome.
The prophecy of the ultimate Messiah, Jesus aka Yeshua, given by Daniel, included the phrase “desolations are determined”. This mean that the true Messiah was quoting Daniel when He foretold the destruction of the temple at Matthew 24 and other places. In fact, this phrase is why they ultimately killed Him, defying even the prophecy they sought to be fulfilled.
Fully understanding the fall of the Temple and the events that led to it helps us to understand our faith better. This message identifies the four key factions in the first century working to remove Rome and their idiosyncracies. This knowledge helps us to build confidence in who Jesus aka Yeshua really was. This detailed message about the fall of the second Temple ties in relevant scriptures to Daniel 9 and provides proof Jesus is the Messiah. I recommend watching this one because the notes below are pretty rough.
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