As long as theological statements have been codified, the Torah
has been viewed against Grace. This phenomena has colored the
perception and understanding of many generations of people
regarding Torah. People who have seen the world through the
Christian worldview have, along with the many advantages, accepted
a distorted view of Torah. To them, the Torah is bad, the Gospel is
good. Gospel is life and freedom; Torah is seen as slavery and
death. With this view as their starting point, it would have been
impossible to avoid the inevitability of a negative view of the
Law.
With the birth of the Messianic movement, Jewish believers began to
have a new self-perception in which their Jewishness was something
good and positive and not something to be "saved from." Yet the
misperception of Torah persisted as that which was, at best, a
"schoolmaster to lead one to Christ" and, at worst, "the temptress
who seeks to seduce its victims from salvation by grace through the
lure of a salvation of works righteousness."
The real problem with the Torah is not the Torah but the human
misunderstanding of Scripture. The Torah was given by G-d at Mt.
Sinai. Yeshua was more than a latter born Moshe. He is the Word who
was in the Beginning, through whom the world was created. He is the
G-d of Israel, the G-d who gave the Torah to the sons of Israel
through the hand of Moshe. The commandments of the Torah are
Yeshua's commandments, not an arbitrary set of rules or rituals.
They are a revelation of the heart of G-d; they are a reflection of
Yeshua's heart. They cannot be understood to be G-d's lesser
commands. Yeshua's teachings do not permit such a view. Those who
wish to be more like Him must follow the Torah's teachings because
they are His very heart. This is the true meaning of the Torah as a
schoolmaster to lead us to Messiah. The Torah is not a divine
introduction service, arranging blind dates, after which its
usefulness is completed. It is a schoolmaster, a teacher -- to
guide and train us to become more like Him because this was how He
lived and what was in His heart.
The Torah is not a lesser revelation of Yeshua, like an uncompleted
puzzle. Simply attaching an addendum to a prayer or commandment
does not make it any more complete than it was prior to the
addendum. The mitzvah is already complete in that it reflects the
heart of Yeshua. When a mitzvah is completed as it was intended
when given, it reflects the heart of G-d. Our goal should not be to
amend every prayer, commandment, and ritual with Messianic
nomenclature. Rather, our goal should be to follow Torah, having
faith and a desire to connect with G-d through the act of
following. Surely, this was the life Yeshua lived and the life He
desires His people to live. Every act of observance is an
opportunity to connect with Him. He is the fullness of Torah. Our
lives should be so full.
