Rick Warren, one of the nation’s most prominent pastors, told Fox News he is extremely concerned about recent attempts in the media to deify President Obama. He was especially disturbed comments made by comedian Jamie Foxx who called the president “our Lord and Savior.”
“That sent shivers up my spine,” said Warren. “There’s a word for that – it’s called blasphemy. It’s wrong.”
Instances of the president being portrayed as a Christ-like figure have increased since the Democratic National Convention – where unauthorized street vendors sold Obama prayer garments and posters that proclaimed him to be “prophecy fulfilled.”
A painting of the president portrayed as the Crucified Christ is on exhibit at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston. The artwork shows Obama with outstretched arms – a crown of thorns on his head.
But one of the more egregious instances of deification came during last week’s Soul Train Awards.
“It’s like church over here,” Foxx told the audience. “First of all, give an honor to God and our Lord and Savior Barack Obama.”
Warren, the pastor of Saddleback Church in southern California, said the deification of any individual is simply wrong.
“That’s called creating an idol,” he said. “Idolatry is forbidden by the first two commandments of the Ten Commandments.
He said individuals who do put their faith in President Obama “are going to be severely disappointed.”
“Think about all the promises that were made four years ago,” Warren said. “None of them were fulfilled.”
Those people are going to be severely disappointed.
If you put your hope in an individual – think about all the promises that were made four years ago. None of them were fulfilled.
He said that President Obama promised to unite the nation – and would bring about hope and change.
“It’s more divided now than it’s ever been,” Warren said. “That’s disappointing.”
“Any human leader – conservative or liberal – is going to disappoint you at some point,” he added. “You’ve got to put your hope in things that never change.”[1]
**********************************************************************************************************************************
The Third Foundation is that He is not physical. This means to believe that the One whom we have mentioned is not a body and His powers are not physical. The concepts of physical bodies such as movement, rest, or existence in a particular place cannot be applied to Him. Such things cannot be part of His nature nor can they happen to Him. Therefore the Sages of blessed memory stated that the concepts of combination and separation do not apply to Him and they said, "Above there is no sitting nor standing, no separation nor combination... The prophet says, "To whom can you compare Me? To what am I equal? Says the Holy One." (Yeshaya [Isaiah] 40:25) If He would be a physical body He would be comparable to physical bodies.
In all places where the Holy Scriptures speak of Him in physical terms, as walking, standing, sitting, speaking and anything similar, it is always metaphorical, as our Sages of blessed memory said, "The Torah speaks in the language of men". Our sages have discussed this issue at length.
This third foundation is referred to when [the Torah] says, "For you did not see any form" (Devarim [Deuteronomy] 4:15), in other words, you did not perceive him as being an entity with a form because, as we mentioned, He is not physical and His power is not physical. [2]
Are Christians of today idol worshipers?
The Trinity and Deity of Jesus:
What the Bible Really Teaches
By John of AllFaith © 04.20.12
Let's discuss this on his Blog!
Questioner: llewellyn
Private: No
Subject: Godhead
Question: Because Jews now accepted Christ, do they also accept the TRINITY formulated by Roman Catholic Church. What is your view of Jesus Christ and the Godhead?
Hi Llewellyn,
Clarification: The vast majority of Jews today as in the past do not "accept Christ." Most continue to reject the claims of Y'shua (Jesus) being Messiah for the same reasons they always have -- of course, all of the original talmidim ("disciples") were Jewish. These reasons by the way are biblically solid. They are based on the fact that he has not (yet at least) fulfilled the most critical prophetic requirements of that office (as Messianics we simply disagree with our non-Messianic Jewish kin on these matters). More than that however, the continuing Jewish rejection of Y'shua's claims is based on what the Nicene Christian Church teaches about him and much of what they have done (and continue to do) in his name. No Torah observant Jew could possibly accept the Jesus of Nicene Christianity, in part because of their anti-Torah trinity doctrine.
Understand that the vast majority of people now calling themselves "Messianic Jews" are not really Jews at all (Revelation 2:9, 3:9)! They are Nicene Christian Gentiles (i.e. non-Jews who embrace the Nicene Creed of the Catholic Church -- as almost every Christian denomination and sect does -- including "Jews for Jesus" and similar "Messianic Christians" -- You can read the Nicene Creed HERE if interested to see why this document must be rejected by those who accept the teachings of Torah.
Rav John directly warns about such people "who claim to be Jews but are not" at Revelation 2:9, 15 and 3:9. Its a serious offense against the elect of God.
Becoming Jewish (Messianic or otherwise) requires formal conversion into Judaism by a Jewish beit din and the embrace of the essential Jewish doctrine: The absolute Oneness of God as declared in the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4). Like all Torah observant Jews, authentic Messianic Jews reject the Trinity doctrine, the deity of Rebbe Y'shua and/or any other created being, and several other key doctrines created by the Romans in the 3rd and 4th centuries (following their destruction of the Holy Temple in 70 CE).
The Bible is clear on these points: Rebbe Y'shua (Torah teacher Jesus) was the first created being (Colossians 1:12-15) -- God was never created.
Rebbe Y'shua is "one" with the Torah or "Word" of God (John 1:1) not with God in a literal sense -- Everything he taught and did was in complete harmony with Torah (John 5:19).
Rebbe Y'shua is our elder brother (Hebrew 2:11) -- God is our Father (Matthew 6:9, note that he says "Our father" not "your father" or "Myself who is in Heaven").
All who are Torah observant are in this sense "one" with God (Hebrew 2:11) because they are in agreement with Torah (the Word) and Torah reveals the Mind of God. Torah is not God (John 1:1).
Rebbe Y'shua prayed for God's anointing on his followers that his talmidim (students) would be one with him (Y'shua) in the same way that he is one with the Father (John 17:22) -- Clearly Rebbe Y'shua was not praying that his talmidim would become gods!
Rav Paul clarifies this point concisely when he tells Timothy:
"For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (King James Version of I Timothy 2:5)
Rebbe Y'shua himself states:
John 10:29 My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand.
John 14:28 Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.
There are many many such Scriptures in the New Testament where he declare that God is greater, wiser, possesses more knowledge (Mark 13:32) etc. Rebbe Y'shua always submits his will to the superior Will of God (or in more Jewish terms, he always chooses yetzer tov over yetzer ra) and he prayed that this would be equally true of those who embrace his reforms (John 17:11-23).
Rebbe Y'shua lived on earth as a fully Torah observant Jew. He said that not a single yod would every be removed from Torah. So what does Torah say on this subject?
Deuteronomy 6:4 "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one [echad] LORD:"
The God of Israel and the Bible is "echad," a word that means "one and only" "one and there is no other" despite how some Nicene Christians are trying twist its meaning. What does it mean that God is One?
Prophet Isaiah quotes the One God as saying:
Isaiah_43:11 I, even I, am the LORD; and beside me there is no saviour.
There is NO ONE equal to, independent of nor empowered as, HaShem, the God of Israel as even the name Y'shua means: "Salvation is of Yah."
GOD alone saves. He does this through various means according to His purposes.
In the Bible Ba'al worship is frequently and thoroughly rejected for the Jews and other followers of biblical religion. Ba'al worship is essentially the belief in a godhead that is divisible and that manifests as separate gods (known as ba'als or "masters"), each controlling various aspects of existence as demigods or devas as they are known in India. This is widely known. For instance:
"Ba'al" can refer to any god and even to human officials; in some texts it is used as a substitute for Hadad, a god of the rain, thunder, fertility and agriculture, and the lord of Heaven. Since only priests were allowed to utter his divine name, Hadad, Ba'al was commonly used. Nevertheless, few if any Biblical uses of "Ba'al" refer to Hadad, the lord over the assembly of gods on the holy mount of Heaven, but rather refer to any number of local spirit-deities worshipped as cult images, each called Ba'al and regarded in the Hebrew Bible in that context as a "false god" (Source)
THE revelation of Abraham was and is that there is only One God, Eternal and Indivisible.
Abraham's own father produced ba'als for worship, but HaShem revealed to the patriarch of our people the singularly important truth that God is echad, that God is indivisibly One. The Nicene trinity doctrine and the doctrine of the deity of Y'shua created in the 3rd and 4th centuries CE by a group of non-Jewish Roman bishops denies this fundamental revelation of God, this foundational declaration of biblical and Jewish religion.
No one who accepts this teaching can accurately be considered religiously Jewish.[3] http://allfaith.com/Religions/Noahide/trinity.html
No comments:
Post a Comment