Daniel C. Juster, Th. D., Restoration from Zion of Tikkun International
We are dealing with a significant problem in theology. Much of the theology is being given to believers by preaching media stars and church leaders who I would call low information preachers. They may have charisma and can hold a crowd well, but they say outlandish and heretical things. One of the most glaring examples of this are the statements by some claiming that the “Old Testament” no longer applies to us or is irrelevant for New Covenant Christians. One preacher even said that he put a sword through the Old Testament to be free from it. The error is even more glaring in the light of the numerous statements in the New Testament on the authority and value of the Hebrew Bible. One has to ask if these preachers ever had one course helping them to understand the Hebrew Bible and its application to the New Covenant era. I doubt it. Of course, understanding a national constitution in the Torah and the ritual system of the Tabernacle is much more challenging than the love chapter, I Cor. 13. Yet these writings can be understood and applied. It is important to do so.
From Matthew 5 :17, 18 we read, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter or the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear form the Law until everything is accomplished.”
Then Yeshua goes on in the rest of the chapter to show how the Torah is applied in the New Covenant.
Paul in speaking of the Hebrew Scriptures tell us in II Tim. 3:16, 17 that it is all “God breathed,” and is profitable for doctrine, reproof and for training in righteousness.”
In Romans he tells in 15:4 that the Hebrew Bible was written to “teach us so that through endurance and encouragement of the Scriptures, we might have hope.” In 16:26 we read that what has been revealed to us now has been “made known by the prophetic writings by the eternal command of God so that all nations might believe in him.”
Peter echoes this and says that the Scriptures came not by the will of mean, but men spoke as they were carried along by the Spirit. (II Peter 1:20)
And we can go on and on. We really can not understand the New Testaement without the Hebrew Scriptures. Indeed, so much of the New Testament is interpretation and re-application of the Hebrew Bible. So much of God’s plan for world redemption and peace is in the Hebrew Bible. And when the Apostles were teaching, there was no New Testament. They relied on the Hebrew Bible.
The false teachings called Marcionism, were condemned in the early centuries of Church History. It is time to call out these false teachers and restore the authority of the Hebrew Bible.