A Critical Look at the International Alliance of Messianic Congregations

and Synagogues (IAMCS) Steering Committee Report

of False Accusations Against the Hebrew Roots Movement

 We, as Messianic leaders and teachers, have become increasingly concerned that there are a small number of individuals and groups today promoting the idea that the Torah is not valid in the lives of Believers in Messiah Yeshua [Jesus Christ]. These people, headed by the Steering Committee of the IAMCS, state that all Believers – Jewish and Gentile alike – ought not to walk as Messiah, by honoring the Torah, particularly the Shabbat, the Feasts of the LORD, and eating a Biblically kosher diet. This erroneous understanding of Scripture, which has been around since the fourth century, and the days of the Roman Emperor Constantine, is the subject of this paper. This doctrine promoted by the IAMCS leaders causes them to conclude that the Torah is only for the Jews and that Gentile obedience to the Torah is limited to the four commandments in Acts 15. This misunderstanding of the intent of the New Covenant, divides the body of Messiah into two factions, one obedient (to varying degrees) to the culture of the Torah, and one that is submitted to the Gentile world and its culture. Brothers of the IAMCS, this ought not to be!

The IAMCS leaders’ conclusion about their distinction between Messianic Jews and what is required of “Gentiles”, is reached by only reading the initial sentence of the Acts 15 council’s decision, and not the concluding statement. The Apostle James stated:

“Therefore it is my judgment that we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles, but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood. For Moses [Torah] from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath“ (Acts 15:19-21 NAS).

At the giving of this decree in Jerusalem, the Apostles never envisioned that the Gentiles would create a separate system of religion, known as the “Church”, which would nullify the commands of Torah, by declaring them “done away with in Christ”. James and the Elders believed that those who were coming to God, out of the nations, would attend the synagogues each week and to learn more about the Covenant God has with Israel. To attend the weekly Sabbath gatherings, with the disciples of Yeshua, would cause the non-Jew to join in the same worship services along with the Believing Jews. The two would become one in Messiah, not two separate and distinct people groups, but one body, with one expression of faith. There should only be one purpose, to preach the Gospel, and make disciples, to the Jew first and then to the Nations/Gentiles (Rom. 1:16).

If only the four above initial commandments apply to the Gentiles, does that mean the Gentiles are free from the rest of the Ten Commandments: “Thou shall not steal”, Thou shall not covet,” and Thou shall not bear false witness against your neighbor”? That would be ludicrous!  Who determines which of the Ten Commandments are universal for the fellowship of Believers? Is it man [the IAMCS] or God?

 It was never the intention of the Acts 15 council to create two approaches to the worship of the God of Israel, one for Jews and one for the Gentiles. They understood that “God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He also did to us; and He made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith” (Acts 15:8-9).

What defines a heart cleansed by faith? It would be the sign of the New Covenant spoken of by the prophet Jeremiah and confirmed in Hebrews 8:8.

“Behold, days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,” declares the LORD. “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the LORD, “I will put My law [Torah] within them, and on their heart I will write it, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people” (Jeremiah 31:31-33).

 The New Covenant is not entered into by a legalistic observance of Torah. No one has ever been saved by obedience to Torah. Our faith in the Messianic movement is grounded in the words of Messiah, the mediator of the New Covenant (Heb. 12:24):

“And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying,“This cup which is poured out for you is the new covenant in My blood” (Luke 22:20).

The brothers of the IAMCS, should not bear false witness against the brothers and sisters in the One Law, Hebraic Roots movement, by declaring they “advocate legalism” instead of salvation by faith. Such a statement is to accuse others of denying the blood of Messiah by which the New Covenant was sealed. This is a FALSE accusation. There is no law, or Torah observance by which man can be saved. It is only by the blood of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, that anyone, Jew or non-Jew, is reconciled to the Holy One of Israel.

Other SLANDEROUS and FALSE ACCUSATIONS asserted in the paper, “One Law, Two Sticks: A Critical Look at the Hebrew Roots Movement”, include erroneous assumptions that the One Law, Hebraic Roots movement believes the following:

• That “…the law wasn’t intended just for Israel, but for everyone.”
• That “…neither the coming of Messiah…changes anything…as the universal human need to relate to God through the laws of Moses.”
• “… that the true ‘Hebrew roots’…are found in the keeping of the laws of Moses…”
• Our “…mission…is to promote observance of the law as a means of restoring…”
• That “Followers of ‘One Law One People’ insist that everybody ought to be keeping the Torah.”
• “The question of Israel identity…is intimately intertwined with replacement theology.”
• In being an “advocate of legalism”
• That “…he who keeps the law given to Israel, therefore IS Israel.”
• That “One Law theology is…replacement theology.”
• That the origins of our faith are in “The Millerites”, “Adventists and Sabbatarianism”, Seventh Day Adventist Church”, “Sacred Namers”, “Herbert W. Armstrong”, “British/Anglo-Israelism”, “ Worldwide Church of God”, or “Two-House Movement”
• That “the modern miracle of the Jewish State is not something to be celebrated.”
• That Hebrew Roots people are “anti-Semitic”
• Our “ultimate goal…is replacing the Jewish people…”
• We are “a Gentile group which claims it has some kind of biblical right…to possess the ancient Jewish homeland…”
• “…that the only hope for the Gentile believers is to get out of the church…”
• “…that the Jews are either not descendants of Israel at all, or that Jews are a people who constitute just one tribe among Israel.”
• We are “opposed to the gospel of scripture…of forgiveness of sin, the Hebrew Roots message is a gospel of law; to wit, that man is to be reconciled unto God not by faith in God, but by keeping the Torah.”
• That “In Hebrew Roots, the message is that God is supposedly angry at the Gentile church…”
• That “God is… not as a loving and forgiving God, who gave His only Son to die for the sins of all people. But rather, an intolerant God, who rejects all Gentile cultures…a Gentile must become culturally Jewish in order to come into the fullness of a healthy relationship with God.”
• That our message is “…that the reason Messiah dies on the tree was not to deliver the Gentile from sin, but to deliver the Gentile from being a Gentile…”
• That “if one keeps Torah, then this verifies a person’s ‘chosen-ness’ and means, he or she is an Israelite. In this manner, the Jews are not Israel…”
• That “Hebrew Roots groups…have little to no interest in the Jewish people.”
• Our “…’vision’ is not for Jewish people to come to Messiah, but rather, to push Torah on Gentiles.”

The labels of “anti-Semitic”, “replacement theology”, and “legalism” should not be placed upon those who value the One Law/Hebrew Roots teachings. It would take the majority of Scripture to prove all the above false accusations of the Messianic Jewish IAMCS leadership against the One Law/One People, Hebraic Roots movement. Perhaps if they just took the opportunity to talk, face to face, with someone, they think they oppose, they would find that their case against them is based on false information.

One thing we can agree with, in the IAMCS paper, is that the LORD, Yahweh, is not interested in the Gospel being cloaked in a Gentile culture. The Gentile world view does not come from the Biblical root. The church did take a very wrong turn, in the fourth century and it is our desire to return to a Torah-based faith in Messiah, one that is rooted and grounded in Him and His teachings. We do not agree with Constantine and his creed. We will NEVER again, “…renounce all customs…unleavened breads and sacrifices of lambs of the Hebrews, and all the other feasts of the Hebrews, sacrifices, prayers, aspirations, purifications, sanctifications, and propitiations, and fasts and new moons, and Sabbaths… [Constantine’s Creed]. Never again!

Contrary to the views of the IAMCS, it is not obvious to all that the “roots of the biblical faith are Jewish”. Many non-Jewish Christians have accepted the 1700 year anti-Semitic deception of the Enemy, and they need to be taught the root of our faith. The Prophet Isaiah describes the Biblical Root, “And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD” (Isaiah 11:1-2).

It is especially important to teach that Messiah Yeshua is the Biblical root of the Messianic faith. It is most disturbing that some have fallen into the error of thinking that traditional Judaism is the Jewish root, and therefore have fallen away from faith in Messiah Yeshua. Stating that there is a “Jewish root”, without defining that root as Yeshua, causes confusion for those who are new to the Hebraic Roots/Messianic faith. Messiah Yeshua, as the Root of our faith, reaches farther back into history, before our father Abraham, and therefore, before there was the distinction of what is Jewish.“Jesus [Yeshua] said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). It is vital that the Body of Messiah know her Jewish Bridegroom as the Lion of Judah, and to know that He has existed as the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, as the Root of the Messianic faith (Rev. 5:6, 12, and Rev. 13:8).

What value is the Law [Torah] for all Believers in Messiah? Torah is the loving instructions of the Holy One of Israel to the redeemed body of Believers. Torah was not given for salvation, but for the redeemed community of faith. Torah is for sanctification, not salvation. To misinterpret the Torah is to take away from the jots and tittles of Scripture. “Blessed is the man that walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law [Torah] of the LORD; and in His law doth he meditate day and night.  And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper” (Ps. 1:1-3).

The Gospel is to reach the Jew first. Over the last 1700 years, the “Church” has ineffectively delivered the Gospel message in a way that a Jew could receive it. It is time for the Body of Messiah to wake up to the Covenant faithfulness of the God of Israel. If we continue in the error of the Constantine based Christianity, we will continue to nullify the effect of the New Covenant. Messiah Yeshua’s prayer was that we would be one:

“That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:  I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me,  and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me” (John 17:21-23).

The purpose of the Gospel of Messiah, among many things, is to save the lost, restore the broken, redeem the captive, and to make the two one, be they Jew or non-Jew, slave or master, male or female. We are to be One in Him, not two different groups of people, Jews and Gentiles, with two different approaches to worship. One people, with one manner, is the instruction of Torah. “One law shall be to him that is homeborn, and unto the stranger that sojourns among you” because God has “made no distinction” between the Jew and the non-Jew (Exodus 12:49 & Acts 15:9).

The purpose of this paper is to address the Steering Committee of the IAMCS and tell them they have not done due process, according to Matthew 18. These men have co-written a paper, without speaking to their brothers or sisters about their offenses. Those addressed in the “One Law, Two Sticks” paper, were not even given the notice that they were being attacked before the paper was published all over the internet. This approach does nothing to solve the breach, but to perpetuate it. Scripture states we are to go our brother, privately, first. If doesn’t produce peace, then we are to take a second or third witness. Only as a last result, if the appeal and second appeal is not heard, should it be broadcast to the entire Body of Messiah. Unfortunately, the IAMCS leaders have not followed the simple instructions of our Master and Savior, Yeshua, and are therefore guilty of bearing false witness against their One Law/ Hebrew Roots brothers and sisters in Messiah. The intent of this paper is to reveal to them the error of their ways, and hopefully see them do the works of repentance, and cease publishing of their slanderous paper over the internet and in their congregations.