My Story
It all started when my wife and I were praying for the 2008 elections and even did something we had never done: we did a three-day Ester fast. On the third day (November 4th), YHWH spoke to my wife in a clear way. He said:
"Are you going to call sin what I call sin, and Holy what I call Holy or are you going to let the order of your day (society) determine your faith?” He made it clear we are to follow him in truth and not mix it with compromise.
About 3 months prior, we went through a very good 13 week course by Focus On The Family called “The Truth Project” that showed in a detailed way, how the world is rejecting the one true God and watering down the truth of who he is, what he calls sin and what he calls Holy.
Realizing media bias and untruth, we began to search for biblically based or Christian based news the mainstream media isn’t telling. I found what I was looking for; an on-line news paper called World Net Daily (WND). I thought the information on the website was interesting, so I ordered a few issues of their magazine called “The Whistle Blower”.
About this time, someone at work sent me a compelling video about eclipses and how special eclipses (as researched from NASAs website) occur on or mark Jewish festivals perfectly. Actually YHWH calls them His festivals or feasts (feasts that are not about food) rather than "the Jew’s feasts or festivals", and they are more like appointments and rehearsals. In the video it explained how YHWH seems to be pointing a finger at (marking) significant dates with signs (appointments). Aren’t we supposed to look for signs? There is a rare occurance of solar eclipses called a “tetriad”. This happens when there are 4 total lunar eclipses (blood red moons) including one on Passover which is the first festival of the year, and one on the Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot) which is the last of YHWH's feasts of the year.
When the the video explained other significant things indicating we might be in the very beginning of the tribulation, this got my attention because Wall Street had just fallen, which just happened to coincide with the Jewish new year (our 2008) exactly seven years from 2014/2015. These things are just the tip of the iceberg of "coincidences"
Click Here for amazing information about this and the video*, or go to the Table of Contents and select "Signs In The Heavens".
*The video can also be seen at: http://www.choothomas.com/prophecy.wmv
The Awakened Friend
Shortly after seeing this video, a woman who is a good friend of ours (from a church we attended a few years ago), contacted my wife and shared some amazing things about how she was on the same quest for truth and discovered a fantastic Torah/Bible study by Tony Robinson, called “The Restoration of Torah”, which uses thematic connections to help to decipher the Bible with the Bible.
Torah is the first five books of the Bible. To be honest, I never enjoyed reading out of the Old Testament, especially the first five books (Torah) of it, but when in the New Testament it says they were teaching or being taught in the synagogues, the Torah was most of what was being taught (even by Jesus Himself). After Jesus’ (Yeshua's) death and resurrection, Torah was still mostly what was taught. There was even a point in time that Torah was outlawed by the government, so people read and studied it risking death for doing so. Those who did not have it, or were unwilling to risk persecution, were still able to recall it from the rest of the Bible, because the things that happen in the Torah keep repeating themselves (in various different ways) and still do to this day! Thematic connections show you how. And now that I am studying them, the Bible is opening up to me like never before. Its wonderful! Not only is the Torah used to decode the rest of the Bible (scripture to decipher scripture), but it can also be used to decipher the future as well! This is not so surprising, when you consider in the Hebrew mindset: things happen in a cyclical (cycles) way, not linear like we think. In nature (which YHWH created), everything happens in cycles. Here is the link for Tony Robinson’s Restoration of Torah/Bible study: http://restorationoftorah.org/resources/parasha/43-torah-portions-english also in the "References" page on this website)
Torah?
Why was Torah so important? Because It was given directly by YHWH in Moses' writings, that’s why it’s called the “written law”, but Torah doesn’t mean “law” as most people think, In the original Hebrew (the language the Bible was written in) Torah means “instruction”. The problem with the oral law was that the religious leaders heaped on (added) a ton of extra laws that no one could keep, that’s part of the reason Jesus (Yeshua) said “I have come to fulfill the law, not to abolish it (like stopping at a stop sign: you fulfill (complete) the law by stopping at it, then move on. When you come to the next one, you don’t just keep going because you fulfilled the law at the last stop sign, you fulfill the law again. The problem here is the translation of the word fulfill. This brings me to the next point: Have you ever played the game where someone whispers a story to the person next to them, and that person whispers it to the person next to them and so on, and so on until the last person told, recites the story as he or she heard it? Then you probably know by the time the last person recites the story, it is not an accurate representation of the original story. What do you think happens when the Bible written mostly in Hebrew gets translated into Greek, Aramiac, Latin, and finally English?
Best Bible Version
I have always known to get the most accurate version of the Bible, you would have to understand the language it was written in (Hebrew and Greek). But that seemed a daunting or even impossible task (to me). I was not however, aware of some things such as an online/free downloadable Hebrew to English/Greek to English Interlinear Bible (with built-in Strongs Concordance), which can be found on the "Resources" tab of this website or by clicking HERE.
We downloaded it onto our computer. The words in Hebrew read right to left on the first line, which is symbolize-like language, on the next line, Hebrew letters translated as close to English as possible, and on the third line, Hebrew word meaning is translated into English as close to accurate as possible in a way that takes a little getting used to because Hebrew doesn't read like English (verbs come before nouns etc) . It is interesting to say the least. But it also includes King James version to use for guidance, so I read that first, then the Hebrew to English direct translation to look for inconsistencies and revelations.
We found very good video and audio teaching by people such as Bill Cloud, Rico Cortes, and Brad Scott. Links for these teachings can also be found on the "Resources" tab of this website or by clicking HERE.
I currently attend a group for Torah study as well as on my own, and love it. Actually, it turns out this is happening all over the country. People are getting back to their Hebrew roots by the tens of thousands. Some say it’s even prophecied in the Bible when it talks about “the restoration of all things” (see "The Restoration" in the Table of Contents or click HERE) in the end times and restoring a “pure” language. In Hebrew, one of the meanings of the word “Hebrew” is “pure”!. As I said before, the Bible is coming alive to us for the first time in our Christian walk and it is truly amazing.
Do you remember the event that started all this? It was the word my wife got during the three-day fast where YHWH said “Are you going to call sin what I call sin and Holy what I call Holy, or are you going to let the society of your day dictate for you?” Well during a Torah study, YHWH had her focus on the first day of creation when He separated Earth from sky, darkness from light, land from sea. Then truth from lie (in the garden) and how marrying into other tribes with their idols and gods, ultimately caused YHWH’s chosen people (the Israelites) to worship them as well.
Traditions Of Man
The next message we got from Him was “Are you going to follow me, or the traditions of man?” That was about two weeks from Christmas, so knowing there are some miss-truths about Christmas, (like the fact "Jesus" was not born on Dec. 25th, but several pagan gods supposedly were) we discovered He was most likely born at the end of September/beginning of October (during the feast of Tabernacles).
About the time we were doing this research, I got a book in the mail that was a free gift when I ordered a monthly subscription to the Whistle Blower magazine. The book was called: “Shocked By The Bible”. It is basically a book about the misconceptions people have about what is and is not in the Bible. It agreed perfectly with what we were discovering in our research, confirming we were on the right track. We decided celebrating Christmas in the traditional way, was following the traditions of man, so we did what Jesus (Yeshua) Himself did: We celebrated Hanukkah. (see "Christmas vs. Hanukkah" in the Table of Contents or click HERE).
In the last three years of, studying and researching these things with the Hebrew mindset and revelations, I have learned more than the last thirty years of being a Christian. Things that didn't make sense now make total sense, and contradictions that have always bothered me are now being explained. The scriptures come alive like never before and my understanding of them has increased ten fold. It is because of these truths and revelations, I have truly decided in my heart to follow YHWHs ways and not mans ways and traditions. Needless to say, following YHWHs ways in America today, is not easy, but I believe so worth it. I have since realized this information and these revelations are not for those who don't want to hear them, but rather for those (mostly Christians) who YHWH is waking up as an information hub for them.
I truly believe with world events occurring the way they are, the Tribulation will be starting soon (sorry, the pre-trib rapture is a lie) and Yeshua will be returning, so we want to be ready.
At the end of time I want more than anything, for Him to say "Well done good and faithful servant". I wish the same for you.
Blessings and Shalom.