What Side Are You On?

We are constantly bombarded with these kinds of questions:

1. Are you Pro-Choice or Pro-Life?
2. Are you Christian or Messianic?
3. Are you Evangelical or Catholic?
4. Are you Left, or Right?
5. Are you Jew or Gentile?

But then it comes the caveats for those questions:

1. If you believe the death sentence you are not really Pro-Life.
2. If you are not (Christian/Messianic) you are not a believer.
3. If you are not (Evangelical/Catholic) you are not a real believer.
4. If you are from the Left, you are Communist; if you are from the Right, you are a Tyrant.
5. If you are Jew, you cannot be Christian; if you are Christian, you cannot be Jew.

So where do we draw the line?

You can make a decision based on several considerations: listen to your heart, though Jeremiah 17:9-10 reminds us that it can be deceitful; follow the democratic approach by considering the consensus of the majority; or simply pause, kneel in prayer, and seek guidance from the Holy Spirit (Ruaḥ HaKodesh). Ultimately, let us return to the Word of Yah for wisdom and direction.

Are you aware that there is a character in the Bible to whom this question was asked? We can gain much insight from his response.

I am convinced this character was Yahweh Himself, the Angel of Yahweh, the same one who showed up to Moses on Mount Horeb (Sinai) in the burning bush. The One that showed up to Hagar by the springs of water, the One who wrestled with Jacob and gave him a new name, Israel. Not an ordinary character, not an ordinary messenger (angel), but Yahweh’s presence Himself, the Yeshua who was before Abraham was. But this is a “question” to answer on another post, which will come out soon.

But I digress, pay attention to His reply:

No, for I have now come as Captain of the host of Yahweh.

What it is interesting here is how He completely rejected the question. In some English and Spanish translations, it is portraited like this:

No … but I am the Commander of ADONAI’s Arm; I have come just now. (CJB)

No … but I am the Commander of the Army of the LORD. Now I have come. (ESV)

No … pero como Príncipe del Ejército de JEHOVA he venido ahora. (RV1960)

No! … Rather I indeed come now as commander of the host of Yahweh. (LSB)

Nay … but as Captain of the Host of the LORD am I now come. (KJV)

Nay .. but I am Captain of the Host of the LORD; I am now come. (JPS 1917)

Neither … Rather, I have now come as Commander of ADONAI’s Army. (TLV)

Neither … but as Commander of the Army of the LORD I have come now. (NIV)

Neither one … I am the Commander of the Lord’s Army. (NLT)

There are important key words in this passage, independent of who you think this angel (Messenger) is. Some of our translations is missing one of the key words of this passage. So, the best way to know who’s lacking is by looking at the Jewish scriptures-based translations. The most popular are the Complete Jewish Bible (CJB), Tree of Life Version (TLV), Jewish Publication Society Bible (JPS), and The Scriptures (TS). Honorary mention to the Legacy Standard Version (LSB), which uses the Jewish scripts to translate the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) and the Greek scripts to translate the Brit Ḥadashah (“New” Covenant).

This is how it is found in the Masoretic text removing cantillation and vowel points.

לא כּי אני שׂר־צבא־יהוה עתּה באתי

^{Transliteración}
lo ki ani sar-tzaba-YHWH ata bati

באתי	עתּה	יהוה	צבא	שׂר	אני	כּי	לא
bati	ata	YHWH	tzaba	sar	ani	ki	lo
have come	now	God’s name	of the host	captain, leader, prince	I	rather, indeed	no
H935	H6258	H3068	H6635	H8269	H589	H3588	H3808

The direct translation would be:

No rather I captain-of the host-YHWH now

From the Septuagint (LXX):

ἐγὼ ἀρχιστράτηγος δυνάμεως κυρίου νυνὶ παραγέγονα

^{Transliteración}
egō archistrategos dynamis kyrios nyni paraginomai

As many has concluded, the New Living Translation is lacking an important part of the response. Which is unfortunate. But that is why you cannot rely in this translation as your source of doctrine. Even the Septuagint (LXX) includes the “now”, so why is not in the translation, that’s a good question, but notice that the Septuagint neither include one of the keywords I think are important. Where is the word “No” or “Neither” in this sentence?

For me, and let’s point that out clearly, that’s for me, the key words in this response are: “No or Neither”, “I”, and “now”. And of course, let me explain why.

First, you need to understand the question that provoked this response: “Are you for us or for our adversaries?” (vs. 13)

Second, it is essential to understand who is responding. Third, what are the implications of the response, and fourth, the extent of the response.

Who is the Messenger?

To come to a conclusion of whom the Messenger is, we have to keep reading and look for clues and patterns that indicate who is the one speaking. Is him an agent or is the actual deliverer?

First clue, Joshua bowed down to his face, and the Commander did not rebuke him. Second, the Messenger told Joshua:

Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy.

Where did we have heard this before?

That is right, when Yahweh spoke to Moses, He told Moses to remove his sandals. What it is very interesting is that first we are introduced to the “agent” delivering the message as “the Angel of Yahweh” back in Exodus 3 verse 2.

This gives us a clue of who the Messenger speaking to Joshua is, —the Angel of Yahweh—, Commander of Yahweh’s Army, who is speaking as He is Yahweh, and receive worship without rebuking the one offering it.

Every time this character shows up all these patterns show up as well. Which should give us a clear understanding of whom He is, and who is responding to Joshua.

I will have a post dedicated to the Angel of Yahweh, so stay tuned for that, but let us continue.

The Angel of Yahweh said “neither” —what does this entails?

Well, I’m glad you asked.

“Neither”, “No”— Whose side is Yahweh? Whose side is Yeshua? The fact is that Yahweh is not in anyone’s side. He only side with His will. So, the question one should ask instead.

Whose side I’m in?

When the Messenger responded to Joshua (Yehoshua) He was with His sword drawn out. He was ready to strike, hence why Joshua was curious to know who this warrior was.

This brings a great resemblance with the first Passover. When Yahweh gave instructions to Moses about the specifics of this first Passover, He made it clear that judgement was coming to whomever was not inside of a home marked by the blood of the lamb.

Did you catch that? Redemption was offered to anyone, either Egyptian or Israelite who is found inside the shelter marked with blood. And at the same time, judgement was also enforced to anyone, either Egyptian or Israelite, who was caught outside the house marked with blood.

So that’s our first clue, Yahweh is on the side of those who obey Him.

The Messenger had not given Joshua His instructions yet, so the loyalty of Israel has not been tested at this moment. Meaning that the loyalty of the Messenger has no ground to stand on, His loyalty will be shown while His instructions are obeyed.

Who brings us into the next important keyword.

“Now” — why is this word so important?

We have been led to believe that Yeshua’s loyalty to us depends only in His work at the cross, paid by the blood once and for all. But this is completely misunderstood. When Yeshua died for us, He did not die for us to keep doing what we always do, He wants to transform us.

As with Abraham, Yahweh has called us to a life away from our family customs, our homes comfort, and away to manmade cultures. We are called to be a set-apart nation, as Israel has been called to be a set-apart nation.

Yeshua did not call us into stagnate waters, He called us into a river of living water. He called us into the wilderness where we have to learn how to depend on Him. That’s why in this moment Yeshua asked the rich young person to sell everything he had and give it to the poor, not because riches are wrong or bad, but because with riches we tend to forget to depend entirely in Him.

Back to the Messenger, when He said: “No, for I have now come as Captain of the host of יהוה —Yahweh—”, it is important to pay attention to the always present statement of His answer. “Now” is always active, for example, start now to read, by the time you finish reading you are still looking here now.

The ever present promises of Yahweh are true and He is faithful to fulfilled them, still they come with a loyalty clause.

The call of salvation is not passive, is a daily and constant call, we are called to believe, when? Now. How? Everyday. Until?

We are to endure until the end, and every second the Holy Spirit is standing before us with His sword drawn waiting for us to respond, and if you ask Him: “Are you for us, or for our enemies?” And He will reply: “Neither”.

There’s always two ways, but there is only one that leads to Yahweh

From the beginning, Yahweh has offered us the ability to choose, contrary to any other creature under creation, we have the ability to choose to obey or not.

Animals follow a ritual of survival, following their appointed times, time to accumulate food or to rest, time to procreate, and time to migrate.

The sun and the moon have to follow the patterns established for them during creation. The same as the stars in the heavens. We can use them as signs in the skies for seasons, for navigation and to track time.

But us, humanity, we are allowed to follow our own rules, which might or may not work in our behalf, or we can choose to follow Yahweh faithfully.

Yahweh told us clearly, if we choose not to follow His instructions we will surely die. We were to allow ourselves to be fed by the Tree of Life, the Archetype of the Messiah.

When we choose to walk away from the instruction of Yahweh, which in the story of Creation is represented by the Tree of Life, we run away from the source of life itself. Then why we have people asking: “How can there be a God if there is death, hate and destruction?”, the answer to that question is very easy: “Because you feel something is wrong is prove of the existence of God”.

How is this possible? Well, we are spiritual beings, we were made to lead with Yahweh, we feel that something is wrong because there is a God who is calling. The entire creation, including the heavens and everything in it, are in the expectancy for us to be restored to the fullness of our purpose.

We are still prompted with the same challenge, to follow Yahweh or to keep following our misguided and corrupted concept of good and evil. The instruction in the Garden was presented as a tree, to the Israelis was presented as the Word written in stones, to us NOW is presented as the only way to the Father, Yeshua the Messiah.

Yeshua is the only way of salvation; there is no other way. But not only that, we are presented with a challenge. Who is Yeshua, why He speak as He and the father are two different beings? And that’s a concept that brings great division among believers. Especially when we start to bring theories of what this fluidity of Yah should look like.

It is sad to see how many believers are always finding ways to deny what has been established in the Bible, but that is a subject for another post. But if you want to find out more about this, check this video from One for Israel about the “trinity” from a Jewish perspective.

The most important thing we should keep in mind is this. Yahweh from the beginning had test our faith, not to diminish it but to establish your faith in solid ground. But in order to grow it is necessary to also recognize that the Holy Spirit, —Ruaḥ Ha’Kodesh—, is not just a breath, it is Yahweh’s presence Himself. Diminishing the role of the Ruaḥ Ha’Kodesh is a letter of suicide to your faith.

There are many believers that cannot grasp the main purpose of unity with the Jews, with the Ecclesia, with the Nation of Yahweh, because they have separated themselves from the agent Yahweh left to us, who point us back towards His will.

This is the main purpose of the Ruaḥ Ha’Kodesh in your life. To bring you back to Yahweh, to the works of Yeshua.

Yahweh’s character is a mystery to us, but His biblically established fluidity has an important role in our lives, each manifestation of His presence has a specific attribute that brings value to our relationship with Yahweh.

And even in the Brit Ḥa’Dashah this complex paradigm follows the same pattern established in the Tanakh.

Wait, who’s sending who, is it “the advocate whom the Father will send in Yeshua’s name” or is it “the advocate, whom Yeshua will send to us from the Father”?

The answer is yes, yes. We serve an Elohim Echad, One God, but who always deal through our challenges in different ways, as our strong foundation, or as our redeemer, or as our source of wisdom. Each manifestation has their function in Yahweh’s approach towards us, mostly because of His mercy.

We are sinful and deserve to pay for our rebellion. And the cost is death. But Yahweh, in His infinite love towards us, He finds way to reveal Himself to us. After all Yahweh told Moses:

Yahweh always provide a way for us to approach Him, He even gave Himself as a ransom for our sins, so we can come confidently to His presence, and provided us with the Holy Spirit to guide us to His righteousness.

Conclusión

Yahweh, as a good Father, He wants us to grow and allow us to make mistakes and want us not to stay in the consequences of our mistakes. Previously He provided a way through sacrifices, not because of the sacrificed body, but by the blood that flows as consequence of the sacrifice, which function as a replacement for our life’s sentence. The life is in the blood.

And this was not something introduced in mount Sinai, Yahweh showed mercy to Adam and Eve when He clothed them by sacrificing animals, to cover their shame. But provided a promised so they do not live eternally in the state of shame. Yahweh was even gracious to prevent them to have access to the source of life, if so, Adam and Eve would’ve been living today seeing the consequences of their shame.

Yahweh has provided a way to life, yes there’s two ways, but there is only one way that leads to life. Torah, that is the shadow of the Messiah, but the essence is Yeshua.

So, let’s choose life, and let us abide in His word, through the Ruaḥ Ha’Kodesh —Holy Spirit—, who soften our heart to be able to follow His commandments.

This is the only way to come and experience the true presence of the Most‑High Elohim. Amen.

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May Yahweh bless you and keep you; May Yahweh make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you; May Yahweh lift up His face towards you, and give you peace.

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Shalom