From Lost to Saved

(The Wonder of it All!)

Were you expecting a "recipe" for deliverance? There are many out there - being "sold" in the pulpits and on TV - but "there is no such thing"! However, with that said, it is abundantly clear to this writer that YaHuWaH, our Father, uses different methods to begin our journey towards Him. It could be a text "you remember", a web site you "accidentally" visit, a word from a friend, some current event that may makes you "curious" - YaHuWaH knows what will entice you to search - to seek Him out (actually it is Him seeking you out!). His Ruwach (Breath/Spirit) is everywhere remember - He fills the universe! From the time of our "new birth" in YaHuWSHuWaH, our Savior, to the time when we enter through one of the gates into the city, there are many "events" that must transpire in our lives; "conviction (cut to the heart)", repentance (a change of mind - Ibriy "shub"), "belief, trust, hope", "confession of His Name", "immersion into the Name of YaHuWaHYaHuWSHuWaH (see Immersion Note at the bottom of this page.)", "belief in, and obedience to His Word/Torah - If you love Me, keep My Commandments." And on our journey the Comforter - That Still Small Voice - will always be there to guide our walk, and this "walk" will be at a pace that fits the

"circumstances" of our lives. Without any of these "events" and there are more - our "hope" would be in vain! The one thing that we must not do, is to put "deliverance" in a "box" or in a "listing of things that must be done", and then proclaim that to obtain deliverance, all of what is in the "box or listing" must be accomplished before we are acceptable before YaHuWaH. May it never be! The scriptures given below are simply to show that our being saved through YaHuWSHuWaH is not of ourselves, but from the Father, YaHuWaH - the Giver of Life in YaHuWSHuWaH. Nor was it an "afterthought". His great plan has existed even before this world was created, and YaHuWaH, by various methods and in different ways "draws us to Himself" and we are "changed into a "masterpiece"through YaHuWSHuWaH, to become a part of the Ysra'al that was created to "enthrone Him on their praises"! In the scriptures below all of the "events" of our deliverance are there - some stated, some not.

The Setting:
Ephesians 1:4-5 Long ago, even before He made the world, YaHuWaH loved us and chose us in haMashiyach to be Setapart and without fault in His eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through YaHuWSHuWaH the Anointed. And this gave Him great pleasure. YashaYahuw
[Isaiah]

43:25 I, I AM HE Who blots out your

transgressions for My Own sake; and remembers your sins no more. [The awesome Truth hid within this statement is that without this "blotting out and remembering our sins no more", YaHuWaH would not have a people! - this is the only method He has to bring to Himself - through YaHuWSHuWaH - a people Set-apart and without fault in His eyes!] (His calling and His work!) Let's look a this verse again and identify the Persons involved: I (YaHuWaH the Father), I AM HE (YaHuWSHuWaH - the Son) Who blots out your transgression for MY (I, I, duality of One) sake, and remembers your sins no more." (If YaHuWaH "forgets" them - they cease to exist!) Colosians 1:19-20 For all the Fullness (of YaHuWaH) was pleased to dwell within Him (YaHuWSHuWaH); and through Him (YaHuWSHuWaH) to reconcile all things to Himself (YaHuWaH), by Him (YaHuWSHuWaH), whether things on the earth, or things in the heavens, having made peace through the blood of His (YaHuWSHuWaH's) stake. Romans 8:28-30 We know that all things work together for good for those who love YaHuWaH, to those who are called according to His purpose. For whom He fore-knew, He also pre-appointed to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers; whom He pre-appointed, those He also called. Whom He called, those He also declared right. Whom He declared right, those He also esteemed. Romans 9:11-16 For being not yet born, neither having done anything good or evil - in order that YaHuWaH's

predetermination might remain by choice, not by works, but by the hand of Him Who calls, it was said to her, The elder will serve the younger.[Bereshiyth 25: 23] Even as it is written, Ya'aqob I loved, but Esaw I hated.[Malakiy 1: 2-3] .... What shall we say then? Is it [His selection] unfairness by YaHuWaH? May it never be! For He said to Mosheh, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. [Exodus 33: 19] So then it [being chosen] is not of him that wishes for it, nor of him that strives after it, rather ofYaHuWaH Who shows mercy. ..... 9:23 and that He might make known the riches of His esteem on vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for esteem, ..... Romans 11:4-6 But how does YaHuWaH answer him?[AliYahuw [Elijah]] Yet I reserve in Ysra'al seven thousand men all whose knees have not bowed before the LORD (ha-BA`AL) and all whose mouths did not kiss it: [1 Kings 19: 18] Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant by the selection of favor. And if the selection is by favor, then it is no longer of works; otherwise favor is no longer favor. But if it is of works, it is no longer favor; otherwise work is no longer work. Ya'aqob 1:17 Every good act of giving and every perfect bestowment is from above, coming down from the Father of the Lights, with Whom can be no changing, nor even a shadow of change. 1:18 Of His Own will He brought us forth by the Word of Truth [YaHuWSHuWaH], that we should be the first-fruits of all He created.

How it Happens:
Yahuwchanan [John] 6:37 (YaHuWSHuWaH speaking) Everyone that My Father has given to Me shall come towards Me, and he who does come towards Me I shall in no way refuse. Yahuwchanan 6:43-44 Therefore YaHuWSHuWaH answered them, do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to Me unless the Father Who sent Me draws him, and I shall raise him up in the Last Day. Yahuwchanan [John] 6:65 He (YaHuWSHuWaH) said, For this cause have I said to you that no one can come to Me, unless it is given to him by My Father . (The saved are "hand picked" by YaHuWaH ! - His selection, His work!) Yahuwchanan 3:5-8 YaHuWSHuWaH answered, Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born [conceived] of Water and of the Ruwach [Spirit/Breath], he cannot enter into the Kingdom of YaHuWaH! That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born [conceived] of the Ruwach haQadosh [Set-apart Spirit] is ruwach; do not marvel that I said to you, You need be procreated [conceived] from the First [above] . The wind [Ruwach] blows where it wants to, and you hear its sound, but do not discern from where it comes nor where it is goes. So everyone who has been conceived of the Ruwach, is just like this! [not knowing how their deliverance happened or why they are where they are .... it's all the work of YaHuWaH!] There is a text in Habaqquq 1:5, though in its context is not referring to the Scripture above -

yet it expresses the wonder of it: "Look among the nations, watch, and wonder marvelously; for I am working a work in your days, which you will not believe though it is told you!" And I am sure there are many who have been "born anew" who can relate to this! .... and in chapter 2:4 of Habaqquq, there is the beautiful text:... "but the righteous one by his certainty of Me will live." (the righteous shall live by belief). YashaYahuw [Isaiah] 64:8 O YaHuWaH, You are our Father! We are the clay, and You are the One Who forms us; we are all the workmanship of Your Hand. (The clay is inert formless - until the Potter works it as He sees fit.) YashaYahuw [Isaiah] 26:12 O YaHuWaH, You have set total well-being in place for us,You have worked into us all our achievements as well! [You have even done all of our works in us!], ["By [YaHuWaH's] added provision we are rescued, through belief/trust, and [even] that is not from ourselves; it is YaHuWaH's gift, so that no one may boast" Eph. 2:8-9 , ..."It is YaHuWaH Who is operative in you, both [making you] want to and [also] proves it by carrying out the good things that please Him." (Phil. 2:13) (SFHHof Ysra'al)] ----- "For YaHuWaH is working in you, giving you the desire to obey Him and the power to do what pleases Him.] There is no "part" of our "deliverance" that is of ourselves - it is ALL of YaHuWaH-YaHuWSHuWaH! YaHuWSHuWaH said that without Him, there was not ONE thing we can do!

Galatians 3:26-29 So you are all children of YaHuWaH through belief in haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH. And all who have put on haMashiyach in immersion have been made like Him. There is no longer Yahuwdite or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. For you are all Nastarims--you are one in haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH. And now that you belong to haMashiyach, you are the true children of Abraham. You are His heirs, and now all the promises YaHuWaH gave to him belong to you! Bereshith (Gen.) 3:21 YaHuWaH Aluahiym made coats of skins for Adam and for his wife, and clothed them. (This implies that YaHuWaH performed the very first slaughter in the presence of Adam and Hawah. To typify the necessity to shed blood for the sin of disobedience and to "cover" [labash] ones nakedness.) [labash also has the meaning of "put on" - H-3847] Ephesians 2:4-7 But YaHuWaH is so rich in mercy, and He loved us so very much, that even while we were dead because of our sins, He gave us life when He raised haMashiyach from the dead. (It is only by YaHuWaH's special favor that you have been saved!) For He raised us from the dead along with haMashiyach, and we are seated in Him in the heavenly realms--all because we are one in haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH. And so YaHuWaH can always point to us as examples of the incredible wealth of His favor and kindness toward us, as shown in all He has done for us through haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH. (Oh Yes!) Ephesians 2:8-10 YaHuWaH saved you by His special favor when you believed. And you can't take credit for this

(belief); it is a gift from YaHuWaH. Deliverance is not a reward for the good things we have done [works], so none of us can boast about it. For we are YaHuWaH's masterpiece. He has created us anew in haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH, so that we can do the good things He planned for us long ago. 2 Timothy 1:9 It is YaHuWaH Who saved us and chose us to live a Set-apart life. He did this, not because we deserved it, but because that was His plan long before the world began--to show His love and kindness to us through haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH.

He keeps us by His power:

Yahuwchanan (John) 10:27-30 (YaHuWSHuWaH speaking) My sheep heed My Voice (obey Me), and I acknowledge them, and they follow Me. I give endless life to them. They shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of My hand. My Father, Who has given them to Me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of My Fathers Hand. I and My Father are ONE. (Echad) [YashaYahuw [Isaiah] 43:13 Yes, since the day was I AM HE; and there is no one who snatches out of My Hand. ]
1 Yahuwchanan [John] 3:8-9 To this end the Son of

YaHuWaH was manifested, that He might undo [nullify/destroy] the works of the Adversary. No one who is born of YaHuWaH will continue to sin, because His Seed remains in him [haMashiyach in you]; and he

cannot go on sinning, because he is born of YaHuWaH. ... 4:4 You are of YaHuWaH, my sons, and have overcome them; because greater is He Who is in you than he who is in the world.

Deut. 30:6 YaHuWaH your Al will circumcise your heart, and the heart of your seed, to love YaHuWaH your Al with all your heart, and with all your being, that you may live. YirmeYahuw 31:31 Behold, the Days come, says YaHuWaH, that I shall cut a new (renewed) covenant with the House of Ysra'al, and with the House of Yahuwdah ... I shall put My instructions in their inward parts, and in their heart shall I write it; and I shall be their Aluah, and they shall be My people: 31:34 and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know YaHuWaH; for they shall all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says YaHuWaH: for I shall pardon their crookedness, and their sins shall I remember no more.
Yehezqel [Ezekiel] 11:19-20 I will give them one heart, and I will put a new Ruwach within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them a heart of flesh; that they may walk in My statutes, and keep My ordinances, and do them: and they shall be My people, and I will be their

Aluahiym. (the "new covenant" that was given in the TaNaK notice the "I will's) Phillipians 1:6 ... being confident of this very thing, that He Who began a good work within you will complete it until the Day of YaHuWSHuWaH haMashiyach. Colosians 3:2-4 Set your mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden in haMashiyach within YaHuWaH. When haMashiyach, our life, is revealed, then you will also be revealed with Him in esteem. YashaYahuw [Isaiah] 43:25 I, I AM HE Who blots out your transgressions for My Own sake; and remember your sins no more. (This is all done through YaHuWSHuWaH in Whom YaHuWaH dwelt in all His Fullness - bringing the world to Himself!) 1 Yahuwchanan [John] 5:11-13 The witness is this: YaHuWaH granted to us eternal Life, and this Life is in His Son. The one having the Son has the Life. The one not having YaHuWaHs Son does not have the Life. These things I have written to you who believe in the Name of the Son of YaHuWaH, that you may know that you have endless life, and that you may continue to believe in the Name of the Son of YaHuWaH. ... 5:20 We know that the Son of YaHuWaH

has come and has given us an understanding, that we might acknowledge the True One, and we are in the True One, in His Son YaHuWSHuWaH haMashiyach. This is the true Eloah, and endless Life!

And finally from Rev. 19:7-8 Let us rejoice and jump for joy, and let us give Him the Qabod. For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His Kalah/Wife/Bride (Ysra'al) has made herself ready. It was given to her (YaHuWaH's work - !!!) that she would array herself in bright pure linen: for the linen is the righteousness of the ha'qedoshim (the saved Set-apart ones - our righteousness is of Him.)

Immersion Note:
Galations 3:27-29. For as many of you as were immersed into haMashiyach have put on haMashiyach. There is neither Yahuwdite nor Greek, there is not slave nor free, there is not male and female, for you are all one in haMashiyach YaHuWSHuWaH. And if you are of haMashiyach, then you are seed of Abraham, and heirs according to promise. 1. To begin with, it must be understood that "immersion" is not unique to the Apostolic Writings but was performed in the TaNaK, and is identified in the traditional translations as "washing". The priesthood washed their flesh with water before, after, and during the rituals of making atonement, or bringing about the removal for sin, and in the Ibriy language, this is known as "washing/mikbah" or immersion. This was also the command of the prophet, Alishua, to Na'aman the leper,

when he commanded him to "mikbah" or dip seven times and be cleansed. Again, as Yahuwchanan [John] prepared the way for YaHuWaH (YaHuWSHuWaH haMashiyach), Yahuwchanan, as a rightful "officiator of mikbah/immersion" - (appointed by YaHuWah) commanded the crowds to "mikbah" or immerse for the remission of sins in the Yarden River, in accordance with the Torah commands which deal with this. There were also a great many "immersion" pools in Ysra'al and especially in Yahrushalom and were used frequently by those who felt the need to be immersed. From "The Scriptures for the Whole House of Ysra'al", We have this: Matt. 3:5-6 "Then people from Yahrushalayim, all of Yahuwdah , and all the region around the Yarden went out to him. They were ritually immersed under his supervision in the Yarden, acknowledging their sins." [The Shem Tob Hebrew text says, They were immersing because of his word] "Under his supervision: Immersion at that time was not something done by another person; that was a practice of Mithraism, a religion common among Roman soldiers. A kosher immersion is done by the person himself, with a witness to assure him that every part of his body, including all of his hair, has gone under the water." 2. Scripture never teaches that a mikbah or immersion must be performed by someone else - rather, the crowds immersed themselves. In fact, we have the Scriptural evidence that the apostles COMMANDED the crowd to

be immersed, and some 3000 were saved as seen in the following example. Acts 2:38 "Shimon said to them, 'Repent and be immersed each one of you in the name of Master YaHuWaH-YaHuWSHuWaH for the remission of sins ....' Shimon was preaching from the steps of the Hekal in Yahrushalayim. Just below him were hundreds of mikbah (immersion) baths. Both the steps he spoke from and the baths are visible today just outside the Western Wall. In Kepha's day immersion wasn't an act of conversion from one religion to another, but an act of purification from sin. A person repented of their sin, prayed, and then entered into the water of the mikbah to symbolize atonement. AENT - AramaicEnglishNewTestament pg. 308 Yahuwchanan is recorded as being the "officiator" in the immersion of YaHuWSHuWaH haMashiyach, and Philip also immersed the Ethiopian man - not physically touching them but being witnesses to their complete immersion. Yahuwchanan the Immerser according to the Word, chose places where there "was much water" for his immersion sites. If he "immersed" them one by one as some seem to believe (see baptism note below) .... why then was "much water" needed? They simply responded to Yahuwchanan's preaching, confessed their sins, prayed, entered into the water and immersed themselves under the watchful eye of the Immersion Officiator. 3. Scripture never limits the number of times which a

person may immerse. In fact, it was a Scriptural command that every time you become physically unclean (i.e., in contact with a dead body, etc) that you were to "wash", and again be considered clean at evening. Mikbah was also preformed for physical healing as we see with the blind man at the pool (mikbah) of Shalach in Yahrushalom. Yahuwchanan (John) 9:6 "When YaHuWSHuWaH had said this, He spat on the ground, made clay with the saliva, anointed the blind man's eyes with the clay, and said to him, "Go wash/mikbah (immerse) in the pool of Shalach" (which means "Sent forth"). So he went away, washed (did mikbah), and came back seeing." 4. Immersion for the remission of sins should be in the Name above all Names, which is "YaHuWaHYaHuWSHuWaH", and performed for the remission of sins. "In the Name of..." requires that it be in YaHuWaH's authority, and that the purpose for the immersion be well known and proclaimed. Apart from complete immersion (preferably in running water, such as a river or stream - but not commanded as such - could be a bathtub if one can completely immerse in it - if that is all that is available) in the Name of YaHuWaHYaHuWSHuWaH haMashiyach, there are no other Scriptural requirements or commands. 5. You can immerse yourself - as did those of Ysra'al but it would be better to find another believer to attend.

Self immersion is the only way that many of the Ysra'al of today can be immersed. YaHuWaH is calling to Himself "one of a city and two of a clan", and these newly called ones may never have the opportunity to be a part of a congregation - large or small! Self immersion was done by those of Ysra'al of the past whenever the need arose for an immersion and was acceptable then as it is now. An elder is not required to be present, and anyone can and should assist others with their immersion. We are all to assist others in their immersion, as a witness, an encouragement, and to welcome the immersed into the community of Ysra'al as a brother - should you be blessed with a "community" of like-minded believers. The act of immersion into the name of YaHuWaH-YaHuWSHuWaH's is personal, not corporate, and we become identified by our Husband, calling upon His Name for deliverance. We need to be the one saying the words, not a by-stander (like a pastor proclaiming "I immerse you. . . ") It's only about YaHuWaH-YaHuWSHuWaH and the one entering the water. Acts 2:38 Kepha said to them, Each of you reconsider, and be immersed, every one of you, in the Name of the Master YaHuWaH-YaHuWSHuWaH haMashiyach for the washing away of sins, and you will receive the gift of the Ruwach haQadosh. A special note about the history of the present day method of "baptism": In Debarim (Deut.) 2:12 it is said that the Chorites who lived in Seir were destroyed by

Esaw. Chorites literally means "cave dwellers". Esaw (Edom of today) represents Rome and their adaptation of Constantine's Mithraism which was his religion and that of the Roman soldiers and which can be traced all the way back to the time of Nimrod. One of the hallmarks of Mithraism is that they most always worshiped in caves. They also had an elohiym named "Gad" pronounced exactly like "god" with a major festival on December 24, 25, and January 1. They also had a water baptism in which the priest holds the recipient as he goes underwater. This common form of baptism as practiced by many of "churchanity" today, stems from them and this practice not from the Hebrew form of immersion in which there is merely a witness that one goes completely under water. So the Church (Esaw/Edom) still inhabits the caves of Mithraism by practicing this particular form of "baptism". YaHuWaH says to us - Come out of her my people and touch (practice) no unclean thing!
Again, there is so much more - the whole of the Word - rings with the great Truths of our Saving/Deliverance through YaHuWaH's Manifestation within YaHuWSHuWaH!