Covenant Faith Whole-Bible believers

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Whole-Bible believers, learning to live what we read

We gather on Shabbat in one another’s homes and study the Scriptures together. Here is what that means, and what you can expect from this site.


We are whole-Bible believers. That phrase is not a denomination or a brand. It is a plain description: we follow Jesus the Messiah, and we hold that every part of the Bible, Genesis to Revelation, is true, unchanging, and meant to be lived. We gather on Shabbat in one another’s homes and study the Scriptures together, and the fifteen questions on this site are the ones we work through there.

Much of what you will read here concerns the Torah, God’s instruction given through Moses, and why we believe it still applies to followers of the Messiah: the seventh-day Sabbath, the appointed feasts, clean and unclean food, tzitzit. We know those are not the usual conclusions. We did not arrive at them lightly, and we do not expect you to accept them lightly either.

What you can expect from this site is Scripture doing the arguing. Each page shows the passages, including the ones commonly raised against our position, and then draws the point in a sentence or two. You will not find a case built on tradition, history, or personalities. You will find the text, read in context, and an invitation to check it for yourself. If you are new, start with the fifteen questions; if you have questions of your own, the contact page is open.

What “whole Bible” means to us

Most believers would say the whole Bible is God’s word. We mean something a little more specific: that no part of it has expired. Paul told Timothy that “Every Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16-17), and the Scriptures Timothy had grown up with were the ones we now call the Old Testament. If they were profitable for instruction in righteousness then, we do not see where they stopped being so.

We want to be clear about the order of things. We are saved by grace through faith, and not by anything we do (Ephesians 2:8-10). No one keeps a Sabbath or a feast or a food law in order to be accepted by God. We keep them because we already are, and because the one who saved us said, “If you love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). Obedience is love’s response to grace, never a substitute for it.

“Don’t think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn’t come to destroy, but to fulfill. For most certainly, I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not even one smallest letter or one tiny pen stroke shall in any way pass away from the law, until all things are accomplished.”

Matthew 5:17-18

Heaven and earth are still here. Jesus tied the endurance of the law to their endurance, and he went on to say that whoever does and teaches even the least of the commandments will be called great in the Kingdom (Matthew 5:19). We take that as our instruction. When he confronted the religious leaders of his day, it was over man-made traditions that set aside God’s commandments (Mark 7:8-13), never over the commandments themselves.

The prophets said the new covenant would put that same law inside God’s people: “I will put my law in their inward parts, and I will write it in their heart” (Jeremiah 31:33). The new covenant did not shrink the law. It moved it from tablets of stone to hearts of flesh, by the Spirit (Ezekiel 36:26-27). So when we say whole Bible, we mean the whole word, from one God who does not change (Malachi 3:6), written on hearts that he has changed.

Get in touch

What we hold

Six convictions

Each one is worked out at length in the study series. Here they are in short.

Scripture

The whole Bible is true

Every Scripture is God-breathed and profitable (2 Timothy 3:16-17). We read Genesis to Revelation as one consistent word, and we let the front of the book explain the back. Nothing in it has expired.

Messiah

Jesus is the Messiah

He is the Son of God, the Word made flesh (John 1:14), who died for our sins and was raised on the third day. His teaching was his Father’s (John 7:16), and he kept the Torah he taught.

Torah

The Torah still stands

Jesus said not one stroke would pass from the law until heaven and earth pass away (Matthew 5:17-19). Sabbath, feasts, food, tzitzit: we keep what can be kept today and hold that it is to be taught to the next generation (Deuteronomy 6:6-7).

Grace

Grace before obedience

We are saved by grace through faith, not by works (Ephesians 2:8-10). Obedience earns nothing. It is how the saved love their Savior: “If you love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15).

Testing

Test everything

“Test all things, and hold firmly that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21). We measure every teaching, including our own, against the law and the prophets (Isaiah 8:20), and we welcome anyone who does the same to us.

Israel

One people, grafted into Israel

Believers from the nations are not a replacement for Israel and not a separate people. We are wild branches grafted into Israel’s olive tree (Romans 11:17-18), fellow citizens who were once strangers to the covenants (Ephesians 2:11-19).

How we study

Five habits we try to keep

Nothing clever. Just the text, read carefully, and then lived.

  1. Read in context

    A verse means what it meant to the people who first heard it. Before we ask what a passage means for us, we ask who wrote it, to whom, and about what problem. Most hard passages become clear once the surrounding chapter is read, and most doctrines built on a single verse fall apart the same way.

  2. Take the whole counsel

    Scripture interprets Scripture. Jesus and the apostles argued from Moses and the prophets (Luke 24:27, 44), so we read the later books in light of the earlier ones rather than the other way around. If a reading of Paul makes him contradict Moses, or Jesus, or himself, we assume the reading is wrong, not the text.

  3. Test what you hear

    “Test all things, and hold firmly that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21). The Bereans checked Paul against the Scriptures daily and were called noble for it (Acts 17:11). Isaiah’s standard is ours: if a teaching does not speak according to the law and the covenant, there is no light in it (Isaiah 8:20). That applies to this site too.

  4. Walk it out

    Understanding is not the goal; obedience is. The word is “very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it” (Deuteronomy 30:14). When we see a commandment we can keep, we start keeping it, imperfectly at first, and learn as we go. Faith that never becomes works is dead (James 2:17).

  5. Bring it to Shabbat

    We gather on Shabbat in one another’s homes and study the Scriptures together. What one of us finds during the week, we bring to the table: a passage that answers one of the fifteen questions, a verse that seems to cut the other way, a practical problem in keeping a commandment. Iron sharpens iron, and nobody studies alone.

Where to begin

Start with the questions, or come and see

Fifteen questions, each answered from the text and each open to your testing. Read them at your own pace, or write to us and join a Shabbat gathering in one of our homes.