A Set Apart God & His Set Apart Ways For Set Apart Believers

Hello friends, I'm Chadwick Harvey and this is Faithful Performance, where we explore the testimony of the biblical prophets and how they perfectly correlate with the current events of today. Thank you for joining us.

In this episode, we're going to discover how to be set apart as believers on God's set appointed times that he has ordained. Before we commence, I'd like to make a special announcement. My good friend Taylor Strickland and I have released our debut album and debut single, "The Ark of God," a couple of weeks ago. If you haven't heard the music, you can get a free download on my website, faithfulperformance.com, or find it on all the digital platforms — Spotify, iTunes, and others. We would really appreciate your support. We will also be releasing the second song of the album, "The Exodus to Aliyah," in the coming week. We're doing five songs in total, so stay tuned. We hope you find inspiration in both the music and the videos.

Tonight we'll be discovering how to be set apart with the Lord as set apart believers on his set apart times. This is so important. When we read the Holy Bible from Genesis to Revelation, God has always called his people to be set apart from the world. Unfortunately, when we look at the church today, there are too many similarities between the church and the world, which is dangerous, because we are not being set apart in God's set apart ways — his set apart times that he wants all of us to use for fellowship with him, for intimate relationship, according to what he has ordained, not what mankind has ordained in the churches.

It is so important to recognize that he wants us to be set apart. We are set apart first by receiving the blood of the Lamb, Jesus — Yeshua — as our Messiah. That sets us apart for eternal salvation, according to John 3:16 and other great passages. But once we are set apart by the blood of the Lamb, he wants us to fully cross over into these set apart times and set apart ways that he has ordained from the beginning.

I would like to start in Revelation 4:11, which says: "You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, honor, and power, for you created all things, and by your will they exist and were created." God Almighty created all things. As Psalm 33:6 says, he breathed them out of his mouth — the universe, the sun, the moon, the stars. It is totally phenomenal what the Lord God has done. He created all of these things, and some of these set apart ways were established for you, for me, and for the one new body, the one new man — the nation of Israel, the commonwealth of Israel — so that we might walk according to those set apart ways.

As we know, he created man on the sixth day, making us part of his creation, giving us dominion over everything. He definitely wants us to be intimate with him and to truly take hold of these set apart ways in our heads, our minds, our souls, and our spirits. As Genesis 1:26 says: "Then God said, let us make man in our image, according to our likeness." He formed mankind in Elohim's image — the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit — and according to their likeness. This brings to mind what Messiah said in John 14 through 17 about being one with the Father. He and the Father are one, and he wants us to be one with him, as we are made in his image and likeness. He wants us to be a part of these beautiful set apart ways that he has ordained, not mankind.

Ephesians 1:4 says: "Just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love." This is such a powerful scripture. He knew us before the foundation of the world. We were in him before the foundation of the world. He wants us to be holy, to be righteous, according to what he has set apart for his children — which is you and me.

Even from the very beginning, with Adam and Eve, he set them apart in the garden. He wanted fellowship with them, to set them apart from the world in the beautiful Garden of Eden. We know what happened, but the original intent was to separate them in that garden — just as he will restore us to that state in Revelation 21–22, in the new Jerusalem, where we will once again be set apart for the beautiful things he wants us to embrace, to take hold of in our heads, our hearts, our spirits, and our souls, and to admonish one another with.

When we think about Adam and Eve being set apart, we also see that God set apart Noah in his generation. Noah was one of eight who survived the great flood — everyone else perished. Noah was set apart because he obeyed the Lord. Scripture says this repeatedly: he obeyed the Lord, he had faith in the Lord, and he was righteous in the sight of the Lord. And so the Lord set him apart.

We also think of Father Abraham, who was set apart as well. He grew up in Babel — what we think of as Babylon. His father Terah was an idol worshiper in the region of Nimrod. Yet Abraham crossed over from being a Gentile to being a Hebrew. We find this in Genesis 14:13, where Abraham is called "the Hebrew." The word Hebrew simply means to cross over — some translate it as "passing over." We all want the Lord to pass over us in the day of judgment. Abraham was a Gentile who crossed over into the ways of the Lord. According to the Talmud — the oral traditions and history of the Jewish people — Abraham lived with Noah for approximately fifty years, learning the ways of the Lord. He had to learn them; he was a Gentile. One could say that one of the reasons Noah lived as long as he did was to teach mankind the ways of the Lord, including Abraham.

The ways of the Lord are the ways of the Lord. Just because they were written down on tablets at Sinai after the Exodus from Egypt does not mean they were new. The ways of the Lord have always been the same — forever, everlasting, from the beginning to the end. His ways are his ways. These set apart times and set apart days are so important to him. So we must cross over as well. I was born a Gentile, but once I received the blood of the Lamb, I must cross over into the commonwealth of Israel — to become, in a sense, a Hebrew, just as Abraham was.

We can also look at Ruth. We all know the beautiful story of Ruth. She was the great-grandmother of King David, but she was a Gentile. What do we see in Ruth 1:16? "Your God, my God. Your people, my people." She crossed over literally — from Moab in Jordan into the promised land — but she also crossed over spiritually to the God of Israel. She was a Gentile. So we see this concept of crossing over, of being set apart by the Lord. Ruth crossed over not only geographically from Jordan to Israel, but also in her faith. That is the attitude and conviction we need to have as born Gentiles: that the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and David is Yeshua, Jesus, and we need to worship according to the way that Jesus has ordained — according to the Word of God. He is the Word.

We must realize that it is a narrow road. As he says in Matthew 7:13–14: "Enter through the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." This is a very sobering passage. There is a narrow road and a narrow gate — not the wide gate. As I said, too often we see very little difference between the world and the church — in the sin present in the church, and in the man-made traditions we have inherited. It is time to circumcise our hearts, our minds, our souls, and our spirits, and truly look at what the Word of God says about how to be set apart on the beautiful things the Lord has ordained — to be in fellowship with him on his time schedule, on his set apart days, and not according to mankind's ways.

It is a narrow road that leads to life. Remember, it leads to life — because we are going to discover the two things in the holy scriptures that represent life as we go forward.

It is so important to have covenant theology and to have our theology of the covenants correct. There are three things I believe we need to have as a foundation: God's calendar, his divine appointments — or feast days as most know them from Leviticus 23 — and the everlasting covenants. If we have those three foundational principles correct, then the Bible will read very smoothly. There will be no contradictions, no errors, no confusion. God is not a God of confusion. But those are the three prerequisites for having our theology properly grounded.

If you are not familiar with covenant theology — with God's plan of salvation for Jew and Gentile — it all begins with Abraham and the Abrahamic covenant. God promised a seed, which we know to be Yeshua, Jesus, to rule over the promised land, for that covenant also included the promise of the promised land. The Davidic covenant builds and extends upon the Abrahamic covenant. David was promised a seed — the same seed of Abraham — to sit on David's everlasting throne over the promised land, over Israel. Matthew 1 opens by calling him "the Son of David, the Son of Abraham." Matthew is pointing you back to the covenants — he is the fulfillment of the Abrahamic seed and the Davidic seed. And we know the new covenant: he is the Messiah, the Savior of the world for Jew and Gentile, the Jewish Messiah of the scriptures. We are all saved by the blood of the Lamb. We will be living in the new covenant literally when the Jewish people — as prophesied in Ezekiel 36 and Jeremiah 31 — receive Yeshua as their Savior and Messiah, and he washes them clean and puts the Torah on their hearts and minds, as he does for all of us, and then we will be living fully in the new covenant.