When referring to the Son of God, I use his original Hebrew name, Yeshua. It's more of a courtesy than anything. Having traveled the world, I have been called many names, including Emille and Ernesto. 

It was always refreshing when someone, even in a foreign country, used my real name, Ernie. So, I extend the same courtesy to Yeshua.

The Catholic doctrine of the Trinity emerged in the 4th century. It proclaims one God co-equal in three persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

The central problem with the doctrine of the Trinity is that Yeshua, the star witness, never claimed to be God (Yahweh), only the Son of God. In a court of law, this would be akin to not having a murder weapon while trying to convict someone of murder. The evidence to support the Trinity is circumstantial at best.

So we can twist, contort, and shoe-horn scriptures to fit modern doctrine based on Constantine’s 4th-century edicts, or we can take the Son of God at his word that he is merely the Son of God, not God Himself (Yahweh).

One of God's chief attributes is omniscience (all-knowing). If Yeshua is God, a co-equal member of the Trinity, why does he not know when he is coming back, according to Matthew 24:36?  

Another of God's attributes is omnipotence (all-powerful). If Yeshua is God, why did he say in Luke 22:42, "Not my will, but your will be done," as though his will was not coequal with God's will? And why is he standing at God's right hand, a less-powerful position of subservience, in Acts 7:55?

Many use the scripture "I and the Father are one " in John 10:30 to suggest that Yeshua is God. This passage merely states that the Father and Son are of one heart and mind, not the same.

In John 14:8, Philip asks Yeshua, "Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us." Jesus responds in verse 9, "Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father." This is not stating that Yeshua is the Father (God) but that Yeshua so emulated the Father on earth that they wouldn't see anything new if the Father had appeared. Besides, in Exodus 33:20, God states, "No man can see me and live."  

Yeshua does not need to be God, so common sense begs us to reconsider this doctrine. If for no other reason, it violates the First Commandment that proclaims only ONE GOD, Yahweh, the God and Father of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Yeshua, and all who claim to know God.

Scripture does not allude to this. The church after Pentecost was Hebrew, so it would have been highly unlikely that they worshiped anyone other than Yahweh as God. The worship of Yeshua as God did not occur until the 4th century Catholic Church created the doctrine of the Trinity.

To understand Thomas' declaration in John 20:28, where he cried out, "My Lord and my god," you have to go back to John 14, where Yeshua was comforting his disciples before his crucifixion, telling them, "Believe in God. Also, believe in me." When Thomas saw Yeshua after his resurrection, he doubted until he placed his fingers into Yeshua's hands and side, declaring, "I believe in God, and I also believe in you, Lord!" Modern translators did their most tremendous disservice to the scriptures, creating the impression that Thomas was proclaiming Yeshua as God. He was not. He was only reaffirming what Yeshua told them in John 14.

In Jeremiah 10:2, God commanded His people not to learn or practice the ways of the (pagan) nations. That may be why the Hebrews do not celebrate birthdays in the Bible. Birthdays were celestial markers originated by pagan astrologers who worshiped the sun, moon, and stars. There were only three birthday celebrations mentioned in the Bible, and all three resulted in death, including Job's family, Pharoah's baker, and Herod's nemesis, John the Baptist.

The birthdate of Yeshua is not mentioned in the Bible, nor was it celebrated in the early church until the 4th century, when December 25th was proclaimed as Yeshua's birthday. Given that God was particular with the dates and times of His Feasts and Festivals, why would He not give the specific date of something even greater: His Son's birth?

The church doesn't care when he was born, only that he was and that they need to tell the world about his birth. Agreed, but why bring the most significant truth the world has ever known to them on the back of a lie and a falsehood?

So common sense begs us to ask this question: Is celebrating someone's birthday on a day they were not born true or false? And if so, does that violate the Ninth Commandment not to practice falsehoods? And if that is not bad enough, why do we celebrate the birth of God's son on the same day the pagans celebrated the birth of God's greatest enemies, the sun gods? That doesn't seem very respectful to me.

The early church after Pentecost was predominantly Hebrew and continued to meet on the Sabbath as Yeshua, the Apostles, and the church did for hundreds of years. However, the rise of Christianity in the Roman Empire, the desire to distinguish Christian practices from Jewish traditions, and the influence of Roman sun worship practices on early Christianity resulted in the creation of the Roman Catholic Church. This new hybrid Christian-Pagan church changed the Sabbath from the Seventh Day to the First Day, the day of the Sun, and incorporated many other pagan doctrines and beliefs.

Did they have the right to set aside the oldest Commandment of God? Matthew 5:19 reminds us that those who 'set aside' God's Commandments will be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven. Any church that does not remember God's Sabbath, which starts at sundown on Friday and goes until sundown on Saturday, is sacrificing eternal position.  

1 John 2:5-6 states, "This is how we know we are in him:  Whoever claims to know God must live as Yeshua did." Why take chances with eternity? 

The early church after Pentecost was predominantly Hebrew. They continued meeting in synagogues on the Sabbath, reading the Torah, and keeping the Commandments. They had the added joy of believing that Yeshua was the long-promised Messiah and discovering all the prophetic fulfillment, including the final atonement of their sins. As anomalies in the otherwise traditional Hebrew community, they relied on one another more closely, meeting in homes, enjoying first-hand accounts of the Messiah's life from his Apostles, and building deeper bonds as new believers in Messiah Yeshua. 

The church, known early on as 'The Way,' continued to grow, which irked the Pharisees, who tasked Paul to persecute it. In an encounter with Yeshua, Paul was struck blind and, upon recovery, began taking the news of the Messiah to the Gentiles. After he had finished his journeys in Rome, he was executed. However, the church continued to grow. 

Nearly 300 years later, in 325 AD, Emporer Constantine created the Roman Catholic Church to distance itself from its Hebrew origins and appease all of Rome. Pagan doctrines like the Trinity (worship of multiple gods), the worship of a matriarch, praying to the dead, confessing sins to men, and the mystical conversion of bread and wine into Yeshua's literal body and blood found their way into the new Christian doctrines.

The Catholic Church also changed God's Sabbath from the 'seventh' day to the 'first' day, the pagan Day of the Sun. Since the Romans worshiped the birthdays of their pagan sun gods on December 25th, they decided to celebrate the birthday of their newly minted Christian God, Jesus, on it even though there is no record of his birth date in the Bible.

God was not very impressed with this abomination and plunged the world into the Dark Ages, where the Catholic Church would become a powerful and corrupt force that would mock, ridicule, persecute, and murder non-Catholic Christians and Jews for centuries.

1,700 years later, the Catholic Church remains, with much of its membership ignorant of its sordid past. Parts of its pagan-infested doctrines are still practiced today in every denomination and non-denominational church worldwide. This hybrid Christian-Pagan church of the world is referred to as the Great Harlot abomination in Revelation 17.

The church proclaiming and worshiping anyone other than Yahweh as God violates the First Commandment. 

Worshiping idols and artifacts, such as crosses, statues, and the erroneous images of Yeshua and the saints, violates the Second Commandment.

Declaring, worshiping, and praying to anyone other than Yahweh as the one True God violates the Third Commandment.

Changing God's Sabbath from Saturday (Seventh) to Sunday (First) violates the Fourth Commandment. 

Celebrating the birth of Yeshua on a day he was not born violates the Ninth Commandment.

Many will take issue with these, but they do so at their peril and will not spend eternity at the top of Heaven.

The Commandments contain the blueprint and outline for all humanity to follow. Some of the Hebrew law is also applicable to humanity as a whole. At the same time, most of it was given to the Hebrews to govern their new society, which was now wandering the desert. A case can be made that we are obligated to consider all of the Hebrew law. But before we get too bogged down in the law, we should focus more on the words etched in stone as they are less contentious and more impactful.

As I see it, Paul could not prevail upon the Rabbis in the cities where he went. In reaching out to the Gentile pagans, he was able to sell them on forgiveness, mercy, and grace. But he failed in the more significant matter of submission and obedience to God's Commandments, as much of the pagan world was steeped in idolatry and the worship of other gods. Most were only interested in adding Yahweh and Yeshua to their collection of gods.

Paul's efforts were ultimately consumed by the Roman Catholic Church, which would have made him roll over in his grave as it was rolled out. While his letters provide some of the best teachings in the Bible, his mission was ultimately a failure. The church today seems to be more fixated on his letters than the Torah or the Gospels of Yeshua, which might account for why the church, as a whole, has very little impact on the world around it.