This year the ninth of Av begins at sundown on July 19th. Being told "no" is seldom a pleasant experience, especially when that answer is preceded by great hopes and expectations. It can take a long time to heal emotions after the sting of rejection is felt. Such is the case in parasha Shelach. Here the children of Israel are given an answer that proves to be almost more than...

In this video blog, Daniel and Steven Lancaster join together to give you a glimpse into the holy land of Israel. Archaeology, geography, geology, along with the language and cultural history of the Land and the People of Israel make the words of the Torah, the Psalms, and the Prophets - the Scriptures of Israel - come alive. In this video blog you'll get a raw peak into the experience...

In your Seder tonight at some point you will read: THIS is what has stood strong for our fathers and us. For there was not only one nation who rose up against us, but in each and every generation they rise up against us to put and end to us. But the Holy One, blessed is he, rescues us from their hand. First Fruits of Zion will be hosting a...

Due to time constraints on the Haggadah project we were unable to send out the monthly eRosh e-mail at the beginning of Adar. The Adar calendar has now been uploaded to the eRosh home page and we will have the children's and teen's material up in the next day or two. God willing we will be back on track with our regular eRosh e-mail next month. We apologize for any...

Anti-missionaries have questions. We have answers. Judaism has objections. We have solutions. At Vine of David and First Fruits of Zion, we are going to begin utilizing our blog post space for answering Judaism's arguments against faith in Messiah.

I have great news to share. The HaYesod Student Workbook has been sent to the printer! It was an incredible amount of work and we are very pleased with how it turned out. We expect delivery the first week of December.

Here is a note I sent our registered leaders on Friday:

No man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. (1 Corinthians 3:11).
The firm foundation of God stands. (2 Timothy 2:19)

Jesus is the foundation of Christianity. The Christian faith is "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone" (Ephesians 2:20). Just as the foundation of a house supports and shapes the structure built upon it, Jesus holds up Christianity and shapes it after Himself.

The Torah is God's foundational revelation to his people. Through it, God opens our eyes not only to how we should behave, but who he is and how to be in relationship with him.

But the blessing found in the Torah does not come automatically. We must immerse ourselves in the Torah's words, occupy ourselves with them, and set them before our eyes and on our lips. We must place the words of the Torah on our hearts and speak of them when we sit in our homes, when we walk along the road, when we lie down, and when we arise (Deuteronomy 6:6-7). God promised Joshua,

First Fruits of Zion wants to participate in your simcha--and, we want to add to your joy. So, send us a picture of your sukkah, we will post it on our website and you will be entered into a drawing to win a complete Torah Club volume of your choice. We will be giving away 5 Torah Clubs to five different entries in the following categories:

At First Fruits of Zion, we teach that the Torah is not cancelled by the Gospel. Unlike the common Christian theology that teaches Jesus abolished the Law, we believe that the Torah is God's eternal, unchanging word. We believe that the Torah's commandments like the Sabbath, the festivals, the dietary laws, and so forth are still relevant to all believers today. However, we see a biblical distinction between a Jewish person's obligation to those things and a Gentile believer's obligation.