Your question, RobGuy, gets to the very heart of the implementation of the Torah---and it's therefore critically important that we get to the bottom of it. I can't claim to be infallible either, of course, but I have spent enough time mulling over the Torah to at least have formed some opinions on the matter.

The way I've come to see it, Israel alone was charged with keeping the signs---among which wearing the tzitsit is an obvious example. But since that can still easily be done, let’s consider at the same time some “sign” commandments that can’t be kept in any literal sense today. These would include anything having to do with the duties of the priests or Levites, and especially the offering up of the Levitical sacrifices—a subject that consumes half the Torah. We can observe these (that is, we can examine them with an eye toward discovering what Yahweh meant to tell us through them), but we can’t do them, for Israel is in rebellion against Yahweh, and has therefore been precluded from performing what he commanded them to perform. It’s as if God told them to eat their vegetables, but they refused. So He has put them in “time out.” And those vegetables are still sitting there on the kitchen table, uneaten.

On the other hand (it seems) there are the “practical” commandments like not eating pork and mice, not murdering each other, not coveting or stealing each others’ stuff, and honoring our parents. Here is where the typical Christian viewpoint goes totally haywire, for the ekklesia tends to look at this as a buffet---taking the “laws” they agree with (like not committing adultery) and leaving those they don’t (like remembering the Sabbath and keeping it set-apart). It’s totally inconsistent, and illogical to a fault. Also sprinkled in there are all sorts of community or cultural things, like setting aside cities of refuge, leprosy and ritual purification laws, the ashes of red heifers and that thing in Numbers 5 about suspected infidelity---things that outside of eretz Israel have never been done, and with conflicting local laws in place, would be very hard to institute. (Try using the Torah’s method of dispensing justice to murderers in America, and see what happens. The victims’ families would all be on death row. Woof!)

So as a practical matter, how do I (as a gentile believer) approach the Torah? Feel free to disagree with my observations and conclusions, but here’s what I’m thinking:

1) Only Israel was commanded to perform the Torah.

2) From the very beginning, gentiles were invited to join Israel as a “mixed multitude,” but if they did, the Instructions applied to them as well.

3) On some level, all of the “sign” instructions have practical value.

4) On some level, all of the “practical” instructions have spiritual significance---they’re signs. (The dietary laws, for example, instruct us to be discerning about what to put into our lives.)

5) Therefore, I see no practical difference between our proper approach to the “sign” Instructions and the “practical” ones. They are all signs, and they are all commandments.

6) Generally speaking, I endeavor to perform the Instructions I can, and “observe” the rest. For example, I avoid pork (not because God told Israel not to eat it, but because I trust His advice), treat the Sabbath as a special day consecrated to Yahweh (though I express myself in worship whenever I feel like it), and so forth. I don’t wear a tsitzit, but I have no good reason for not doing so, even though nobody I’m likely to meet would have the foggiest idea what it means, or even what it is.

7) I realize that even now, having studied the Torah and having a reasonably good idea of what to do, I fail miserably at keeping my part of the bargain, no matter how hard I try.

8) I further realize that my shortcomings are permanently covered (which is what “atoned” means) by the shed blood of Yahshua the Messiah, fulfilling in ultimate perfection all of the blood sacrifices specified in the Torah. I’m thinking especially of the chata’t (or “sin” offering”---covering my lapses in behavior); the asham (or “trespass” offering---covering my lapses in holiness).

9) Yahweh forces no one to avail themselves of the Messiah’s sacrifice. We may choose, if we wish (and if we’re arrogant fools) to try to meet His standards---keep His Instructions---in our own strength. I happen to know (from long and bitter experience) that it can’t be done, which explains my great joy and eternal gratitude for Yahshua’s redemptive sacrifice on my behalf.

10) Hopefully, your father was a loving man, as mine was. If we understand that Yahweh patterned a human father’s role after His own character, we can begin to comprehend what He really expects of us. He knows we kids aren’t going to get everything right the first time---or even the tenth time. But He does insist that we trust Him and that we try to do what He asked of us. When our dad commanded us, saying “Don’t touch that---it’s hot,” he wasn’t doing it to impose his will upon us, curtail our freedoms, or grasp power for himself, but merely to save us from unnecessary pain. If we chose to disregard that commandment, we burned our disobedient little fingers. Yahweh’s instructions are just like that: they’re for our benefit, not His.

kp

Tzitzit
And Yahweh spake unto Moses, saying, “Speak unto the children of Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue: And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments of Yahweh, and do them; and that ye seek not after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring: That ye may remember, and do all my commandments, and be holy unto your God. I am Yahweh your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: I am Yahweh your God.” Numbers 15:37-41

Fringes on the garments were to be a reminder of Yahweh's commandments. But why must they include a single blue strand? Ancient Israelites had only one source of blue dye – it was extracted from a mollusk. In strictest sense, obeying the Torah by wearing tzitzit required becoming “unclean”, illustrating that we are ALL in need of redemption.
And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you: They shall be even an abomination unto you; ye shall not eat of their flesh, but ye shall have their carcases in abomination. Leviticus 11:10-11

As a Torah observant Jew, our Messiah, Yahshua, commonly called Jesus, wore tzitzit. The prophet Malachi predicted both his coming and his work:
But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings. Malachi 4:2

But as he went the people thronged him. And a woman having an issue of blood twelve years, which had spent all her living upon physicians, neither could be healed of any, came behind him, and touched the border of his garment (his tzitzit) and immediately her issue of blood stanched. And Yahshua said, “Who touched me?” When all denied, Peter and they that were with him said, “Master, the multitude throng thee and press thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me?” And Yahshua said, “Somebody hath touched me: for I perceive that virtue is gone out of me.” And when the woman saw that she was not hid, she came trembling, and falling down before him, she declared unto him before all the people for what cause she had touched him, and how she was healed immediately. And he said unto her, “Daughter, be of good comfort: thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace.” Luke 8:42-48
This example is tied in the Ashkenazi style. In Hebrew, each letter is associated with a number. The groupings of knots “spell” Yahweh Echad. Echad is the Hebrew word which means “Unity”, and is (mis-) translated “Lord” in most English versions of the following verses. It's the same word used at the end of Genesis 2:24, “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh (Unity).”

And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? And Yahshua answered him, “The first of all the commandments is, 'Hear, O Israel: Yahweh our God is one Unity: And thou shalt love Yahweh thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength.' This is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, 'Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.' There is none other commandment greater than these.” And the scribe said unto him, “Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God, and there is none other but he: And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” And when Yahshua saw that he answered discreetly, he said unto him, “Thou art not far from the kingdom of God.” And no man after that durst ask him any question. Mark 12:28-34

Hear, O Israel: Yahweh our God is one Unity: And thou shalt love Yahweh thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. Deuteronomy 6:4-6

Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself: I am Yahweh. Leviticus 19:18

Thank you for the replies everyone!

I think I will need some more time to chew on what you said about the signs part KP, but I think I'm beginning to understand the point you were driving at.

If anyone was curious, I think I will start wearing Tassels in the upcoming weeks, as soon as I get some.

But another question for those who wear them, how do you deal with wearing them at your work? For instance, I work in a restaurant, and we of course have a dress code. I don't know whether or not I will be allowed to wear them there or not. How do you deal with that situation? Have you noticed your bosses/places of employment having a negative attitude towards them or not? Thanks!

My family and I wear them. Proudly I might add.

And if you live in America your employer cannot legally discriminate against you for wearing them.

As for any argument that would say "well that is for Israel", I would say, "That is who you are grafted into".

"Wear Tzitzits" = Yes Sir!

(By the way, I should add, I owned a restaurant before I retired, so when I say they cannot discriminate against you, I know what I am talking about, barring a Health food issue or something from the health department, but you could always tuck them in if you needed too)