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What would a Gentile church have to look like
in order to provoke the Jewish community to
jealousy?
There
are a number of things that a church can do to
fulfill the calling of Gentile Believers to "make
the Jewish people jealous." Here are some
suggestions: Emphasize the ongoing importance
of Israel in the plans of God. Emphasize the Jewishness
of the New Testament, the Jewishness of Jesus
and the apostles. Emphasize God's love for Israel,
and speak positively of Jewish people, but never
compromise the truth that the Jewish community
needs to receive Yeshua for salvation. Teach some
basic Hebrew words. Sell some books and tapes
that teach on the Jewish holidays and customs,
and “Jewish Gospel” music. Incorporate
some of that Jewish Gospel music into your worship
service. Include the Jewish holidays in your teaching,
and even celebrate one on occasion, like a Passover
Seder. Pray often for the peace of Israel and
the salvation of the Jewish people around the
world. Try to be as supportive as possible of
the reborn State of Israel. Have a Messianic Jewish
speaker address the church at least once a year.
Why not invite us to come and give our “Sharing
Yeshua Seminar” which will teach your people
how to witness to Jewish people? Do a special
evangelistic outreach to the Jewish people in
your area. Zealously support good Messianic Jewish
ministries and synagogues by your financial giving
and through your prayers.
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How do I witness to my Jewish friend?
I’m
glad that you want to tell your Jewish friend
the Good News about Yeshua, the Messiah of Israel.
Presenting the Message about the Messiah who can
restore us to God and bring us eternal life is
the best way to bless Israel and the Jewish people;
and God promises to bless those who bless the
seed of Abraham. According to Paul, the apostle
to the Gentiles, bringing the Good News first
to the Jewish people should be an evangelistic
priority for all believers. Sharing the Good News
about the Messiah with Jewish people is not complicated.
After 26 years of experience, I have found only
a few basic principles are needed. First, be prepared
to experience some rejection, as well as some
acceptance. For many reasons, this is a difficult
area for many Jewish people, and so you have to
be willing to handle some rejection graciously.
However, many Jewish people are receptive to hearing
about Messiah Yeshua, if He is presented to them
properly. Second, one of the biggest barriers
that prevents Jewish people from believing in
Yeshua is the assumption that if they believe
in Yeshua, they will no longer be Jewish. Of course,
that is not true. Messianic Jews are more Jewish
than ever! But to help overcome this barrier,
emphasize the Jewishness of the Messiah. Yeshua
is the most Jewish of Jews - a descendant of King
David, was circumcised on the eighth day, went
to synagogue regularly, as was His custom. He
taught and kept the Torah. He is Israel’s
Chief Rabbi, our ultimate Prophet, our High Priest,
the Messiah and the King of the Jews. Tell your
friend that Yeshua’s disciples were Jewish
men who continued to live very Jewish lives. In
fact, history tells us that there was a Messianic
Jewish movement in Israel for some 600 years after
Yeshua came! Emphasize the Jewishness of the New
Testament, which was written by Jews, about the
greatest Jew of all. Let your friend know about
the possibility of joining a Messianic synagogue,
which can be found in most major Jewish population
centers, where he and others can live as Jews,
and raise their children as Jews. Let him know
that he not only doesn’t have to give up
his God-given Jewish identity by following Yeshua,
but that he will even enhance it! Try to correct
the common misperception that Christianity is
against the Jewish people. True Christians are
to love all people, especially the Jewish people.
If possible, be a true friend and show your friend
some genuine love. You might want to communicate
that Christians owe a debt to the Jewish people
- for the Bible, both Old and New Testaments,
for the Messiah, for the Apostles, and for the
Church. Whenever possible, stand with Israel and
be as supportive of Jewish causes as possible.
Encourage your Jewish friend to read the Bible
- it doesn’t much matter where - Old Testament
or New Testament. God’s Word is so powerful
and self-authenticating that if someone simply
starts reading it with an open heart and mind,
and prays to God to reveal the truth, they’re
90% of the way there! If the opportunity arises,
read Isaiah 52:13- 53:12 with him verse by verse,
and discuss how it is fulfilled in the events
in the life of Yeshua. Be fair and warn your friend
that there is often a cost to becoming a Messianic
Jew, including possible rejection by family, friends
and community leaders, but that it is a cost well
worth paying. Finally, be patient. The seeds that
are sown often take years to come to fruition.
Have the attitude that you are planting seeds,
and that it may take time and different circumstances
before the harvest arrives.
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What happens to Jewish people who don't believe
in Yeshua? Are they lost and going to Hell?
Incredibly,
there are many so-called Christians, and even
some Messianic Jews today, who suggest that Jewish
people don't need to believe in Yeshua in order
to be saved! They teach that since the Jewish
people have a covenant with God, they don't need
the New Covenant of the Messiah; or they teach
that all religions will get everyone to Heaven.
Little could be farther from the truth! Very early
in human history, our first parents rebelled against
God, and sin and death took control of humanity.
Instead of drawing nearer to God, Adam and Eve
ran away from HaMakor - the Source of Life. The
entire world was now cursed, along with all mankind;
Adam and Eve were exiled from the Garden of Eden,
and forbidden to eat from the Tree of Life. The
whole world (which includes the Jewish people)
remains dead in trespasses and sins (Ephesians
2:1). The whole world is perishing, decaying and
headed for destruction like a rotten piece of
fruit (John 3:16). Rabbi Paul, the great theologian
sent to the Gentiles, wrote the Church at Rome
that he was not ashamed of the Gospel, "for
it is the power of God for salvation, to everyone
who believes, to the Jew first, and also
to the Greek." Paul made it clear that
Jewish people not only are not exempt from the
need to receive Yeshua, but in fact the Good News
is supposed to go to us first! Paul went on to
declare that "all who have sinned without
the Law will also perish without the Law, and
all who have sinned under the Law (the Jewish
people) will be judged by the Law... we have already
charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under
sin... for all have sinned and fall short of the
glory of God" (Romans 2:12, 3:9, 23). Simon
Peter, one of the leaders of Yeshua's Emissaries,
standing before the Sanhedrin, declared to the
priests, Torah scholars and rabbis of Israel that
there is salvation in no one other than Yeshua
of Nazareth, and there is no other spiritual reality
anywhere in the universe which can bring us salvation.
It doesn't get much clearer than that! John, one
of the other Emissaries and Yeshua's closest friend,
wrote that, "He who has the Son has the life;
he who does not have the Son of God does not have
the life." It's as simple as that. The Son
of God Himself said that He was the Way, the Truth
and the Life, and that apart from placing faith
in Him, no man could get to the Father. Rabbi
Yeshua said to a group of Jewish leaders (men
who believed in God, who knew the Torah, who went
to the Temple in Jerusalem and who offered sacrifices),
"Unless you believe that I am He, you shall
die in your sins" (John 8:24). If we could
be saved by Judaism, Messiah Yeshua wouldn't have
said to a Jewish man like Nicodemus that it wasn't
enough to be born once, even if one was a knowledgeable
or pious rabbi. Even a leading Torah-teacher
like Nicodemus needed to be born again - to undergo
a spiritual rebirth, in order to enter the Kingdom
of Heaven. There are scores of places in the Holy
Scriptures which teach that all of humanity (including
the Jewish people) is utterly lost, and that each
and every Jewish person (along with everyone else),
in order to be saved, must hear and believe the
Good News about the Messiah. Pretending the dying
patient isn't sick doesn't help the patient. Acknowledging
that he is sick, and then administering the appropriate
medicine is what the dying patient needs. Allowing
Jewish people to die without Yeshua is spiritual
malpractice of the highest order! What about those
who say that Jewish people have never really heard
about the Messiah, or that an anti-Semitic Jesus
was presented to them by a corrupt church? Ignorance
is no excuse. Hosea warned us that "my people
are destroyed for lack of knowledge."
We are responsible for the information given to
us through Moses and the prophets. Yeshua said,
"They have Moses and the Prophets; let them
hear them (Luke 16:29)." We have the revealed
Word of God, written by our own Jewish prophets,
which clearly points us to Yeshua. Didn't Moses
specifically promise that God would raise up another
great prophet, like himself, who would speak the
words of God to us, and if we didn't listen to
that prophet, God would judge us severely (see
Deuteronomy 18:15-19)? The Son of God claimed
that He was written about in our very own Torah!
"The one who accuses you is Moses, in whom
you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses,
you would believe Me, for he wrote of Me"
(John 5:45-46). No Jewish person is going to appear
before God and say, "Judge of the whole Earth,
I'm not responsible for not believing in the Savior
you sent to us. I never knew." Or, "Master
of the universe, I didn't like the way Yeshua
was presented to me. Besides, my rabbi told me
not to believe in Him, so it's not my fault."
These excuses won't be accepted! We are responsible
for choosing the spiritual leaders to whom we
listen. We are warned not to listen to false teachers.
If the blind mislead the blind, so that both fall
into a pit, both are responsible. While it may
be true that much of the Church has presented
a Yeshua that has been stripped of His Jewishness,
many true Christians have also shown us the love
of God, often at great cost to themselves. Besides,
there has also been a remnant of Messianic Jews
in every generation. For example, there were many
Messianic Jews in Poland before World War Two.
I am told that there were four Messianic Synagogues
in Warsaw before the Holocaust, and that there
were many Messianic Jews who were sent to the
concentration camps, who had a Jewish witness
to the reality of Yeshua to their fellow Jews.
There are some today who teach "Two-Covenant"
theology, the idea that God has one saving covenant
with the Jewish people, and a different saving
covenant with the Church (the New Covenant); therefore
Jewish people don't need to accept Yeshua, since
He is part of the New Covenant. That's terribly
wrong! The Messiah and His New Covenant was presented
first to the Jewish people! It was specifically
predicted by the prophet Jeremiah that the New
Covenant was to be made with the Jewish people
(see Jeremiah 31:31-34). While it is true that
the people of Israel have had several covenants
with God (the covenants made with Abraham, Moses,
David, and the New Covenant made with Yeshua),
that does not mean that an individual Jewish person
can reject a covenant and still be saved. The
fact that Israel has a national covenant with
God does not save every individual Jewish person.
After all, not all Israel are Israel. Since the
coming of the Messiah, it is only those Jews who
have welcomed Messiah Yeshua and the New Covenant
who are saved. There are certain theological boundaries
that distinguish between orthodoxy and heresy:
Inspiration of the Scriptures, the Trinity, the
Deity of Yeshua, and the sanctity of human life
in all of its stages. The need for all people,
including Jewish people, to personally receive
Messiah Yeshua in this life in order to be saved,
is one of those boundaries that separates orthodoxy
from apostasy. Every true child of God must
repudiate any teaching that crosses this boundary
whenever and wherever it occurs, and call it by
its true names: heresy, apostasy, compromise and
cowardice. If your denomination, pastor or rabbi
isn't teaching the clear truth from the Word of
God on the lostness of mankind (including the
Jewish people), and the need for all people to
accept Messiah Yeshua in order to experience atonement,
forgiveness and salvation, I would encourage you
to bring the truth to their attention. If they
don't listen, then seek a new spiritual leader
who does teach the truth.
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I see commercials for an organization called
"On Wings of Eagles" which helps
Russian Jews. I want to help Russian Jews.
Is this a good ministry to support?
We're
encouraged by our Christians brothers and sisters
who have a heart for the welfare of the Jewish
people. We also applaud efforts to help Russian
Jews emigrate to Israel, provided they are given
the Good News in the process. After all, a person
who dies apart from Messiah in Israel is no better
off than a person who dies apart from Messiah
in Russia! Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, the head of
the organization behind "On Wings of Eagles"
is not only not a Messianic Jew, but is actually
hostile toward Messianic Jews, and is an outspoken
opponent of Jewish evangelism! His book, What
Christians Should Know About Jews and Judaism,
devotes an entire chapter to besmirching Jewish
people who follow Yeshua, and urges Christians
to have nothing to do with them! Those who work
with Rabbi Eckstein are discouraged from either
giving any Messianic literature to the Russian
Jews they are assisting, or from sharing their
faith with them. The needs of Russian Jews wanting
to return to the land of their ancestry is legitimate,
and anti-Semitism is a reality in post-Soviet
Russia; however, neither present circumstances
nor the pain of recent history is an excuse to
withhold the life-giving message of Yeshua from
Jewish people. For those who desire to help Russian
Jews emigrate to Israel, or help them once they
arrive, there are good ministries operated either
by Messianic Jews or evangelical Christians who
present the Good News along with material help.
You can contact us for a list of those organizations.
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