One of the things I think is rather funny of the anti-missionaries who contact me, is that our ministry does not advocate active proseltizing--like going to Tel Aviv and passing out tracts. (Doesn't work, and even tract-based Christian missions to non-Jews really doesn't work either.) We simply encourage non-Jewish Messianics to witness to Jewish people via acts of kindness and service.
Go to the pro-Israel rally. Frequent Jewish businesses and establishes. Work with Jewish people on matters of common interest to the community. And let them see you doing some of the things that they do--especially on Shabbat and the feasts--provoking them to jealousy.
Let God sort out the details, and let Messiah be revealed to them by your proper obedience to Torah (Matthew 5:16). Let them see something unique about you that they lack: the salvation of the Lord.
Good question. I'd say I am convinced Yeshua is the Messiah because of God's revelation in my heart primarily. I know that doesn't intellectually sit well for some people, but that's the truth.
@J.K.
I love the zing you did yesterday. :-) I agree with service first as a means of being a disciples and witness for Yeshua.
You know, if you watch any of the debates between Jews and Christians -- especially the ones involving Shmuely Boteach, God bless him -- he continually brings up this very issue... "Your Messiah says 'look at their fruit', but Christian action towards Jews has seen thousands of years of bad fruit."
Much service is needed to begin to mend fences -- service without the catch of "do you love Jesus". Service and love without any expectation of return, without any gotchas.
-Someone who started a new religion aside from Judaism. -Anything other than a Jew. -A denouncer of Judaism. -A hater of Pharisees [since the (Pharisaic) Talmud lists several kinds of Pharisees, most being bad; and since while some certain Pharisees were admonished by Yeshua and conspired against him, other Pharisees were taught by Yeshua, listened to Yeshua, tried to save Yeshua's life, etc, etc]. -A pacifist.
HaRav Yeshua WAS:
-A religious Jew. -A teacher and practicer of Kabbalah [Torah-spirituality]. -An upholder of Jewish Oral Tradition [like the teaching of the resurrection, the recitation of brakhoth/blessings, the importance of the Shema, etc) -Sent to initiate collective, national salvation of the tribes of Israel [establishment of the Kingdom of Heaven/God, which is the re-established Kingdom of Israel).
What Yeshua IS: -In the Heavens. -Tiphereth on the Ets Hhaim. -Metatron, who has been discovered by thousands of Kabbalah studying Jew over the centuries.
What can I say? Just read the introduction I wrote to the Survey of the Tanach workbook and you'll see our dilemma. Just running off to ArtScroll when we have a crisis in understanding OT history has not served any of us well. The methods anti-missionaries use, when applied to the Tanach, would turn it into a Jefferson-type Bible, where we are all Deists reading nice stories, but not necessarily anything more.
I hope to have an MP3 study of the Tanach Survey starting in early 2010. I'm planning to do a 12-15 study through my Two Houses of Israel workbook first. Both will be "controversial" if you are citizen of Fundieland...
And G-d bless you folks for being involved in such a crucial debate. He must surely love it when we witness to His own, difficult though (we have made) it be over history.
At a recent meeting of ACSI (apologies for yet another shameless plug) we had a talk from a guy from the Australian Union of Progressive Judaism, the topic being on different streams of Judaism. The guy was basically a pluralist.
Now, I cannot debate on quite the same level as the McKees, Kirkhams and Gabriels but later in the evening the guy asked me honest questions about "Our Jesus" and I gave him honest answers. I even joked to him that, if he was a Christian, I wouldn't like him, since he was a "liberal theologian".
He mainly wanted to know what was regarded as "orthodox"- i.e., who is your most revered commentator? What is standard doctrine, etc?
He listened intently but I would have preferred if he was offended by some of what I was saying, rather than happily accepting so much of it as part of his pluralist research.
But a funny thing happened. I found myself defending the Torah...to this Jew! He described it as "contradictory" and obviously hated the animal sacrifices and so on. I explained that the Torah becomes harmonised by Yeshua. That the Torah shows us how badly we need salvation, and only G-d can provide it...and He did.
FINALLY he started to look offended! I had to be careful, since we use the Jewish Community centre and I feared getting kicked out for proselytizing ;).
I've mentioned this before- the biggest conundrum for us "tellin' them Jews about Jesus", is the horrific acts our spiritual ancestors have committed to them in His name. A little repentance for this would go a long way, but we should never withhold the truth.
Well done to all you guys. I am so much more the richer for visiting here.
Oh, I just noticed something in the debate and wondered if I could bring it up here. Your Jewish friend listed the blood curse of Jeconiah (Jer 22) as a disqualifying factor to Jesus inheriting the throne of David. I understand there may be more than one way around it, but has anyone seen this one, the abstract of which I've snipped from khouse.org:
(Regarding inheritance) There is a peculiar exception recorded in the Torah , resulting from a petition from the daughters of Zelophahad , that family inheritance still be available through daughters where there were no sons available to the family, providing the daughters married within their tribe. (Numbers 26:33, 27:1-11, 36:2-12, Josh 17:3-6, 1 Chr 7:15). It became traditional in those cases for the father to adopt the son-in-law.
why yes Yeshua is the Messiah kind sir :D
ReplyDeleteYep, He's just not the one most Jews were looking then or now.
ReplyDeleteJudah, were you convinced that Jesus is the Messiah by exegesis of scripture or by the revelation of God in your heart?
One of the things I think is rather funny of the anti-missionaries who contact me, is that our ministry does not advocate active proseltizing--like going to Tel Aviv and passing out tracts. (Doesn't work, and even tract-based Christian missions to non-Jews really doesn't work either.) We simply encourage non-Jewish Messianics to witness to Jewish people via acts of kindness and service.
ReplyDeleteGo to the pro-Israel rally. Frequent Jewish businesses and establishes. Work with Jewish people on matters of common interest to the community. And let them see you doing some of the things that they do--especially on Shabbat and the feasts--provoking them to jealousy.
Let God sort out the details, and let Messiah be revealed to them by your proper obedience to Torah (Matthew 5:16). Let them see something unique about you that they lack: the salvation of the Lord.
@Gary,
ReplyDeleteGood question. I'd say I am convinced Yeshua is the Messiah because of God's revelation in my heart primarily. I know that doesn't intellectually sit well for some people, but that's the truth.
@J.K.
I love the zing you did yesterday. :-) I agree with service first as a means of being a disciples and witness for Yeshua.
You know, if you watch any of the debates between Jews and Christians -- especially the ones involving Shmuely Boteach, God bless him -- he continually brings up this very issue... "Your Messiah says 'look at their fruit', but Christian action towards Jews has seen thousands of years of bad fruit."
Much service is needed to begin to mend fences -- service without the catch of "do you love Jesus". Service and love without any expectation of return, without any gotchas.
HaRav Yeshua was NOT:
ReplyDelete-Someone who started a new religion aside from Judaism.
-Anything other than a Jew.
-A denouncer of Judaism.
-A hater of Pharisees [since the (Pharisaic) Talmud lists several kinds of Pharisees, most being bad; and since while some certain Pharisees were admonished by Yeshua and conspired against him, other Pharisees were taught by Yeshua, listened to Yeshua, tried to save Yeshua's life, etc, etc].
-A pacifist.
HaRav Yeshua WAS:
-A religious Jew.
-A teacher and practicer of Kabbalah [Torah-spirituality].
-An upholder of Jewish Oral Tradition [like the teaching of the resurrection, the recitation of brakhoth/blessings, the importance of the Shema, etc)
-Sent to initiate collective, national salvation of the tribes of Israel [establishment of the Kingdom of Heaven/God, which is the re-established Kingdom of Israel).
What Yeshua IS:
-In the Heavens.
-Tiphereth on the Ets Hhaim.
-Metatron, who has been discovered by thousands of Kabbalah studying Jew over the centuries.
What can I say? Just read the introduction I wrote to the Survey of the Tanach workbook and you'll see our dilemma. Just running off to ArtScroll when we have a crisis in understanding OT history has not served any of us well. The methods anti-missionaries use, when applied to the Tanach, would turn it into a Jefferson-type Bible, where we are all Deists reading nice stories, but not necessarily anything more.
ReplyDeleteI hope to have an MP3 study of the Tanach Survey starting in early 2010. I'm planning to do a 12-15 study through my Two Houses of Israel workbook first. Both will be "controversial" if you are citizen of Fundieland...
And G-d bless you folks for being involved in such a crucial debate. He must surely love it when we witness to His own, difficult though (we have made) it be over history.
ReplyDeleteAt a recent meeting of ACSI (apologies for yet another shameless plug) we had a talk from a guy from the Australian Union of Progressive Judaism, the topic being on different streams of Judaism. The guy was basically a pluralist.
Now, I cannot debate on quite the same level as the McKees, Kirkhams and Gabriels but later in the evening the guy asked me honest questions about "Our Jesus" and I gave him honest answers. I even joked to him that, if he was a Christian, I wouldn't like him, since he was a "liberal theologian".
He mainly wanted to know what was regarded as "orthodox"- i.e., who is your most revered commentator? What is standard doctrine, etc?
He listened intently but I would have preferred if he was offended by some of what I was saying, rather than happily accepting so much of it as part of his pluralist research.
But a funny thing happened. I found myself defending the Torah...to this Jew! He described it as "contradictory" and obviously hated the animal sacrifices and so on. I explained that the Torah becomes harmonised by Yeshua. That the Torah shows us how badly we need salvation, and only G-d can provide it...and He did.
FINALLY he started to look offended! I had to be careful, since we use the Jewish Community centre and I feared getting kicked out for proselytizing ;).
I've mentioned this before- the biggest conundrum for us "tellin' them Jews about Jesus", is the horrific acts our spiritual ancestors have committed to them in His name. A little repentance for this would go a long way, but we should never withhold the truth.
Well done to all you guys. I am so much more the richer for visiting here.
Oh, I just noticed something in the debate and wondered if I could bring it up here. Your Jewish friend listed the blood curse of Jeconiah (Jer 22) as a disqualifying factor to Jesus inheriting the throne of David. I understand there may be more than one way around it, but has anyone seen this one, the abstract of which I've snipped from khouse.org:
ReplyDelete(Regarding inheritance) There is a peculiar exception recorded in the Torah , resulting from a petition from the daughters of Zelophahad , that family inheritance still be available through daughters where there were no sons available to the family, providing the daughters married within their tribe. (Numbers 26:33, 27:1-11, 36:2-12, Josh 17:3-6, 1 Chr 7:15). It became traditional in those cases for the father to adopt the son-in-law.
Joseph was, according to the Torah, son of Heli.