P'nei Adonai resources for walking in the presence of God
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P'nei Adonai resources for walking in the presence of God
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• Introduction The Kingdom
• of God? of Heaven? The King
• in the Tenach Entering the Kingdom
• who goes to Heaven? Sharing the Good News
• praying with people
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Countering LiesMuch of modern Jewish resistance to the good news is the product of centuries of Christian anti-Semitism.Anyone wanting to share the good news with a Jewish person should be familiar with how Christian Replacement Theology and Rabbinic teaching have created many lies that foster hostility between Jews and Christians. An earlier essay began by quoting Paul in Colossians 4:3-6:
Due to unfortunate facts of history, often all it takes for a conversation between a Christian and a Jew to be "full of grace" is for the Christian to be willing to rebuke the lies and anti-Semitism of Relpacement Theology.
BackgroundAnti-SemitismBroadly speaking, history has progressed through three stages of anti-Semitism.At the council of Nicea (325 A.D.) it was declared that you cannot live in the Church while living a Jewish lifestyle. This was the final stage of Christianity becoming a religion severed from its Jewish roots. The Inquisition and the Reformation led to many cities and countries adopting the position that you cannot live among us while living a Jewish lifestyle. In particular, Peter the Hermit taught that Jews must wander the earth in punishment for killing Yeshua; this mindset led to taking away the rights of Jewish people and forcing them into ghettoes, pogroms, or exile. Finally, Nazi Germany declared you cannot live at all because you have Jewish lineage. The Holocaust is such a deeply planted wound in the Jewish psyche because for the first time anti-Semitism could not be peacefully avoided: there was no way to make peace, feign conversion, or even leave the country. Modern radical Islam, with its Nazi roots, continues this final stage of anti-Semitism.
Replacement TheologyCompounding the damage done by anti-Semitism is a doctrine called Replacement Theology that teaches that God has abandoned the Jewish people, and now treats only Christians as his people. Replacement Theology further teaches that all of the blessings God promised to the Jewish people instead go to the Church, but all of the curses with which God has ever threatened Israel are upon it.Fortunately, Replacement Theology is quickly losing ground in Christian culture. (Here is an interesting article in the Jerusalelm Post from March of 2006 about this trend.) Not only has God never abandoned the Jewish people, but many of his promises to them are independent of their ability or faithfulness to obey God's commandments. The re-establishment of a state of Israel is a major example. God still protects and cares for the Jewish people, and they play a special role in his plans, no matter how much evil is in This World. Although Yeshua has not yet brought peace to the earth he can bring peace to the life of anyone who accepts him as messiah -- even someone living a Jewish lifestyle. Being able to include that last phrase requires Gentile Christians to readily admit that Replacement Theology is wrong and that persecuting the Jewish people goes blatantly against Yeshua's teachings. Not only does this admission, in some small way, help heal old hurts, but it is notable to people when someone devoted to Yeshua admits that Yeshua's followers have not always been on the right path.
The Lies of Replacement TheologyThe Jews killed Yeshua, so God rejected IsraelGod had prepared the Jewish nation so its leaders and most of the other Jewish people would reject Yeshua during the first century.The Jewish people were not sure what the messiah would be like, because leaders taught different things and the weekly scripture readings skip over the messianic prophecies most clearly about Yeshua. The different sects of Judaism were busy arguing about what people must to do earn the messiah's arrival: the idea God would send the messiah as an unearned gift seemed strange and wrong. The Jewish people were even spiritually blinded by God to be unable to understand the messianic theme in scripture unless they were truly turning to God. Yet tens of thousands of Jews did accept Yeshua (Acts 21:20), and the rejection of Yeshua by Jewish leadership was part of God's plan to allow the good news to more easily go out to Gentile nations. Yeshua died willingly, and fully able to escape that fate (Matthew 26:53, John 18:4-6). He died because of humanity's sin, not because any certain people group was interefering with God's plans.
The Church has replaced Israel; God is finished with the Jewish peopleThere is no scriptural reason to think that God's promises to Israel now belong to the followers of Yeshua. In light of modern history this position is impossible to maintain.
Christians persecute JewsSince the Diaspora began, many people who called themselves Christians have been ignorant of the Word of God and have persecuted Jews.Many have been manipulated by authority figures eager to make the Jewish people a scapegoat. The two most famous examples are Haman and Hitler. (Some Jewish people mistakenly believe that Hitler and/or the Nazis were Christian. Here are two articles that eloquently disprove that lie.) Many have poisoned by the frustration of an authority figure who was unable to preach to Jews successfully. The most famous example of this is Martin Luther, who became very anti-Semitic after Jewish people did not flock to his Reformation as he expected. (His struggle to separate Christianity from the corruption of sixteenth-century Catholocism was noble, but he still expected Jewish people to leave their culture when accepting Yeshua as messiah!) Finall, many have simply lived in a nation that called itself "Christian" while acting contrary to Yeshua's teachings. Neither Yeshua nor any of the apostles ever taught anyone to persecture the Jewish people. Rather, they were Jews. Yeshua's early followers saw themselves as a Jewish sect and as the faithful remnant of Israel.
God punished the Jewish people by allowing the HolocaustSatan knows that he can postpone the Day of the Lord by postponing Jewish revival. The Zionist movement began modern Jewish revival as a move of God's Spirit in the 1830s among prophetic Christians, and the vision was caught by many Jewish people in the latter half of the 1800's. The Holocaust was Satan's effort to stop this plan of God, by tempting men to sin.Messianic Jewish culture contains many stories of God appearing to people during the Holocaust, even in concentration camps. The Jewish people were hated by the Nazis, not by God. They were not being targeted by God for punishment, nor were they the only ethnic group targeted by the Nazis. Judaism has always accepted that This World has evil, and it is proper to rejoice about God's goodness without blaming God for the evil (Exodus 18:8-9). We are offered a perfect World to Come without evil. The better "big question" is now how a good God can allow evil in This World, but why a good God would want us to experience This World before the World to Come?
Jewish revival will only happen after the raptureThis lie teaches that the gentile Church has no need to do outreach to Jews. It runs counter to Yeshua's own statement of Matthew 23:39, and Paul's explanation in Romans 10-11 of the special calling given by God to Gentile followers of Yeshua.It also goes against a deeply held belief among all Jews, founded in scripture, that God is trying to draw the unfaithful portion of Israel to true teshuvah and avodah. God wants Israel to experience revival, not divine wrath. When God punishes Israel it is less severe than how other nations are punished for the same crimes, and never entails the loss of Jewish identity. God helps those who belong to him; he does not appear at the last minute to "clean up a mess" his divine plan otherwise ignores.
Christians are arrogantly sure Jews are going to hellThis is not a scriptural belief. An earlier essay in this section discussed how Romans 2:12-16 and Hebrews 11 refute it.As that other essay pointed out, the real issue is "If I cannot kneel before Messiah now, why should I believe I will be able to do so later, including after I die?" Admittedly, many Christians do have this arrogant belief. But then, Maimonides would also share it, and be equally sure most modern Jewish people were undeserving of heaven.
The Lies of Rabbinic TeachingJewish people don't believe in YeshuaCurrently more than 500,000 Jewish people participate in over 500 Messianic congregations worldwide.
Rabbis do not believe in YeshuaA rabbi with an established career has a lot of social resistance to even considering Yeshua's claims. We should ask instead why any traditional rabbis have accepted Yeshua, for some have!
The messiah cannot be divineThe Tenach describes many times Adonai manifests himself as a man. It is not surprising that sometimes the best way for Adonai to communicate with people is to appear as a person.An earlier essay in this section discussed manifestations of God in the Tenach. As that other essay pointed out, the bigger question is why one such manifestation would be permanent. What does it teach us about Adonai and about his relationship with mankind that Yeshua is in human form after his resurrection and ascension?
Isaiah 53 refers to how Israel suffersIsaiah 53 cannot apply to Israel. The singular personal pronoun "he" is used consistently, and does not correspond to Israel. Israel has not made atonement for the world (v. 6), has not suffered silently (v. 7), and has not been without sin (v. 9). Also, if "he" refers to Israel, who does "my people" refer to in verse 8?
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