What is the biblical attitude toward the Jewish people?
by Joseph Shulam
Introduction:
Here are some common misconceptions held by Christians about the Jewish people:
1. It is next to impossible to reach them with the Gospel.
2. The Jews are just not interested in salvation and redemption from sin.
3. They had their chance with the Gospel in the first century and rejected it. Now, we must go to those who have never heard the Good News even once.
4. God has rejected the Jews and turned to the Gentiles.
5. Jews have the Law of Moses and can be saved through its observance. They do not need the Yeshua, the Messiah.
As an introduction, I share the answers to these questions with you.
1. The very fact that, as a Jew, I stand before you to teach about reaching the Jews should be enough proof that this assumption is just not valid. Here are some figures to consider. Over 100 indigenous congregations of Jewish "believers" are in the United States. According to the Messianic Jewish Alliance of America, there are over 100,000 Jews who, in one form or another, accepted Jesus as their savior. In 1967, the Hebrew Christian Alliance, which later changed its name to the Messianic Jewish Alliance, had only 600 members in the U.S.A. This year, some 30,000 members of the Alliance are affiliated with it. Even in the churches of Christ, I have found Jews in almost every congregation that I have visited. It should be known that Jewish people are not impossible to reach with the Gospel. Later, we will discuss why it is hard to reach them and what we can do to make it easier.
2. No religious group in the world is more interested in salvation, redemption, and the Messiah than the Jewish people. Let me just take an example from the Israeli Rock Music scene. We have at least a dozen songs circulating in Israel whose subject is the Messiah and his coming. Jews pray every day for the coming of the Messiah.
3. It is true that the Jewish authorities, and with them the majority, rejected Yeshua as the Messiah. It is a false assumption that Israel as a whole rejected Him. From where did the apostles come? Who were the 3000 who obeyed the Gospel on Pentecost? Who were the Myriads "who have believed, and are all zealous for the Law"? We cannot take the argument seriously that we need to first preach to those who have never heard the Gospel even once. If we do, the implications would be none other than the end of all evangelism and the death of the church.
4. Did God reject the Jews? Many who do not know the scriptures would say, "Yes." However, those who know the scriptures would immediately remember Paul's statement: "I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be!" Romans 11:1-2, "God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew."'
5. This attitude is unbiblical. If any nation has a clear mission, it is to Israel. Paul said, "Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation." Romans 10:1. It was to the Jews that Peter said: "And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men, by which we must be saved."Acts4:12.
Where does all this leave us?
It leaves us with the Biblical responsibility to bring the Gospel to the Jew. ( You must notice that I have not said, "also to the Jew."" This is not the Biblical position. It takes into consideration the sensitivity of my brothers from Gentile origin. The Biblical position is to the "Jew first."
Who are the Jews?
"Jews" is the Biblical name given to the citizens of the Judean kingdom and inhabitants of Judea.
2 Kings 16:6:
"..Razin, king of Aram, recovered Elath for Aram and cleared the Jews (Judeans) out of Elath entirely."
2 Kings 25:25:
"Ishmael, the son of Nethaniah, can with ten men and struck Gedaliah down so that he died along with the Jews and the Chaldeans who were with him in Mizpah."
Here, Jews and Chaldeans come together, which shows that the text is not speaking of Jews as only a religious group but as a race.
In the Books of Esther, Ezra, and Nehemiah, the term Jews is used widely, both as a geographical notation and as a race. However, it is never used as a religious term in the Bible.
The previous point is also valid in the New Testament. The term "Jew" is used instead of Greek. Jesus died on the cross as "King of the Jews." The word "King" here is a term of national political significance, not religious.
The semantic development of the term "Jew" is from the Tribe of Judah to an inhabitant of the territory of Judea. However, when the ten northern tribes were sent to exile and assimilated, the term "Jews" was applied to all Israelites, all of whom came from the seed of Abraham. We see a reflection of this in the New Testament, Romans 2:17-29, 3:29-31. We see that first in Romans 1:16, "Jew" is an ethnic, national race. However, by the end of chapter 2, Paul is turning the term "Jew" into a question of "faithfulness."
The same changes have happened in Judaism. In Israel, now the "Who is a Jew?" issue is the hottest political potato on the agenda of our government. Today in Israel, " a Jew is everyone who is born of a Jewish mother, or converted to Judaism, and has not changed his religion."
What about the question of the genealogies?
This is not a serious question - it stems from people who have some latent historical anti-Jewish attitudes. A Scotch-Irish does not have to produce a genealogy to know that he is Scotch-Irish. In America, if someone states that they are half Cherokee Indian, shall I ask them for genealogy to know that what they say is true? David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel, held that any fool who wants to state that he is Jewish should be accepted as such immediately before he changes his mind.
However, if we talk about genealogies, Jews probably have longer genealogies than most nations. The names of the families have been kept for generations. Hitler knew who was a Jew.
I say these things not out of pride but out of a desire to help you understand that this argument is not valid and that you are not going to win people to God's kingdom by arguments that deny the self-definition and identity of the people you are attempting to win to the Messiah.
A Jew is any person who is born Jewish and identifies himself as such!
What is the biblical status of Jews concerning salvation?
Here are some biblical truths concerning salvation:
"I am the way, truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me. John 14:6. Many other passages indicated without a shadow of a doubt that there is no chance for salvation without the Messiah Yeshua. The biblical truth needs to be accepted and applied to all men, and especially to Jews, since the Bible also says in Acts 4:12, "Salvation is of the Jews."
Salvation is by faith through grace. No person can be saved by his works, and no person is saved by the ethnic or church group he belongs to. Every person is responsible for his salvation and relationship with God. "Let each work out his salvation with fear and trembling."
Jews do not have any special privileges regarding salvation. "God is no respecter of persons," and the majority of the people in the New Testament who accepted Yeshua as the Messiah were Jews. From these two points, we learn that the message of salvation is for all, including the Jews.
Salvation and Election, and their relationship in the Bible.
The American Protestant and Post-Protestant Christian movements have been significantly influenced by the Reformed background and the war between Calvinists and Lutherans, those who believe in predestination and those who do not. As a result of this heritage, we have confused two basic biblical doctrines: salvation and election.
What is the election in the Bible?
ROM 11:27. "For this is my covenant unto them when I shall take away their sins. 28. As concerning the Gospel, they are enemies for your sake, but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sake. 29. For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.
This verse teaches two essential things. One, There can be election without faithfulness to God. In other words, people can be the elect and be lost because of their unfaithfulness. Two, Israel is still beloved and the elect of God for the sake of the fathers.
ISA 45:1: 'Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him; and I will loose the loins of kings, to open before him the two leaved gates; and the gates shall not be shut; ISA 45:2 I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron: 3 And I will give thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of secret places, that thou mayest know that, I the Lord, which call thee by thy name, am the God of Israel. 4 For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.
In these four verses, we see two facts. The first is that a pagan Persian King, Cyrus, is called the Anointed of God. The word "anointed" is the same as Messiah, which we call "Christ" in English. In verse 4, we see that Jacob, a patroname of Israel, is called "mine elect."
As we see in the Old Testament writing, the election of Israel is related to the cosmic elements. See Jer 31:35ff: "Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and the stars for a light by night, which divideth the sea when the waves thereof. The Lord of Hosts is his name. If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith the Lord."
It should be noted that the New Testament addresses this question most directly. ROM 11:1:
"I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2. God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew...."
If the text of the Bible is so clear, why is it that so many good Christians have not seen this point for so long? Well, this is a legitimate question. Moreover, the answers are the same as to all the questions.
It was not the right time for the church to understand this point.
2. The Lord kept it hidden from the church's eyes to give them a chance to discover it themselves and overcome the church's pride, which Paul warns about in Romans 1.
3. The evil anti-semitic teachings of Western Christianity that sprung from Roman paganism were kept and did not come under the blood of the Messiah. Only after the Holocaust was it possible for the "church" to deal with this ancient disorder.
What is the practical outworking of this teaching for the church of Christ today?
What it does not mean nor imply.
It does not imply that the Jew has a different way of salvation from the Gentile.
It does not imply that the Jew is better than the Gentile who has accepted the Messiah and God of Israel.
What does this understanding teach the church?
It does imply that God is not breaking his promises. He is fulfilling what He promised to the ancients and will also fulfill the things He promised the church.
The Jews still have an essential task and place in God's heart. No, I do not mean to say that they are specially privileged. However, I mean to say that God loves them and wants them to come to Him and accept the Messiah Yeshua.
The church must be interested in Israel's redemption and do everything possible to bring the Good News of the Messiah back home to Israel.
Where does the church of Christ come into the picture?
The churches of Christ, which started through the restoration movement, are the only genuinely indigenous Christian movement in the U.S.A. It is clear to all who look upon the churches of Christ in America that the most significant advantage of the church in socio-economics and politics is the desire to have an authentic Biblical perspective both in
practice and biblical theology. For this reason, the churches of Christ have been able to break free from the shackles of continental religious traditions. The return to the word of God has brought them closer to the world of the first-century church, which, by the way, happened to be Jewish.
The creeds of colonial Europe do not bind the churches of Christ, giving great freedom for examining and re-examining biblical truths. Nothing is more valuable in the restoration movement than religious freedom of conscience and mind. This is what made the restoration movement powerful and a uniting force.
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