Israel's Messianic Jews Under Attack

Posted by on 6 June 2008 | 0 Comments

In the News...

Time Magazine.  Friday, Jun. 06, 2008.  By Tim McGirk/Ariel

The flyers appeared everywhere inside the Jewish settlement of Ariel, on car windshields and telephone poles, and in bus shelters. "Beware," it read, "these are the members of the Jewish Missionary Cult. They are baptizing Jews into Christianity."...  Included was a photo of Pastor David Ortiz and his address.  Ortiz didn't give it a thought. His Jewish neighbors liked him, and so did Ariel's mayor, who found Ortiz, originally from Brooklyn, useful in recruiting funds and political support from American and German Evangelicals for this stone-clad settlement on a breezy hilltop inside Palestinian territory.  But somebody disliked Ortiz and his beliefs enough to try to kill him and his family. By chance, Ortiz and his wife Leah were gone on March 20th when an unknown person dropped off a bomb disguised as a holiday gift package loaded with candy and chocolates...  Messianic Jews, as these Jews who believe in Jesus are called, number just a few in Israel — anywhere between 6,000 and 15,000 — but they provoke hatred all out of proportion to their meager numbers. Many orthodox Jews view them as traitors for joining the Christian faith, which for centuries has persecuted Jews...  Some rabbis also view the Messianic Jews' conversion as part of a grand Evangelical scheme to fulfill Biblical prophecy (which requires the conversion of the Jews) and hasten the Messiah's arrival. Messianic Jews observe Judaism's rites, holidays and customs but believe in Jesus as the Messiah. Read More

CBN News.com Turning Up the 'Heat' on Messianic Jews. By Chris Mitchell.  June 4, 2008

CBNNews.com - JERUSALEM, Israel - In the latest in a growing number of incidents against Israeli Messianic Jewish believers -- Jews who believe that Yeshua (Jesus, in Hebrew) is the Messiah -- a group of ultra-Orthodox youth set fire to New Testaments collected from the town's residents.

Donnie's Remarks...

The salvation of Israel is one of several prophecy signs that will happen before Jesus the Messiah returns. The Apostle Paul writing to the Romans refers to the fact that many Jews have not trusted in Christ.  But, he affirms that sometime in the future "all Israel will be saved."

Romans 11:11-12 (MSG)
¹¹ The next question is, "Are they down for the count? Are they out of this for good?" And the answer is a clear-cut no. Ironically when they walked out, they left the door open and the outsiders walked in. But the next thing you know, the Jews were starting to wonder if perhaps they had walked out on a good thing.
¹² Now, if their leaving triggered this worldwide coming of non-Jewish outsiders to God's kingdom, just imagine the effect of their coming back! What a homecoming! 

Romans 11:25-27 (MSG)
²⁵ I want to lay all this out on the table as clearly as I can, friends. This is complicated. It would be easy to misinterpret what's going on and arrogantly assume that you're royalty and they're just rabble, out on their ears for good. But that's not it at all. This hardness on the part of insider Israel toward God is temporary. Its effect is to open things up to all the outsiders so that we end up with a full house.
²⁶ Before it's all over, there will be a complete Israel. As it is written, A champion will stride down from the mountain of Zion; he'll clean house in Jacob.
²⁷ And this is my commitment to my people: removal of their sins.

This Time magazine story reveals how deep the spiritual blindness of the nation Israel is today, and how reluctant, despite their religion, they are toward accepting Jesus Christ as the Lord, King and Messiah.  But rest assured they will accept Him.  I believe their conversion will occur toward the end of Daniel's 70th week when they, along with the rest of the entire world, will see Jesus return to the rapture the Church.  Perhaps the rest of the world will hear a collective "Oy Vey' He really is the Messiah!"