This Just In
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
In The Real World: More than 2,000 people lined the walls of Old Jerusalem this week. In honor of President Bush's first visit to Israel, the 2,000 demonstrators carried Israeli flags and signs reading: "BUSH READ YOUR BIBLE: ISRAEL BELONGS TO THE JEWS" and "JERUSALEM = JEWISH".
In the Messianic Times: A three-quarter page article on Chalutzim Academy childhood sweethearts who got married after college.
Commentary/Opinion: The level of self-inolvement exhibited by the Messianic community is dangerously pathetic.
This has been the latest edition of This Just In....Stay tuned for more breaking news as it cracks....
Labels: Bush, Israel, Jerusalem, Messianic Judaism, Messianic Times, Zionism
posted by Shoshana @ 8:50 PM
Where is Our Wilberforce?
Saturday, February 24, 2007
This afternoon, I was afforded the opportunity to catch Amazing Grace, the story of British Parliamentarian William Wilberforce, who successfully championed a bill outlawing the slave trade in the early 1800s. As a young man, Wilberforce experienced a spiritual awakening, and considered leaving politics for the church before he was convinced by friend and future Prime Minister William Pitt to gauge his moral compass towards spearheading the issue of abolition. Wilberforce committed himself, heart, soul, and strength, to outlawing slavery, a commitment that resulted in ulceritive colitis so painful that he relied on large quantities of laudnum, a potentially deadly painkiller, just to function in daily life.
Where is our William Wilberforce? Where is the Wilberforce of the Jewish people? Where is the Wilberforce of the Messianic Movement? I have yet to meet one person who would commit themselves to the pains of death in order to inspire our movement to seek out and meet realistic goals. 75% of Israelis are in favor of joining the European Union, which would require the State of Israel to give up its Jewish religious and ethnic identity. We can poo-poo this action, but do we really have the right? What are we as Messianic Jews doing to support Israel? Writing a check? Remembering the name in our prayers? Wow. Big deal. Do you even have the ability to identify with Israel, the knowledge to understand what it means to be all alone in the world, the courageous determination to turn your tube of lipstick into a bullet and fire it into the face of the enemy who is bent on your anhiliation?
I recently received a mass-mailing from the International Messianic Jewish Alliance, informing me that they have taken over the publication of The Messianic Times. In the letter, Executive Director Paul Liberman writes, "[The Messianic Times] will remain independent in its contents, but linked to us economically and in other ways. We both try to take a global and non-partisan position." The IMJA is Presided over by Joel Chernoff, who also acts as the General Secretary of the Messianic Jewish Alliance of America. The IMJA also claims a relationship with a number of sister organizations, including the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations. Can we assume that these organizations share the same opinions regarding global, non-partisan persectives?
Let's be clear, here: The soul of our people is on the chopping block, bound and gagged with a knife to her throat, waiting for G-d to shout, "STOP!" and provide the sacrifical lamb to take her place. We, the ones who have faith in that Sacrificial Lamb, are too busy figuring out "Who's a Jew" and "What's a Jew" to even be bothered defending our own Jewish people, our own Jewish land!
Tell me: If a true Jew is one whose heart is right with G-d, then who are you to even begin to claim to know how to identify a Jew? What, you think you're so special because your parents called themselves Jews, because you daven three times a day, because you don't eat pork in public? Is that it? Do all these things give you the authority to put a label on another person, to decide who they are and what their subsequent role is in life in relation to yours? Who are you to play G-d when there is work to be done! Yeshua didn't preach, "The hour is late and the workers are few, so you'd better figure out which ones are in and which ones are out." The GATHERING is our job; the winnowing belongs to HIM.
We are a pathetic people. It does not surprise me that our scriptures are filled with detailed accounts of G-d's wrath set loose upon us. We have not changed. In nearly 3,000 years, we have not changed. We are still the same prideful, deceitful, self-involved, easily-led-astray creatures despite the piety we claim through our faith in Messiah. We begin by preaching to seek the good in others and end up judging one another instead. I am tired of fruitlessness in our movement; I would rather we be the tree Yeshua condemned to death than to remain sitting here, in the presence of the Son, bearing no fruit.
How long will it be until we raise our voices, until we put our plows to the ground, until we take that step out of the pathetic and into the prophetic? I refuse to stand by and watch as the faithful are ripped to shreds and the wanton whore our soul to our enemies in fear and self-loathing. I will not stand idly by and accept destruction. My generation will not be another one condemned to Babylon, or to the Pale, or to Warsaw or Auschwitz; I refuse to let that happen to my people. I refuse to hand over my G-d given identity to the wills and whims of men who claim to be both my enemy and my friend. I will not waste my time judging nor being judged.
Nor will I waste my time with defeatist logic that argues against my support of my people and my land out of an offense to my pride. How many in our movement refuse to consider aliyah because of the difficulties facing believing Jews in the land of Israel? Still, how many more have hardened their hearts to our land because they are refused entry, and some of their bretheren stand persecuted in the land for their beliefs? SO WHAT? Did the talmidim turn their backs on their nation and their people because they faced the threat of persecution? How weak are we in Spirit that our souls seek consolation in the flesh? To those who make these ridiculous arguments, I must ask: Do you know Messiah, or do you just claim an affiliation for the eternal perks?
Where are our William Wilberforces? Where are our Devorahs, our Joshuas, our Gideons, our Davids? Where are the Messianic Jews who are willing to stand up as a united Army of G-d and defend all that is holy and true in the face of an evil that seeks to destroy us? Is everyone just sitting around, waiting for G-d to do their bidding? If so, then take up space in someone else's waiting room, in the pews of the churches that are sorely lacking in members and crumbling to the ground in self-destruct. Our G-d is a G-d of action and responsibility, not ambivalence and sloth. We did not become a people by saying, "Uh, well, my supervisor is unavailable at the moment; may I take a message?"
It took William Wilberforce nearly an entire lifetime, lived mostly in gruling pain, to see his goal accomplished. Are you willing? Are you willing to see our movement grow, to see Messianic Jews take on real issues facing the Jewish people, to take ownership in the land, and to unite with all believers in Adonai as one in the name of Israel? Or are you just in it for the kitsch?
You're either in, or out. There is no in-between.
Labels: Amazing Grace, IMJA, Israel, Jewish Identity, Jewishness, Judaism, Messianic Judaism, Messianic Times, MJAA, UMJC
posted by Shoshana @ 6:16 PM
