Knowing Jesus

I have just been reading Jacob Fronczak's book Yeshua Matters, a book that describes his journey in discovering the historical Jesus.

He writes:

Christians generally understand that they should be like Jesus Christ, but most of us don't know enough about Jesus to make this aspect of discipleship a daily reality in our lives.

There is no Christianity without Jesus Christ. He is at the centre of everything we believe in. He is our connection with God. We literally worship and adore him.

But we hardly know anything about him.

But how can we be like someone we don't know anything about?

Think about it for a while, and even scarier questions begin to emerge. What if Jesus isn't anything like what most of us think?

What if the real Jesus doesn't look anything like the stained glass windows and children's book illustrations? Even worse – what if we're not really following his teachings? What if Jesus wouldn't agree with either of our political parties' platforms? What if the core of his message is different then we think it is? What if we think we are doing a great job following him but in reality we would have been kicked out of the upper room?

What if we have lost a really pivotal idea of who Jesus is?

Pick up any popular book on American Christianity and you'll read about problems. The church has problems. Christianity has problems. We aren't functioning correctly. In some way, we're broken; we're sick. People are leaving churches, youth aren't keeping their faith into their college years, pastors are suffering from burnout, and church doors are closing all over the country.

Some of our churches are experiencing great numerical success, but statisticians like George Barna remind us that even as the majority of Americans claim to have had a conversion experience, and even some churches experience huge growth, only a tiny fraction of professed believers are truly committed to the faith, and most churches are struggling. If anything, the Western church appears to be shrinking. We're getting weaker, smaller. Slowly but surely, we're circling the drain.

Spare me the Bible verses about the narrow path if you find. I have read the New Testament, in the New Testament Church wasn't sick or dying. It grew exponentially. It rocked its world. It set in motion a movement that now encompasses the globe. Why don't we generally see that kind of movement in the church down the street?

Every book I have read has a different solution. Maybe we don't love hard enough. Maybe we don't pray hard enough. Maybe we don't evangelise enough. Maybe we haven't fully grasped God's grace. May be we're not satisfied enough involved. Maybe we're not committed to making disciples. Maybe we have failed to engage the culture. Maybe we have forgotten what our mission is. In short, these are all problems. But what is the source of these problems? Why aren't we doing all those things?

To me these problems sound like symptoms. The church at large hasn't found the real root of the issue, the real disease. Not yet.

I have been going to church for longer than I can remember. I have wondered, along with everyone else, what the problem is. Why doesn't our church looked like Acts 2 or 1 Corinthians 13 or Philippians 4? Why aren't church attendees becomingconverts and why aren't converts becoming disciples? Why do people in in church complain so much? Why do they leave at the drop of a hat? What's with the backbiting and shallowness? Where is the depth? Where is the passion? Where is the commitment? Where is the community? Where is the Love?

As committed Christians, we are so close to the answer. We are on the cusp of it. We are standing on the solution, and we don't even know it. We sing about it and church and hear about it from the pulpit.

The solution is Jesus, and the problem is that we have lost sight of who Jesus is.

Not only that, we have lost sight of so much of what Jesus came to do, of what Jesus' core message was, and even to whom Jesus' message was originally delivered.

In place of the real, living Jesus, we have substituted a theological formula, a set of beliefs, a litany of dogma. We have substituted the apostles' Creed for the teachings of the apostles. We have substituted the Nicene Creed for the person of Christ. I am not saying that beliefs are bad – they are good, they are necessary, and Christians cannot afford to be slouches when it comes to theology – but theology and beliefs are no substitute for a real relationship with a real person, the real historical Jesus.

The only solution to Christianity's problem, the only cure for her illness, is to bring back a personal, intimate knowledge of Christ, to really encounter him, to meet him afresh, to get to know him as the first Christians did. We have to know Jesus better. If necessary, we have to sacrifice everything else in order to know Jesus better.

There is no other solution. There is no way to sustain a Christianity that is not fully, completely centred on the historical person of Jesus Christ, and there is no way to centre our lives on Jesus Christ if we don't take the time and effort to know Jesus as well as we possibly can.

Jesus is all we have – our only connection with the father. If we get one thing right, it had better be Jesus.

"On Christ, the solid rock, I stand; all other ground is sinking sand."

If you are a disciple of Christ, then wherever your spiritual journey takes you from here, it must be informed by an accurate conception of Jesus. The picture of Jesus in your mind must match the real historical person of Jesus. In this chaotic world of full of differing and contradictory beliefs about Jesus, you cannot afford to be any less than crystal clear on the identity of Jesus of Nazareth.

Today, thanks to the efforts of centuries of biblical scholarship, we know that Jesus was a practising Jew. We know that our faith is built on nothing less than the blood and righteousness of a Jewish rabbi from a backwater town in Israel.

And I think this matters. Yeshua matters. The fact that Jesus was a practising Jew matters. It changes how we see him, how we here his teachings, how we follow him. It changes how we see ourselves and how we see his people, the Jewish people. It changes how we live and how we do church. It changes our message. Or at least it should.

Pages 143-146.

Dwight Pryor: Unity Not Uniformity

Finally, Supersessionism suffers from what I would call an unfortunate reductionism in the distinction between Jew and Gentile.  This is based mostly on a misapplication of a passage from Paul's letter to the Church in Galatia.

Paul states tha tin Messiah there is "neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, free or slave" (Galatians 3:28).  This statement was written in a polemical setting and a particular context, in which some were arguing that Gentiles who have faith in the Messiah are not in fact part of covenant Israel:  and to become part of the covenant people they must become proselytes to Judaism, i.e., be circumcised.  The Apostle Paul counters:  To the contrary, because of what God has accomplished in Messiah, in fact believing Gentiles are co-heirs, fellow sharers, and part of Isrel's commonwealth.  They are in full covenant standing.

When you take this text to say that Messiah has abolished all distinction between Jew and Gentile you are violating the witness of Scripture.  Paul continues to make this distinction in his letters -- because the distinction between Jews and Gentile was established by God Himself.

Moses states it poetically:  When God allotted the portions of the earth to the sons of Adam, He did so in rleationship to the sons of Israel, (Deuteronomy 32:8).  Through Abraham God intended a mutuality of blessing between Jew and Gentile.  For there to be a blessing, there must be distinction, an 'other' that is to be blessed.

The point is that from Paul's perspective the division between Jew and Gentile has been removed in Messiah -- the divisiveness -- but not the distinction.  That will continue not only in the Church, but even unto the final fulfillment of Scripture.  When we come to the consummation of all things, Revelation records that in the New Jerusalem the gates will be named after the Tribes of Israel,  and to Jerusalem will come the kings of the Gentiles, bearing their gifts, their glory (Revelations 21:12, 24).

God intended from the beginning for the nations to find their blessing through His covenant people Israel.   Of course Jesus fulfills that promise in large measure. But fulfilment is more than a discharge of duty; it is filling-full of a relationship. In such a 'filling-full' can occur again.  Even his Jesus fulfilled the commandment to love God and love your neighbour, so we too must the phone. Everytime engage in loving and kind it is one to another we are fulfilling the Torah.

When therefore we reduce or abolish the God-given distinction between Jew and Gentile, between Israel and the nations, we engage in a kind of forced uniformity, whereas the Bible speaks of unity.

There is a difference between unity and uniformity. In Galatia there were those (whomever they were) saying that the only way Gentiles could become part of the covenant people was to become Jews, i.e., be circumcised. Ironically the church went to the opposite extreme, claiming that the only way Jews could become part of the new covenant people (the Church) was to cease being a Jew and in effect becoming a Gentile. Jewishness no longer had a relevance; in fact it was an obstacle to true faith.

The problem we face is twofold: as Protestants, invariably our faith t and ends to be individualistically focused and other-worldly oriented. The Hebraic point of view by contrast tends to speak of corporate faithfulness, with a this-world orientation.

As I sat at the same time ago, questions are keenly interested in "going up" -- in getting people up and out of this world. People often ask me when the rapture is going to occur. My response was: "I don't know. But this I know: While you are so concerned about going up, God is passionate about coming down!"

Look at this from right to left from the beginning, in Genesis, to the end, in Revelation, God is coming down. And at the end, the New Jerusalem, is it going up? No, it is coming down. God is perenially in pursuit of a people.  According to the apostle Paul, we Gentiles have experienced the mercies of God in order that we could be joined to that people and and His covenant story in the earth.  And that story from beginning to end involves Israel.

When all things are said and done, in the final consummating act of God's creation, the chief player will not be the church, nor will it be the nations. It will be Israel.  Through Israel, God says, "I will show myself wholly to the nations" (Ezekiel 36:23). And together the nations shall stream up to Jerusalem -- for blessing, fellowship and the fullness of worship of God who will take up permanent habitation in Zion.

When the Son of Man comes, he returns not to London, impressive as it is, nor to New York. He returns to Jerusalem.  To there the nations will go up. There the fullness of God's intended mutuality of blessing Jew and Gentile will be consummated. For too long the Church has tried to expropriate the blessings to itself apart from Israel.

Sometimes Israel itself, as Abraham Heschel said, is a messenger who has forgotten the message. I'm not speaking today about the spiritual state of a particular Jew. Nor am I speaking about the merits of the current administration of the State of Israel. I'm talking about God -- the God who has a purpose for a covenant people, and who in His sovereign will and freedom of choice elected to identify His name forever with the Jewish people.

We who worship the living and true God, we who have been brought near to him through Messiah's sacrifice, surely we must never suggest that God has rejected the Jews, replaced Israel or revoked the Torah. As Paul insists, "God forbid!"

Source: Pryor, D (7 February 2007). A different God? An edited and amended transcript of a lecture given at Salters Hall London. Pages 14-17.

Abraham J Heschel on Anti-Semitism

"Our era marks the end of complacency, the end of evasion, the end of self-reliance, Jews and Christians share the perils and the fears; we stand on th bring of the abys together.

Nazism has suffered a defeat, but the process of eliminating the Bible from the consciousness of the western world goes on.  If is on the issue of saving the radiance of the Hebrew Bible in the mindsof man that Jews and Christans are called on to work togetrher.  None of us can do it alone.  Both of must must realize that in our age anti-Semitism is anti-Christianity and that anti-Christianity is anti-Semitism.

[What unites Christians and Jews:]  A commitment to the Hebrew bible as Holy Scripture.  Faith in the Creator, the God of Abraham; commitment to many of His commandments; to justice and mercy; a sense of contrition, sensitivity to the sanctity of life and to the involvement of God in history; the conviction that without the holy the good will be defeated; pray that history may not end before the end of days; and so much more."

Quoted in "Beyond Contempt:  Removing Anti-Jewishness from Christian Worship" by Tony Stroobant.  Published by the Faith and Order Committee, Methodist Church of New Zealand, 2009, pages 13-14.

"Who is a Jew?" Revisited

My home group has been studying the Book of Galatians for over a year and a half now. Its a book that can be easily misunderstood. Most misunderstand the question that Paul is trying to answer. He isn't trying to answer a dilemma between Law and Grace. Paul is trying to answer the question: Who is a Jew?

I've finally found a succinct summary of the position I have been developing on Christian Identity. It turns out that Spurlock from Bereans Online has already beaten me to it and saved me a lot of time:

• Eph 2:1-10 Gentiles become a part of Israel by grace and faith.
• Eph 2:11-12 Are no longer Gentiles. Not "commonwealth" but citizenship enjoying the full rights and benefits of any other member of Israel.
• Eph 2:13 Ex-Gentiles have been brought near
• Eph 2:14-16 The dividing well having been removed by Christ. Spurlock refers to the "18 measures." What are they?
• Eph 2:17-21 Peace not just between God and Mankind but also peace within the house of God.
• Eph 3:1-6 Thus the ex-Gentiles are part of the same body, fellow heirs with the incumbent members and partakers of the same promises.

One king, One people, One Torah: Echad. The fulfilment of John 17:16-22.

If this is true, then even more questions arise, here's one or two:

1. If all believers are to obey the Torah, then what are we to do with 1 Corinthians 7:17-24?
2. Should all Christians be making Aliyah?
3. Where should Christians then stand on the Middle Eastern peace process?

For further reading:  who_is_a_jew.pdf (bethimmanuel.org)

Hebraic Time v Greek Time

I was given a copy of a chapter from Boman's "Greek Thought and Hebraic Thought."

According to Boman in Greek thought, time stretches out on a line, with the future stretching out before you and the past extending behind you.  The point on which you stand is the present.

In Hebraic thought only the past and the present exist.  The future does not yet exist.  Anything we do is in the present and it shapes the future.

If true, how does this affect our views about predestination?

Torah for the Gentiles

Here's an interesting quote:

"The Torah was given in the desert, given with all publicity in a place to which no one had any claim, lest, if it were given in the land of Israel, the Jews might deny to the Gentiles any part of it."

Mekilta on Exodus 19.2

Newman, E I and Spitz, S (eds., 1945).  The Talmudic Anthology.  Berhman House.

Divine Invitation v One Law

FFOZ has published a paper on their latest position on Torah Observance and Gentiles [1]. They have stepped back from their "One Law" stance and adopted a new theory which they have named "Divine Invitation". In their view Divine Invitation is more scripturally defensible than the One Law Doctrine.

Their arguments against the One-Law are built around Paul's opposition to circumcision, Jewish identity theft and disunity.

The question of the status of Gentile believers in the kingdom of God is a common thread to all the arguments. Addressing this question may present a way around the difficulty.

Paul seemed reluctant for Gentile Believers to undergo physical circumcision (see Galatians 5.3) , but did that mean they were not to be circumcised at all? In Colossians 2.11-12 Paul declares that Gentile believers have indeed been circumcised and baptised thus fulfilling the two requisite Rituals required for becoming a proselyte.

If all Gentile Believers are Proselytes then Numbers 15.15-16 applies and One Law is thereby established.

If then a Gentile Believer becomes Torah Observant, wouldn't they outwardly begin to bear some resemblance to Jewish culture which traditionally has had the same goal?

FFOZ have been repelled by One Law because of the disunity it creates between believers. There is no doubt that the Torah itself has a sanctifying effect. It is a sword that divides. Rather than discarding One Law perhaps the problem is an inappropriate application of Galatians 6.1.

[1] Michael, B and Lancaster D T (2009). Messiah Journal. Issue 101. pp 46-70

Were Gentile believers meant to observe the Torah?

Bereans Online has a really good discussion about the relationship between ethnically Jewish believers and Gentile believers within the kingdom of God. The discussion is within the context of an examination of a new theory called "Divine Invitation Theology."

This new teaching reasons that because the Apostles would have seen the issue through the lens of the LXX, they would have not considered the believing Gentile in the same category as the ger as mentioned in the Torah. Hence, this new teaching claims that none of the Torah passages that refer to gerim apply to today’s believing Gentiles.

Key texts used by this new teaching:

As for the assembly of, there shall be one statute for Jews and for the proselyte, a perpetual statute throughout your generations; as a Jew is, so shall the proselyte be before HaShem. There is to be one Torah and one ordinance for Jews and for the proselyte who sojourns with you. Numbers 15:15-16 (paraphrased)

And certain men came down from Judea and taught the brethren, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.” Acts 15:1 NKJV

But some of the sect of the Pharisees who believed rose up, saying, “It is necessary to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.” Acts 15:5

Bereans Online responds:

This new teaching introduces several anachronisms into the discussion. It also pretends to know the way that the Apostles “read” the Scriptures – denying the power of the Holy Spirit to clearly communicate through His eternal word in their native language: Hebrew. If the Apostles were biased to accept what this new teaching contends was the First Century practice of proselytism by the LXX, then that very position undermines their subsequent rulings as extra-biblical, and having no authority for the believer then or now.

While the Septuagint (LXX) is invaluable to our understanding of ancient Hebrew as well as First Century Greek, using it the way that this new teaching does is anachronistic. It takes the usage of the word “proselutos” as it was used in a time after the First Century and projects it back into the days of the Apostles – and then even further back to the time of the translating of the LXX (270 BCE). This ignores the history and etymology of the Greek word “proselutos.”

During the reign of the King Ptolemy II Philadelphus (of Selucid Egypt), around 270 BCE, the Hebrew Scriptures were translated into Greek. Traditionally, this translation was made by seventy [LXX] Jewish scholars.

The translators of the Septuagint considered the context of each usage of the word ger [stranger, sojourner] to consider if it was referring to a covenant member or a pagan. When the context dictated that the reference was to a Gentile covenant member, they translated ger into the Greek word proselutos. It is from this word that we get the English word “proselyte.” Much
confusion has arisen because of the character that this word acquired after the translating of the Septuagint. When the Septuagint was written, this Greek word was found nowhere else. The word seems to have come into existence solely for the purposes of the Septuagint translators – and its usage is not divinely inspired. It was the translators’ paraphrase.

The Greek adjective proselutos comes from pros [toward] and erxomai [to come or go]. In other words, “to come over toward.” This usage started as a way to describe those covenant members who were not members of the covenant community of Israel by birth. This usage eventually redefined the word. It started off as a way to identify those Gentiles who “crossed over” to side with the God of Israel and to live with Israel in the covenant community (to “come near” is Temple language).

It was only later that the word came to mean “those who formally converted” to another religion. The important distinction is that the word was not used in the Septuagint because it implied formal conversion, but rather because it described the actual way that such people could be distinguished: namely, that they had drawn near to Israel to participate in the worship of the One True God. It is anachronistic to read the Septuagint usage of the word proselutos and the present meaning of “proselyte” back into the usage at the time of the translating of the Septuagint. To assume that the Apostles did not correctly read and use the Hebrew text is to deny the work of the Holy Spirit in helping them rule correctly regarding Gentiles.

Normative Judaism has this same usage of the word “ger.” Many English translations that are used in normative Judaism translate the word “ger” as “proselyte.” For instance, the Stone Chumash translates Leviticus 19:34 in this way:

The proselyte who dwells with you shall be like a native among you, and you shall love him like yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt. Leviticus 19:34a – Stone Chumash

If the word ger was translated consistently, it would read:

The proselyte who dwells with you shall be like a native among you, and you shall love him like yourself, for you were a proselyte in the land of Egypt. Leviticus 19:34a

This is obviously a case of writing a theology into the text as opposed to allowing the text to frame our teaching. This is a fundamental principle in Bible study: the text informs us, we do not inform the text. The Bereans of Acts 17 practiced exegesis (meaning from the text), not eisegesis (meaning into the text). Eisegesis is something used by experimental theologies.

There is no Scriptural basis for “ritual conversion” or to become a proselyte. The Scriptures speak against those who would seek to gain some sort of “Jewish identity” by undergoing this man-made ritual. Beloved, it is a man-made tradition that says that a man or woman can become a Jew by undergoing a ceremony – it is not the Torah.

When this new teaching promotes the idea that the Apostles fell into the trap of allowing the practice of ritual conversion to twist their understanding of Scripture, it is a great concern. If, as this new teaching asserts, the Apostles read the passages pertaining to gerim and their covenant obligations and were influenced by a much later understanding of the Greek word “proselutos” then it is proof that their teaching of Acts 15 and 21 is in error, and is only included in the Apostolic Scriptures to give us an account of how they made that error. While we do not consider this to be the case, we are steadfast in our understanding that G-d’s Word is immutable. It does not change meaning as the culture or language around it changes. It means precisely today, what it meant in the ancient past – and it will mean the same for all of eternity.

This idea of ritual conversion through circumcision to become a Jew has created considerable confusion for Christians. To become an ethnic Jew is unnecessary for Salvation, for Salvation is by faith alone. As part of that faith, one should become faithful to God's commandments, and if one is moved by the Spirit to do so, the Gentile believer may undergo circumcision.

Sometimes circumcision is mentioned in the bible as part of the commandments, at other times, the writer intends the ritual conversion to become a Jew. How can the reader tell the difference?

Who is a Gentile?

I mentioned in a previous blog that I was reading the "Rabbi from Burbank" by Isidor Zwirn and Bob Owen.

His story, in many respects, is a poignant one: After being rejected by his fellow Jews for becoming a Christian, he found it difficult to be understood by Christians as well.

One of the problems he found was that Christians would not, could not accept that they were not Gentiles.

"The church people of any denomination I had occasion to meet were all courteous and respectful to me... ...When I appealed to them to search out and discover their own biblical roots in Abraham and Judaism, my words fell upon deaf ears. I tried to tell the Christians that they were not goyim as defined by the Jews, a somewhat derisive term that means "heathen" or "pagan," but they would not hear me and continued to refer to themselves as Gentiles." [1]

Christians are Jews too?! Through the spirit of adoption, through the teaching on being grafted in, through being considered as Sons of God, Paul teaches that we are all a part of the Seed of Abraham. Thus we too inherit the Promises.

[1] Zwirn, R I and Owen, B (1987). The Rabbi from Burbank. Tyndale House Publishers. Illinois. Page 77.

See also Carpe Deo: "Who is a Jew?" Revisited (carpe-deo.blogspot.com)

Objections to Torah Observance: "The Torah is for Israel" Part 2

Photo by Asafantman

The bible is clear that the Torah and its commandments are part of the Covenant between God and the people of Israel at Mt Sinai through Abraham, Mose and David.

Does that mean that the Torah is only for those who are ethnically Jews or who have become Jews by virtue of a circumcision or conversion to Judaism?

According to the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, the admissability of non-Jews (or Gentiles) was discussed at length and the minimum observance necessary to ensure that they would not be rejected out of hand was determined. The Apostles reasoned that this would allow Gentiles to enter the Synagogue where "Moses" (or the Torah) would be taught to them. The Book of Acts goes on to tell the story of Paul as he established new churches with mixed Jewish and Gentile membership.

The Epistles address some of the theological controversies that arose as the new believers sought to reconcile traditional interpretations of the Torah in the new light of Christ. And what do these Epistles say regarding the status of Gentile believers?

Clearly they recognise that Gentile believers are:

1. Children of God through the Spirit of Adoption (Romans 8.15)


2. Counted as the "Seed of Abraham" (Galatians 3.29)


3. Joint Heirs of the Promises given to Moses, Abraham and David (Romans 8.17).


4. That the Gentiles and the (Torah Observant) Jews are to become One New Man under Christ (Ephesians 2.11-22).