Yom ha-Azma'ut, or Israel Independence Day, is commemorated each year on the
fifth day of the Hebrew month Iyar. This day marks the end of the British
Mandate and the official forming of the State of Israel in 1948.
Jewish sovereignty over the ancient homeland enabled Jewish people to return
to Israel from the four corners of the world, as the Bible predicted they would.
The modern state of Israel is comprised of Jews from hundreds of nations and as
many different backgrounds and languages. Yet, a distinct Israeli Jewish culture and
style has emerged as demonstrated by the use of Hebrew as a common
language. This means the gospel of Y'shua can be proclaimed to millions of
our people using one language!
Of the almost six million Jews that have settled in Israel, less than one percent
believe in Jesus. As we Jews for Jesus celebrate Israel Independence Day, we also
recognize our dependence on God as we seek to reach Jews in Israel and all over the
world with the message of Y'shua.
Also Celebrate Israel's 60th Birthday with
these items.
The most obvious connection between Jews and Mother’s Day would seem to lie in perennial jokes about Jewish mothers (think of the scene in Woody Allen’s film where his mother appears to him in the sky). Or maybe in riffing Saddam Hussein’s “the mother of all ….” (fill in the blank; think of Gary Larson’s Far Side cartoon of a guy delivering the “mother of all pizzas” to Saddam’s war room).
But a look at the history behind Mother’s Day in the United States suggests another direction. Apparently, the U.S. version of Mother’s Day first got off the ground about 1870, when Julia Ward Howe issued her Mother’s Day Proclamation. Howe is best known as the author of The Battle Hymn of the Republic. Whatever her sentiments were when she penned that song, a dozen years later she was an activist, protesting battlefield deaths, calling on other mothers to join her...
Did you see the full-page ad in The New York Times on Friday, March 28, entitled “The Gospel and Jewish People: An Evangelical Statement”?
Sponsored by the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA), the statement is signed by well-known evangelical pastors, theologians, and journalists who believe in Jewish evangelism. It is a concise, updated reaffirmation of WEA’s 1989 Willowbank Declaration on the Christian Gospel and the Jewish People.
Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League has called it “particularly odious to defend the duplicitous proselytizing of Jews by groups such as Jews for Jesus…” He goes on to stay that “While [the leaders who signed the statement] claim to deplore the use of deception and coercion, they ‘reject the notion that it is deceptive for followers of Jesus Christ who were born Jewish to continue to identify as Jews,’ thus turning the meaning of deception on its head.”
We applaud the WEA and those who signed the document for recognizing the need for the gospel to be lovingly brought to all people, including our Jewish people. And we are particularly encouraged to see our evangelical family acknowledge that those of us who are followers of Y’shua (Jesus) who were born Jewish have every right to continue to identify as Jews.
What do you think?
