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Bible Home Jew and Gentile |
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Christianity and the Middle East An Open Letter to “Christians for Israel” By
Kathleen Banks
September 1998, page 120
David Sudlow, Spokesman Dear Mr. Sudlow:
I wept when I read your brochure, “Who can hear the
Shofar blowing for the Church?” and the various articles in the Spring
issue of Christians for Israel. In my teens I was so devastated by
the suffering of the Jews and others under the Nazis that I lost my faith
for a few years. I could not understand how a just, all-powerful and
loving God could create a world in which people could do such horrible
things to other people. Now I weep again. This time the pain is worse in
some ways because this time some of the people for whom I wept before are
doing to others what had been done to them. And worse still, my own
Christian brothers and sisters are helping them. The Jews who are brought
to Israel do not come to occupy unoccupied lands and homes. Four hundred
and eighteen Palestinian Christian and Muslim villages were demolished in
order to make room for them. The process continues as each new settlement
is built and occupied. The methods used to force the Palestinians to flee
their homes and lands are as follows: imprisonment and torture without
trial (5,000 per year according to an Israeli human rights organization)
and 80 percent of these detainees are never indicted for any crime; homes
are demolished or sealed so that large families have no shelter; taxes are
so high that people lose their homes or businesses because they cannot pay
them; and penalties for crimes committed against Christians and Muslims
are so light (even for murder) as to imply that the injured or dead
Christian or Muslim was no more important than an insect.
In James 3:17 and 18 Christ gave us a means by which to
judge whom we should support and whom we should not support: “But the
wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy
to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and
without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them
that make peace.” Mr. Netanyahu constantly talks peace while building
settlements on land that has been occupied by force and terror, behavior
which can only wreck the peace process and lead to more war. Surely, Mr.
Netanyahu is not one who makes peace. If he is not governed by “the
wisdom that is from above,” then by whom is he governed?
In Acts 1:7 when the disciples asked Christ when He would
restore the kingdom to Israel, He answered, “It is not for you to know
the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.”
Can a man and his family live in a home or on land that
has been taken by force and terror from another family without a gradual
corruption of their spirit occurring? Sir Immanuel Jakobovits, former
chief rabbi of the United Kingdom, writes, “The moral conscience of the
Jewish people has been all but despiritualized, transferred from its
traditional custodians, and virtually monopolized by the secularist masses
and their spokesmen...ideals such as peace, conciliation, tolerance,
sympathy for the sufferings even of one’s enemies, and simple faith in
the eventual triumph of human understanding—all so deeply rooted in the
Jewish tradition—were virtually obliterated from the religious
vocabulary of virtues. This religious insensitivity to Jewish moral values
continues to baffle and trouble me to no end” (See May/June 1998 Washington
Report, p. 52). Rabbi Michael Lerner has written, “If you judge
‘who is a people’s God’ by what they hold sacred, then you have to
conclude that for much of the past 50 years the real object of worship of
much of the Jewish people has been Israel and Zionism. Unfortunately, like
all false gods, this one has failed to satisfy the spiritual hunger of the
Jewish people. If many Jews turn away from Judaism today, Israel has
played no small part in that process. Judaism may be one of Israel’s
most important casualties.” (Tikkun, March/April 1998)
I have no doubt of your love of Christ and your sincere
desire to serve Him. This is why your way of trying to do so pains me. In
light of these verses of scripture from The New Testament; in light of the
numerous differing interpretations by sincere and devout Christians of
Verses 1-6 from Revelation Chapter 20 (the Dispensational Premillennial,
the Amillennial, and the Postmillennial); in light of these laments by
rabbis of the Jewish faith, and in light of verses 15-22 of Matt. 24 which
describe the horror of the end times for most who will be in Israel at
that time (and many of those who are escaping the economic collapse of
Russia to go to Israel with your help may not be sincere or long-lasting
converts), do you not think it would be better to serve Christ by doing
what he commanded in Mark 16:15: “Go ye into all the world, and preach
the gospel (the good news) to every creature”? Many of those “facts on
the ground” which Revelation describes as the preconditions for the
second coming of Christ are not only ugly but evil. God has not commanded
us to make them happen.
May you walk in His peace and in His wisdom.
P.S. If you wish to verify any quotes that I have used you
may do so at the following address: Washington Report, P.O. Box
53062, Washington, DC 20009; World Wide Web:
http//www.washington-report.org
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