Not ashamed

As someone who has been in missionary work in the UK for over 35 years, I have noticed that the church and Christians have grown less confident in sharing Jesus with those around them.

Many fear being ridiculed by identifying themselves as Christians. This is nothing new; Christians have often suffered a fear of rejection because of their faith, thus the Apostle Peter’s exhortation in 1 Peter 3:15 to always be ready to give an answer to anyone who enquires about the hope you have within you.

But alas, the fear of seeming irrelevant seems to have grown to the point where gospel proclamation has all but disappeared. If it is that bad when thinking about reaching a neighbour who may be a nominal Christian, how much harder to preach the gospel to someone from a different faith or who may be strongly opposed to following Jesus – like a Jewish person?

In looking back into the history of the founding of our own mission, International Mission to Jewish People, in 1842, I was surprised to read that our founders needed to get a concern for the salvation of Jewish people back onto the agenda of the UK church. They enlisted the help of some well-known preachers like C.H. Spurgeon to make the Biblical case for Jewish evangelism.

Of course, Spurgeon and others were well received, as was their message. Jewish missions in Europe thrived in partnership with the church. When we look back to the late 1800s right up to the 1930s and the Holocaust, we find that thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of Jewish people professed faith in Jesus. Amazing!

Here we are almost 100 years later and concern for the salvation of Jewish people has mostly disappeared from our churches. This is not because of what we have seen in the news over the past eight months since the war in Gaza began. There has been a latent ambivalence at best, antisemitism at worst, stifling a concern for the salvation of Jewish people from Christian hearts for decades. Sadly, in the UK, most Christians have little to no regard for the salvation of Jewish people – despite the Bible’s command otherwise.

In the Bible, we see the difficulty of considering those outside your own people group. At first the church was entirely Jewish, and, despite Jesus’ command including ‘to Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth’, the disciples stayed put. It took a dream from God for Peter to go to the Gentiles. It seems a wide sheet from heaven full of Cumberland sausages, honey-glazed ham and sticky pork ribs made the point.

Peter went and preached to Cornelius and his whole house was saved. At first this flummoxed the Jewish disciples who thought you had to be Jewish to believe in Jesus, the Jewish Messiah. But after the first Jerusalem Council in Acts 15, the disciples finally got God’s point that Jesus is for everybody, and they got stuck in.

Today we face the same problem in reverse – just as the early Jewish disciples had a problem bringing the gospel to the Gentiles, today’s Christians have a problem bringing the gospel back to Jewish people, despite the Bible’s command to do so.

Maybe we need a dream from God of a sheet coming down from heaven stacked full of bagels, falafels, and matzah ball soup so that they are reminded that Jesus also has a heart for Jewish souls that need saving. What a greater banquet it would be for all with Jewish and Gentile ‘food’ together.

This is the challenge – helping Christians understand that Jewish people need Jesus too. Jewish evangelism must be back on the agenda, activity and support of the local church. I understand this is a hard ask, given the current political context in the Middle East. It’s all about prejudice.

Prejudice is like a coin. On one side are those who love the Jewish people too much and on the other side are those who like Jewish people too little.

Christians who love too much often say Jewish people don’t need Jesus. They believe that Jewish people have their own way to God through their own religion, customs, and history. They do not want to offend Jewish people with the gospel.

On the other side of the coin are those Christians who like the Jewish people too little. Perhaps it is because of Israel’s actions in the Middle East, or because their theology holds Jewish people responsible for the death of Jesus, or because they believe the Jewish people have been replaced by the church and are of no concern to God anymore.

But when we dislike or are apathetic to a person or a people group – that apathy or prejudice chokes the love of God from our hearts for them and their need of God’s salvation. We just don’t care enough to be concerned for their eternal welfare.

Concerning the Jewish people, Jesus looked down upon them in Jerusalem and He wept, saying: ‘I wanted to gather you … as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings.’ I wish Christians today had the same passion for the Jewish people that Jesus had. If you do not, I ask you to pray to God to give you His passion for lost Jewish souls so that you are able to obey His word and make sure the gospel is brought back to Jewish people as a priority.

I’ve heard church leaders disagree over the meaning of Romans 1:16 where the apostle Paul wrote ‘For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile’. Some would say that Paul wants to ensure the ongoing priority of Jewish evangelism, while others argue it is Paul simply stating the historical order by which people first heard the Good News. Does it matter which?

For almost 2,000 years Jewish people have been mostly neglected by the church (save for a few bright spots, some mentioned above). The apostle Paul is telling us that the gospel is the power of God to save ALL people – Jewish people too.

Let’s repent and commit ourselves to Jewish evangelism in earnest. It is not too late to rekindle a Christian love and concern for the salvation of Jewish people as a matter of priority. ‘For if their rejection brought reconciliation to the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?’ (Rom. 11:15)