Shalom ALecheim
I personally disagree with the post but given the baggage the person is carrying about the Church, I can no reason for discussion.The disillusionment the person "felt" with Christianity is now obvious in his Messy Judeoism.
Jews for Jesus, Chosen People, Zola Levitt amoung others have no problem with being Jews who believe in Jesus and can say it with out shame.
Some of us are Jews, albeit Messianic Jews and have no issue with the Church and love what God has done in preparing a Bride for his Son.
Their are "sore thumbs" though out there who keep singing the same old song about if they had a hammer...
and they try to hammer in morning,
hammer in evening
Hammer out Law
Hammer out Grace
Hammer on the Church
They don't hammer out the Love between my brothers and sisters all over this land.
In fact they see elitism as a virtue and seclusion as a proper response to Being a Light.
In Jewish Terms, they are a new phrase......Messianic Pharasee's...
The Torah Observant Messianic Jews...are Messianic Sadduccee's ...
They need to repent, do over the love of God, Messiah , Y'shua, Jesus and the Chrurch, and get over hammering.
They are missing the head of the nail and only hitting their own thumbs and then whinning because no body is following them.
As a Jew, I dealt a lot with the early movements that went heretical and have never stopped warning, advising, praying, stating and frankly getting "face to face" for grace in those Jews and Gentiles who think Judaism is the answer and forget only Y'shua is.
That is, Jesus Christ ALL OUR LORD.
Alecheim Shalom
Eben Abram
Messianic Judaism Part II
I'm starting to have my doubts about Messianic Judaism as a denomination/religion/whatever it is. Don't get me wrong, I still agree with the beliefs, and I think it's great that there are Messianic synagogues, and I'd like to still go to them. But I don't think being a part of one of those synagogues, a part of Messianic Judaism, is enough.Maybe what I really mean is that being a part of any denomination and only being involved with that denomination is not enough. Taken broader, mabye being part of a religion and only being involved with that religion is enough.
By separating itself as a denomination, Messianic Judaism isolates itself and its unique perspective. I talked in the first entry on this topic about how the language puts some people on the defensive. I mostly focused on the Jewish side of that, but I think it creates trouble for Christians, too. I know that I and several others I know viewed Messianic Judaism as completely separate from Christianity, even being offended at times by being called Christians or at least very adamant about our opinion that we aren't Christians. There are reasons for that attitude. For one, I think that some MJs want to do whatever they can to make themselves more acceptable to mainstream Judaism and so try to fully separate themselves from Christianity. Also, many see the differences between Christianity and Judaism as too problematic to ignore or reconcile, seeing Christianity as compromising and becoming paganized, leaving the Biblical faith behind.
I'll admit, the latter is why I still do not actually consider myself a Christian. It's strange...I don't actually have a problem with Christian practices. I don't consider them paganism. But I personally find a lot more depth and meaning and understanding in Jewish tradition, since I feel that it's closer to what Yeshua and his earliest followers would have known. It helps me to understand the Bible more, and when certain things (mostly communion and baptism) are practiced in a way that's different from how I understand them. Also, I'm not a Trinitarian, so I between that and the sacraments I usually feel like I don't fit into any church and so I don't try.
But that's so arrogant! None of us has a perfect understanding. I don't know how much of the Jewish traditions I've learned about and experienced were actually practiced by Yeshua and how much of it came about later. We have so much to learn from each other, and it seems like a really bad idea to cut off connections with other people who have a different perspective and who could help us to understand more. Just because I disagree with a group on some particular issues doesn't mean I can't join them and open up a conversation with them.
So I'm trying not to see myself as any specific denomination or religion. I intend to go to as many services of different types as I can, continue going to the ones where I feel at least mostly comfortable, and try to get some dialogue going. God's people shouldn't be divided like this, putting up walls to keep people out when God's trying to call them in. And we shouldn't be shutting ourselves out from people who could help us get closer to understanding and obeying him. We should be helping to repair the world and build connections between people, not making them worse.
I haven't worked out yet exactly what that looks like, for me or in general. I'm hoping to learn that from other people, too, talk to others about my ideas and see what they think would be a good way to go about it. I'm in a strange situation that's almost forcing me to choose a denomination, because I'm feeling like I might be called to be a pastor before, after, or during my PhD work. I'm not sure where jobs are in that without being ordained, and I'm fairly sure I can't get ordained except in these denominations. That makes me a little sad, even though I understand why it's set up that way. I'm still praying, though, not making any decisions about that yet and just trusting God to show me the way.
