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    Evangelical Christians
    Should Support Israel
    by Dr. Arthur Glasser

    May, 1948. That's when it happened, and the State of Israel was reconstituted in "the Land" after 2000 years! I only heard the news much later, for I was in a remote corner of southwest China serving in the midst of a growing cluster of non-Chinese tribal churches. Before that I had been a Protestant Chaplain in the First Marine Division in the South Pacific war. The Jewish people? Evangelicals in those days were still incapable of grasping the full implications of the horror of the Holocaust in which these people by the thousands and up to six million were deliberately destroyed, just because they were Jews. And now, the State of Israel! It took some time to integrate all the implications of this national restoration with my earlier understanding of what the Bible clearly states, that the Jewish nation will be back in "the Land" when the Messiah returns in power and glory.

    But now I am to share with fellow evangelicals solid and convincing reasons why we should support Israel. Evangelicals? The root basically means "gospel" or "good news" and in popular use refers to people committed to the "good news" of Yeshua (the Jewish way of saying Jesus). Since this news is too good to keep, a dominant concern of evangelicals is to share it with all people. Witnessing, mission, evangelizing-these are key words in our vocabulary. But what makes a person an evangelical? Everyone knows that the Bible is the great and unique treasure of Jewry. Widespread today is the flawed assumption that the Bible is largely the creation of their sages, men of religious genius, capable of unusual reflection and insight. They produced a book, essentially about Ethical Monotheism-about the only true and living God who has created all things and who seeks to influence the movement of human history.

    But evangelicals see things differently. They accept the witness of Scripture to itself that Yeshua fully endorsed. It is the Word that God revealed through his prophets and to his people, the Jewish nation. It is primarily concerned to detail his view of the human race in all of its tragic waywardness, its penchant for evil and violence, and its alienation from God, even its hostility toward him. But the Bible doesn't merely expose the human heart and record the long tragedy of human history. It focuses particular attention on what God in his holiness and love has done to reconcile sinful human beings to himself through the atoning sacrifice of Yeshua. Evangelicals are committed to him as the Messiah of Israel and the Savior of the world. That's why in obedience to him they regard their open confession of his "good news" as a highest priority.

    Why Should Evangelicals Support Israel?

    So then, why should evangelicals particularly support Israel? In the first place, anything that concerns the Jewish people should be their concern. This arises in part from the massive indebtedness of all people everywhere to them. What people anywhere in the earth can honestly say that they are not indebted to the Jews for their contributions to world culture? These contributions touch every aspect of human society and individual enrichment.

    But this is not the whole story. Evangelicals are particularly grateful to the Jewish people for Holy Scripture. It was they who received the Word of God-protected it, preserved it, transmitted it, and interpreted it to us. We rejoice in the certainty of the salvation that Yeshua said "is of the Jews" (John 4:21), and that came to us through him, the Jew of Nazareth. The whole story is embodied in Scripture. What evangelical has not been enriched and challenged by the record of men and women from Abraham and Sarah onward, who obeyed God and served him down through Israel's long history!

    Improving the Relationship Between Evangelicals and Jews

    Evangelicals have often failed the Jewish people. They do not lift their heads when they recall the conduct of evangelicals in the Church during the Nazi period (1933-1945) in Germany.

    Yet today, many evangelicals pray regularly for Israel and the Jewish people. At Fuller Seminary, where I teach, we meet weekly for an hour to discuss the latest news from Israel and to pray. We affirm that we are "spiritual Semites" (not a supposed "replacement" for the Jewish nation). After all, most of us are but wild "gentile shoots" that have been grafted into God's "Olive Tree" (Romans 11:17-24). But together with Jewish believers in Yeshua, we seek to stand against all forms of anti-Jewishness or anti-Semitism. Indeed, we must never forget that Israelites are "Beloved of God on account of the Patriarchs" (Romans 11:28; Deuteronomy 7:8).

    Evangelicals and Modern Israel

    Evangelicals believe that God has been faithful to the Jewish people. In this year of Israel's Jubilee, the nation should be rejoicing. After all, it has survived the ravages of five defensive wars and has witnessed the steady growth of its population through immigration from all parts of the world. But never has the mood of a people been less joyous. A recent publication from Israel speaks of its slumping economy, the disintegration of its long-awaited peace process, the intensification of strife within Israel's religious life. Its rabbinic institutions appear less able than ever to speak to the spiritual hunger of the people. The international community is more hostile, Israel's enemies more formidable and better armed than ever, and the Zionist dream is fading, even from the most ardent. Truly, if ever a nation needed the prayer and prophetic support of evangelicals throughout the world it is Israel today.

    But there is hope shining brightly in the midst of the Negev. Recently, I heard about Messianic Jews and Palestinian-Arab Christians in the Negev who went camping together. As they met, they recognized the dehumanization that both groups suffer. This led to a more genuine acceptance of one another, then unity in prayer for the blessing of God on the nation. Is this not the option so desperately needed in Israel today-not the way of violence and retaliation, and the ever heightening spiral of open hostility? Why not the way of Yeshua?

    In my file I have the correspondence of an outstanding Jewish scholar who became the most prominent Messianic Jewish theologian of this century (Jakob Jocz 1906-1983). He often corresponded with Rabbi Hans Joachim Shoeps. They found that they had a mutual concern-that genuine dialogue take place between Rabbinic and Messianic Jews. Was the following statement, attributed to the rabbi, an expression of their common expectation? Ponder its implications: "The church of Jesus Christ has kept no picture of its Savior and Lord, but it might well be that he who comes at the end of time, he who has been alike the expectation of the synagogue and the church, will bear one and the same countenance."



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    Dr. Arthur F. Glasser is Dean Emeritus of the School of World Mission, Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California.

 
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