Today I flipped through the book again and was surprised by how one-sided it was. Stern's ecclesiology was so short-sighted. Don't get me wrong, I have immense respect and gratitude for his pioneering work. But no work is perfect. And the blind-spot in this book was Gentile identity, seeing it as limited to Christianity and the Church.
The reality for Messianics is that, although we love Christians, we have a completely different ideology: we are pro-Judaic; they are anti-Judaic.
That's why most of us get kicked out of Christian congregations/fellowships.
At our last fellowship, I spoke out against an "elder" (he was just in his early twenties) who had said something that I perceived to be offensive regarding an actual elder (who was seventy). I knew in the Spirit that there was something wrong with this guy (it turned out later he was arrested for taking video up women's skirts). Here's an excerpt of the email I received after speaking out:
"You are an exact replica of the Pharisees in Jesus day!....Here is my question for you. Why is it, in this situation and all the others that everyone sees things different than you? What damage has it caused? Everyone is fine except you. You are the only one offended....your spiritual judgment is severely impaired....I do not think that you are genuinely saved. I think you are a Pharisee and an enemy against those who are genuine sheep....I have dealt with demonically influenced people like you before. I see through the schemes of the enemy.Why do I share that with you? To embarrass the one who sent it to me? No. Because I know that other Messianics out there have been through the same thing or are about to go through the same thing. Be prepared. You will be called demonic for practicing Torah, teaching Judaism. You might be called worse things that what I was called.
YOU ARE NOT WELCOME AT OUR FELLOWSHIP ANY LONGER. (NOT THAT YOU ACTUALLY FELT A PART OF IT ANYWAY)"
This is not necessarily part of the overall subject, but something stood out that you said, that I can relate to you on.
ReplyDeleteToday I flipped through the book again and was surprised by how one-sided it was. Stern's ecclesiology was so short-sighted. Don't get me wrong, I have immense respect and gratitude for his pioneering work. But no work is perfect. And the blind-spot in this book was Gentile identity, seeing it as limited to Christianity and the Church.
I think this shortsightedness is exactly what we see in the major MJ organizations, such as the UMJC.
I read James, post today, and his paraphrasing of what Carl Kinbar spoke about at the Shavuot conference caught my eye... which was in relationship to what gentiles place in the scheme of all of this is, and it is similar to Stern's conclusions, I guess it is shared among those who follow in this type of mindset, regardless, their conclusions always baffle me. I am always left with the feeling that I just read an incomplete sentence, I am waiting for them to put the whole picture together or make sense of it all, and they simply do not, instead we are left with either agreeing with a large assumption or just hoping for the best.
From these predominately 'BE' perspectives, there are 'Jews' and then there are the 'nations', and there simply is no thought concerning gentiles who are now spiritual sons of Abraham or are now part of Israel or are now Sons of the Kingdom, simply gentiles are the nations and nothing else. With that we miss a large piece of the puzzle. Not making a distinction between those who are simply what the bible describes as the nations and those who are part of the body of Messiah, sons of the Kingdom, fellowheirs, etc, is a grave mistake.
How does one deal with the eschatological understanding of the resurrection and the sons of the Kingdom, it does not fit in their theology, its like a conversation I had with Gene concerning the nations attacking Jerusalem, Gene thinks all of us who trust in God are going to be fighting against Israel because we are the nations, he had to accept that point, because if it did not believe that, then his simple understanding of the nations falls apart. But that is exactly it, there is no distinction, nations simply means me and you, start training for war, we will be fighting even though we do not want to, its prophecy... :P