In reading Acts 15 we can almost hear the in-fighting going on with the Apostles debating if it should be allowed for a Gentile to even be allowed to follow Jesus!

They jealously guarded their Jewish heritage and did not want to allow any other people-groups “in” as it were. So, what caused the shift to the current state of affairs where a large percentage of Jews do not recognize Jesus as their Messiah?

In the article from One for Israel, titled, Why Don’t Many Jewish People Accept Jesus As Messiah?, they make an interesting point: “most Jewish people today don’t really know what following Jesus is all about. Many believe that Jesus was the founder of a new religion called Christianity, an idolatrous religion for the Gentiles that worships three gods instead of one.”

They continue: “many Jews have a very distorted and warped picture of Christianity and Jesus because they have never seriously studied the issue and never read the New Testament. Indeed, it is considered forbidden and even dangerous to do so. In the Religious communities if anything is taught about Jesus, it is often very biased, negative and sometimes completely untrue.”

From a misunderstanding of the Trinity to pointing toward historical figures like Hitler who used a random Scripture in their obscene propaganda, the Jewish leaders through the ages may be directing the course of focus away from the One True God.

The article makes a wonderful point that “Over the centuries the church has failed to present Christianity as what it truly is – a living relationship between God and His people (both Jews and Gentiles) through Yeshua the Messiah – and that in its roots it is thoroughly Jewish. Through physical birth a person is either Jewish or a Gentile, but through spiritual birth both a Jew and a Gentile become followers of Yeshua the Messiah.” And concludes with this powerful point: “Jesus is the Jewish Messiah. Believing in Him is the most Jewish thing a Jew can do. We need to explain to our Jewish friends that when a Jewish person accepts Jesus as the Messiah he becomes more Jewish than ever before and his Jewish identity will be deepened, and his love for the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and a passion for the Jewish Scripture will be restored and renewed.”

 

What do YOU think? Is Jesus YOUR Messiah? Comment below.