CONVERT, DAMN YOU! CONVERT!

By Hugh Fogelman

 

 

The Los Angeles Times, in its September 7, 2002 edition, under Religion had a headline reading; “Catholics Called Wrong Not to Evangelize Jews.” And who called the Catholics wrong? Guess who–the Baptists! The same group who has ordained a minister that is now the National Director of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).1

The newspaper article continues: “Southern Baptist officials say Catholics’ agreement not to try to convert them denies Jews salvation.”  The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the National Council of Synagogues issued a statement on August 12, 2002 saying Catholics “… should no longer try to evangelize Jews because they already dwell in a saving covenant with God. Trying to convert Jews is no longer theologically acceptable in the Catholic church.”  

The Los Angeles Times story continued; “Such sentiments did not sit well with some Protestants. Soon after the document was issued, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) director of Jewish outreach said, ‘there can be no more extreme form of anti-Semitism than to deny Jews a chance to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. Asking Christians to abandon evangelism even for a single ethnic group, is akin to asking Jews to eat ham and cheese sandwiches,’ Jim Sibley told Baptist Press, the denomination’s official news service.” 

In a television debate on the Phil Donahue show (MSNBC), Albert Mohler Jr, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY said, “it was his [Baptist] responsibility to share the good news of the Gospel knowing that all who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved.” Rabbi Shmuley Boteach responded that Mohler was a “spiritual Neanderthal with repulsive, revolting views and a liability to Christianity.” Mohler means that all who do not believe in Jesus will go to Hell, telling Jews they have no way for their salvation. Mohler must have forgotten that for thousands of years, righteous Jews did indeed have salvation from God Himself. Finally, by trying to “save the Jews” from hell, Southern Baptists are actually saying that their religion is mightier than the JEws, claiming God has left the Jews and Christians are now the “chosen people.” After all, according to these Baptists, Jews believe in an obsolete, out dated, archaized “Old Testament” which was superseded with the new improved New Testament.  

When I told my wife how much this upset me she replied: “Why? If Jews really knew their rich heritage, their religious beliefs, their Scriptures―no one could ever convert them. All they have to do is to say NO, and walk away.” Sounds simple, doesn’t it? 

Christianity, by design, is a replacement religion. Jews have been forced, driven off, murdered, annihilated, kidnapped, ridiculed, assimilated and all other manner of anti-Semitic garbage that the world could throw at them. Though often ignored, one of the Jews biggest challenge today, is to retain a Jewish Judaism. Besides the multi-million dollar onslaught waged against them by overt Christian missionaries there are innumerous covert Christian and/or syncretism groups posing as legitimate variants of traditional Torah true Judaism.

 
But perhaps the worst people are those frauds who try to convince Jews that belief in Jesus not only does not preclude such a believer from Jewry, but also is actually acceptable and necessary to bring about the messianic era for Jews. Despite the fact that absolutely no Hebrew or Aramaic or Arabic Jewish literature mentions Jesus or attributes any halakha (laws) or aggada (sayings) to Jesus, yet some Jews are drawn into a belief that our messiah has already come  when Judaism says so.

To throw a curve to those Jews who should know to reject such obvious lies, the new breed of missionary changes Jesus’ into a Hebrew sounding name. To the missionary, this is better to lure the unsuspecting who are told of Jesus as:Yeshua ben Miriam; Yehoshua ben Miriam;  Yahshua Ha Masiakh; Yahshua the Messiah; Yehoshua haMoshiakh; Yahsua bar Yosef; Yeshua ben Yussif; Yehoshua hanatzret;  Rabbi Yeshua or Ribi Yehoshua!

Deceit is the norm for these “wolves in sheep clothing.” They use these names and other Jewish terms and words to lure unsuspected Jews looking for Jewish websites for information about Judaism. Some of these fake Jewish organizations are: Beit Netzarim; Netzari Judaism; Orthodox Netzarim Judaism; Association of Torah Observant Nazarenes; Sefard-Shalom; Shalom Sefarad B'nai Aryeh Y'hudah Ministry; and Bet Yosef Institute of Torah Federation of Messianic Sephardim. Neither is there such a collection of Jewish scripture known as: Brit Hadash, B'rit Chadash, Brit Chadasha or  Nazarean Codicil.

In the Los Angeles Times of  October 12, 2002, page B25 headlines read “EVANGELISTS DEFEND TRYING TO CONVERT JEWS.” It goes on to say “The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) is taking issue with an August report from U.S. Catholic Bishops that opposes efforts to target Jews for conversion.

The WEA, representing 120 national and regional church fellowships and 75 nondenominational ministries, has reaffirmed and reissued a 1989 declaration defending Jewish evangelism. The 1989 declaration was written by 16 theologians from nine nations. One of them, the Reverend. J.I. Packer, an Anglican teaching at Regent College in Vancouver, British Columbia, endorsed the reaffirmation stating: “Sharing Jesus Christ with our Jewish friends is as important a task as it ever was.”

The Catholic bishops said deepened appreciation of God’s UNBROKEN covenant with the Jewish people means “campaigns that target Jews for conversion to Christianity are no longer acceptable in the Catholic Church.” 

But, the evangelical paper defends such targeted evangelism and denies that Israel’s covenant relationship by itself brings salvation or that “any person can enjoy God’s favor apart from the mediation of Jesus Christ.” 

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Rev. Hugh’s comments:

1.  The Catholic Church NOW recognizes God’s unbroken covenant with the Jewish people. Why did they not know this before? Maybe they finally read their bible "In those days it will happen that ten men, of all the different languages of the nations, will take hold, they will take hold of the corner of the garment of a Jewish man, saying, "Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you!' " (Zechariah 8:23) AND "O Lord, Who are my power and my strength and my refuge in the day of trouble, to You nations will come from the ends of the earth and say, "Only lies have our fathers handed down to us, emptiness in which there is nothing of any avail!" (Jeremiah 16.19) 

2.  Many biblical scholars believe that the last paragraph of Matthew was added on by the early church fathers; “Go ye therefore and teach all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Ghosts – teaching then to observe all things whatsoever I (Jesus) have commanded you” (verse 28:19-20). In other words, they feel that the author of Matthew NEVER wrote that.                                       

 

Footnote: 

1 Pastor Thomas Robb, National Director of the KKK (Ku Klux Klan), is an ORDAINED BAPTIST MINISTER who claims, "We [the KKK] are born-again Christians and intend to remain so." Robb also publishes “The Torch: The  Revolutionary  Newsletter  for  White  Christian  America.” He claims it to be “Politics from a White Christian perspective - the way our country was meant to be!”

Source:  http://www.christianidentity.tv/the%20torch%20front%20page.htm 

 

 

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