When people become Christians, they take on a new spiritual identity. But when Lloyd Carsen met Jesus in 1970, he procured a new name as well as heavenly citizenship. Becoming a Christian birthed in Carsen a newfound appreciation for his Jewish heritage. While his parents had given him a Hebrew name at birth, they used more culturally appropriate family names for life in North America and to protect themselves from persecution as Jews. Soon after his conversion, Carsen decided to reclaim his original birth name, full of the flavor of his Jewish identity. And so, Tuvya Zaretsky was reborn.
Zaretsky has spent nearly all the years since then as a missionary with Jews for Jesus. He currently serves as the director of the Southern California district of the organization, but he continues to further the understanding of Christians in the West about their spiritual family in the Middle East.
HOW MANY JEWISH CHRISTIANS ARE IN ISRAEL AT THIS TIME?
I think the safe figure is at least 2,000. But I’m comfortable saying that it is quite a bit more than that. Both the conversion growth within the country and the increase of Jewish believers coming from outside of the country have helped swell the numbers.
WHAT DO YOU SEE AS THE MISSIONARY’S ROLE IN THE MIDDLE EAST?
For some, the word missionary is a bad word in the Jewish community. There are missionaries that Israelis find difficult to relate to because they come in with an American agenda; others come in with a European agenda. But this approach only works for people who are from those countries and who want to remain within those cultural contexts.
In contrast, my first contact with any Christians in the Middle East occurred when I met a Christian and Missionary Alliance couple who had been stationed in Jerusalem. They challenged my world-view by modeling humility, integrity, and Christ’s love. They also encouraged me not to come to their church but to go down the street to the congregation of Israeli believers. That wasn’t because they did not want or need me. It was because they understood that I needed to discover faith in Christ in a culture that was close to what I could perceive, understand, and live. American culture was subservient to their ministry of the gospel of Jesus Christ to Jews and Arabs. That was a very, very powerful message to me.
As a result, I now believe that the role of the missionary is to communicate the gospel to nationals, help them understand it in their own national context, and give them the responsibility of introducing Christ to their own people.
LET’S MOVE TO THE ROLE ESCHATOLOGY PLAYS IN EVANGELIZATION. YOU HAVE SAID THAT MANY JEWISH BELIEVERS ATTRIBUTE THEIR CONVERSION EXPERIENCE TO READING MATERIAL LIKE HAL LINDSEY’S “THE LATE GREAT PLANET EARTH.”
Back in the early seventies, that was very much so. At least one survey showed that 56 percent of Jewish believers were attracted to the gospel first by the Bible, and 22 percent by books on messianic prophecy.
IN THE BOOK OF ACTS, THE PREACHING OF THE APOSTLES CENTERED ON THE FACT THAT JESUS FULFILLED MESSIANIC PROPHECIES. DO YOU TRY TO FOLLOW THE SAME PATTERN IN YOUR EVANGELIZATION OF JEWS?
Exactly. For example, we point to Luke 24 and ask, What kind of a Bible study did Jesus have with the men on the road to Emmaus where he opened up Moses, the Prophets, and all the Scriptures? What does it mean that Jesus taught that the Messiah must suffer and die? Passages like Psalm 22, Isaiah 7:14, Isaiah 9:6, Isaiah 53, and Jeremiah 31 that talk about the new covenant are rarely ever discussed within the Jewish community.
So we follow the first-century pattern of opening up the Jewish Bible and asking, Well, what would the credentials of Messiah be if he were to present himself?
WHAT WISDOM HAVE YOU GAINED SINCE THE EARLY SEVENTIES ON THE ISSUE OF FOCUSING ON THE TIME OF JESUS’ RETURN?
This might sound contradictory. One is that I am both eager and thrilled to focus on the second coming of Christ as a supremely important motivation for evangelism and mission. I fear, otherwise, that we lose sight of the fact that the world is not going to remain as it is forever. We can fall asleep at the wheel and forget that eventually he’s going to close the chapter. So, from that side, the discussion of the reappearing of Jesus Christ is extremely important.
Back in the seventies, I was attracted to Jesus because I suspected he might be coming back any year, any month, any time in the next couple of decades. But over the years, I’ve become more comfortable with the idea that, indeed, he is coming back, and it may be soon; but I’m not going to stand up and say that this particular State of Israel and this particular time in Jewish history has to be the one, the time, or the place where it is all going to come together.
Now, I feel there are more important issues to deal with than those eschatological ones. While eschatology might be interesting, the real task of the church isn’t to speculate on when Jesus is coming back; the task of the church is to make sure that everybody who’s around gets a chance to hear about him before that time.
YOU SAID YOU HAVE HOPE FOR PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST. WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE FOR PEACE TO COME TO THE MIDDLE EAST?
When people embrace Jesus Christ, he brings peace into the hearts of people. Therefore, it is incumbent upon Western Christians to support evangelism among Arabs and Jews living in the Middle East. It is a missiological mistake to allow sentiment, or the fear of offending, to lead the evangelist into theological accommodation. Christianity is an evangelizing faith.
Salvation through Christ is the world’s only hope for peace. Jews and Arabs together in Y’shua [as Jesus is called in Hebrew] can be an example of how peace could bloom in the Middle East. The only real hope for peace in the Middle East is for the Prince of Peace to reign by faith in the hearts of people.
HOW ARE EVANGELICALS DOING OVERALL AT SUPPORTING THE CHURCH IN THE MIDDLE EAST?
I sometimes see two extremes of thinking from evangelicals on this topic. Each extreme pits Middle Eastern peoples against one another. But the jingoism of the evangelical Zionists is no different from the belligerance of the evangelical political correctionists. Both advocate their view of the right “biblically based” behavioral solutions. In my experience, Christians have advocated political solutions as an excuse for not doing the tougher task of evangelism.
The church in the Middle East is not consumed with choosing between peace or Armageddon. The Western stereotyping of our peoples as Joshua versus the Amalekites has to be rejected. I think part of the problem goes back to the British Mandate period where the English way of dealing with people under the empire was to set them against one another rather than having them turn against England. Jews and the Arabs were encouraged to set themselves against one another.
As those missionaries who have been able to rise above the nationalism know, Christians in the Middle East want to live together as cousin peoples and as a community that witnesses to the dynamic, saving, life-changing love of Jesus Christ. You do not have to hate Arabs to love Jewish people, and you do not have to hate Jews in order to care about Arabs coming to faith in Jesus Christ. Can the Western evangelical lose the stereotypes and encourage us in the true task of the church?
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