It is the time of year when Jewish people will be celebrating two of their most important holidays, Rosh Hoshanah, the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. Many people wonder to what extent Jewish Christians should participate in these events, and to what extent they should celebrate their Jewish heritage in general.
The most basic answer is that Jewish Christians – like Irish Christians and German Christians and Arab Christians – should feel free to maintain their cultural traditions so long as it is done in a Christ-honoring way and does not involve denials of Christ or violations of God’s Word. When an Italian or a Greek or a Jew becomes a Christian, they do not cease being Italians or Greeks of Jews. But their Christian identity become paramount, placing limitations on other loyalties and habits.
Jews for Jesus is a organization that seeks to evangelize Jewish people, in part by showing that one does not give up Jewishness by believing in Jesus – or Yeshua – as Messiah. An ad for their holiday events gives this invitation: “Join us for Rosh Hoshanah as we worship the God of Israel. Through music, liturgy, and word, we will celebrate together His provision of Y’shua (Jesus), who gives us new life and who is the atonement for our sins.”1 I think this indicates a lovely approach to evangelism, so long as all worship is explicitly Christian, as this invitation indicates.
However, there are often indications that some in what is called the “Messianic Jew” movement who emphasize their Jewishness in unbiblical and unhealthy ways. Some express that their Jewish background makes them a higher order of Christians, wrongly interpreting passages like Romans 1:17, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” That priority is redemptive-historical, that is, salvation came first to the Jews and then through them to the Gentiles, but it does not posit Jewish-Christian supremacy. Instead, the New Testament argues for an essential unity in the church, where all ethnic, class, racial, and economic distinctions give way to our new identity as Christians. Paul says, “For [Christ] himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility” (Eph. 2:14). Some within the Messianic Jewish community are expressing concern that this is not being followed. Stan Telchin, one of the leading Jewish evangelists, has written a book titled
Messianic Judaism IS NOT Christianity! A Loving Call to Unity. The point of the book is to repent of ethnic and cultural pride and for the Jewish-Christian community to be fully integrated into the broader Christian community. Then, the church can truly say, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28).
Paul, who wrote these verses emphasizing a transcendent unity in Christ, also showed a deep concern for his fellow Jews. He zealously sought the salvation of Jewish people, but most of his ministry was spent ministering to Gentiles. He could say, “To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews” (1 Cor. 9:20). Surely, this endorses a proper participation of Jewish Christians in Jewish holidays and other cultural events, so long as their Christian message is not put aside. But Paul’s interests were not limited by his ethnicity, and the same should be true for Jewish believers. Paul said that he also became like Gentiles (minus the sin) so as to reach Gentiles, concluding, “I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some” (1 Cor. 9:22).
It is not easy to find the right balance. Paul seems to have struggled with this, once going to the temple with the intention of offering Jewish sacrifices, to prove that he was not an enemy of the Jews. God stopped Paul from carrying out what would have been a sinful denial of Christ (see Acts 21:26ff). Paul loved his Jewish people so much he was willing to lose his own salvation for them, if God had let him (Rom. 9:1-2). We, too, should be burdened for our families, our cities, and others with whom we have ties, including ethnic and racial groups. But always, we must uphold the great commitment Paul expressed in Colossians 1:18, “that in all things Christ might be preeminent.”
1
http://www.jewsforjesus.org/programs/highholidayservices.
Rev. Richard Phillips is the chair of the Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology and senior pastor at First Presbyterian Church Coral Springs, Margate, Florida.
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