While watching TV the other day, I saw commercials for Heinz Ketchup, Coca- Cola and Hershey’s Kisses.
And, for the first time, the thought crossed my mind: “Why are these companies even advertising? After all, they’ve been getting their messages out for years; everybody already knows who they are!”
Everybody, that is, except the 2.5 million people who are born each week. They don’t know and, like the rest of us did, they have to start their learning with the basics.
And that’s why after 2,000 years of Bible teaching and instruction, there are still people who don’t know that Yeshua is Jewish.
And I was once one of those people. I’ll never forget the time I was walking on campus at college and saw a group called “Jews for Jesus.” They were handing out tracts and literature about who they were saying my Messiah was. One of the representatives gave me a card and said, “It has a portrait of Jesus on it; look, He’s Jewish!”
Many of you may have seen this card. On one side it has the verse from Revelation 3:20, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”
On the other side of the card is a color illustration of Jesus knocking on that door. A Jesus, mind you, with long blond hair and blue eyes. A Jesus who looks more Scandinavian than Israeli. A Jesus who was portrayed like a California surfer, not the itinerant Rabbi of His day.
Get the The Spring Feasts and Purim Book
You’ll learn the history and prophetic significance of each Spring Feast and the meaning it holds today for Believers in Yeshua. Holiday recipes will help you celebrate the Springs Feasts and Purim. Discover what God’s appointed times hold in store for you.
Where do people come up with this stuff? Who kidnapped my Jewish Yeshua, and how much ransom had to be paid to get Him back?
The short answer to the first question is that since the early Church mistakenly accused the Jewish people in their day of Deicide, what followed was an intentional effort to distance the Bible from everything and anything Jewish, even if it meant stripping Yeshua of His own Jewish identity.
But how do we know that He was, is and always will be Jewish? I mean, my traditional Jewish parents once told me that the reason we as Jews didn’t accept Jesus as Messiah was because, while He was born Jewish, He decided one day to (supposedly) come to His senses and convert to Christianity, and that’s the story.
The Bible, of course, tells a very different one. A Jew is a Jew because of a bloodline, an ancestry, a genealogy. If you are a descendant of one of the 12 tribes, you are Jewish. Just look at His family tree as it is detailed in Matthew 1 and Luke 3. It is the lineage of the Tribe of Judah. Yeshua—fulfilling prophecy—descends from King David. Note how He was circumcised on the 8th day, was taught Torah, observed the Jewish/Biblical Feasts and Festivals and even went to the synagogue on the Sabbath!
And perhaps the strongest evidence of all: If Yeshua said He was Jewish, who are we to argue with Him? Indeed, in the Aramaic translation of John 13:13, Yeshua identifies himself as a Jewish Rabbi.
Get the The Spring Feasts and Purim Book
You’ll learn the history and prophetic significance of each Spring Feast and the meaning it holds today for Believers in Yeshua. Holiday recipes will help you celebrate the Springs Feasts and Purim. Discover what God’s appointed times hold in store for you.
And while some would say that He started out Jewish but then stripped Himself of His Jewish identity, Revelation 5 says otherwise. Verse 5 in that chapter tells us that when He comes back, Yeshua will be referred to as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah and the Root of David.
I so enjoy this festival time of year because it reminds me that these precious feasts are not simply Jewish Feasts; they’re Yeshua’s feasts. He observed them all—and all of them are all about Him!
Chag Sameach! (Joyous festival!)
