Mark Huey of Outreach Israel Ministries delivers the following message, “An End-Time Move of the Holy Spirit,” as we evaluate the significant purposes we believe that the Lord has for today’s Messianic community of faith.
Generally speaking, the children of God, who rely upon the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, have been fascinated with the coming of the Messianic Age and/or the end of time for thousands of years, particularly in relation to their personal eternal destiny. Such is humanity’s self-centered finite nature, whether inherited in the fallen nature of Adam or even when enlightened by the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. This is to be expected, because according to the Book of Ecclesiastes, the Creator has uniquely placed eternity in people’s hearts, with a specific caveat that they will not find out all the work that God has done from the beginning to the end, in spite of the insatiable curiosity. Consequently, given such a warning, Qohelet or the Preacher added that people should instead rejoice for God’s gift of life, and devote their lives to do good works, until one departs from this world:
“I have seen the task which God has given the sons of men with which to occupy themselves. He has made everything appropriate in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, yet so that man will not find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end. I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and to do good in one’s lifetime; moreover, that every man who eats and drinks sees good in all his labor—it is the gift of God” (Ecclesiastes 3:10-13, NASU).
However, regardless of the wisdom conveyed by the Preacher in this ancient text, with everything made appropriate in its time, even Yeshua’s God-fearing disciples affirmed humanity’s fervent desire to know the unknowable, when they questioned Him about what the signs of His coming would entail. Almost two thousand years ago, given all of the spiritual dynamics that the Disciples had been exposed to in the previous few years, while following and listening to the Messiah’s teaching and claims, they anticipated the commencement of the Messianic Age and sought specific answers from Him to eternity-related matters:
“Yeshua came out from the temple and was going away when His disciples came up to point out the temple buildings to Him. And He said to them, ‘Do you not see all these things? Truly I say to you, not one stone here will be left upon another, which will not be torn down.’ As He was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, ‘Tell us, when will these things happen, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?’ And Yeshua answered and said to them, ‘See to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in My name, saying, “I am the Messiah,” and will mislead many’” (Matthew 24:1-5, NASU).
In the Olivet Discourse, Yeshua stated more about the End of the Age than anywhere else in His teachings. Forebodingly, His initial reaction, to these logical queries from His most intimate followers, was to caution them not to be misled when it came to the destruction of the Temple, the sign of His coming, and/or the End of the Age. Without hesitation, Yeshua categorically warned His Disciples that over time, many will come as professing followers (“in My name”), who declare Him to be the Messiah, and yet, they will mislead many. Many false teachers and false prophets, who will claim to be Christians or followers of Yeshua, will whether knowingly or unknowingly, mislead many undiscerning souls. The ash heap of history is littered with too many examples to mention. Their false teachings, misguided prognostications, and errant predictions about the End of the Age or the return of the Messiah, generally prey on people’s fear of what only the Creator God knows, as stated by the Preacher above, and affirmed by Yeshua’s declaration to His Disciples:
“But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone” (Matthew 24:36, NASU).
Nevertheless, despite these revealing Scriptural statements—because eternity has been placed in the hearts of people—there is still a voracious appetite for many seekers of God to want to know the signs of the end of time. Over the ages and increasingly at this late hour, eschatology or the study of the end times has blossomed and grown. The distance from Yeshua’s First Coming lengthens, and the End of the Age is almost two thousand years closer. At this time in salvation history, a virtual cottage industry of books, movies, video games, DVDs, CDs, and other assorted paraphernalia that are related to the end of time, the return of the Messiah, or apocalyptic themes, are introduced every year by those who claim to be followers of the Messiah. Of course, the proliferation of ear-tickling teaching, and now eye-catching video presentations, should be anticipated, as was forewarned about by the Apostle Paul, in some of his final instruction, delivered to his faithful disciple Timothy:
“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths” (2 Timothy 4:3-4, NASU).
Today, a resurgence in obscure teachings about the Nephilim described in Genesis 6:4 and Numbers 13:33, in light of the technological advances in genetic engineering, has another generation of seekers speculating about things that the Lord has kept unknown for His purposes, as noted in Ecclesiastes 3:11 above. Yet the curious nature of human beings, with eternity embedded in their hearts, makes people susceptible to teachings that rely heavily upon non-canonical writings which are suspect in origin. Consequently, inquisitive people have an inherent tendency to spend an inordinate amount of time talking about and contemplating theories that do not necessarily enhance a person’s walk with the Messiah. But instead, due to these thought-provoking distractions and vain speculations (1 Timothy 1:4), people are kept from doing the good works that please the Almighty during their limited time on Earth.
It has been nearly two thousand years since the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Yeshua the Messiah. Certainly the world is closer to the End of the Age and His return today, than it was in the First Century. Additionally, with the technological advances of the past century in transporting people and electronically transmitting information, knowledge and the availability to information are increasing rapidly. With these present-day realities, many prophecy teachers have surmised that a statement regarding a “time of distress,” coupled with the resurrection of the dead found in the Book of Daniel, is on the verge of being fulfilled:
“Now at that time Michael, the great prince who stands guard over the sons of your people, will arise. And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book, will be rescued. Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. Those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever. But as for you, Daniel, conceal these words and seal up the book until the end of time; many will go back and forth, and knowledge will increase” (Daniel 12:1-4, NASU).
Some interpreters of the Book of Daniel have concluded that proper interpretation and understanding of Daniel’s concealed prophecies are finally happening, because his book is being unsealed, as the end of time approaches. Hence, given human beings’ innate curiosity regarding eternal questions about the End of the Age that has prevailed for millennia, a reasonable question in an attempt to discern the times, given the increased access to information and knowledge about salvation history, naturally arises:
Is the explosive growth in the past several decades of the Messianic movement among Jewish and non-Jewish Believers a sign that the End of the Age is approaching?
Clearly, the worldwide emergence of the Messianic community of faith, over the past century, is a palpable result of the Holy One doing something radically different among His chosen ones from Jewish and non-Jewish backgrounds. Most assuredly, our family believes that the preponderance of non-Jewish followers of the Messiah of Israel—who have been drawn into the Messianic movement, coming from strong evangelical backgrounds with generations of godly people preceding us—can be considered a significant move of the Holy Spirit. Personally, we have no other way to explain our conscientious and, we believe, Spirit-led actions to leave the relative familiarity of evangelical Christianity, and instead seek to conduct our lives in a manner more consistent with the way Yeshua and His Disciples walked. Now through the eyes of enlightened hearts (Ephesians 1:18), spiritual passages like the following from the Apostle Paul to Believers in Asia Minor, regarding how the sacrificial blood of the Messiah established the framework for the “one new humanity” to develop in Israel’s Messiah, with the enmity between people groups abolished, is better understood with a similar emergence of modern-day Messianic congregations and fellowships:
“For we are His workmanship, created in Messiah Yeshua for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we would walk in them. Therefore remember, that once you, the nations in the flesh—who are called ‘Foreskin’ by the ones called ‘Circumcision,’ which is in the flesh, made by hands—remember that you were at that time separate from Messiah, alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Messiah Yeshua you who were once far off, have been brought near in the blood of Messiah. For He is our peace, who made both groups one, and broke down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, the religious Law of commandments in dogmas, that He might create in Himself the two into one new humanity, so making peace, and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, having killed the enmity by it” (Ephesians 2:10-16, author’s rendering from Ephesians for the Practical Messianic).
In many ways, this First Century revelation about the “one new humanity”—with the relatively recent formation of Messianic communities of faith—affirms the choices, made by unknown thousands from the nations, to pursue a Torah observant Messianic lifestyle in the modern era.
However, to consider the above question, I must first confess my own inclination to want to understand the times and discern them like one of the sons of Issachar, who were “men who understood the times, with knowledge of what Israel should do” (1 Chronicles 12:32a). But rather than theorize or speculate about the aforementioned topics relating to the End of the Age, because we view spiritual things through a “mirror dimly” (1 Corinthians 13:12), I want to instead use personal testimonies (one of the weapons of spiritual warfare described in Revelation 12:11) to conclude that the Messianic movement is an end-time move of the Holy Spirit. After all, for a non-Jewish family like ours to willfully choose to be totally dedicated to ministering to those called into the Messianic community of faith, we have had to firmly believe that the emergence of the Messianic movement was, and most assuredly is, an end-time move of the Spirit of God. Let me share a few of our collective testimonial highlights…
Back in 1992, after having been born again for fourteen years, and while in a season of spiritual searching enduring a life trial, I came across a book written in 1956 by Arthur Wallis entitled, In the Day of Thy Power, which chronicled many of the “awakening” spiritual movements that had taken place since the Middle Ages. While the historical aspect of what the Spirit of God had done down through the centuries was intriguing, there was an anonymous quote defining what “success” was from a spiritual perspective, located on a page between the Table of Contents and the Introduction, declaring,
Success: If you would make the greatest success of your life, try to discover what God is doing in your time, and fling yourself into the accomplishment of His purpose and will.
I was so impressed by the profundity of this statement that I typecast and framed it, placing it on my desk to ponder for years. Thinking back on that action and how the Lord used these words to encourage me to discern what He was doing before flinging myself into work for Him, brings back great memories. Perhaps others can relate to certain things the Lord providentially placed in their lives, to guide them into the decisions and choices which have ultimately led them into the Messianic community of faith. Clearly, this quote was used back then and even to this very day, to inspire me to personally pursue the Lord with zealous abandon, upon discerning what He was or is doing at different points in salvation history.
Within the next year of seeking to discover what God was doing (1993), the Lord brought a precious believing woman into my life, who shared a godly heritage, a profound admiration for history, and most especially, a deep love for Him. At that time, Margaret was a widow with three children, whom I had dated one time twenty-one years prior, during our undergraduate years at college. After our romance blossomed and we were married in 1994, her strong Wesleyan Methodist upbringing and my Calvinistic Bible Church perspectives did not necessarily line up theologically, as we were unable to solve the centuries-old debate regarding the responsibility of man and the sovereignty of God. So the Lord led us to compromise, by attending some Charismatic churches, desperately seeking to discover what the Lord was doing at that hour with us and in the Body of Christ. While courting we concluded that, for His purposes, He had allowed two marriages to dissolve, through a premature death and a divorce—but had allowed us to get reacquainted in order to fall in love and remarry, only after He responded to our heartfelt pleas for guidance with tangible answers. We both were convinced that the trials of life we had endured, had simply honed us for the work where the Father would eventually lead us. Of course, we never suspected that He would, in about a year of searching, lead us to a Jewish Messianic congregation and show us by His Spirit that the much prophesied restoration of all things (Acts 3:19-21) was what He was in the process of accomplishing!
However, before we sought out a Messianic group to celebrate the Fall feasts, we went on a tour to Israel led by Zola Levitt Ministries. This trip to Israel was conducted in lieu of going to Toronto, where we were being told by those who had returned from the Toronto Blessing phenomenon that “the Spirit of the Lord was being poured out, and everyone needed to go to get a touch from the Lord.” The peer group pressure to go to Toronto fomented in the Charismatic circles we were frequenting was extreme. The following verse, Acts 3:19, “Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord,” was being liberally referenced in messages about God’s “time of refreshing” His people. So one day while I was out jogging in preparation for an upcoming marathon, I debated in my mind whether we should go to Canada—because at this stage in our spiritual walks, we both wanted to do what the Lord was doing, and perhaps, despite some of the craziness we witnessed, we thought that maybe this unusual activity in Toronto could be God’s Spirit at work. Instead, toward the end of my workout, I got a visual image in my mind’s eye of the Lord pouring out His Spirit on the Land of Israel, with a direct splash going up in the air, circling around the globe, and descending upon Toronto. In a flash, the word “Jerusalem” came to my heart and mind, and I ran home and declared to Margaret that rather than go to Toronto, maybe we should go to Israel and receive a “direct” outpouring. Without much hesitation, she responded with this suggestive remark, “Well, if we are going to Israel, we should go with Zola Levitt, because who other than a Messianic Jew would you want to guide you on your first tour of Israel?” Since I knew Zola from his ministry efforts in Dallas, I immediately retorted affirmatively, and we were soon booked on the next tour in December 1994. It was there in Israel on our tour that the Holy Spirit, among some significant and wonderful encounters with Him, prompted us specifically to celebrate the feasts of the Lord upon our return to the United States.
It took about nine months, but by the time Rosh HaShanah of 1995 arrived, after we commemorated the Fall feasts of the Lord, we had a congregation to attend. Over the next few months, as we continued to attend the Erev Shabbat and Shabbat services, it became readily apparent to us that this is where the Spirit of God was truly ministering to our souls, so we discontinued going to church. We soon joined the new members class at the synagogue and began to take Hebrew. Before long, we were fully integrated into the Messianic Jewish assembly.
Since those early days and our years of pursuing the Lord from a Messianic perspective, as He has led us into full time ministry, we have discovered through interactions with a wide assortment of people from around the world, that they also were awakened to their Hebraic and Jewish Roots in roughly the same time period from 1995-1997. These testimonies have helped confirm to our family that we had discovered one of the major global moves of God’s Holy Spirit in our lifetime! Providentially, this move of the Spirit was not being orchestrated by some huge ministry with all sorts of resources making their claims from satellite TV stations. But instead, this was something being led and nurtured by people just like our family, who were unknown people from various walks of life scattered around the world. From 1998-2000, as we were led to help small Messianic ministries grow and flourish, we were eventually led to fling ourselves without reservation into the accomplishment of His purposes and will—after much prayer, Biblical research, and confirmation coming from a variety of sources. In our personal analysis from a historical and Scriptural perspective, what we witnessed firsthand made increasingly more sense, as we studied and got more comfortable with the Torah and the prophecies found in the Tanakh. Thankfully, our fervent family pursuit of serving the Holy One of Israel was confirmed over and over again that we were being led by the Spirit of God.
Broadly speaking from a historical point of view—given the relatively recent history of the past century or so—one discovers that the Lord has been working on parallel tracks with many Jews and Christians around the world, to accomplish His will. The Zionist movement was promoted effectively by Theodor Herzl and birthed in Europe in the late Nineteenth Century. Zionism ignited a passion among many oppressed Jews to leave Russia and Eastern Europe and emigrate to the Ottoman Empire’s Palestinian province, in order to establish a permanent home on the ancient land from which they were dispersed. For nearly two millennia, in what is known as the Diaspora, Jews sought contentment, but until this time had never had a concerted successful attempt to return to the land of their ancestors and reestablish the State of Israel. The time was just not right. However, in His time during the late 1800s and early 1900s, the Lord raised up people such as Eliezer Ben Yehudah to revive the Hebrew language into a modern version that was eventually restored to the Jews who formed the modern State of Israel. Here was another tangible indication that the Lord was starting to do something unique with the Jewish people, who had been entrusted with the oracles of God (Romans 3:2). Eventually through the traumas of persecutions, pogroms in Russia, and ultimately the Holocaust in Germany, in the Twentieth Century, the Lord used world powers such as Great Britain with the Balfour Declaration in 1917, to lay the groundwork for the new Jewish State of Israel.
This activity among the Jewish people was being paralleled in the Christian world, with the growing acceptance of the dispensational teaching of John Nelson Darby and the Plymouth Brethren in the late 1800s. This pre-tribulation rapture teaching impacted C. I. Scofield, who first published the influential Scofield Bible in 1909 among evangelicals, which readily embraced the return of the Jewish people to the Promised Land. This enhanced the dispensational message and established a basis for what would later be termed “Christian Zionism.” At the same general time, the 1904 revival in Wales and the 1905-1915 Azusa Street Revival, in the first decade of the 1900s, was reintroducing the concept that the gifts of the Spirit were not just for the early Church, but available throughout the ages. New understanding, about the promised restoration of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel, made verses like the following much more understandable today—because more than a simple refreshing was expected, but ultimately “the restoration of all things,” as prophesied by many of the ancient prophets:
“Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; and that He may send Yeshua, the Messiah appointed for you, whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time” (Acts 3:19-21, NASU).
Perhaps as many concluded regarding the End of the Age, the books of prophecy were finally being unsealed and understood, as suggested by Daniel 12:4 above. After all, for the first time since the early centuries of the post-resurrection assemblies, Jews were coming to faith in Yeshua, and non-Jews were being drawn to return to the Hebraic Roots of the faith. The Messianic community of faith, unlike any other spiritual entity we know of, is perhaps preparing a people for the coming time of distress mentioned in Daniel 12:1 and/or Jacob’s distress found in Jeremiah 30:7, by training up a group of Believers who exemplify this verse found in the Book of Revelation:
“Here is the perseverance of the saints who keep the commandments of God and their faith in Yeshua” (Revelation 14:12, NASU).
There is coming a time of great turmoil in the world when the saints of God will be at war with the Beast System that will dominate human affairs. But according to Revelation 12:17 and 14:12, despite the emergence of the antimessiah, who will be at war with the saints (Daniel 7:21; Revelation 13:7), there will continue to be a remnant of Believers, who have a testimony of faith in the Messiah Yeshua, while seeking to keep His commandments. We believe that the Messianic community of faith, despite its differences of opinion on many non-essential matters, is widely representative of who those “end-time saints” are going to be.
Yet, having been a marathoner in my youth, patience and perseverance have had to become essential attributes when seeking spiritual understanding. In fact, through prayer, serious Bible study, continual analysis and research about the Messianic movement over the past two decades of reading accounts, talking to firsthand witnesses, and/or personal experiences in a wide array of Messianic settings—we have come to some conclusions about the future of the Messianic movement and its relationship to the End of the Age.
If one takes the more recent history of the Messianic movement from the 1960s to the present, there are some continuing parallels in light of what the Holy One has been doing with the Jewish people and the State of Israel, and the Body of Believers over the past sixty years or so. The initial, most significant event was the formation of the State of Israel in 1948, following the horrific consequences of World War II and the Holocaust. Many Christians at that time were astonished that an ancient prophecy found in the Book of Isaiah was being fulfilled:
“Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Can a land be born in one day? Can a nation be brought forth all at once? As soon as Zion travailed, she also brought forth her sons” (Isaiah 66:8, NASU).
At Israel’s modern-day reformation, the dispensationalists were ecstatic, as the relatively recent eschatological theories about the pre-tribulation rapture took on added significance. Support for the State of Israel and the Jewish people returning to their ancient homeland from the evangelical community began to grow exponentially. Ministry efforts developed from a wide array of Christian sources. But as the reconstituted State of Israel struggled to survive in a hostile environment surrounded by Arab and Muslim enemies, various Christian-oriented countries increasingly lent support either economically, diplomatically, or at times, even militarily. About twenty years later, on June 7, 1967 in the midst of what has been labeled the Six Day War, the Israelis finally liberated Jerusalem from the Jordanians after nearly 2,000 years under Gentile control. In what can be considered a unique victory over extraordinarily superior forces, the fledgling country not only survived, but expanded its borders to the Jordan River forcing back the Jordanians, captured the Golan Heights from Syria, and occupied the Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsula from Egypt. The testimonies of miracles on the battlefield are incredible to hear or read about! The omnipotent Creator God favored His chosen people against their adversaries, and freed the City of David from its oppressors!
On a spiritual plane, during the half-dozen years or so, until the Yom Kippur War of October 6-25, 1973, there was a period of time in Christian circles known as the “Jesus Movement,” when the Spirit of God brought to faith a growing number of young Jewish and non-Jewish people. Many of the Jews were children of Holocaust survivors, or had simply been caught up in the hippie and anti-war movements that thrived during this era. This “Baby Boomer” generation, born after the end of World War II, has had a tremendous impact on the growth of the Messianic movement. In fact, major Messianic groups were fortified during this era, as the Spirit of God rose up visionary leaders to restore a Jewish expression of worship and service gleaned from childhoods spent attending Orthodox, Conservative, and Reform Jewish synagogues. Believing in Yeshua as the Messiah of Israel became the common denominator, as these Jewish pioneers of Messianic Judaism endured being ostracized by their families and relatives, if not persecuted by other Jews who did not believe that Yeshua was the Savior.
Yet, as the Messianic Jewish movement of the 1970-1980s began to mature in the 1990s, all of a sudden, the Spirit of God was drawing non-Jewish Believers from evangelical Christian backgrounds (like us) into many Messianic places of worship. Eventually, as the non-Jewish congregants began to explode and numerically dominate most Messianic Jewish assemblies and celebrate the feasts of the Lord, some people would conclude that this was in many ways a realization of these verses prophesied by Zechariah millennia ago:
“Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘The fast of the fourth, the fast of the fifth, the fast of the seventh and the fast of the tenth months will become joy, gladness, and cheerful feasts for the house of Judah; so love truth and peace.’ Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘It will yet be that peoples will come, even the inhabitants of many cities. The inhabitants of one will go to another, saying, “Let us go at once to entreat the favor of the LORD, and to seek the LORD of hosts; I will also go.” So many peoples and mighty nations will come to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem and to entreat the favor of the LORD.’ Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘In those days ten men from all the nations will grasp the garment of a Jew, saying, “Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you”’” (Zechariah 8:19-23, NASU).
From another perspective, the increasing amount of tourism that has brought millions from around the world to Israeli-controlled Jerusalem, to seek or entreat favor from the Lord since the liberation of the Six Day War, can also be noted from these verses.
However, despite the scores of prophecies being realized in this era with the birth and emergence of the Messianic community of faith around the world, it continues to have challenges—primarily from within rather than from without. This is widely due to the pioneers of the movement reaching a point in their lives when many are returning to a place of wanting to separate out, and rigidly distinguish, between Jewish and non-Jewish Believers. We are seeing the middle wall of partition being built up, once again, by too many—when what we are supposed to see is all Believers making up the holy Temple of God:
“So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Messiah Yeshua Himself being the corner stone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, is growing into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:19-22, NASU).
These “baby boomer” pioneers of the Messianic movement are to be recognized and appreciated for the unique skillset and personalities they have had to initiate much of the good work that has occurred since the 1970s. However, it appears from what is transpiring today in a sizeable enough part of Messianic Judaism, that these uniquely called leaders do not have the abilities or desires to build on what has been established. Instead, rather than encouraging the further development of the one new humanity, there has been a relatively recent thrust to encourage non-Jewish Believers in the Messianic movement, to return to their previous church settings.
Pioneers in any field of endeavor, be it business, education, government, technology, or in this case, spiritual matters—often do not have the skillset or the personalities to lead a movement during the building or development stage, after the pioneering stage wanes. The pioneers have to give way to the builders, if any enterprise or endeavor is going to survive and thrive. Perhaps just like Ezra, Zerubbabel, and Nehemiah were used to return the Jewish exiles to Jerusalem, and the Apostles were chosen to spread the good news of the Messiah to the First Century world, or the founders of the United States were assembled to launch a unique form of government—the people who followed each set of pioneers had to build on what had been started by those chosen to be the pioneering generation.
This building and development stage takes a different set of skills, gifts, abilities, and in most cases, a different generation. It appears to the aging pioneers of our current generation, that it is easier to return to older patterns and ideas, and with them many of the old support structures that came out of an era when Jewish Zionism coupled with dispensational Christian teaching, kept Jews and non-Jews separated. Lamentably, the fund raising formula that encouraged Christian Believers who love Israel, to support the Messianic Jews who desire to maintain a rigid separation, has spilled over into the first few decades of the Messianic movement. Consequently, from purely economic terms, it is difficult to launch out into uncharted waters, depending solely on the Lord for His provision. That leap to go against the time tested means for supporting ministry, requires a certain measure of faith and the strength to take on the new challenges that will inevitably come as the building generation takes over. But because we believe that the Almighty One is restoring all things and will bring His people together in a rather unique and significant way, His plan cannot be thwarted in spite of what “the establishment” might try to do.
This leads me to quote from the Book of Acts, when the highly respected Torah scholar Gamaliel was giving some sound advice to his students and followers, who were very concerned about what was transpiring among the followers of Yeshua. Citing a number of examples about purported moves, perhaps of God’s Spirit among different people, Gamaliel made these statements about the Apostles, in attempting to discern if these followers of Yeshua were a genuine move of God:
“So in the present case, I say to you, stay away from these men and let them alone, for if this plan or action is of men, it will be overthrown; but if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them; or else you may even be found fighting against God” (Acts 5:38-39, NASU).
I cite this ancient warning by Gamaliel, because it can apply to the “pioneer generation,” who are reluctant to relinquish their roles and responsibilities to the maturing “developer generation” of the Messianic movement.
We believe that the Messianic movement is one of the end-time moves of the Spirit of God, which is preparing a future generation for the return of Yeshua the Messiah. We do not speculate on when that time will be, but rather fall back on the Preacher’s sage advice to spend our time on Earth joyfully doing the good works that we have been called to do. Above all, we want to point people to Yeshua and His saving grace, freely available to those who truly repent, and believe in the sacrificial offering He made for their individual sin. Because eternity has been placed in our hearts, we pray that when our individual or collective time comes to be with the Lord, He would receive us with the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant!” To hear these words from the Lord would absolutely affirm that our life on Earth has been a resounding success!
We give thanks for the pioneers! But it will soon be time for them to release the reins of responsibility to the builders, who we believe will be supernaturally empowered to take the Messianic movement into its next stage of development and maturation. In so doing, may the Holy One receive all honor and praise for what He is going to do through those called unto His service during this end-time move of His Spirit, while advancing His Kingdom, until the restoration of all things…
