We have forgotten!

We have forgotten! There are two sides to this story. Not one. ChurchandWorld * linked to The Palestine Chronicle, a Radical Palestinian web News Site.[1] The article is “Decision of the United Methodist Church Will Live in Ignominy.” The article written by Susan Abulhawa is a complaint aimed at the United Methodist Church, since in their Conference, which recently ended, they voted against divesting from Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard and Motorola, companies that do business with Israel. These are the same three companies that the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) with be voting against in their July General Assembly.

The article is clearly one sided and over the top with its language. Abulhawa writes, “The Methodist Church failed to pass a resolution to divest from three major beneficiaries of the most incendiary human rights abuses and colonial crimes of our time.” She undoubtedly forgot about North Korea, Sudan and Rwanda, etc.

To be fair there are some real problems with some of Israel’s polices including water, settlements and some places where the wall has been placed. However there are also some very real problems with the governments ruling over the Palestinian people. And this is where I want to point out that the article is extremely one sided and we have forgotten some of Israel’s needs, in particular her security needs. Even the recent CBS program on the Palestinian Christians, of which I have been very critical, admitted that Israel’s wall has cut suicide bombing attacks down by 90 percent. That is very effective.

And because we have forgotten what Israel’s needs are I am placing several videos with this posting so all can remember what it was like for Israelis ten to fifteen years ago.


There are solutions but one sided divestment is not one of them. We have to be honest enough to talk about all problems.



Remember that the wall and the checkpoints were meant to keep back the bloodshed.

* ChurchandWorld is a subscription site and the price is very reasonable. It covers Presbyterian & Methodist news from all positions, progressive and orthodox. .

[1] The Palestine Chronicle is radical enough to use some of the same writers as the vile web site Veterans Today.

Matthew 25: 31-46: the brothers and sisters of Jesus

Matthew writes about the judgment in chapter 25 of his Gospel. It is not a text about salvation by works as some have supposed. Instead grace flourishes with an awful warning. But before I begin, I should offer a clarifying thought. Paul in Ephesians reminds the reader that grace is free—we are not saved by works. But we are “created for good works which God prepared beforehand so that we could walk in them.” (Eph. 4:4-10) And the letter of James is filled with admonishment that we as believers take care of the needy, the poor and oppressed. But Matthew 25:31-46 is not about gaining salvation by good works.

It is instead about how the nations treat those who belong to Christ. In stating “These brothers of mine” Jesus identifies those who are aided or ignored as believers. Calvin in his commentary on the Gospels points out that this text begins with an understanding that the righteous have their salvation from somewhere else besides themselves. Calvin writes:

But before speaking of the reward of good works, he points out, in passing, that the commencement of salvation flows from a higher source; for by calling them blessed of the Father, he reminds them, that their salvation proceeded from the undeserved favor of God.

With some explanation from the Old Testament Calvin adds:

There can be no doubt, therefore, that Christ, in describing the salvation of the godly, begins with the undeserved love of God, by which those who, under the guidance of the Spirit in this life, aim at righteousness, were predestined to life.

And Calvin points out that in his day there were some who used this text to suggest that visiting the sick, the prisoner, giving food, drink and clothing to the needy was all that was required of a Christian. Almost prophetically he wrote , “Most improperly, therefore, do fanatics, under the pretext of this passage, withdraw from hearing the word, and from observing the Holy Supper, and from other spiritual exercises; for with equal plausibility might they set aside faith, and bearing the cross, and prayer, and chastity.”

R.T. France in the Tyndale Commentary brings further clarity noting that Jesus deals with judgment throughout chapters 23-25. France also points out that recent scholarship sees judgment coming against those who have rejected Christ’s brothers (the adopted children of God) who have proclaimed the gospel. Rather than philanthropy, it is “men’s response to the kingdom of heaven as it is presented to them in the person of Jesus’ ‘brothers.’ It is therefore, as in 7:21-23, ultimately a question of their relationship to Jesus himself.”

France likens the sufferings of “the least of these my brethren” to the sufferings of Matthew chapter 10 and to Paul’s list of hard experiences in 2 Corinthians 11:23-27.” Those who belong to Jesus have not understood that by receiving those who proclaimed the gospel to them and others, via their care, they have ministered to Jesus. Those who have rejected the brothers and sisters of Christ and their message of salvation show their rejection by ignoring their needs.

I remember many years ago reading a story of a pastor, in the now dismembered USSR, who was in prison for his faith. His wife was destitute and spent many nights alone on the streets even in the rain. She was one of the “least of these.” As France puts it:

It is in any brother of Jesus, however insignificant, that Jesus himself is served, and it is that service which is therefore the criterion of judgment, as it indicates how one responds to Jesus himself. It is important to note that, in each of the passages which refer to ‘these little ones’, the point is to declare the importance of such people because of their identification with Jesus (see esp. 10:40, 42, 18:5).

And whoever receives one such child in my name receives me; but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.(Matthew 18:5-6)

Positive investment versus divestment: making peace

The Christian Century has an excellent article about positive investment in the Palestinian society. The article is “Investment, not divestment: How to help the Palestinians” and is written by Thomas A. Prinz and Karl-John N. Stone. The article begins with questions:

Many U.S. denominations have partner churches in the Holy Land. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, for example, has a strong commitment to “accompany” the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land.

Given the relationship that many American churches and American Chris¬tians have with Palestinian Christians, the challenge is how to properly engage the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Should we take sides in the conflict by echoing the narrative of our suffering Palestinian brothers and sisters? Or does being faithful to the gospel call us to include Israeli suffering in the breadth of our concern? How do we acknowledge the complexity of the conflict and help Palestinians and Israelis move toward the day when they live at peace as neighbors?

One of the helpful thoughts in this article is:

Encouraging economic investment in Palestine is a positive, potentially transformative strategy, and it is to be preferred to the punitive options of encouraging divestment and boycotts of Israel or of companies doing business with Israel. Boycott and divestment are focused on tearing down and punishing one side in a complex conflict rather than on promoting constructive solutions to the conflict and improving lives.

The notion that divestment from Israel will somehow make peace and a two-state solution more likely is based on the misconception that one side bears all the blame and that the actions of one side alone control the future of negotiations. Furthermore, divestment campaigns make peace and a negotiated solution less likely, for they tend to increase Israelis’ sense of fear and isolation and thus decrease the likelihood of their being willing to take the risk inherent in any peace agreement. If “perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4:18), then increasing fear and isolation is not a proper Christian response to conflict.

Prinz and Stone go on to give a multitude of examples of positive investment already happening in Palestine. As I stated this is an excellent article with very practical applications and examples. It is really too bad that one of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s organizations, the Israel/Palestine Mission Network, has chosen to deride the writers attempts at help and peacemaking with their article, “IPMN Responds to Christian Century on "Positive Investment"

Confusion, IPMN and what I really want to say-still lies

Sometimes I do get confused. I will admit to confusion. I originally put up a posting which began with what I thought was a link to a Palestinian Orthodox site. My friend David Fischler informed me that as near as he could tell, “The web site is run by a collection of people connected to the Malankara Orthodox Church of India, and is run out of Chicago." (I have now deleted that posting)
 
So I did a bit more exploring including sending off an e-mail to a contact address on the “The Orthodoxy Cognate Page – OCP Media Network,” site. That was where the article “Israeli Persecution forces Christians to Emigrate,” written by Muslim, Khalid Amayreh was posted. I originally found it because the Israel/Palestine Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) linked to it on their twitter page.

A George Alexander answered my e-mail with the statement that:

We truly understand your concerns about the article. OCP Media Networks features various article all around the globe. There has been extreme sentiments in the article, but at the same time we cannot rule out the recent attacks on Christians by some extreme Jewish organization.

We apologize for any hurt the article has caused.

But he did not tell me where the web site originated. However, I sent him a link to my first posting on this subject and I saw someone from Abu Dhabi (On my feed) reading the posting. That is the United Arab Emirates.

To add to it I found this great article on the same site,  “The Orthodoxy Cognate Page – OCP Media Network”: “Bethleham’s Last Christians.” The source is from a Jewish news site, Y Netnews, the original article I was concerned about was from what appears to be a Palestinian or Arab news site, Alresalah Press. So it is fairly clear that OCP Media Network is simply gathering news.

I am left with blaming my own confusion but also with blaming the Israel/Palestine Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) for linking to the article “Israeli Persecution forces Christians to Emigrate.” They of course, unfairly, would not link to "Bethleham’s Last Christians." Therefore I wish to emphasis what was wrong with the first article by placing that part of my last posting below.

"The article the IPMN linked to is “Israeli Persecution forces Christians to Emigrate.” The article is found at the site “The Orthodoxy Cognate Page – OCP Media Network,” but the article is written by a Muslim, Khalid Amayreh. Amayreh never really points to any contemporary persecutions except to mention the wall which of course has to do with security and radical Islamic extremism rather than Christianity. Instead he begins with the 1948 war that Israel fought against five Arab nations, insisting that the destruction of several Arab Christian villages by Israeli forces was because they were Christians.

Indeed, Amayreh’s whole thesis is that the Jews inherently hate Christians.

He writes, “I knew too well and all along that Israel had been persecuting and tormenting Christians since time immemorial …” And he attempts to use the sacred books of the Jews against them. Amayreh has slipped into other centuries; he is seemingly infected by anti-Semitic writings which were ultimately challenged with the challengers winning. But sadly falsehood is never left to die.

Amayreh dredges up many of the anti-Semitic ideas that plagued the 18th and 19th centuries. In fact, these are the actual ideas that fed into the Nazi era. They have to do with the Talmud. Citing author Yisrael Shahak, author of Jewish History, Jewish Religion: The Weight of Three Thousand Years, Amayreh lists the various sins of the Talmud.

Besides the understanding that the Jews tried Jesus for “idolatry, inciting other Jews to idolatry, and contempt of rabbinical authority,” Amayreh also states that the Talmud teaches that Jesus is accused of witchcraft, “whenever an orthodox Jew mentions the name Jesus, he or she must recite the following curse: ‘May his name is [sic] damned, and memory erased.’”

Amayreh dishonestly pleads:

Would people like Pat Robertson and John Hagee, who pretend to be the spiritual guardians of Christianity, or even the Holy See, approach their Jewish friends and plead to them to see to it that this vulgar literature is expurgated from the Talmud or at least not taught in hundreds of Yishivot or Talmudic schools throughout Israel.

Amayreh goes on to write of “Chesronot Shas.” It should be noted that while true history informs us that it was the Catholic Church that censored those portions of the Talmud, Amayreh states that it was the Jews themselves.

One web site, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, which counters anti-Semitism, explains the Chesronot Shas this way:

Hesronot Shas (or Chesronot Shas ) -Medieval censors banned portions of the Talmud which they believed contained Jewish libels against Jesus and the Christian holy family, though these are not mentioned by name. The banned materials were circulated as a separate book called Hesronot Shas. Today they have been reintegrated into most editions of the Talmud, and the Chesronot Shas is also freely available in Hebrew. Anti-Semites continue to insist that that Chesronot Shas is a secret Jewish book that outlines the Jewish plot against non-Jews, Jewish hatred of Christianity and the Jewish plan to take over the world

Amayreh uses it to defame the Jews. Among other things he writes. “it has been established that the omissions use the most vulgar and abusive epithets to describe Jesus and his mother, such as calling him “the son of a prostitute and a Roman soldier, who learned witchcraft in Egypt and who beguiled Jews to worship him as an idol.” Jesus, who is called Balaam the son of Beor the soothsayer, is also boiling in a huge cauldron in hell, full of excrement and human semen.”

Now to connect this back to Yisrael Shahak and his book Jewish History, Jewish Religion: The Weight of Three Thousand Years, it has been noted by other Jewish scholars that Shahak used information from a much earlier anti-Semite, Johann Eisenmenger (1700) who wrote, Judaism Unveiled, Judaism Discovered, Judaism Revealed, and Judaism Unmasked. In 1871 August Rohling wrote the Talmud Jew which was also a rehash of Eisenmenger’s book.

George L. Mosse gives a great deal of information on the false information about the Talmud in his book, Toward the Final Solution: A History of European Racism. Supposedly among other absurdities Rohling wrote that the Talmud was “full of exhortations to cheating, lustfulness, usury, and hatred of Christians.” He also insisted that the Talmud “regarded Christians as servants of Baal and that it permitted Jews to take any amount of interest from Christians, to practice sodomy and violate their women.” And further, in the Talmud “Christians were called swine, dogs and monkeys.” So we have a line that goes from Eisenmenger to Rohling to a Jewish anti-Semite` Yisrael Shahak.

But it is all carried forward by a Muslim anti-Semite, Amayreh, and linked to by a Presbyterian organization, IPMN, whose communications head must surely believe the lies. What neither they or the Orthodox site realize is that one of these books was tried in a court of law and lost.

Mosse adds to his information:

Rabbi Joseph Bloch of Vienna, an eccentric outsider, took Rohling to court and obtained a judgment (1885) that “not a single text exists in the whole of the Talmud in which Christians or pagans or idolaters are given the name of an animal.”

Sadly Mosse concludes with this, “But this made no more difference to the myth than the final exposure in a Swiss court in 1934 that The Protocols of the Elders of Zion were a forgery.”

In less than seventy years after Rohling wrote the book the Talmud Jew, Hitler would come to power. In slightly more than seventy years after the publishing of the Talmud Jew 6, 000, 000 Jews would be dead. How easy to tell lies or to point to, link to or uphold those who tell lies. How hard, impossible, to undo the years of horror brought on by those lies.

At this point one must point at the IPMN of the PCUSA because of their constant linkage to anti-Semitic articles in defense of their own prejudices. And as David Fischler points out in his posting, Presbyterians for Hate, “This is the kind of stuff that the IPMN is recommending their followers read. This is the organization that will be leading the charge for PCUSA divestment. This is a group that the denomination ought to have repudiated long since, but which still resides in the good graces of its leadership.”

Waiting

From a sermon by Dietrich Bonhoeffer using the text Luke 12:35 -40:

"And now it seems as if, in this attempt to create a new kind of human being, the Bible also wants to have a word to say, as if it definitely sets up its own ideal of the human being who should go out to meet the future. It is not the political, not the ethical not even the religious person of whom the Bible speaks, but the person who is waiting and watching, the waiting person. For that is obviously what our text is saying. That is the meaning of this scene that Jesus paints before our eyes: night has fallen across the dark countryside. But there is a house from which light shines out into the night. Several men, with their swords at their belts and lamps in their hands, are looking out of the house across the dark countryside. They seem to be waiting. They are slaves awaiting the return of their master from the wedding, who fight off sleep and keep watch in joyful expectation to be able to open the door immediately for the master when he comes. No one knows the hour when he will come. But they know that he is coming, and that is why they are alert and watchful in the night. How long did they keep watch? No one knows--it may be that they are still keeping watch today among us. and now Jesus calls these slaves blessed and says to the disciples: so be like the slaves who are waiting for the master. You be ready, too! Be people who are waiting." [1]

[1]Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Ecumenical Academic, and Pastoral Work: 1931-1932,

Dietrich Bonhoeffer works Vol. 2

The GAPJC decision, sexual permissiveness and the times ahead

The Lord said to him ”Go through the midst of the city, even through the midst of Jerusalem, and put a mark on the foreheads of the men who sigh and groan over all the abominations which are being committed in its midst.” (Ezekiel 9:4)

Have you lately felt a mark on your forehead or heard the glide of a pen as God writes down in his book your conversation with other grieving brothers and sisters? (Ezekiel 9:4; Malachi 3:16-17) As I read news reports about the onslaught of sexual permissiveness and the final decision coming from the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission (GAPJC)concerning the Lisa Larges’ ordination case I am deeply grieved. The Bible and Confessions no longer have meaning for our denomination. It is as though some monstrous entity is walking through the land aiming at all that is righteous and good.

Several days ago Hans Cornelder of ChurchandWorld linked to an article “Students Walk out on Dan Savage.” The article was about the sex columnist who was asked to speak at a conference called Journalism on the Edge. Savage “was invited to give a keynote address last Friday at the JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention.” Rather than talk about bullying he made fun of the Bible and then ridiculed the Christian students who walked out. (I will place a video at the end of this.)

Later a friend, Robert Gagnon, linked to an article which truly showed the outrageous positions of Savage who advocates for non-monogamous marriages (among other vices). The article is “Married with Infidelities” and it is written by Mark Oppenheimer who seems to agree with Savage to a certain extent.

Add to this another article linked to on ChurchandWorld, “One of the most outrageous bills ever” about a pending bill, Senate bill 1172, in California which would permit:

lawsuits to be brought against therapists offering “sexual orientation change efforts” if the treatment occurred “without first obtaining informed consent or by means of therapeutic deception, or if the sexual orientation change efforts were conducted on a patient who was under 18 years of age at any point during the use of the sexual orientation change efforts.

And another article about another pending bill in California, “Bill would ask State Contractors: Are You Gay or Lesbian?” The author explains “The measure, Assembly Bill 1960, would enable the owners of businesses that contract with the state to identify themselves as gay, lesbian, transgender or bisexual. It would not require them to do so.” The bill is backed by all Democrats plus the “the National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce and by the Sacramento Rainbow Chamber of Commerce.”

The article also states that, “The Department of General Services currently is required to collect data on contractors by race, ethnicity and gender. AB 1960 would add LGBT-owned businesses to that list.”

In California, schools are already required to teach students about LGBTs lifestyle and history.

We are weaving together a multifaceted sexual configuration for our society, which includes progressive denominations. Such a configuration will suck the Christian orthodox underground. But we must not go underground nor be passive in the midst of such awful cultural darkness. (And here it is important to insist that already the pro-choice death culture marches in step with the new sexual arrangement of our culture.) To paraphrase Dylan Thomas’ poem, “Do not go gentle into that dark night.” But, no, we will not rage against the dying of the light, because we walk in and with the Light.

We must walk within the light, with love and forgiveness, proclaiming the redemptive work of our Lord Jesus Christ. We do not know what trials lay ahead but we do know to whom we belong.




Therefore since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
For consider him who endured such hostility by sinners against himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. (Heb, 12:1-3)

Watching Over Israel-and some fun

Sometimes blogging and twitter are, well, at least fun. This morning I was reading a tweet by the Israel/Palestine Mission Network which was linked to a video of a few Israelis asking the Methodist Church, which is in conference, to vote for divestment from some companies doing business with Israel. Listening to the video I noticed on the side a video of a Methodist Church choir singing Mendelssohn’s “He watching Over Israel,” from Elijah. It seems to me that the Methodist and Presbyterians might be grappling with the One who seeks both justice and truth. And not all of the truth is told by those promoting divestment. The Palestinians need a state and the Israelis need security.  I am placing the video here so that the Methodist and Presbyterians can listen and remember that God does watch over Israel.