October 31, 2018 Show with Stephen Atkinson & Mitch Tepper on “The Attack Upon Tree of Life Synagogue: Christian Evangelists in Outreach to the Jewish Community Respond to the Largest Fatal Attack Upon Jewish Citizens of the USA Upon American Soil in History”

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister

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George Norcross in downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

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Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Now here's our host, Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth. We're listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday.

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What day is today? No, it's a Wednesday. Sorry. I have been so busy lately, I just lost track of the actual date.

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Wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this 31st day of October, Reformation Day 2018, and I'm so delighted to have two returning guests on today to speak about something that I wish we didn't have to speak about.

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Of course, there is a lot of what we are going to be addressing today that I love speaking about, and that is evangelizing our

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Jewish friends, families, loved ones, and neighbors, but it is the reason for this specific program that gives me great sadness, and I'm sure everybody who is listening is still not really quite has really not quite snapped out of the fact of this horrific event that took place last

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Saturday, where we had the largest fatal attack upon Jewish citizens of the

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USA upon American soil in history, and that was the attack upon the Tree of Life Synagogue in the

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Squirrel Hill area of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. To discuss this today, we have my friends

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Stephen Atkinson, who is the director of the North American Division of Christian Witness to Israel, and we also have

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Mitch Tepper, who many of you may remember was just on recently. He is the new missionary for the

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North American Division of Christian Witness to Israel, and unlike Stephen, Mitch is actually a believing

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Jew, a Jew who has embraced Jesus Christ as his Messiah and God, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you both back to the

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Onion Trumpet and Zion Radio, Stephen Atkinson and Mitch Tepper. Well, thank you.

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It's a joy to be with you, Chris, and yeah, it is a very sad occasion, but we're delighted to be here, and just to bring some sensitivity as well as sensibility,

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I hope, into this tragic situation. And, of course, there were 11 people who were murdered at this assassination, which people may be thinking that there must have been other occasions in American history where more

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Jewish citizens have perished. I'm sure that more than 11 Jewish individuals died at the attack on the

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World Trade Center at 9 -11 and so on, and perhaps even at the Pentagon building, but this was specifically a targeted attack, which is why it is identified as the largest fatal attack upon Jewish citizens of the

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USA upon American soil in history. This was intended specifically to be the murder, the assassination of Jewish individuals.

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And... Go ahead, I'm sorry. No, no, you go ahead, Chris. Well, before we get...

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Yeah, I just wanted to say, like, I think the one thing that really strikes me in all of this, and the one thing

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I want us to begin with, is that this was, you know, people might spin this whatever way they want, but this was, as you rightly say, an anti -Semitic attack.

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This was a targeted attack, and I think also for our listeners' benefit,

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I think it's important for us to recognize it was an attack upon individuals, and not just, you know, not just numbers, not just, you know, the largest number, etc.,

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etc., and, you know, one of the things that's really struck me, I just, you know, I've been reading articles, as you, as everyone has, but I want us to see these people as individuals, and weep with those who weep, and, you know, permit me a moment or two just to go through the names, and I just want to even use their first name, because I don't want it to read just like a list of names, but there was

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David, 54, there was Cecil, 59, Sylvain and Bernice, 86 and 84,

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Joyce, 75, Melvin, 88, Danny, 71,

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Richard, 65, Irving, 69, Jerry, 66, and Rose, Holocaust survivor, 97.

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These were individuals who were targeted, who were struck on, and their families and loved ones.

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We want to weep with those who weep at this time, and I think, you know, that there's where we must begin.

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Whatever way we continue the conversation, Chris, and however we analyze this, let's begin with that humanity.

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There are these 11 souls who are taken into eternity, and we are here to, not just to discuss in any bare theological manner, but with some human sensitivity and pastoral care,

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I trust, for the lives that remain and the families of loved ones that remain.

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So I just wanted to get that out there. I hope it wasn't, you know, intensive to actually do that.

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Oh no, that was a perfect, perfect way to begin, brother. Let us, and we also want to start by saying, you know, so much of this has been politicized, and we get, we are telling anyone who's listening, we are not politicizing this.

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We've heard too much of it. You've seen it in all the articles, whether it's against Trump or Pence.

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We don't want to go there. This is, this, to us, is this opportunity, you know, and we spoke about it as being that Esther moment for not just the

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CWI, not just for other Jewish missions, but for the Church as a whole. This is this

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Esther moment for all of us. Just like 9 -11 was that, as tragic as that was.

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It's that moment where maybe this is the time. Maybe you've been put in the place, and I believe that, that me being in Squirrel Hill, a

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Jewish man from Brooklyn coming to Squirrel Hill, coming to Pittsburgh, I know that it was ordained by God.

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It seems more, you know, providential than any time in my life right now.

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And all of us as a Church, as believers, need to use this moment to evangelize our

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Messiah, Yeshua. And we don't want to be insensitive, but at the same time, what breaks our hearts is realizing that there are people in this synagogue, okay, that might never have heard the

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Gospel. We don't know one way or the other, but they might have never have heard the Gospel, and that should break our hearts.

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Amen. And before we get any further into the actual subject at hand, Stephen Atkinson, if you could let our listeners know, for those of them especially who have never heard of Christian Witness to Israel, or the

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North American division of that ministry that you are the director of, why don't you tell our listeners about CWI, Christian Witness to Israel?

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Well, Christian Witness to Israel began 175 years ago out of a, just a

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Bible burden, I would call it, for the Jewish people that they may come to know through shalom, through peace.

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And as we would understand that as coming only through the Prince of Peace, which is

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Yeshua, which is Messiah Jesus, and so it was in our origins, we trace them right back to Scottish Presbyterians, but very early on we were destined to become an interdenominational and international organization for ministering to the

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Jewish people with the one thing that is needful, and that is the Gospel. So in short, really, we've been telling

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Jewish people about Jesus for 175 years. Bringing us right up to date, it has been my joy and privilege to traverse the pond and come over here from the

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UK. I live in Arkansas, and my desire is to promote and develop and train and raise up this increased witness to the

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Jewish people. Christian Witness to Israel, we do it by missionaries, but we also do it by the

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Church itself being its own Christian Witness to Israel. And I've been living here for six years,

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I've been traveling through many, many, many miles and many churches and many arenas and seminaries and other places to challenge and equip and stir up.

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But, you know, even as Mitch was saying there, there is a sense in which God has been in all of this, because, you know, we've had desires to raise up missionaries to the

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Jewish community in various parts of the U .S. We are waiting on a visa for our dear brother to come to Chicago.

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So, you know, 300 ,000 Jewish people in Chicago, we want a witness there, a strong witness from CWI.

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There are 600 ,000 in Miami. We want a witness to CWI, a witness to Christ there.

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We know that there are many other Jewish missions and we love them. We work with many other Jewish missions, but we are wanting to be in all these highly populated

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Jewish areas. But, again, in the Lord's providence, the Lord raised up a man in Pittsburgh, and quite literally, he has been on our payroll for three weeks, four weeks.

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You know, and it just seems to me stunning in the strange, mysterious, and heavy providence of God that, you know, as many of my supporters, many of CWI's supporters and churches have got behind us, that we cannot say, well, we have boots on the ground.

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We have our missionary there who we had planned, you know, months ago, years ago even, we might say, to go into Squirrel Hill, and we're right in the midst of this.

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A small Jewish community of about 30 ,000, 15 ,000 of which live in Squirrel Hill, and I'm just,

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I am so encouraged myself that I have my brother Mitch there. He is ideal for the situation, and I just want your listeners to really be in prayer for Mitch and his wife

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Mia, both Jewish believers, as they pour the love of Christ into this mourning and this broken community.

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May they be a witness for Christ's love in that. And for those of our listeners who weren't listening intently to Stephen Atkinson, let me just clarify some things.

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I just interviewed Mitch Tepper, who is the new missionary for Christian Witness to Israel's North American Division.

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I just interviewed him last, or two Wednesdays ago, the 17th of October.

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Actually, two weeks ago today. It was the 17th of October, and when we were having this interview, we had no idea, obviously, we're not prophets, we had no idea that this assassination would have taken place right in Mitch's backyard in the

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Squirrel Hill area of Pittsburgh. It is, I think the providence of God is amazing, not only because of the geography involved that Mitch lives in that area, but also because Mitch and Stephen had already reached out in some way to that synagogue before this even happened, and it seems clear that God intends for these brothers to minister to these folks in some way.

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We have no idea what the outcome will be. We have no idea, obviously, that any souls will be led to Christ as a result of this, but of course that is our hope and prayer, and we could pray that with confidence since God's elect are from out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation.

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And also, I want to let our listeners know something about CWI. Just to put some famous names that most of you will be familiar with, to perhaps give you an idea of the importance of CWI, Robert Murray McShane and Charles Haddon Spurgeon both had essential roles in the

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Christian Witness to Israel ministry. Am I right, Stephen? Yeah, yeah, indeed.

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It was McShane who was one of the motivating Scottish Presbyterians, and he prayed the opening prayer at the first ever meeting, and indeed

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Spurgeon was very supportive and preached for CWI on four occasions, and did the annual sermon for CWI.

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But I think it is wonderful that we have such a heritage and such a history, and in Reformed circles, if you don't mind me saying, we are kosher, and we have that good theological heritage.

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But I don't want to rest on that, and particularly at such a time as this, I want to say, well, what are we doing now?

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What is our response to this tragedy? Our theology is one thing, but we must put theology into practice.

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It's not enough for us, Stephen, to come onto the radio press and just kind of talk through and theologize it by the importance of Jewish mission.

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We need to say, okay, what is our response to this? What is the world's response to this?

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What is the Jewish response to this? What should be the Christian response to this? What will be

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Mitch and Mia's Jewish -Christian or Messianic -Jewish response to this? I think these are the things that we need to talk through and examine.

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We have a good history and heritage, but I've been doing too much talking so far.

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I want my brother Mitch to really give us, what is the situation on the ground in Pittsburgh?

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I'm sure there are multiple sensitivities. Maybe give us a little idea as to how things are on the ground in Pittsburgh and North Pittsburgh and Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh.

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Well, you know that there's been one memorial service after another in churches, in the synagogues down in the

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Pittsburgh and Squirrel Hill area, and that hasn't stopped. In fact, we're going to be doing one at Shalom on Friday, which we'll speak about later.

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But, you know, you've talked about it before, and I know we spoke about it, that whole

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Kumbaya attitude, the whole everybody wanting to make a strong political statement about this.

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So there's a lot of that going on there. You see different groups speaking against this and against that, and not focusing not just on the tragedy, but on our response as a church needs to be to come back with Yeshua, with the

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Messiah, with Yeshua HaMashiach. And Al Mohler, who I guess is still part of the advisory board, is that true,

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CWI? Indeed, yeah. Al Mohler is on our advisory board. He did a tremendous podcast just a couple of days ago, which you can listen to if you go online, or you get his podcast anyway.

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He did a beautiful podcast, I think it was two days ago, and he said the same thing.

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Yeah, Monday. He said the same thing. He said, we can't stop politicizing.

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What we need to do is, this is an opportunity to speak of Yeshua. That's what we need to do.

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Michael Brown has written a bunch of articles in the last few days, and he's speaking about anti -Semitism, which is so rampant, and he says that the main thing that we see anti -Semitism is today, is everything is the fault of the

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Jewish people. And there's still a lot of that that goes on. And I know that even in the evangelical church, that we have to be very careful that in some overt or passive way, that we're not being anti -Semitic in our stance.

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And I think the way that we show that isn't by giving the whole, like as you said before,

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Stephen, the whole kumbaya, let's just all get together and let's all get along. But this is to break the church's heart to want to go in to Squirrel Hill when all this nuttiness that's going on down there dies down.

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And like we were speaking of, when, you know, if you have someone in your family, if a tragedy hits, if someone dies, everybody's there at the beginning.

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But after the weeks go by, the loneliness sets in. And I sense that right now, there's so many people rushing in, rushing in, that eventually after a couple of weeks are gone, and it gives me and other people, my wife, an opportunity to get in there.

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And when these people are really starting to feel the grief heavily, because right now it's such a whirlwind, that we can be in there to help and have opportunities, and that's what we need prayer on, to have opportunities to share their

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Messiah with them. Right now may be a little insensitive. What we want to do right now is see if there's something we can pray about.

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We know there are grieving people there. But the bottom line is, our heart is about sharing their

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Messiah with them. And that's what CWI is all about. That's what all these other Jewish missions want to do, except we have to wait for that perfect timing, which might not be there for another couple of weeks.

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Now, I think it would be a good idea, just to get some more clear description of these folks at the

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Tree of Life Synagogue in the Squirrel Hill area of Pittsburgh.

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The spectrum of religious Jews is wide. We have everything from the

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Hasidic or ultra -Orthodox, to the more modernized

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Orthodox, to the conservative, to the Reform Jews who are liberal, and the

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Reconstructionist Jews who are even farther to the left than their

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Reformed Jewish brethren. Tell us something about this specific congregation. This is a conservative congregation.

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The ages range, you know, thank the Lord there were no children or young people.

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I think the youngest on the list is 54, is that correct, Steve? I think it was.

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Yeah, that's right, yep. Yeah, I think the youngest is 54, which is a miracle in itself, because there are families there, there are young children there.

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And it was a baby -naming event, which makes it even more remarkable. Yeah, they had a brick and a model there that day, as far as I know, and that was another miracle, just like 9 -11 was a miracle that there were so few.

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It could have been so much worse then, and it could have been so much worse also at the Tree of Life, because there were people from different congregations who came to see the celebration of this circumcision that they were having that morning.

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So yeah, that in itself is a miracle, and God protected those. And you know, and obviously we grieve for the 11 and the families, but on the other hand,

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I think I spoke to you about this, Chris, that one of the biggest reasons that I got involved with, and I knew before this, that I was going to get involved with CWI, but really cemented it, is when my mom passed without knowing it.

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And incidences like this should cement in us how important it is for us.

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And we need to evangelize, you know, and our mission is obviously to evangelize to everyone, but to the

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Jewish person first. And things like this should, that's what it should bring about in us.

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It should give us an impetus to say, you know, I gotta get out there, I need to share, I need to be more intentional. I think that's the word that God has given me and so many other people in this generation, is we need to be intentional with our witness.

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And many times in my life, and I think we've all been guilty of it in the

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Evangelical Church, we have not been intentional with our witness. Well, I'm telling all my brothers and sisters out there, it's time to be intentional, as Esther, such a time as this.

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Praise God. What do you say, if I can just ask Mitch though, but what do you say,

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Mitch, to the Jewish community that says, well hey, you know, we don't want you to be intentional.

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We want you to leave us alone. We're okay. Their response to this will be to kind of, you know, close down the shutters, as it were, and get together and strengthen one another, because they're great at that, and they always have been great at that, and they will stand with each other, and they just will say, but we just want to be left alone.

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Just leave us alone. You know, church, community, blah blah blah, you know, you might have good intentions, but just leave us alone.

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So what do you say to that, Mitch? That's a great question, and it's not an easy answer, but I do know that when

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I say intentionality, I don't mean go down there and hand tracts out. I don't mean go down there with your

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New Testaments and get on a soapbox and stop preaching in the streets of Squirrel Hill.

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What I mean is relationships. You know, there was a beautiful thing when

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I was in Paris. It was a beautiful thing that started, that has continued, but the first time it happened was when

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I was in Paris, and what that was is they had a get -together with Holocaust survivors in the

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Jewish district in Paris, and it was a beautiful thing. They weren't there to knock them over the head with the

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Gospel. What they were there to do is hear their stories, listen to their stories of the

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Holocaust, share with them Jewish music, traditional music, and just listen and speak and make friends.

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Why? So they can come back again, and they've been doing it. I'm not sure how many meetings they've had, but that was

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August, whatever day that was. 9th or 10th was the first meeting. As far as I know, they've been doing it at least once a month, if not more.

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So we're looking at August, September, October, and a fourth one if they only do it once a month is coming up.

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That's amazing. I mean, and that's what I'm talking about. That's what we need to do, not knock them over the head, and obviously, there's a time for urgency, but right now, right now, it's a time for sensitivity.

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Amen, and as we read in, I was just going to read Isaiah 40, verse 1.

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Comfort, comfort my people, says your Lord. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem.

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We really need to speak tenderly today. There is a time for more aggressive evangelism.

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I mean, I don't think that we should rule out the idea of street preaching in the

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Pittsburgh area. Like, for instance, Chosen People Ministries, one of your friends and fellow ministries in the

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Jewish evangelism area of the faith, they were also started, a list might surprise a lot of the dispensationalist brothers in Christ that we have who love

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Chosen People Ministries and support them, but they began as a reformed ministry through the street evangelism of Presbyterians.

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Am I correct? I think you are.

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Yeah, yeah, so I remember Mitch Glaser. Mitch Glaser told me that fact that a rabbi or a

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Jewish individual is converted through the street preaching of Presbyterians. Yeah, we work together with the

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Chosen People. In fact, we've done a couple of things in the UK in conjunction with Chosen People Ministries, but they're a dear ministry to us as well.

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Right, well, my whole point was even though that you can do something that is really a bad strategic move that sends a wrong signal and really will immediately give a bad taste in the mouths of everybody who witnesses it, just because of the timing, but that doesn't mean that it's something that would be out of the question, but as far as now is the time for tenderness and compassion and to actually invest your lives in these people, especially since you are nearby, that is,

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Mitch Tepper is nearby, Stephen Atkinson is in Tennessee, correct? In Arkansas.

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In Arkansas, I'm sorry, but now is the time, just like if someone close to you, whoever they might be, is experiencing a great loss of a loved one.

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It's important. It is important to be intentional and to be sensitive, and I would ask your listeners to truly pray for us in this regard, and it is important that we do both, that we don't shrink back, but we have wisdom from on high.

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You know, people are hurting, people are in mourning, and we have the answer.

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I remember very vividly, if I can share just a personal story, way, way early in my ministry life,

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I was in my 20s, I was an intern, as you would call it, I was assistant minister in a church in Belfast, and I had just buried one of our members, and I was visiting his widow the following week, and a strange thing as the conversation developed, and I was in a mixed congregation at this time, if I can say that, and the widow said to me, you know, your preaching is a little different from the senior pastor's preaching, and I tried to be loyal, and I tried to be a little careful, but I just let her talk, and she said, well, you know,

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I said, well, what's the difference? She said, well, you talk about being born again, and he doesn't, and it really struck me that I'm in the home of someone that has just lost their husband,

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I'm trying to minister in that situation, and if she brings it up, that I preach about being born again, and her pastor, her senior pastor doesn't, and one of the saddest things that she said to me then, and it has stayed with me 30 plus years, was she said, you know, you're right, and the sad thing is that Mr.

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So -and -so did not tell my husband that, and I was just broken and weeping with her, and it just reminds us that even in the saddest and most difficult pastoral situation, which

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Mitch will have in these coming days, pray for him, we still need to be sensitive, but we also need to bring that one message, the message of Yeshua, and indeed the message of being born again, and I was at a conference in Kansas, actually, over the weekend, and you know, it was strange, again, and providential, but the speakers of that conference were speaking about being born again, and John 3, but they were referencing

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Ezekiel 36 and 37, and again, it just reminded me that being born again is not a

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Christian doctrine, it's a Jewish doctrine. It's exactly what

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Ezekiel was preaching. Well, you mean it didn't originate with the

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Christians? Yeah, it didn't originate with Christianity. You know, when

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Jesus says to Nicodemus, you know, you're a teacher of Israel, you don't know this stuff?

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Come on, you should know that being born again is actually very

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Jewish. So, you know, this is what we want to bring to our Jewish friends, that, you know, prophesied by Ezekiel, and even

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Jeremiah and the New Covenant, Jeremiah 31, this is something that was prophesied, that God would pour out a spirit of supplication,

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He would give a new heart and a new spirit, He would blow on dry bones and give new life.

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Well, hey man, we're just praying that the wind of God would come at such a time as this, and that we would talk about these serious, eternal issues with sensitivity, but without shrinking back.

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Yeah. Well, let me come back from our first, we're going to a break right now, Mitch, and you could chime in immediately when we come back.

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Yeah, yeah, I'll piggyback off of when I get back. Sure, and I also want to get into the roots, the facts and the philosophy, the actual roots of where all the anger and hatred comes from, specifically in regard to the

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Jews, and if anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA, and please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. I just want to quickly, before I forget, tell folks, if you want to, after this show is over, if you want to look up the interview that I recently conducted with Pastor Lowell Ivey, I just had that interview on Monday, the 29th of October, he was a white supremacist gang member in prison who came to faith in Christ, and he was an anti -Semite.

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He fantasized about doing the very thing that that satanic assassin just did in Squirrel Hill.

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He actually believed at one time that that was a wonderful thing to do, and all a part of what the master race so -called should be doing, and this also shows that Jesus Christ can even save a satanic individual like that through the gift of repentance and faith that he has received, and of course he has renounced that evil as damnable and satanic and no longer has any kind of bigotry and hatred controlling his life.

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So I just urge you to listen to that interview with Lowell Ivey that took place on Monday, and his last name, if you type it into the search engine, is

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I -V -E -Y. But we're going to be right back after these messages, so please don't go away.

34:20

Hi, Phil Johnson here. I'm executive director of John MacArthur's media ministry,

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Grace To You, and I'm also an occasional guest on Iron Sharpen's Iron Radio, so I'm delighted that my friend

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Chris Arnzen and I will be heading down to Atlanta for the G3 conference, where I'll be joining

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James White, Steve Lawson, Vodie Baucom, Mark Dever, Conrad Mbewe, Todd Friel, Josh Bice, and a host of other speakers to address the topic of biblical understanding of missions.

34:54

Chris Arnzen and I hope to see you all at this very important conference from January 17th through the 19th.

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Make sure you stop by the Iron Sharpen's Iron exhibitors booth to say hi to Chris. For more details, go to G3conference .com.

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Hi, I'm Stephan Limblad, Assistant Professor of Systematic Theology at IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas.

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I accepted this call to teach at the seminary because I'm firmly convinced that the people of God in the churches of our

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Our churches and our people need to be well -grounded in these truths. Indeed, future ministers of the gospel need to understand these truths in order to proclaim them to all of God's people.

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Chris Sorensen, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio here. I want to tell you about a man I have personally known for many years.

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His name is Dan Buttafuoco. Dan is a personal injury and medical malpractice lawyer, but not the type that typically comes to mind.

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Dan cares about people and is a theologian himself. Recently, he wrote a book titled Consider the

38:00

Evidence for the Bible. Ravi Zacharias wrote the foreword. Dan also has a master's degree in theology.

38:07

Dan handles serious injury and medical malpractice cases in all 50 states. He represents many

38:13

Christians in serious injury matters all over the country. Dan is an exceptional trial lawyer.

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He wrote the test for the National Board of Trial Advocacy, and currently his firm has over 100 cases that have settled for $1 million or more, and in approximately 10 different states.

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In Illinois, his lawyers had the fourth largest settlement in the state's history. In New York, his case involving a paralyzed police officer made the front page of the

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I recommend that you call Dan. Consultations are free. There is no fee unless you win.

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Dan Buttafuoco's number is 1 -800 -669 -4878. 1 -800 -669 -4878.

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Or email me for Dan's contact information at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. James White of Alpha Omega Ministries here.

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My name is Steve Lawson, founder and president of One Passion Ministries, as well as teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries.

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I serve as professor of preaching and oversee the Doctor of Ministry program at the Master's Seminary in Los Angeles.

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I would like to recommend the church where one of my preaching students, Andy Woodard, serves as the pastor.

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It's called New Covenant Church, NYC. They are a Reformed Baptist church that meets in midtown

41:13

Manhattan. You can find their service times and location on their website, which is www .ncc

41:21

.nyc. They believe in a sovereign God who commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel.

41:29

If you're looking for a church that believes in expository preaching, which is simply biblical preaching, in New York City, I'd like to recommend that you visit

41:38

New Covenant Church, NYC. Again, their information can be found at www .ncc

41:45

.nyc. Have a great day. Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen. If you just tuned us in, our two guests today are

41:54

Stephen Atkinson, who is the director of the North American Division of Christian Witness to Israel, and also

42:01

Mitch Tepper, a Jewish believer who is the new missionary for the North American Division of Christian Witness to Israel, also known as CWI.

42:09

We are discussing the attack upon Tree of Life Synagogue. Christian evangelists in outreach to the

42:15

Jewish community respond to the largest fatal attack upon Jewish citizens of the United States upon American soil in history.

42:22

If you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. We do have a question already from Dr.

42:31

George Cipioni, adjunct professor and director of the Biblical Counseling Institute of Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh, but I'm sorry,

42:40

Dr. Cipioni, we already answered your question. He said he tuned in late and didn't know if you had already discussed the history of CWI, so you missed that already,

42:50

Dr. Cipioni, but I would love it if you wrote in another question, so think of another question and send that in because our guests already answered your question.

43:04

Go ahead, I'm sorry. I was going to ask if there was another question because I didn't want to piggyback on what we ended with Stephen.

43:11

Oh yeah, I want you to do that before we get into the history of Go ahead, Mitch. Sure, what

43:18

I was going to say is many years ago

43:23

God gave me a sermon after 9 -11 called First Responders from Jude 21 to 23,

43:32

I think which really to me ties all this stuff in on the way that you go into these situations, but in Jude 21 it says, keep yourself in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our

43:45

Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life, and having mercy on those who doubt.

43:51

Save others by snatching them out of the fire. To others show mercy with fear, hating even the garments stained by the flesh.

44:01

And God gave me a little acronym for this scripture which really fits,

44:07

I think, exactly what we'd like to do when we go into situations like this and go into Squirrel Hill, which is what we must do, and the little acronym starts with what we must do is show mercy, okay?

44:22

That's the first thing that sometimes we need to do. Other times we need to show urgency.

44:27

You know, we see when the disciples lack faith, and we, as an illustration, when we see

44:35

Jesus pulling Peter out of the water, or when we see Jesus on the road to Emmaus, have we ever thought about the way he said, why do you have such a little faith?

44:47

Do you think he screamed it out? No, I think he did it with much mercy that said, oh, you have little faith, let me give you more faith.

44:54

And there's the urgency, I mean, there's this deep on the cross talk about urgency. Then there's the sensitivity, and my best illustration that I can show of the sensitivity that Jesus had that I would like to have, and I think all of us would want to have, is when the woman with the issue of blood touched the tassel, which is the prayer shawl, touched the tassel of his garment, he was like, who touched me?

45:18

You know, which sounded like a ridiculous statement, but he knew. And that's the kind of sensitivity I think

45:23

God wants to give us. And the last thing is to show true piety, you know, that we can walk into situations and not be stained by the sin that we are walking sometimes into, and be able to keep ourselves pure in those situations.

45:37

And I think that what applied when we're speaking about first responders in 9 -11 applies today very much so.

45:47

And I'm using that MUST acronym from June 21 to 24 to be able to get out there and do what

45:56

I know I'm going to need to do, and just like my brother said, yes, and you both said, you start off with just getting in the door.

46:04

But once you're there, you eventually get to a part of the relationship where you can show

46:10

Jesus, because like we know, we have no idea how long any of us have left on this side of eternity.

46:17

And whenever we see someone go to the other side of eternity without Yeshua in their lives, it should pain us immensely.

46:26

Amen. And one thing before I have Stephen begin on the origins of hatred of the

46:33

Jews, one thing that I want to say is that I think that we have to be careful, what you mentioned before about Mitch, about your mother, perhaps both of your parents,

46:48

I can't remember. My dad's still alive, yeah. Okay, your mother then entering into eternity without Christ.

46:55

I think that we do have to be careful not to act as if we are omniscient, because we don't know for certain, you don't know for certain, that somebody may have evangelized your mother.

47:09

I don't know if she was, I don't know if you were a Christian when she was still alive, but somebody, if you, either through your evangelism or someone else, we don't know what kind of echoing remembrance of that gospel message was going through someone's mind before they departed this earth.

47:31

So I think we have to be careful not to immediately assume that people that we know are in hell, because we just, unless we are with them when they are taking their last breath and they're cursing

47:45

God, there is a mystery there about, like for instance, if the family of the thief on the cross who came to repentance while he was hanging there next to Christ, if the family had not been there to hear him repent or they did not later hear of it from the apostles and evangelists, the disciples of Christ, they would have thought that their loved one had gone into eternity without a repentance in faith because they knew he was a thief.

48:15

So, you know, we just have to be careful. But if you could, Steve, start off with the roots of anti -Semitism in your opinion.

48:28

Well, I think that there's going to be a lot of folks having some kind of mindset as to where all this hatred came from.

48:38

And we've already had, you know, on both sides of the political divide, people giving their comment on that.

48:45

And I simply want to go back and make the point that it's not, this is not something that has happened in America in, you know, in the past two years or the past 10 years.

48:56

This anti -Semitism has been going on for thousands of years.

49:03

And if that is the case, then we've got to recognize the reality of it, recognize the origin of it, and respond appropriately rather than, you know, getting on the political bandwagon and simply making comments into the current politics in the

49:21

USA. So I want to get that right out there that this, what this guy did was a naked anti -Semitic attack on Jewish people.

49:33

And it's nothing new. And I suppose we have to simply name it as coming from the pit of hell.

49:40

It is a diabolical thing that Satan is seeking to destroy the

49:48

Jewish people, because from our understanding of both the Tanakh and the

49:55

Berkut HaShah from Gentile parliaments, the Old Testament and the

50:00

New Testament, from the whole of the Bible, we understand that Satan is attempting, in his folly, to frustrate the plan of God.

50:09

And the plan of God is that he is not done with the Jewish people. He has providentially preserved them.

50:17

They are here by his divine hand, and therefore we, the Church, need to identify, why are they here?

50:25

What is our calling towards them? But we also need to identify that Satan, his strategy, for want of a better word, is to eliminate the

50:37

Jewish people. And so this anti -Semitism comes quite directly from the pit of hell.

50:43

And I think we have good scriptural arguments for it as well, if you look at Revelation 12, and I would love, you know, our

50:53

Jewish friends will get them, I hope, to read Isaiah and Ezekiel and Leviticus, but I would love to get them to read

51:03

Revelation. And particularly, I'm thinking, Revelation 12, where the dragon is pursuing the woman.

51:11

I'm looking at Revelation 12, 17, the dragon became furious with the woman, and the woman is

51:18

Israel, the Jewish people. The dragon became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God.

51:30

I believe very strongly that that is Satan's war on the offspring of Israel.

51:37

And what we have on Saturday is simply that front and center as a

51:44

Satanic attack upon God's peculiarly precious people.

51:51

And I think—go ahead, Mitch. I was just going to say, there are just some certain things you can add on to that.

52:00

Like, I don't know if you've heard of Jenny Tong, who was from the House of Lords, but she made some terrible comments about Bet and Yahu and about Jews, but one of the things she said, in every generation they are guilty.

52:15

When they are killed, it is ultimately their fault. But this is nothing new. This is classic anti -Semitism restated with the latest flavor of the hour.

52:25

When Jews are killed, it's the fault of the Jews, since the Jews are always guilty. In one generation, they are guilty of deicide, a nation of Christ killers.

52:34

In one generation, they are parasites, bleeding their host country dry.

52:40

In another generation, they are trying to take over the world. In another generation, they are guilty of the ethnic cleansing of the

52:48

Palestine. But in every generation, they are guilty. When they are killed, it is ultimately their fault.

52:55

This is the heart of anti -Semitism. And to call it evil and satanic would be quite fair.

53:01

And that is from an article that Michael Brown wrote just a couple of days ago, which I thought was beautiful.

53:07

And also he spoke about, this is not him, this is the Gospel Coalition, spoke about the beginnings of even the term, which is a wrong term, because Semitic is not

53:18

Jewish, just Jewish people. It's Arabs as well. So they use this, yeah, they use this pseudo term by a

53:26

German journalist. His name was Wilhelm Marr, who started the whole idea of anti -Semitism in a pamphlet he wrote in 1879, which obviously was continued on.

53:38

He himself renounced it. Well, no, I'm sorry. He was another gentleman who renounced at his death, these terrible things that he wrote about the

53:48

Jews. Yeah, he did renounce it. At the end of his life, Marr renounced his own hatred of the

53:54

Jewish people, and he expressed concern that anti -Semitism in Germany would become entangled with mysticism and nationalism.

54:02

It does sound prophetic when you look at the Nazi party that came out just, what, 40, 30, 40 years after that statement was made.

54:11

So absolutely amazing stuff. And, you know, anti -Semitism comes in many forms, and I think we,

54:18

I realize the evangelical church, we need to be honest that we've been guilty of it.

54:24

I mean, how many times in my life have we kidded about, you know, whether it's, you know, they own

54:33

Hollywood, or they own all these businesses, they're always wealthy, or they're always cheap. I've heard that my whole life, being

54:39

Jewish by Christians who thought they were being funny, but those wounds are very deep with many

54:46

Jews. In fact, I have some very conservative

54:51

Orthodox Jewish friends that make those same claims about their liberal

54:58

Jewish neighbors. So it's, hatred is universal.

55:04

No ethnic group or skin color can hold claim to the sole propriety of racial hatred or bigotry, and so on.

55:20

In fact, let's pick up on that when we come back from the break. We're going to our midway break right now.

55:25

It's the longer the normal break that we have, because Grace Life Radio in Lake City, Florida, they need to localize

55:36

Iron Sharp and Zion Radio to Lake City, Florida, because, so therefore, I should say, they air their own commercials and public service announcements to localize the show.

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So please be patient with us as we take this longer than normal break, and write down the information of our advertisers, because the more you patronize them, the more they are going to stick around and support

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Iron Sharp and Zion Radio financially with their advertising dollars, and you are more likely going to patronize them more frequently if you have their information written down.

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So please write down their information. Also, write down questions for our guests Steve Atkinson and Mitch Tepper at chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages from our sponsors.

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I want to tell you about a man I have personally known for many years. His name is Dan Buttafuoco.

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That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. My name is

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Steve Lawson, founder and president of One Passion Ministries, as well as teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries.

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I would like to recommend the church where one of my preaching students, Andy Woodard, serves as the pastor.

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01:11:23

Iron Sharpen's Iron Exhibitors booth, and I hope you join me there. First of all, the Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology is next week,

01:11:29

November 9th and the 10th, at the Grace Bible Fellowship Church in Quakertown, Pennsylvania.

01:11:36

I urge you to please join me there if you are able to get there by train, plane, or automobile. I would love to see you there.

01:11:42

The theme is the Glory of the Cross. The speakers include David Garner, Ray Ortlund, Richard Phillips, Timothy Gibson, and Carlton Nguyen.

01:11:50

That's November 9th and the 10th, Grace Bible Fellowship Church, Quakertown, Pennsylvania. If you want to register, go to AllianceNet .org.

01:11:58

That's AllianceNet .org. Scroll down, or click on Events first, and then scroll down to the

01:12:05

Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology. Then, coming up in January, I will once again be manning an

01:12:13

Iron Sharpen's Iron Exhibitors booth at the G3 Conference, which stands for Gospel, Grace, and Glory.

01:12:19

That will be Thursday, January 17th through Saturday, January 19th, at the Georgia International Convention Center in College Park, Georgia, which is a suburb of Atlanta.

01:12:30

The speakers include James White, John Piper, Stephen Lawson, Votie Balcombe, Mark Dever, Conrad M.

01:12:36

Bayway, Tim Challies, Phil Johnson, Stephen J. Nichols, Todd Friel, and many, many more are on that roster.

01:12:44

I strongly urge you not only to register to attend, but if you have a church, parachurch, ministry, or business that you would like to promote, they are expecting between 4 ,000 and 5 ,000 people there.

01:12:58

So, I strongly urge you to register for an exhibitors booth to publicize whatever it is you want to promote amongst

01:13:05

God's people there at the G3 Conference. Go to g3conference .com, g3conference .com.

01:13:11

Don't forget, also, there is a Spanish -speaking edition of the G3 Conference on Wednesday, January 16th.

01:13:19

So, tell your Spanish -speaking and bilingual friends about that as well. Then, also in January, I'm heading from Atlanta, Georgia, or College Park, Georgia, to Laurel, Mississippi, for the

01:13:32

Deep South Founders Conference. This is the first time I have ever been in Mississippi, and it's the first time

01:13:39

I've been to this conference. The speakers include my dear friend, Dr.

01:13:45

Conrad M. Bayway, pastor of Kabwatha Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia, Africa, and Chancellor of African Christian University, and the most powerful preacher alive on the planet

01:13:55

Earth, in my opinion. He will be joined by Rusty Reed, Gerald Henderson, Jason Goodwin, and Bobby Crenshaw from January 24th through the 26th in Laurel, Mississippi.

01:14:09

If you want more details on that conference, go to deepsouthfounders .com, deepsouthfounders .com.

01:14:17

Please tell all of my advertisers that you heard about them from Chris Arntzen of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

01:14:23

Last but not least, if you love Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, you don't want us to disappear from the airwaves, please go to ironsharpensironradio .com,

01:14:31

click support, then click, click to donate now. You can donate instantly with a debit or credit card by doing so.

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You could also send in a check the old -fashioned way via snail mail if you prefer that. There will be an address that pops up on the screen when you click support at ironsharpensironradio .com.

01:14:49

As always, please never siphon money away from your regular giving to your local church where you are a member, and never put your family in financial jeopardy by giving to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

01:15:01

Those two things are commands of God and have priority as far as your finances are concerned. Supporting Iron Sharpens Iron Radio is not a command of God, but if you are financially blessed above and beyond your ability to obey those two commands, then please donate as heavily as you can and as frequently as you can to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio at ironsharpensironradio .com,

01:15:21

click support, then click, click to donate now. If you want to advertise with us, we surely could use your advertising dollars, so send an email to chrisarensin at gmail .com

01:15:30

and put advertising in the subject line. chrisarensin at gmail .com. As long as whatever it is you want to promote is compatible with what we believe here at Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, you don't have to believe identically with me, but you need to be promoting something that's compatible with what we believe and send that email to chrisarensin at gmail .com

01:15:48

and put advertising in the subject line. By the way, if you don't have a local church where you are a member, where you are under the authority of locally ordained elders, you are living in rebellion against God if you're not prayerfully searching for a church.

01:16:04

So if you are in that position where you don't have a church home, send me an email to chrisarensin at gmail .com

01:16:10

and put in the subject line, I need a church home or something similar because I have lists of churches all over the world and I've already helped a number of people in the

01:16:18

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio audience find churches globally. So we hope to hear from you if you are indeed without a church home.

01:16:25

That's also the email address, by the way, where you could send in a question to Stephen Atkinson and Mitch Tepper of Christian Witness to Israel's North American Division.

01:16:34

It's chrisarensin at gmail .com, chrisarensin at gmail .com. And Stephen Atkinson, we were talking about the satanic depth of evil that anti -semitism is in the history of anti -semitism.

01:16:51

Of course, as my friend Robert J. Cameron, now in heaven for eternity with the

01:16:58

Lord, he was a black Orthodox Presbyterian pastor and he used to say bigotry is a sin problem, not a skin problem.

01:17:10

And I think that we could broaden that even to include

01:17:15

Gentiles and Jews. Of course, historically, you know, you had Saul of Tarsus, fire -breathing

01:17:22

Pharisee of Pharisees, Hebrew of Hebrews who was men and women to be executed for their

01:17:28

Christian faith. People in general, universally, are sinners.

01:17:34

Without the blood of Christ, they will go to hell. Without the repentance and faith granted by a merciful and gracious God, they have no hope.

01:17:44

And hatred and bigotry is universal. But those who profess the name of Christ have no excuse to hate anyone, regardless of what history may prove to be.

01:17:56

We don't have any excuse before God or before our neighbors as to why we would hate a particular group of people, even if they're not

01:18:05

Christian, even if they oppose what we believe, even if they are vicious in what they say about what we believe.

01:18:14

There is no room for hatred in our lives, am I right? Well, again,

01:18:21

I think it's important for us to make the correct response in this, as opposed to, we can't, there will be other responses that people will make, but the

01:18:33

Christian Church must make its response. And what we want to, you know, what we want to share and what we want to indeed challenge and perhaps stimulate is the right

01:18:43

Christian response to this tragedy. And to those who are in mourning at this time, it was, you know, it was somewhat striking.

01:18:57

It was actually, it was beautiful to see some of the Jewish response.

01:19:03

I'm thinking particularly of the Jewish doctors that cared for the killer.

01:19:09

I'm thinking of the head of the hospital who went and visited him. Actually, I learned that, you know, the hospital director, president, he had been very challenged by the response after Charleston and the, you know, the response of the

01:19:29

Church to its killers. And, you know,

01:19:35

I think that the Christian witness, whether it be vocal or silent or an arm around the shoulder, this is vital that we get it right.

01:19:49

Having said that, it also concerns me that simply the arm around the shoulder, and as Petrus referred to earlier, the

01:19:57

Kabbayah moment, this is ineffective. You know, simply gathering us all together and saying, oh, we love you all kind of thing is ineffective.

01:20:08

The idea of the brotherhood of man is, you know, yes, there is a sense in which we are all brothers, we are all made in the image of God.

01:20:20

But at the same time, this utopia of a brotherhood of man doesn't work because of the sinfulness of man.

01:20:28

And sadly, while I was struck by the Jewish response,

01:20:34

I also regard it as incomplete, because there is a rabbinic understanding of the goodness of man that, again, doesn't fully go along with both the scriptural detail and also just the practical reality of the world in which we live.

01:20:57

Not even the Hebrew scriptures teach that. Exactly, yeah. You know, and I think that's more, you know,

01:21:04

I'm looking to see these responses, and I'm seeing it's wonderful to see that amazing, you know, the doctor's response, but that is simply the goodness of man.

01:21:13

And they do, you know, proclaim that, and it's lovely to see it, but it is incomplete. But the liberal and ecumenical approach is the brotherhood of man, and that just doesn't work.

01:21:25

And so, you know, I wanted really to ask and maybe just challenge Mitch as he looks upon it from his

01:21:32

Jewish brother's perspective, you know, in terms of being a brother to these folks who have lost loved ones, and they don't have the shalom that you have,

01:21:46

Mitch. So, you know, how do you respond to them as your brothers and sisters?

01:21:54

I think it's important to understand, see, the facts speak for themselves. And one of the things that I thought was very interesting is when

01:22:02

I was checking into a lot of this stuff is that even though Jews, Jewish people make up 2 % of the population, according to the

01:22:12

FBI, they still are subject to the most hate crimes of any religious group.

01:22:17

Is that 2 % in the United States, or is that just, are you talking about... No, no, it's in America.

01:22:23

In America, they make up 2 % of the population, but still, according to the FBI, the most hate crimes are against Jewish people.

01:22:32

Wow. In fact, the percentage in 2012, I don't know if they've done any since then, it was over 62, 62 and a half percent, just about, of hate crimes, which is absolutely amazing.

01:22:47

It's those kind of things that, as a Jewish person, I need to say

01:22:52

I get it, I understand. You know, most Jews don't know anything about the blood libel, which is something

01:22:59

I studied, you know, during the, obviously, Reformation and before, when the

01:23:04

Christians believed that the Jews were stealing Christian children back then.

01:23:11

And understanding that kind of history, because most Jewish people don't even understand that history, and it goes back to Michael Brown's book, which

01:23:19

I recommended to anyone the last time I was there, and I still recommend it, which is Our Hands are Staying with Blood.

01:23:25

I think it's that kind of understanding as not just a Jewish person, but as a

01:23:31

Gentile Christian as well, to be able to understand what that means that Our Hands are

01:23:37

Staying with Blood, what that means that there's been so much anti -Semitism.

01:23:44

I mean, you look at the story with Haman and Esther, which we brought up our Esther moment, you know, that's what

01:23:49

Haman was trying to do, was destroy the Jews, and then the comment Mordecai made was, hey, maybe that's why you're the queen right now.

01:23:58

So you were brought here for this time to make a difference and save our Jewish people. And I believe being

01:24:05

Jewish in this time, I feel that I myself, being Jewish, need to not just commiserate with the

01:24:13

Jewish people who are going through this grieving process, but also to educate the

01:24:18

Church. Look, there's a reason that they have a hard time with who we are and what we believe.

01:24:25

All you have to do is look at history to understand that. And I think that's where that sensitivity comes from.

01:24:32

So yes, I commiserate, I understand why my Jewish brethren have a real hard time with the

01:24:39

Evangelical Church. I mean, just if you look at all the stats, just from 2017, anti -Semitism is up all over Europe.

01:24:51

You know, I mean, it's rampant in Europe. And yes, everybody experiences racism and prejudice, but to a large extent, there's only, like I said, 15 million, not even 16 million

01:25:06

Jews in the world, and the amount of hatred and wanting to get rid of the peoples, the

01:25:11

Jewish peoples, is just, as a race, is amazing to me, compared to others.

01:25:18

One thing that I think what I'm trying to tease out of you also is that your own people will look upon you as having betrayed your identity and your

01:25:34

Jewishness, and yet, you know, the Apostle very clearly is just in awe and wonder at the promises of God, the covenants, the gifts of God to the

01:25:47

Jewish people. I'm thinking Romans 9, the early verses. You're talking about Romans 9, I know that.

01:25:53

I will go there with you right now, if that's okay. There's the

01:25:58

Apostle, you know, the Apostle was, you know, he was being hounded by his own people as having betrayed the religion of his fathers, and yet he totally turned that on his head and spoke of his heart and his, you know, his brokenness for his own people.

01:26:17

And so do you feel that, you know, do you feel that tension within your own heart? Yes, I do.

01:26:23

I, let me, in fact, because you mentioned that, let me read, I'm sure that many know this, just the first five scriptures of 9.

01:26:33

I love them. I am speaking, this is Romans 9,

01:26:38

I am speaking the truth in Christ. I am not lying. My conscience bears me witness in the

01:26:45

Holy Spirit that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen, according to the flesh.

01:27:00

They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenant, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.

01:27:09

To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the

01:27:15

Messiah, who is God overall, blessed forever. Amen. I mean, you can't put it any more than that, and what

01:27:22

I love about these five verses is it shows Paul's heart for the

01:27:28

Jewish people that, I can't find another place that it expresses it as deeply as this.

01:27:34

I mean, just the fact that he starts off by telling the Roman, the Gentile church, look,

01:27:40

I'm telling you the truth. Listen to what I'm saying. This is the truth.

01:27:46

So there's a sincere, honest appeal that he has to them. And then he speaks about these groanings, that I have sorrow unceasing anguish in my heart.

01:27:56

These groanings I have for my people are so deep, I don't even have words to express the groaning.

01:28:02

And then from there, he says, I myself wish I was a curse and cut off from Messiah for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen.

01:28:11

I mean, he's setting them up by saying, I want you to hear what I'm saying. And then with that scripture, you see that, first of all,

01:28:19

I know I can't substitute my salvation, but I'm letting you guys know. I'm letting you know that if I could,

01:28:28

I would. And I think the question we need to ask, look, all of us know that we cannot, we cannot exchange our salvation.

01:28:39

Okay. With someone else. The thing that I love about Paul is I believe him when he says, if I could,

01:28:46

I would. And the question I think we all need to ask ourselves, if you could, would you?

01:28:52

Would you? And then he goes on in the next two verses to explain, look guys, everything you believe, church, everything you believe, the adoption, the glory, the covenant, the giving of the law, the worship, the promises of salvation.

01:29:09

Okay. The patriarchs, and then obviously culminating in the

01:29:16

Mashiach, the human Mashiach and the God over all Mashiach, saying, look, it all comes from them.

01:29:23

If that is true, how could we not, how could we not take this, this

01:29:29

Mashiach that we believe in, because the apostles, the first century disciples went out to the world as was commanded them in Acts 1 -8, as well as the

01:29:41

Great Commission in Matthew 28. How could we not all feel as a church, it is time to give this back.

01:29:48

And what better time, as it says in Esther, than this, to be able to do that. This being an opening that I don't think we've had in this country the way we have right now to do that.

01:30:00

And yes, I commiserate, I understand my Jewish brethren on the same instance.

01:30:06

To the new church out there, it's time to do what we should always be doing, which is evangelizing.

01:30:13

All that we come in contact with, to the Jew first. Amen. We have to go to our final break right now.

01:30:19

Please send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com. chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

01:30:25

Don't go away, we will be right back after these messages from our sponsors. Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune in to a visit to The Pastor's Study every

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Stephen Atkinson and Mitch Tepper, who are both with the Christian Witness to Israel, CWI, North America.

01:39:51

If you have a question, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com. Because of the fact that quote -quote anti -Semitism or hatred of the

01:40:02

Jews or bigotry against the Jews is such a vile evil and satanic thing, don't you think we also have to be very careful as Christians not to falsely label our brothers in Christ with that horrible title of anti -Semite or Jew hater or whatever, just because we may disagree on issues involving eschatology, the role of the physical nation of Israel and so on.

01:40:36

The key is your love for the Jews, your passion to bring them the gospel, and your compassion for them.

01:40:47

You can disagree on what God is doing with the physical nation in the 21st century and not be an anti -Semite.

01:41:00

And unfortunately there are some of our brothers in Christ, specifically more prevalently those who are dispensationalists.

01:41:09

Somebody has the echoing of the show going on in the background. Yeah, I know. I just told my wife to walk out.

01:41:18

We have to be very careful about, because of the fact that it is so evil, we have to be very careful about slandering people with that title though, am

01:41:27

I right? Oh man, are you correct. That is so true. You know,

01:41:32

I mean, we want our brothers to feel the conviction of our hands are stained with blood.

01:41:40

You know, there's a couple of quotes that maybe might help on this. Apparently Edmund Burke said over a hundred years ago or so, the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil was that good men should do nothing.

01:41:55

And probably my favorite quote that came out of World War II was from Martin Niemöller, who after he spent eight years in a concentration camp, he was a

01:42:08

German theologian and Lutheran pastor. Listen to what he says, and you know this quote already, but just to hear it again.

01:42:15

First they came for the socialists and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist.

01:42:20

Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.

01:42:27

Then they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a

01:42:32

Jew. Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak to me.

01:42:39

You know, so I think what Dean said is the fact of let us get on our knees, let us repent, not that we ourselves have necessarily done anything as much as realizing what has been done, not necessarily by Christians, but what has been done or what we have not stood up against being done in the name of Jesus Christ, in the name of Yeshua.

01:43:06

Things have been done to Jews that make it very difficult for a Jew, and I think that's the line of communication that opens up is with that apology, that heartfelt asking forgiveness for the things that have been done in his name.

01:43:22

And I think that's a good start for us, and I think that's where we have to go with this. But I think if I can, if I can earthen just a little bit more as well,

01:43:31

I am convicted sometimes that, you know, I've been a theologian for 35 years and I have been a

01:43:39

Reformed theologian, you know, and I love substantial theology and I love to read the old masters and to read the books, but the bottom line is, and this is why

01:43:51

I began our section with, you know, speaking of the names of the individuals that had lost their lives,

01:44:01

I want us to earth our theology in the real world, and even our understanding of anti -Semitism in the real world, and the real world of Squirrel Hill is hurting at the moment, and we have an answer, we have a peacemaker to bring into that, and however we do that, we must do that.

01:44:23

And so, you know, I want, you know, maybe Mitch, if you want to even say something specifically about some of the things that we are doing in CWI, not simply to counter anti -Semitism, which we must do, but also to disseminate the true gospel, and, you know, what is

01:44:43

CWI going to do now? Okay, brother? Yeah, and that is so important, and I, you know,

01:44:50

I do want to mention, and you mentioned that, I have a lot of my personal stuff that makes it important for me, as someone from CWI, to make a difference.

01:45:02

Well, first of all, I wanted to mention, before I forgot, I thought this was so interesting to me, that the suspect,

01:45:09

Robert Bauer, he happens to be up the streets from me right now. He's at the

01:45:15

Butler County, we have no idea why he was brought there, and it's funny, I was telling

01:45:20

Stephen that if I could, I would get in there, and I would tell him about Jesus. You know, that's what

01:45:26

I would do. I'd say, look, I'm Jewish, and I want to give you the love of Jesus right now, if I had the opportunity.

01:45:32

And just to clear up with my mom, I just want to make this clear, is that I don't know where my mom is, but I do know that the peace

01:45:40

God's given me is that she's in God's hands no matter what, and for me, to take that and give me an impetus to want so much to reach out, and especially now, in Squirrel Hill, to reach out, be the feet on the ground, get in there.

01:45:59

How can I sit down with someone like my dad? My dad is 93 years old.

01:46:06

Just yesterday, when I told him to listen to the interview I did with you a couple of weeks ago, he said he'd listen to it, but he didn't believe

01:46:14

I was Jewish anymore, which hurts. I have a 93 -year -old atheist dad, an atheist dad who says,

01:46:20

I'm not Jewish, but he is, which is disturbing, but I realize what I'm coming against, and what

01:46:26

I might have to come against when I go down to Squirrel Hill, you know? And the great news is, because of what we're doing, and because of CWI, we were able to get an unbelieving

01:46:40

Jewish woman to go to Beth Shalom. She has gone twice. She's going again this

01:46:45

Friday to the memorial service. She's a friend of Mia's that Mia knows from, she's a substitute at school, at the school that Mia teaches at, and you know how exciting it is that after praying, after speaking, after doing what

01:47:01

I do at CWI, this unbelieving woman wanted to come to our fellowship, has come twice, will come the third time to go to the memorial service that we're having on Friday.

01:47:14

And what did you preach on when she was there? We preached on Isaiah 53.

01:47:20

We preached on Isaiah 53. We did it live on Facebook, and I had such a plea, not just to Har in sitting there listening, but also to anyone that was listening through Facebook, that Isaiah 53, which is the great scripture to say, here he is.

01:47:38

This is the Mashiach that you have been waiting for. And honestly, when it came to this woman that came, she was ready to hear it.

01:47:49

There are some who aren't ready. So what are we going to do with those who aren't ready? We're going to try to sit down and grieve with them.

01:47:56

Sit down and grieve with them. Sit down and pray with them. Have, listen to what their story is, whatever their story is.

01:48:04

Whether it's, we're talking about there are very few, but some Holocaust survivors that are around like they did in Paris.

01:48:10

Sit and listen. Hear what they have to say. Open up. Commiserate with them. Let them know, as a

01:48:16

Jewish person myself, who believes in Yeshua, that I hear you, man. I hear your story.

01:48:22

Let's pray. Let's go through the grieving process together. And I want anyone out there to know,

01:48:28

I'm out there to go through the grieving process. I'm out there for any churches that would allow me to come out, whether it's in Squirrel Hill, whether it's in Pittsburgh, even if it's in your area,

01:48:40

Chris, I want to come out there and share this with the church, because we need now to love on Jewish people more than ever.

01:48:50

And if I can help any congregation to have that same passion and zeal

01:48:56

I have about that, I'm willing to go out and travel anywhere to do it. Now, let me ask you guys a question.

01:49:04

I want you to respond to how I have responded when Jewish people, whether they are religious or not, have accused me of being an anti -Semite because I want to see them come to Christ.

01:49:22

I want to see them receive eternal life from their Jewish Messiah, Yeshua HaMashiach.

01:49:31

There are Jews that think that a Christian evangelist is more anti -Semitic than Hitler himself because we may be more likely to, in their eyes, wipe the

01:49:45

Jews off the face of the earth religiously because people convert. But I have said to some people,

01:49:52

Jewish friends and so on, when they have said that it's really sad and hurtful and maybe even hateful that I would want them to come to Christ, I say to them, first of all, that doesn't mean you cease to be a

01:50:06

Jew. That means that you are actually embracing whom I believe is the Jewish Messiah.

01:50:12

And if I were to do anything else, you may disagree with the conclusions

01:50:18

I come to from my study of the Hebrew scriptures. But regardless of whether you agree with me or not,

01:50:26

I have come to the conclusion that your people, your ancestors, your prophets foretold of the coming of Jesus Christ, the

01:50:38

Jewish Messiah. And for me to not tell you about that Messiah is actually the most anti -Semitic thing

01:50:47

I could do. And it would actually be declaring that the Jewish prophets of old were liars.

01:50:55

If I believe that they were not liars and that they were truthful and that they were truly prophets of God, I have to believe what

01:51:04

I think that they were saying, and that was that the Messiah was coming and now I believe that Messiah has truly come.

01:51:11

How do you respond to what I said? You might have heard this.

01:51:18

I don't think I mentioned it the last time I was there. I know that you know this. Both of you probably know the quote,

01:51:23

Pendulet, atheist, right? Yes, I saw that speech that he gave. To me, that is every single believer needs to have that quote resonate in their heads.

01:51:39

They have to go to YouTube and look up Pendulet Receives a

01:51:45

Bible, and you will hear what he has to say. He is an atheist, had to say about a Christian who gave him a

01:51:50

Bible, and it was amazing. Well, let me just quote what I know. This is pretty much verbatim, because I've definitely quoted it many times.

01:52:00

Pendulet, atheist, said, how much do you have to hate somebody to believe eternal life is real and not share it with them?

01:52:12

To me, that says it all. So you cannot worry, and men like our cat said, we need to live a modest way.

01:52:20

We need to see how much we believe the truth by how close will we come to death before we tell a lie to save ourselves.

01:52:28

That, to me, is what it's all about. So we cannot worry about the stones that are being thrown at us of telling the truth, and it's true.

01:52:38

I could tell the truth. I can go down a squirrel hill in two weeks and tell the truth to everybody as sensitively as I want and still be called a traitor, but that doesn't mean that I should stop living in a modest way.

01:52:51

In other words, I'm going to continue to preach the truth. I'm going to continue to do it sensitively, but I mean, yeah, with sensitivity, but I'm going to continue to do it, and I'm going to use

01:53:01

Pendulet's, that atheist's statement to say, yes, you are absolutely right,

01:53:07

Pendulet. I believe it, so I'm never going to stop talking about it. Amen. And we do have an anonymous listener who says,

01:53:16

I'm just curious about something that was said earlier by one of your guests, if you could clarify.

01:53:23

I personally do not believe that I need to apologize for anything that I am not guilty of.

01:53:29

I don't believe in collective guilt or collective demands of apologies, just like many in the social justice movement are doing.

01:53:39

They are saying that all white people have to declare that they are racist and they need to apologize. I do not believe that all

01:53:45

Christians or Gentiles need to apologize for being anti -Semitic if they are not.

01:53:51

That's interesting. I actually agree with that listener. I mean, I don't think I have to stand up and say,

01:53:59

I as a blonde -haired, blue -eyed Gentile need to apologize for the I've never been, you know, first of all,

01:54:05

I'm only 56 years old, but secondly, I don't harbor that kind of, those sins in my heart, that hatred against Jews.

01:54:14

Now, of course, saying that, I'm not saying I'm sinless. I'm just saying that isn't particularly one of my sins of choice.

01:54:22

You know, I'm not somebody who hates Jews or blacks or people of other skin colors.

01:54:27

So how do you further respond to our listener? I think it's just important that we put our hands up and we simply say that, yes,

01:54:35

Luther was wrong when he said those vile things that he said. We've got to put our hands up and say, yes, even

01:54:43

Calvin, in having all the Jews expelled from Geneva, he was wrong, and he flip -flopped a little on some of the things that Calvin writes are wonderful.

01:54:55

And yet, some of the other things are strange and confusing. And we've just got, our

01:55:01

Jewish friends have very long memories. In fact, the Scriptures teach them to remember, to remember, to remember.

01:55:08

And they remember, very selectively, the awful anti -Semitic things that were done in the name of the

01:55:15

Church. You know, people often ask me, what is the greatest stumbling block to Jewish people coming to Jesus? And I will simply say, the

01:55:22

Church. Now, of course, the stumbling block is Christ, but nonetheless, it is the testimony of the

01:55:28

Church. And all I would simply say, well, now is the time for us to get it right. Now is the time for us to wisely and sensitively, and as Mitch has said, rightly said, intentionally, bring the

01:55:39

Gospel to our friends. We cannot leave them alone.

01:55:44

I'm sorry, we can't simply leave them alone and let them go to a lost eternity. But we must come with the love of Christ shining out from our faces, our actions, and our words, and very deliberately tell them the

01:55:59

Gospel of Isaiah. Tell them the Gospel of Jeremiah. Tell them the Gospel of Ezekiel.

01:56:05

And bring them to see that their Tanakh speaks of this one

01:56:10

Peacemaker. And, you know, I want you to pray for Mitch doing that, and pray for me doing that.

01:56:16

And for every opportunity for the Church to be wise and to be intentional in sharing

01:56:23

Jesus, the Jewish Jesus. This is not a Gentile thing. The Book is

01:56:28

Jewish, the man is Jewish, the Messiah is Jewish, the first missionaries were Jewish, and they brought it to us

01:56:35

Gentiles. And I am thankful in the grace and purposes and plan of God that salvation is of the

01:56:43

Jews. Well, my dear friends, my Jewish friends, any who are listening to this, I want to bring back to you the greatest gift that you ever gave to me, and that concerns your

01:56:53

Messiah Jesus and mine. He has changed my life eternally, and I want you to know him whom to know is life eternal.

01:57:02

Amen. And I also want to remind—I just want to quickly remind our dispensationalist listeners that our two guests today are both theologically

01:57:10

Reformed and Calvinists. So I just want to dispel the notion. I would like to piggyback off of that.

01:57:18

I gave you Martin Niemoller's quote. Remember what Martin Niemoller founded the

01:57:23

Confessing Church. In other words, here is a guy who stood up while so much of the

01:57:29

German clergy did not stand up, and he still wrote this quote, this little poem that says,

01:57:36

I could have sold my watch,

01:57:43

I could have sold this ring to save one more. And it's not about this tremendous guilt as much as it is the understanding of the responsibility.

01:57:54

Niemoller understood that, and he is the one who stood up and started the Confession Church. If anyone doesn't know what I mean, the

01:57:59

Confessing Church was a church in Germany that stood against Hitler and the Nazi party, and there were many who didn't.

01:58:06

And even though this Niemoller did, he still wrote understanding there was more I should have and could have done.

01:58:12

Now, how do our listeners, if they want to get a hold of both you and Mitch, both you,

01:58:18

Steve, and Mitch, if they say, I got to have these guys speak at the congregation where I am or at the school where I am or the parachurch organization

01:58:26

I am, tell our listeners how to do that. Well, they can email you, Chris, and you can pass it on to us, or they can email

01:58:35

CWINAmerica at gmail .com. The letter

01:58:41

CWINAmerica, like North America. CWINAmerica at gmail .com.

01:58:48

Yeah, that's the email address. That's the email address. But if they want to simply email you, I know you'll pass it on to us.

01:58:54

And the website is CWINA .org,

01:59:02

CWI for Christian Witness to Israel, NA for North America .org, CWINA .org.

01:59:08

I want to thank you guys both so very much for being on the show during a very important time.

01:59:15

I ask all of our listeners to continue to pray for the survivors of the congregation, the

01:59:21

Tree of Life Synagogue in Swirl Hill, Pittsburgh. Pray that these folks receive eternal life through Jesus Christ.

01:59:30

That is the most important thing of all. And to have the liberal response where you do not evangelize with the gospel is the most anti -Semitic or Jew -hating thing that you could possibly do.

01:59:43

Amen to that. Amen. And I hope that you all always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater