The Pursuit of Peace, Continued

Personal Peace

Believers who live in Israel, Jordan and the region of the Palestinian Authority struggle with their ethnic, political and spiritual identity. In a land where Arab is synonymous with Muslim and Jew with Judiasm, the dilemma for believers from these two communities can be overwhelming.

Most western believers having come from generations of the Christian faith, don't understand the problem. Messianic Jews are a tiny minority within the Jewish community, which itself is a minority in the predominately Muslim Arab region. Christian Arabs are also a minority within the vast regional majority of Islam, and for those who live in the Palestinian Authority Territory the situation is even more complex. Conversion to Jesus Christ from the historic churches is viewed by many as a betrayal of their long heritage, a forsaking of their traditions to join a "heretical western sect." The situation is perhaps hardest of all for believers from a Muslim background. Theirs is the smallest community of believers from the three faiths -- but it is growing.

Messianic Jews face an especially perplexing situation. Being an Israeli means more than simply being Jewish, and being Jewish involves more than mere family lineage. Messianic Jews are a remnant who believe in the Messiah, Yeshua, in the midst of Jewish population that is modernistic, indifferent or radically Orthodox. They find themselves caught in the middle: harassed by the Orthodox Jews, disliked by Arabs and misunderstood or ignored by Christians whose church history is filled with atrocities toward their Jewish ancestors. Often these Messianic Jews are being pressured to integrate into "imported" denominational structures. If they succumb, they lose their effectiveness to witness back into their own communities.

Jews have viewed Christians as their primary persecutors for centuries. Christian history is littered with the debris of anti-Semitism. The relationship between Jewish followers of Christ and the non-Jewish followers of Christ deteriorated rapicly in the first century. The Council of Nicea, convened by Constantine in AD325, asserted that the church did not want to have anything to do with the Jewish roots of the faith. The Council decreed that Messianic Jewish believers of that day could no longer be Jewish -- either ethnically or spiritually -- and still be part of the body of believers. By the second century, the Church chose to regard Jews as a lost, cursed, apostate people without hope. The Inquisition, the Crusades, and the Holocaust all were waged in the name of Christianity. The Nazis even hung signs in their gas chambers that read, "You are being killed in the name of Jesus Christ."

Ilan Zamir, author of the soon-to-be-published book Understanding Messianic Jews, explained to me the dilemma of the Messianic Jew. "The Jewishness of the early Church has been nearly forgotten," he said. "For the first Messianic Jewish body of believers the issue was: How does the non-Jewish believer fit in? Does he have to become a Jew and follow all the biblical Jewish customs and practices? As the Church grew and became predominantly non-Jewish, the question reversed. Now in the twentieth century, Christians are asking the question: Where do Jewish people fit in?"

The situation is no easier for Christian Arabs. In most of the Middle East, they are a minority of faith in a culture dominated by the religiosity of Islam. Arab believers recognize the historical fact that their region was Christian before it was Muslim, with a rich tradition of Christian faith and culture. They live in the geographical wellspring of Christianity, home to the most ancient Christian communities in the world. From the very beginnings of the Church, these communities have been attacked and persecuted, yet have carried on the traditions of their faith. Living as a Christian in an Islamic society today is difficult.

Arab culture and the Arabic language have played an important role in Christianity. After the armies of Caliph Umar defeated the Byzantines at the battle of Yarmouk in 638, Arab Islamic culture moved from its birthplace on the Arabian Peninsula into the area now divided between Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority. Early Islam tolerated a limited espression of Christianity and Judiasm with the subjugated dhimmi status of Islamic law. Arab culture, which prized scholarship, influenced the early Christian communities, and, by the second half of the eighth century, Christian theological literature was being written in Arabic. By the ninth century, Arabic had become the lingua franca for hundreds of monks who came from all over the world to live and study at the major monasteries in the region. Today those communities are predominately Orthdox Christian, and renewal is happening. Orthodox Christians and Muslim Arabs alike are coming to a saving faith in Jesus Christ.

In the nearly five decades of Israeli statehood, the socio-economic condition of the Palestinian Arab Christian population has changed considerably A survey of 500 high school students in Israel found that Arab believers are suffering from significant emotional stress. They have a deep sense of being rejected by both the Jews and the Muslims around them. Many are emigrating.

Messianic Jew and Arab Christian alike share this need for identity, this paradox of faith and culture. The need for a sense of who they are -- both in Jesus/Yeshua/Yasua, Christ/Messiah. Together they are experiencing his peace that passes all understanding.

Conclusion

I join with many who sense that "a new day dawned" in the biblical heartland of the 10/40 Window. The moving of God's Spirit is seen in the stories and hearts of people with whom I met; some of them appear in this report.

Yet troubles and great uncertainties remain. The deep-seated hatred and bitterness of many years is being exposed to the light of the love of Jesus. Many precious people -- Jews and Arabs, from both Christian and Muslim communities, are searching for personal identity and a new peace within. In that search, many are opening themselves to the peace and healing that await them in Jesus.

Regional historians and leaders cause me to believe there is a great hope in this new searching. I pray that the worldwide Body of Christ will know this rising tide of Shalom/Salam, and that the Christians everywhere will join in spirited, prevailing prayer for this region as the threshold of a new millenium passes under our feet.

An Arab Christian leader living in Jerusalem has said: "God's people in the region have suffered and experienced the cross for so long. It's time they begin to experience the crown." Whether is it a cross or a crown, one truth remains; the pursuit of peace is not sufficient to arrive at peace. Any person, family, city, nation, people or region will find lasting peace only as they follow the Author of Peace -- the Source of Peace -- the Prince of Peace.

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