MESSIAH, by Raphael ben Levi
The Jewish people are eagerly awaiting the coming of the Messiah although we believe as a nation they missed him the first time round. The late Elie Wiesel: (Israeli author and Holocaust survivor) narrated a story during an imaginary Jewish/Christian encounter. “My good (Christian) friends, what is the difference between you and me? We believe as religious Jews in the coming of the Messiah. You believe that the Messiah came, went back, and that you are waiting for Him for the second coming. We Jews believe He hasn’t come yet, but He will come. In other words, we are waiting, you for the second coming, we for the first coming. Let’s wait together. After a pause, he said, “And when He will come, we will ask Him, have you been here before?” Elie Wiesel added, “I hope I will be behind Him and I will whisper in His ear, ‘Please do not answer.’”
Elie Wiesel echoed the dilemma facing many Jewish people today who struggle with the thought that maybe, just maybe, they really did miss it the first time round. This is a deeply uncomfortable thought causing increasing numbers to bury their heads in the sand. But God…
We serve a God of miracles! He could even, as the Talmud puts it, ‘fit an elephant through the eye of a needle.’ How would He do it? Would He make the elephant smaller or would He expand the eye of the needle? Neither. The elephant would remain big, the eye of the needle small and He would fit the elephant through the eye of the needle. Illogical? True, but logic is just another of His creations. He who created logic is permitted to disregard it.
There are a lot of ‘elephants’ in the hearts of the Jewish people. We are stubborn and stiff-necked, I know because I am one of them! But God is squeezing us through the eye of a needle against this preposterous impossibility with increasing and startling frequency!
Would you stand in prayer for the salvation of the Jewish people, for to do so is to stand in alignment with the eternal purposes of God!
“For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead? (Rom. 11:15)
