Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel: A Message for Christians

by David H. Stern

Publisher:

Messianic Jewish Publishers

, 1990

Overview

Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel offers a challenge to conventional Christian ideas. David H. Stern’s message is one of clear thinking about neglected questions such as: What central truth, ignored for 1800 years, must be restored if the Church is to fulfill the Great Commission? How are both the Jews and the Church God’s people? Is there a difference between Jew and Gentile in the body of the Messiah? Will God fulfill all of his promises to Israel? Does the Law of Moses remain in force today? Is the Church anti-Semitic? If so, what can you do about it? Should the Church evangelize Jews today? If so, how? Surprising answers to these and other crucial questions, along with suggestions for godly action, are given in this exciting and insightful book by an Israeli Messianic Jew, a Jew who trusts Yeshua (Jesus). Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel introduces Christians to the Jewish roots of their faith and reveals important truths for Jews and the Church today.

Contents

Top Highlights

“It has been pointed out to me that there are Christians who experience this book as promoting the Judaizing heresy which Sha’ul condemns in the book of Galatians. But ‘Judaizing’ does not mean encouraging New Testament believers to investigate the Jewishness of their faith. Rather, it means one or a combination of the following three things: (1) insisting that Gentiles cannot be saved by faith in Yeshua the Messiah unless they convert to Judaism, (2) requiring saved Gentiles to follow Jewish cultural practices, and/or (3) legalism, i.e., requiring Gentiles to obey a perverted version of the Torah in which God’s Law is seen as a set of rules unrelated to faith.” (Page 3)

“When people become Christians they need give up only their sin, not their culture, except the specific elements of it that violate Scriptural norms.” (Page 7)

“Nevertheless, there is something strange, even wrong, in talking about contextualizing the Gospel for Jews; because the Gospel was completely Jewish in the first place! If Christianity’s roots are Jewish, if the Gospel itself is Jewish in its very essence, why should it need to be contextualized for Jews?” (Page 11)

“When the Church proclaims a Gospel without its Jewishness restored, she is at best failing to proclaim ‘the whole counsel of God’ (Acts 20:27). At worst she may be communicating what Sha’ul [Paul] called ‘another Gospel’ (Galatians 1:6–9). Moreover, not only Jews suffer from this off-target preaching—Gentiles suffer too.” (Page 1)

“My view is that we ought to start by making every effort to understand the text of the New Testament as its first century hearers would have understood it and applied it to their situation in life.” (Page 15)

Product Details

• Title: Restoring the Jewishness of the Gospel: A Message for Christians
• Author: David H. Stern
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Publisher: Messianic Jewish Publishers
• Print Publication Date: 1990
• Logos Release Date: 2008
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
• Subjects: Jesus Christ › Jewishness; Jews in the New Testament; Christianity and other religions › Judaism; Judaism › Relations--Christianity; Missions to Jews
• Resource ID: LLS:RSTGJEWSHGS
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2022-02-12T07:30:11Z

About David H. Stern

David H Stern born in Los Angeles in 1935, is the great-grandson of two of the city's first twenty Jews. He earned a Ph.D. in economics at Princeton University and was a professor at UCLA. He then received a Master of Divinity degree at Fuller Theological Seminary, did graduate work at the University of Judaism, and was active in the Messianic Jewish movement. Dr. Stern authored the highly acclaimed English translations, the Jewish New Testament, the Jewish New Testament Commentary, and the Complete Jewish Bible which are available from Logos Bible Software.

In 1941, The United States is drawn into World War II. During that same year, Dr. Henry Einspruch publishes his classic book, The Yiddish New Testament, a breakthrough in evangelistic literature for Jewish people. Over the following decades, the publications of Lederer/Messianic Jewish Communications have been widely used to impact thousands of Jewish people with the Good News of Messiah. These books and tracts have been distributed in the Orthodox Jewish community, have been given out to Jews in the former Soviet Union, and have been used by Messianic congregations and Jewish outreaches all over the world. Messianic Jewish Publishers mission is two-pronged: Reaching out to Jewish people with the message of Messiah and teaching the non-Jewish spiritual family about their Jewish roots.