I tell them, “Behold the Days are coming…!!

What a privilege it is to be part of the Knock and Talk team of Beth Ariel Congregation.

I have been with this outreach for a number of years and experience it as a great blessing.

My husband and I listen to the messages from our Pastor Jacques Isaac Gabizon. Preached from a Jewish perspective, they enhance our understanding of the Scriptures and cause our hearts to be stirred to share this wonderful News, especially with the Jewish people.

I believe the Lord led me to find this Messianic congregation once I had moved closer to Montreal. It was at Passover, in April of 2010, when I attended my first service there. The joy of the Lord and the worship touched my heart. I began to hear more and more about the Jewish nation through the Jewish lens of the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob.  For ten years even before attending Beth Ariel, the Lord had shown me  how important it was to reach the Jew (even first, whenever possible) and then the Gentile.  Later while at Beth Ariel, when I heard about the Knock and Talk outreach, I gladly joined. As a Gentile believer, I am so grateful to the Jewish people for their faithfulness in helping preserve, throughout all these generations, the Word of God as we have it today.  It is important for me to share with them what a blessing I have received through the inspired texts of this Hebrew Bible, written by the living God Who has made know to us His amazing grace.

Every time the team goes out, we pray that God will open the doors, and  prepare the peoples’ souls to hear the Spirit’s call because we know that it is He Who does the actual work inside our minds and  hearts. When at the door, I will often tell these Jewish people that we have come to bless them with the gift of both the Tanakh and the Brit Chadashah (New Testament, or as some would call it, New Covenant). This free set is graciously offered through the Society of the Distribution of Hebrew Scriptures and is made available to every Jewish home willing to receive it.

In sharing about the Messiah, we will quote well known prophets, one of them being Jeremiah. A passage I like to share with them is from Jeremiah 31:31 where God declares: Behold the days will come that I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel and the house of Judah. They need to understand that this first covenant, the Mosaic one, was broken by them but a new one was established with the house of Israel and Judah, that is, the New Covenant that would be fulfilled by Yeshua and signed with His atoning blood.

Other Scriptures by prophets such as Isaiah, Daniel and Micah are also shared, emphasizing to our Jewish friends that all, both Jew and Gentile have failed and are fallen but that God’s righteousness (Yeshua) is what reconciles us with Him once again.   From Romans 3:21 we are convicted; But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the Prophets, Even the righteousness of God through faith in Yeshua to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference;  for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace.

Wow, what a demonstration of God’s love for all human beings.

It is amazing how our Jewish friends react at the door, when they see us speaking to them about prophesies and promises found in their own Tanakhs and pointing to those prophecies which have been fulfilled and those which are still to come.

We do know that Jewish people value tradition, but only the Word of God and the saving knowledge of Yeshua  by  the revelation of the  Holy Spirit  can make people  understand the Word of God. Ephesians 2:8-9 declares, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God not of works, lest anyone should boast.  Only through faith we can receive the righteousness of God in Yeshua. And faith cometh by hearing and hearing the Word of God (Romans 10:17) and so they must keep hearing over and over again.

It is difficult to explain such important truths in just a few minutes at the door, and we are truly thankful when people listen. We are so encouraged when they ask questions and show interest in the Word.

We want Jewish people to understand that believing in Yeshua is not turning them away from their heritage, but making them  more fully and deeply  experience what their calling and raison d’etre is; that is, to find joy, to be holy (because of Him) and to understand that they can become completed Jews so to speak, true praisers of God. This is not deserting their faith, it is only confirming the true biblical one. I am always amazed by the enthusiasm and gladness of Jewish people who have come to the saving knowledge of their Messiah.

It is truly a shame how the evil one has manipulated the church’s history so terribly over the centuries that the name of Yeshua (Jesus) has become so foreign and repulsive to many of them.  This is utterly tragic and a great travesty. Only the Spirit of God can both expose and heal these wounds and reestablish a new way of seeing this truth.

Sometimes when a Jewish sister who is part of the outreach, joins me at the door,  I think is “Wow, what these people are seeing is both a Jew and a Gentile (myself) witnessing , confirming the reality that we are two entities, but one in the Body of Messiah.

This work is so rewarding!

Now to the King Eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor, and glory forever and ever 1Tim 1:17.

Amen.