“Can I ask you a question?”

he said and he looked me straight in the eye:

“how can it be that when one Jew was crucified here 2000 years ago, we were punished and persecuted by you Christians for 2000 years, but when Hitler murdered 6 million Jews the church was silent…? How can you explain why the church continues to be silent? Why didn’t you cry then, and why are you not crying now…?”

Speechlessly I stared at the old Jewish man. He did not expect an answer. He nodded friendly and slowly walked on with his children and grandchildren, leaving us behind in shock.

This week we strolled through the Old Town of Jerusalem after our daily walk when suddenly a young Jewish student showed up and asked us where we were from. He was from New York. He asked us curiously what we were doing in Israel. I told him that we take daily walks on the walls and proclaim God’s promises to His Jewish people. He looked at me with disbelief. I continued by telling this Jewish student that we attempt to clean up the mess left by 2000 years of Christendom.

(Isaiah 62:10 …”Prepare the way for the people. Build up, build up the highway! Remove the stones. …”) I told him that we do our utmost to see how we can restore the disturbed relationship with our older Jewish brother; that we urge believers to seek reconciliation by showing our deepest remorse for the horrible history of rejection, murder and oppression by Christians to the Jewish people during the past centuries.

He stared at me with his mouth open and said:

“Come to New York! Come and tell this to the Jewish community over there, come! They won’t believe their ears… can I hug you?”

And he hugged me in the middle of the road.

Two incidental encounters in Jerusalem. Most believers have no clue how disturbed the relationship is between the Jewish people and the Christians. There is a wide gap between us. God wants us to bridge that gap. We live in an era where Israel will be isolated. We can no longer stand on the sidelines and watch, with our arms folded. That time is forever behind you. You have to make a choice; do I stand squarely behind Israel or do I abandon her. There is no middle ground. Many pastors and congregational leaders are scared to death to make this choice. It only causes commotion in our sleeping congregations…

Dear reader, Daniel understood that Israel had sinned against God and prayed a magnificent prayer of humbleness. He repented, essentially as a substitute. Daniel was a righteous man. He himself had not sinned. I will quote part of his prayer:

…” We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. Lord, you are righteous, but this day we are covered with shame ( ) …our sins and the iniquities of our fathers have made Jerusalem and your people an object of scorn to all those around us.
Daniel 9:6,16

This is the season that God seeks watchmen who will climb the walls of Jerusalem in the same spirit and who will no longer be silent. Watchmen who have the courage to repent for the sins of the church and of their fathers and forefathers; who repent before God and before the Jewish people. Watchmen who have the courage to say: “we Christians are covered with shame…”

See you on the walls of Jerusalem.