Sam’s Sunday Mission Statement
In addition to training leaders how to plant, develop, and reproduce healthy Messianic congregations, Sam Nadler also has a “Sunday ministry.” His Sunday Mission Statement reads this way:
This is because God wants every Christian, every born-again believer, to have a burden to share the Good News with Jewish friends and neighbors. Many Christians are unaware of God’s calling specifically for Gentile believers!
Cultural Blindness
For decades, I was perfectly content in my church-culture-fishbowl, and it never occurred to me that our Christian jargon might actually create barriers instead of building bridges of communication with a Jewish acquaintance or friend. And it was certainly never on my radar to consider that it would be helpful to try to communicate the Good News about the Jewish Messiah in a Jewish context. I wouldn’t have known how to accomplish that.
Previously, when I met Jewish people (whom I didn’t seek out), I assumed they were well-versed in the Old Testament. I would talk to them about Jesus Christ and the wonderful gift of his dying on the cross (while fingering the cross I wore around my neck.) If it were the right time of year, I would invite them to a Christmas Pageant or an Easter Sunrise Service (followed by a ham and egg breakfast).
I was ignorant of the fact that, because so much evil has been perpetrated against the people of Israel “in the name of Christ,” it’s natural for Jews to be wary of those trying to “convert them to Christianity” and stop being Jews. In Jewish-think, to become a Christian means “to become a Gentile instead of being Jewish,” because to them, there are two types of people in the world: Jews and Gentiles (i.e., Christians).
And it never occurred to me that talking to them about Yom Kippur (highlighting the fact that “all we like sheep have gone astray” and need atonement, Isaiah 53:6) or about Passover (and the sacrifice of the Lamb, who made that atonement, Isaiah 53:3-5) would be a more effective way of presenting their need and God’s provision.
Every Congregation was a Messianic Congregation
As a church-raised Gentile well into her adult years, the first time I heard Sam Nadler claim that “every congregation planted by the Apostles was a Messianic congregation,” I was stunned. He went on to say, “It was normative, while the Apostles lived, to celebrate the biblical feasts. This biblical calendar was the Messianic assembly’s calendar.”
Wait! Weren’t the Feasts just a Jewish thing? An Old Testament thing? Didn’t Paul convert to Christianity and start doing church? What does a Jewish expression of faith have to do with the church today? Quite honestly, very little. But is that a good thing? Not if all Christians have the responsibility to be Messiah’s witness to the Jewish people!
Should Gentile believers be bothered by the fact that, since the time of Constantine [early 300s CE/AD], Christendom largely chalks up any demonstration of worship within a Jewish framework as irrelevant and possibly improper for the Body of Christ/Messiah today?
Just because Gentiles are greater in number than Jews, we cannot, and should not, distance ourselves from the fact that “salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22). Our faith is in the still-Jewish Messiah. He always was. He always will be.
What do you mean by “The Gentile Great Commission”?
We know of the “Great Commission” (in Matthew 28:18-20), but what is this “Gentile Great Commission”?
For years, I read right on past Romans 11:11 without giving thought to putting the truth into practice. However, after being exposed to Sam Nadler’s expository teaching (which is always applicational), I couldn’t ignore it! Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles, said,
“I say then, [Israel] did not stumble so as to fall, did they? May it never be! But by their false step, salvation has come to the Gentiles, to provoke [Israel] to jealousy” (Romans 11:11).
This is at the heart of Sam’s Sunday Ministry: to help our Christian brothers and sisters understand that Paul’s urgent message to the Roman congregation is one that the larger “Body of Messiah” (in churches) needs to hear:
“For I am not ashamed of the Good News, since it is God’s powerful means of bringing salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile” (Romans 1:16).
Sam demonstrates how the Body of Messiah in churches cannot engage in spiritual battle with only one-third of a sword, the New Testament/New Covenant. The other two-thirds of it, the Old Testament/Old Covenant, contains the promises and prophecies about the Jewish Messiah. Word of Messiah Ministries encourages churches to adopt a whole-Bible approach to our faith and our witness. The materials that are made available to the church when Sam is there are helpful tools for their witness.
Word of Messiah desires to equip all believers, Jew and Gentile alike, to share the Good News of the Jewish Messiah “to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile” so we may all grow together in Him.
Sam would love to minister to your church! Contact Lisa in our office to schedule him to speak in person (or via Zoom).
Add Comment