But what really made an impact was when I came across Jesus. No one on the entire spectrum of the human race, from the most spiritual to the atheist, can remain indifferent to him. You cannot help but like him – his wisdom, compassion, and love. Every time I read Jesus’ words and learned about his deeds, I wanted more. He was the Jesus I never knew.

Meditation in the Jewish Scriptures describes a different approach to mindfulness meditation: in the Scriptures, mindfulness meditation refers to applying one’s attention upon God, His Word, and His attributes.

Counter to contemporary Western culture, where meditation is often a therapeutic exercise for self-improvement, in the Scriptures it is a path to encounter God by giving attention to His message.

Interacting with a personal God who listens to our prayers and cares about our daily affairs feels foreign to many Jewish people. Thus the Jewish healing movement is an opportunity to explore one’s spiritual beliefs and develop new ways of relating to God.

The adrenaline coursing through my veins pulsed to the racing of my heart. I was completely caught off guard as I sat facing the enemy. Demon deprogrammers were going to try and bribe me out of the cult mindset.

Yes, Jesus existed. But he is much more than a historical figure. Both Jews and Gentiles have been gripped by the person of Jesus as they read the Gospel accounts. If even non-believers must acknowledge Jesus’ existence, then the Gospels make it evident that he has the power to change our lives.

Issues relevant to the “spiritual but not religious” movement are so ancient that the Jewish Bible addresses many of them—and so does Jesus in the “Newer” Testament.

I had a semblance of Jewish education and a strong sense of Jewish identity. But since my home was a home without God – and since the Christians and the Jews I knew did not seem to truly believe – I assumed that God must be present elsewhere.

The New Testament throughout shows that Jesus is indeed the “Mighty God” who has come among us as a human being. Jesus does things only God can do, such as forgive sins and command nature to obey him.

The kind of Judaism Jesus represented is debated, but Judaism it was. For there was as yet nothing called “Christianity.”

Like other Americans of their generation, Jewish Millennials in general favor a less institutional, more mystical or open approach toward faith.

God made you Jewish on purpose. What if faith in Jesus enables you to discover the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—the One who has the final say on what being Jewish means?

Scholars and theologians debate the particular kind of Judaism Jesus represented, but it was Judaism nonetheless. There was, as yet, nothing called “Christianity.”

What is that very elusive quality we call shalom? For it means different things to different people. The ancient Hebrew concept of peace, is rooted in the word “shalom,” meant wholeness, completeness, soundness, health, safety and prosperity, carrying with it the implication of permanence.

I know that I am still Jewish. I don’t use the word “converted” because it implies that I’ve left something behind. I do not feel I have left anything.

Yes, Jesus – Yeshua – was a rabbi, a teacher of Judaism in the first century A.D. But was he more than a rabbi?

Like other rabbis, Jesus taught the importance of Jewish core values. One such value is kibud av va’em, honor of parents.

I am as guilty as the next guy in labeling things “hell” too glibly. By contrast, there are some truly horrendous experiences that you or those close to you may have had to endure, for which hell may be an apt metaphor.

Holden would like to save all the children before the world robs them of their innocence. He recognizes that we are all eventually stained by this world. We are polluted not only from without, but we soon discover that we are impure within. We are infected with a disease we inherited from the first to lose their innocence: Adam and Eve.

Whether it is the threat of nuclear attack or terrorist bombs, it is no wonder that many Israelis and Jews in the Diaspora question if there is any hope for peace in the Middle East or survival at all.

Hans handed Rich the Bible. “In that millisecond,” Rich recalls, “my life was shattered. The name that I saw at the top of the page was Isaiah! Hans had been reading to me from MY Bible, from my Hebrew Scriptures, and I felt as though someone had taken a sword and cut me to pieces.”

Did Jesus invent a new religion? The simple answer is that Jesus was a rabbi – a teacher of Judaism.

What does Judaism say about sin? Is sin relevant to Jewish life? Read here.

Hearing the truth can hurt. We admit it jestingly, but the old axiom has more meaning than most people want to know. When the truth hurts, one must choose either to endure pain or avoid truth—a distressing choice. What does this mean when we apply it to a spiritual reality?

For a professing Christian to side with the anti-Semite is to side not only against the Jewish Apostles who penned the Christian New Testament, but against the Jewish Messiah.

A look at the Jewishness of the authors, focus, language, and content of the New Testament.

Some claim that Jesus taught his followers to hate their mothers and fathesr. If true, that would obviously make Jesus an immoral and unethical teacher, since one of the Ten Commandments is to honor one’s parents. “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the LORD your God is giving you.” the Torah says in Exodus 20:12 NKJV.

Explore the passage of Jewish Scripture that the rabbis deemed too dangerous to keep in the regular synagogue calendar readings. Get the whole scoop on Isaiah 53.

Jewish scholars have paid more attention to the person of Yeshua (Jesus) in the last hundred years than they have in the previous nineteen hundred.

The genealogies in Matthew and Luke present a portrait of the Messiah through four titles: Son of David, Son of Abraham, Son of Adam and Son of God.

More than any other book of the Hebrew Scriptures, the writings of the prophet Daniel confront us with evidence of the time of Messiah’s coming.

I started being nagged with the idea of Jesus being the Jewish Messiah and the only way to know God. It wasn’t so much that it was a problem for me because I was Jewish and didn’t want to believe in Jesus. It was more that I didn’t want to close myself into what I thought was a narrow way of thinking.

I was happy for Lisa, and I’m certain that I already believed intellectually that Jesus was who he said he was. But I wasn’t ready to follow him.

The doctor had already come in that morning to tell me about the cancer. I got emotional and cried. But I was already prepared by the time Jeff came in. Then Jeff told me that he had received Jesus as his Messiah, and that God told him I was going to be okay. And I felt pretty confident that I would be.

God brought us Messiah to restore things to the way they were meant to be. The time is coming when disease will no longer exist and all will be made new.

When God in the Hebrew Scriptures refers to the Jewish people as chosen, he’s saying that he selected them to serve a specific purpose and to carry out a particular task. So what is it we were set apart to do?

What did Yeshua (Jesus) claim to be—Messiah, as powerful as God, God himself, atonement? What didn’t he claim to be, and what decision do we all need to make?

For 2000 years, Jewish community leaders have continued this tradition of excluding Messianic Jews. Despite the celebrated pluralism of today’s Jewish community, there remain tens of thousands of men and women, born of Jewish parents, who are being excluded from the rest.

When the crowd asked Jesus one day, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” he answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (John 6:28–29). And who is the one God has sent? Yeshua.

We canceled hospice. Dad got better. Five weeks later he was in good health. To me, this was a miracle. Pain and despair brought me to the Messiah.

A point by point look at Jesus’ claims, attitudes, actions and how he has affected the world.

What lessons can we learn from the Holocaust? Is guilt good enough? Human nature, history, the capacity for evil, and the ability to fight it. Read on here.

Did Hitler and his followers carry out a theology that is Christian at its roots?

Is resurrection only a Christian concept? Can it be traced to biblical and traditional Judaism–both the Hebrew Scriptures and the rabbis? Where does Jesus fit in? Read here.

By my third year of grad school, my life, externally, was great. I had friends and a boyfriend who made a lot of money. I was in great shape, competing in a triathlon. But inside I was miserable. I found myself questioning everything: If life has no meaning, what does it matter if I live another day? And what happens after I die?

Can Jewish people read the New Testament? Discover why the New Testament draws from Hebrew Scripture, the Jewish Bible. Read about why a rabbi who considered the New Testament to be anti-Semitic changed his mind.

Can I be a Jewish Christian? What makes someone Jewish? What’s the difference between a Christian and a Gentile and a Jew for Jesus? All these answers and more, right here!

At that very moment, I heard a still, small voice in my heart that said, “Alisa, you have a choice. You can either trust me, or you can go your way . . . to your doom!”

I grabbed the New Testament from where I had hid it in the cupboard and opened it. It happened to open to the Gospel of Matthew, chapter one. I was completely overwhelmed when I read the very first sentence: “This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham.”

While the existence of God is accepted by faith, this faith is based on dependable information. It’s not a leap into an abyss.

Every year, around Christmas and Hanukkah, or even Easter and Passover, many Jewish-Gentile couples and families are finding themselves in a tough place to navigate. Here’s a helpful way to understand the difficulties and continue to work toward spiritual harmony in your home.

God is never mentioned in Esther, yet His fingerprints are all over the pages of this beloved book. In the same way, did we fail to recognize God among us when Yeshua (Jesus) walked the earth some 2,000 years ago? Did he, like Esther, come “for such a time as this?”

We don’t always recognize the significance of events as they happen in our lives until we look back and see how everything fits together.

The missionary asked my great-great-grandfather, Hakim, “Did you know that the Messiah you are expecting has already arrived?” and told him that Jesus was the Messiah. Hakim was so upset that he slapped the missionary in the face and threw him out of the synagogue. But that wasn’t the end of the story…

Will God fulfill his promise of sustaining the Jewish people? Several Jewish authors express concern about our survival.

Following Yeshua will mean going against the flow of the values and priorities of the world. It may cost us relationships with family and friends, our reputations and opportunities. We might encounter suffering, heartache and rejection. But God will never desert us.

I take comfort in Jesus’ words: “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life” (Luke 18:29­–30).

Although my faith made for some uncomfortable times with my parents, it also led to some thoughtful and fruitful discussions. And, much to their credit, they never allowed it to rupture our relationship.

Occult forces? Evil entities? Isn’t that just medieval superstitious mishegoss? No, unfortunately, it’s not. Satan is real and out to destroy God’s greatest creation, humankind. His favorite target? Our Jewish people.

Looking back, I realize that probably 75 percent of the people in that occult encounter group were Jewish. Just as I believe there is a God, I believe that Satan is real and seeks to destroy the Jewish people.

“Why didn’t God just kill me if He hated me so much? Why did He let this happen to me?” young Gregory silently screamed. How Greg came to believe in a God who loves him is at the heart of his autobiography.

The Hebrew Scriptures specifically warn us against dabbling in the occult: “There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer [practitioner of the dark arts] or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the Lord.” Deuteronomy 18:10-12

Below the surface were the unanswered questions, “Who am I? Can I know God? What follows death? Can I have the positive assurance that my sins are forgiven?”

He asked if I wanted to pray. I replied, “Sure, where’s the prayer book?” “You don’t need one,” he explained. “Just talk to God from your heart.” I folded my arms across my chest, looked upwards, and said, “God, I don’t know who You are. But I’m tired of doing it by myself, so You have a go.”

Josh Leon lives and works in the Orthodox community. One of the things he enjoys most is plowing through the rabbinic texts and discovering what he believes is more evidence that Jesus fulfilled the messianic expectations of his Jewish people.

Today’s threat from ISIS is not the first time Israel has faced radical fundamentalism from Syria. The modern-day fundamentalism is a flash forward of what the prophet Daniel predicted (and which came to pass in the second century b.c.). But today’s existential threat to Israel is building to a far greater crisis.

In these times of stress and uncertainty, many people rely on one another to feel supported, holding onto each other for strength. But it is difficult to grip the arm of your friend when the ground seems to be shaking underneath your feet. For the few of us in Israel who believe in Yeshua, we know that the only thing reliable and strong enough to hold us is the Lord.

Afer Yoel and his five siblings, all born in the U.S., made aliyah with their mom and dad, he and his brother Dan served in an elite unit in the IDF, where both have narrowly escaped death in combat. Yoel, a Messianic Jew, shares his story and reflects on the difficult subject of God’s protection in battle.

A review of Future Hope, a book by David Brickner, executive director of Jews for Jesus and a fifth-generation Jewish believer in Jesus. Brickner examines prophecies in the Scriptures concerning end times and tells how it is possible to have confidence and hope as these climactic and catastrophic world events unfold.

“Why on this night do we only eat matzah?” It really is the million-dollar question. Why do we have to eat this dry, crumbly bread for eight nights?

I was excited to be heading to the West Coast to visit my older brother Steve. My dad had returned to New York with the good news that Steve had found a place with a nice Jewish landlady who would “keep an eye on him.”

I remember watching the closing moments of The Prince of Egypt, Stephen Spielberg’s animated telling of the Exodus story. Moses descends Mount Sinai carrying the Ten Commandments on two stone tablets, and uplifting music plays as the movie ends.

Humanity has brought sin into the world, resulting in estrangement from God, our own selves, one another and nature. We are no longer who God intended us to be—whether we identify as male, female, or one of Facebook’s 58 genders.

Sexuality is a core aspect of our identity and a part of the basis upon which we interact with others and even God Himself.

A Jewish believer in Jesus pens a heartfelt letter to his sister, who is a lesbian.

Set Free from the Gay Lifestyle I am Jewish by birth. But I was not raised in the traditions of Judaism. I did not attend Hebrew school or synagogue. The only time God was mentioned around the house was as a swear word. My mom and dad were atheists, though they had a...

The Hebrew Scriptures predicted the specific events of the Hanukkah story hundreds of years before they occurred.

Some years Hanukkah and Christmas collide. But what is the spiritual connection between the two holidays?

‘Twas the night before Chrismukkah, when all through the house…

As a young rabbi, Isaac Lichtenstein (1825–1908) reprimanded a young man for showing him a Bible containing a New Testament, took the book from him, and put it on a corner shelf. Thirty years later Lichtenstein opened the book… and it changed his life.

The Bible not only speaks of an end to this world, but also of a new beginning—a new heaven and a new earth. While the Hebrew Scriptures allude to this new world, the New Testament describes it in great detail.

My Jewish friend told me that he had found his Judaism and the God of Judaism at that church. He was now, for the first time, truly proud and excited to be Jewish. I was shocked but curiously intrigued.

When I was diagnosed with cancer, my mother said to me, “Why you, Susan?” I remember replying, “Why not me? Would it be better if it were someone else’s daughter?

Jews who believed in Jesus got no “exemption” from the Holocaust.

About 300 members of the Beth El Congregation of Hebrew Christians in Warsaw died in the Holocaust, including Leon Rosenberg’s daughter and her husband.

Bazyli Jocz, a Jewish believer in Jesus who worked with the Church’s Ministry among Jewish People (CMJ) in Warsaw, Poland, was betrayed to the Gestapo and shot.

It is estimated that as many as ten percent of the Jews in Nazi Germany believed in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah. And they suffered and went to their deaths along with their fellow Jews.

Until she began teaching about the Holocaust at Christian colleges and universities, author Judith Mendelsohn Rood had no idea that many of the Jews killed in the Holocaust were professing Christians.

We each have a paradigm through which we view our Jewish experience. What’s yours?

We all bring certain assumptions to the paradigm through which we view our Jewish experience.

When a rabbi told him that he didn’t have to believe in God, Shimon Eitan became even more confused about Judaism.

The enigmatic musician has had much to say about Jesus in song and in interviews.

Bob Dylan’s lyrics give us some insight into his religious beliefs.

It’s not every day that a musician who played with famous big bands ends up becoming a rabbi.

In 1963, 16-year-old British singing sensation Helen Shapiro was so popular that the Beatles were her opening act on tour!

A California girl moves to England to pursue her passion to play rock and roll; then everything falls apart.

Young Israeli musician causes a stir on national television when she says she is a follower of Yeshua (Jesus).

Lex Rofex, who writes for Jewschool, interviewed Aaron Trank of Jews for Jesus to find out just exactly what a Messianic Jew is, anyway.

Paul Liberman’s The Fig Tree Blossoms: Messianic Judaism Emerges has sold over 100,000 copies. ISSUES interviews Liberman, who was at the forefront of that movement in the 1970s.

Someone has already taken the blame for all of our wrongdoing. But we must acknowledge him as God’s scapegoat, the atonement for our sins.

When a third of Jewish Americans born after 1980 describe themselves as having no religion, how many of us will make an appearance at temple for the High Holidays this year?

A young Jewish man who loved arguing about religion was ready to dismantle the arguments of Jews for Jesus.

World-renowned chemist James Tour, a Jew who believes in Jesus, says that science has served to strengthen, not weaken, his faith.

A famous Jewish chemist made the most important discovery of his life when he opened up the New Testament.

What does the Bible say about human cloning or any technology that threatens to destroy life on its way to achieving a “greater good”?

ISSUES interviews Nancy Ellen Abrams, author of A God That Could be Real: Spirituality, Science, and the Future of our Planet.

Lise Meitner, who helped discover nuclear fission in 1938, was as shocked as the rest of the world when the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

 The Jewish people have always had opponents, because God’s plans have always had an opponent, one whom the Scriptures call the adversary. 

 The real evil behind anti-Semitism is that the Jewish people have been blamed for the earth’s woes throughout the centuries, but they are actually the solution to the earth’s problems. 

Anti-Semitism threatens the foundations of the Christian faith and undermines the saving message of the gospel.

 Many Jewish people are afraid to open the New Testament because of what so-called “Christians” have done in the name of Jesus. 

 A young man encounters virulent anti-Semitism in college, but discovers that Christians who truly follow Jesus love the Jewish people. 

A seemingly harmless game of cards in high school led to a long-term gambling addiction…

A young man wonders if his life of dropping out and drugs has left him totally without hope…

One area that always got the best of Karol was food, which had become an addiction and obsession.

When Harry Chapin led the crowd in singing a Christmas carol, this young Jewish woman found herself crying unexpectedly.

“My Jewish husband doesn’t believe in Jesus, so how can I find spiritual harmony in our case?”

Who is the One who can unite us during the Hanukkah/Christmas season?

If Jesus is the Messiah, maybe instead of Chinese food and comedy, we should think about celebrating his birth in Jewish style.

Historically speaking, Jews and fashion proved to be the perfect match.

No matter what a person wears, to the Almighty, haute couture is irrelevant.

New York Fashion Week and Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, can find themselves tangled together in a ball of devotion and duty.

Susan Salzman, now the rebbetzin at Beth Messiah Congregation in Livingston, New Jersey, once worked in the heart of the fashion industry in New York City.

God spoke to me just as clearly as in a conversation you might have with your friend over a cup of coffee.

Prayer doesn’t have to be formal or fancy; it’s a conversation with God.

Jealous of the peace he saw in Christians, Barry B. was afraid he would be betraying his people – until he met a Jewish believer in Jesus.

The son of an SS officer, Werner Oder is now grateful to God for the privilege of standing for Israel and the Jews in a world of increasing anti-Semitism.

In some cases, Holocaust survivors have not even told their children they are Jewish. I am one of those children.

Knitting is just a hobby for me. But in the Nazi death camp of Sobibor in Eastern Poland, knitting saved several Jewish women from death.

The New Testament should resonate with us Jews, not least because it reflects Jewish core values that are part of Jewish life to this day.

Tikkun olam has become a favorite Hebrew catch phrase for repairing the world. But this is not possible until our own hearts are repaired. Is there someone who can do that?

The Hanukkah-Thanksgiving Connection: Who Knew? Picture this. You and your extended family – aunts, uncles, cousins, parents and grandparents – are gathered for a meal. The table is beautifully set, and a huge feast has been prepared. Many wonderful smells...

Delivered from Fear: a Jewish Thanksgiving Story I know that most people don’t think of Thanksgiving as a Jewish holiday. But I always will. That’s because during Thanksgiving weekend 1973, I experienced the most wonderful, most mind-boggling—and most...

The Mathematics of the Holiday Collision Hanukkah 2013 was quite literally a once-in-a-lifetime event. That’s because the first night of Hanukkah, November 27, will fall the night before Thanksgiving. So the first day of Hanukkah will fall on Thanksgiving Day....

Watch an exciting episode of our animated feature, “Kosher Joe: Do you Believe in Chrismukkah?” And find a great recipe for latkes (to serve with your Thanksgiving turkey!).

If anyone was a skeptic about Jews believing in Jesus, I was. Born to second-generation Jewish American parents in Brooklyn, I experienced much anti-Semitism growing up in the 1950s and ’60s. Since my persecutors weren’t Jewish, I assumed they were Christian. When I was fourteen, there was talk that a certain Jewish family in my neighborhood had converted to Christianity. I was filled with disgust. How could Jews do such a thing?

Many Jewish refugees from Russia settled in Omaha, Nebraska, between the 1880s and World War I. Among them were Debbie Landers’ grandparents. Landers, born Deberah Schwartz in Omaha in 1951, and her younger sister were raised Orthodox by their parents. The...

A motorcycle accident at age 28 left David Farber with one functioning limb—his right arm—and one functioning eye and ear. But it didn’t deter his passion for travel and photography. He has journeyed to Alaska and Africa to photograph everything from moose to...

“The greatest hindrance to creativity,” says painter and photographer Will Rosenberg, “is worrying what others think. If you walk into a kindergarten class and say, ‘Who here is an artist?’ every kid will raise their hand. A couple of...

This Burger Comes with Matzah Ball Soup Judy Burger - Dorothy Gish Judy Burger - Gloria Swanson Judy Burger - Helen Keller, Anne Sullivan, Helen Keller Museum in Tuscumbia, Alabama Judy (Joseph) Burger has seen a lot of the United States – much of it by accident. At...

Shelley Skoropinski, 63, was raised in a Conservative Jewish home in Philadelphia. She grew up in a Jewish neighborhood and was bat mitzvah. Her father, Irvin Korotkin, passed away when Shelley was sixteen. Her older sister, Lana, read the New Testament and at age 21...

Rebecca Redinger, 26, grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, in a Messianic Jewish home in which both her Jewish mother and gentile father believed in Jesus. They raised Rebecca and her siblings to know both Yeshua (Jesus) and their Jewish background. She came to believe in...

Heather Silverman, 24, who lives in Columbus, Ohio, grew up in a Messianic Jewish home. Her father is the leader of a Messianic congregation. She says she began to truly follow Yeshua (Jesus) when she was eighteen. “My grandfather and father always had a camera...

Seeing Jesus through the Jewish Lens My parents are Jewish. I grew up in a Jewish neighborhood in New York and attended Hebrew day school. When I was in the second grade, my parents realized I was falling behind other children my age in reading and math. They decided...

David Philipson, 29, was born in North Carolina and currently resides in Southern California. He grew up in a home where both his Jewish mother and gentile father believed in Jesus, and David came to believe in him at a very young age. “I grew up with a ton of...

I was born into a beautiful Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York, in 1953. My father was a research chemist and my mother a writer. As a child, I was inquisitive about everything and asked all the impossible questions. My parents, I soon realized, did not have all the...

As in the ancient days of the Pharaoh, my mother’s family was forced to flee from Egypt in 1952, a time when Jews were hated and feared there as Israel’s statehood became a fact. The “promised land” to our family was Paris, France. There my...

Meaning of birth Buddhism We are reborn from a previous life until we reach nirvana (extinction of all desire and release from suffering). Hinduism We are reborn from a previous life until we realize our oneness with Brahman. The cycle of death and rebirth is called...

Yoga has steadily gained cachet in the West over the last fifty years. It is found in high school gym class. It was part of a family-geared Easter Sunday event on the White House front lawn in 2010, not to mention health clubs in some of our Jewish community centers....

I’m Jewish and I believe in Jesus. So I’ve often been asked: So … why’d you switch teams? You belonged to the Jewish people, you had a great thing going for you — why did you go over to the “other side”? The side of the Christians,...

My parents, Sy and Frieda Gardner, who have passed now, were both Jewish. My mother was raised in an Orthodox home and said we were descended from the priestly Levites. Her mother and father spoke Yiddish and English, kept a kosher kitchen, regularly attended...

I am gentile and my husband, Barry, is Jewish. Both of us believe in Jesus. Barry’s parents, Sy and Frieda, tolerated Barry’s faith but did not like to discuss it. Frieda was terminally ill with ovarian cancer, and my mother wanted Frieda and Sy to know...

Born in Brooklyn, New York, Herb Opalek was raised in an Orthodox Jewish home which boasts many rabbis in the family tree. He attended Hebrew day school and by age ten was fluent in both modern and ancient Hebrew. He had a near photographic memory and wangled quite a...

By Marylee Shrider Rebecca Gottesman moved to California from New York a half century ago, but her hard-boiled upbringing is still evident in her New Jersey accent and countless stories of an age gone by. “I grew up on the lower east side of Manhattan in a...

Many of us who believe in Jesus (especially those of us who are Jewish) hear from our non-believing friends and relatives that he is “only a crutch.” Robert Rosett, a family physician in California, remembers the first time, as a child, that he asked his...

I was born into a middle class, Jewish American family, which would have made me a princess except my father was a florist, not a doctor. We celebrated the traditional Jewish holidays in a superficial way. While I was taught there was a God, I never really knew him....

I was born in Chicago, Illinois, on September 23, 1949, to a Jewish mother and gentile father. When I was two, they divorced. My mother, Harriet, was very liberal and not very interested in Judaism. She cooked bacon, ham and sausage. She read the Bhagavad Gita and...

Renouncing the Stigma of Mental Illness “It’s said that people with mental illness face a double-edged sword,” writes Margarita Tartakovsky. “Not only do they have to contend with serious, disruptive symptoms, they still have to deal with...

I was born a normal healthy Jewish child on November 17, 1963, in Huntington, New York, the youngest of three daughters. And while my childhood memories include receiving presents on Hanukkah, enjoying shul on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur and our family seder on the...

Tending the Garden of Life? “Is the environment a Jewish concern?” asks Rabbi Eric Lankin, chief of institutional advancement and education for the Jewish National Fund. “Under tikkun olam, we have an obligation and need to restore the broken world....

The world is meant to decay, or perhaps, is destined for it. Even the best and most qualified efforts to sustain our environment must be tempered by the realization that sustainability will not bring permanence.

Dan Sered grew up in Herziliya, Israel, and came to believe in Jesus while a university student in the States. He lives in Israel with his wife, Dinah, and their three children. What were you taught about Zionism growing up in the Israeli school system? Zionism, just...

I was only five years old and had no idea what was going on as our family crowded into my grandparents’ living room on the day before Yom Kippur. I can still remember how my father picked up a chicken, tied up by its feet, and swung it over our heads, the...

As my husband, Stewart, says, we met while I was on staff with Jews for Jesus in the summer of 1984 in New York City. We were both handing out pamphlets—Stewart with another organization called Chosen People—in front of Bloomingdales on 59th Street in New York City....

Stewart and Susan Weinisch encountered a number of obstacles on their way to believing in Yeshua (Jesus). Here are some of the ideas they had to confront: “Christians hate Jews.” This is what Stewart’s father told him, and many people do point to...

Performing music is in my genes. My father, Max, was in vaudeville. My mother, Millie, taught piano. But I could never have guessed the path on which my music would lead me. I was born in Brooklyn on June 30, 1940. My father’s father came from Kiev. He was a rabbi....

Dan’s Story I was born Dan David Aronovich in the Ukraine on December 28, 1977, but I go by Dan David. I have a younger brother, Ron, who is now a surgeon. My family moved to Israel when I was a year and a half. We were not religious Jews, but we celebrated the...

How a nice, Jewish country music-singing girl from Long Island came to a crossroads. Stage fright led her to consider a huge taboo in her family and community: Jesus.

  You probably knew that Handel’s oratorio is about Jesus. But, perhaps because it is usually sung at Christmas time, music lovers may forget a few important facts. Like the fact that Jesus is Jewish. And that the Jewish prophets predicted the coming of the Messiah,...

Jazz pianist Joel Weiskopf, 49, has performed with jazz greats such as Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan, Anita O’Day and Clark Terry. He has recorded CDs with renowned jazz musicians such as John Patitucci and Brian Blade for the highly-respected Criss Cross jazz...

The Serious Business of Storytelling

Andrew Klavan is the author of such internationally bestselling novels as True Crime, filmed by and starring Clint Eastwood, and Don’t Say A Word, made into a film starring Michael Douglas. Klavan has been nominated for the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award five times and has won twice. His books have been translated around the world.

Read the lead article to see what Jewish novelist Andrew Klavan says about Jesus. Sholem Asch (1880-1957), who wrote in Yiddish, was one of the most famous Jewish writers of his day. He wrote historical novels about New Testament themes; his Nazarene in 1939 propelled...

by Joe Glauberg I remember my high school science teacher telling me, “You’ll never be a scientist.” When I protested, citing my excellent grades in science and math, he replied, “Joe, you’ve got show business in your blood.” I...

You don’t have to be Jewish to play a part in the stage production of The Diary of Anne Frank. But it helps. Mark Friedlander played the role of Henk Gies who, with his wife Miep, hid the Frank family from the Nazis. Most of the cast was not Jewish. So when they...

Somewhere right now someone is watching David Suchet portray Agatha Christie’s famous Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot. An estimated 600-700 million people watch the television series worldwide. The reruns get better ratings than many new programs. Suchet has...

Outside, she could hear the matches scratching. As the village around them exploded in flames, the Nazis attempted to set the last house alight. Within these walls, Maria Weinstein huddled in the embrace of her newly adopted family. There, amid the chaos, Jew and gentile united as one family in fervent prayer.

Vera Schlamm One of the questions I was asked frequently when I first came to this country is: Was it really as bad in the camps as they say in the news?” Now the question is: “Was it as bad as was shown in films such as ‘The Hiding Place’ or...

by David...

The following excerpt is from the Messianic Family Haggadah.* This haggadah retains the essential elements of the traditional seder service, but weaves in some New Testament understandings that explain the Passover/Jesus connection. The Three Symbols of Passover...

Learn how Jesus spent his last week leading up to Passover, culminating in his death and resurrection.