Scot McKnight has a good blog post today criticizing Israel’s brutality in Gaza this past month. He also takes the opportunity to respond to his “hate mail” (why don’t I ever receive hate mail?) from fellow Christians (why is anyone claiming to be a Christian sending hate mail?) condemning him for failing to support Israel as he should.
Scot’s response is spot on. Here is an excerpt, but I do recommend reading it all at his blog, Jesus Creed:
“It was a shameful thing for evangelical pastors to be celebrating the opening of the embassy in Jerusalem while just a few miles away the Israeli army was killing dozens of Palestinian protesters against Israeli policies. (The death toll stood at 60 as of Tuesday, Palestinian officials said, and more than 1,700 people had been hospitalized.) It’s shameful, not only because they use their theology to make the moving of the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem a matter of “eternal” significance, but also because they refuse to hold the Netanyahu government accountable for Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, some of whom are themselves evangelical Christians.
“Do I fear being cursed by God for saying that it was a shameful thing for these two pastors to join in the celebration at the opening of the Jerusalem embassy? No, because those who so easily invoke that ancient promise fail to think about what it covers. I do want God to “bless” Israel, as did the ancient prophets who regularly delivered divine messages to their compatriots.
“But those prophets never called for an uncritical acceptance of whatever happened to be the current policies and practices of Israel’s leaders. Here, for example, is a typical one of those ancient messages from the Lord: “So I will come to put you on trial. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive the foreigners among you of justice” (Malachi 3:5)…”
It is absolutely shocking that ‘evangelical’ Christian’s are so ignorant of the horrors happening in Israel against Palestinians.
Ann, I agree with you 100%. If you scan my blog, you will notice that I write about this problem fairly often. I am also hoping that my next book will be about this issue and the many, many mistakes “evangelicals” make in supporting Israel as staunch Christian Zionists. Thanks for your comment.