Category Archives: evangelism

February 3, 2020 · 6:00 AM

I am excited about 2020—are you?

Shalom in our Messiah!

Happy New Year! Your Mission to the Jewish People is now entering our 126th year of ministry. We had many wonderful celebrations for our 125th year including conferences, banquets, and evangelistic ministries in New York, Israel, and around the globe.

We spoke to more than 5,000 Jewish people about Jesus during our summer outreach in New York City and housed almost 2,000 young Israelis traveling in New Zealand who heard the gospel through our staff and volunteers. We also met almost 10,000 Jewish people online, many of whom asked for the free copy of our evangelistic book, Isaiah 53 Explained, in English and Hebrew!

Our I Found Shalom video testimonies were viewed by millions!

We prayed with Jewish people to receive Jesus as their Savior everywhere from New York City to Tel Aviv, as well as Jerusalem, Australia, New Zealand, Ukraine, and in many other countries around the world.

What a year, and by God’s grace we have now expanded our ministries into nineteen countries!

Last year, we took every opportunity to honor our spiritual forefathers who laid a solid and lasting foundation for Chosen People Ministries. But now, it is time to pivot toward the future and look ahead to the opportunities for Jewish evangelism in 2020 and beyond!

After all, we really do not know how much time we have until Jesus returns.

Do you believe we are in the end times? I do, and let me tell you why.

  • Israel now has the largest population of Jewish people in the world.
  • Israel is surrounded by enemies—especially the new coalition between Iran, Russia, and Syria in the north. This is especially dangerous, and we need to keep our eyes open and focus our prayers on this concerning situation.
  • Missiles continue to rain on Israel from Gaza, again funded by Iran.
  • Internally, Israel is in deep trouble because it has been unable to elect a prime minister, which creates instability within the country.

Followers of Jesus have been expecting His return at any moment since the day He ascended. I cannot imagine that Peter, Paul, and the other apostles thought it would take more than 2,000 years.  The fact that we have expected His return in every generation since the ascension does not mean we can become lax and not eagerly await His return today!

I still believe the Lord is coming soon! In fact, according to Zechariah 12:10, where the prophet tells us that Israel will ultimately look to the one who was pierced, Jerusalem needs to be in Jewish hands for this prophecy to be fulfilled. This happened, of course, in 1967!

When speaking of His return, it is true that “of that day and hour no one knows” (Matthew 24:36), but we should not ignore the obvious signs of the times!

There is a growing remnant of Jewish people in Israel and around the world starting to believe in Jesus. There are probably more Jewish believers in the world now than ever before with an increasing number of Messianic Jewish believers in the Holy Land. There are more than 150 congregations in Israel, and thousands of young Israelis are now serving the Lord….in the Land!  This is clearly a sign of His soon return in light of what Paul wrote in Romans 11:25–29!

Chosen People Ministries is in the midst of this exciting time through our ministries in Jerusalem, Ramat Gan (Tel Aviv), Galilee, and northern Israel.

I believe we need to preach the good news to the Jewish people more intensively than ever before!

Next Steps in 2020

This is exactly what your Mission to the Jewish People plans to do in 2020!

And this is why we are initiating our To the Jew First Campaign, based upon Romans 1:16, where Paul said, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”

We will focus on three critical areas:

Israel

We are intensifying our outreach in the Holy Land—doing more and more as the Lord enables. We hope one day soon to purchase a center in Tel Aviv. For now, renting a center in the heart of Ramat Gan, one of the largest, most populated, but unreached suburbs in Israel. This has been an exciting venture as we continue to reach younger and more secular Israelis each week through our concerts, Bible studies, evangelistic lectures, and Sabbath dinners.

There were almost forty people who are not yet believers at our last outreach Sabbath dinner, along with protestors standing outside the doors of our little center in Ramat Gan!

We now have more than twenty staff serving the Lord in Israel, and most of them are native Israelis. Our efforts among Holocaust survivors, children’s camps, congregational planting, and much more is all going well!  Thank you for your prayers and for your ongoing support for this work in Israel.

Opportunities Online

We are maximizing the use of digital media in Israel, the United States, and around the globe for the gospel.

We now have more than one hundred testimonies of Jewish believers online.

Our Isaiah 53 campaign continues, and we are meeting lots of Jewish seekers online!  The campaign costs about five dollars per book, including advertising and shipping costs.

This year we will send out more than 10,000 Hebrew Isaiah 53 Explained books to Israelis!

We also developed a full range of online discipleship Bible studies so Jewish people seeking the Lord can study the Bible and grow in their faith once they become believers.

The Joshua Initiative

Finally, we are increasing our efforts around the globe to train young believers to serve the Lord.

This is what we call the Joshua Initiative.

This includes those seriously studying the Word of God and learning more about Jewish evangelism at our Charles L. Feinberg Seminary program in Brooklyn. Thank God, our beloved supporters enabled us to purchase the Feinberg Center’s facility without debt!

You can tell how excited I am about entering 2020 and beginning our 126th year of Jewish ministry!

I would rather be disappointed if He does not come today, tomorrow, or even this year. I still believe we need to do all we can with the greatest sense of urgency to proclaim the gospel to both Jews and Gentiles each and every day.

So, call me a fanatic!  I suppose I am and if you want to know why, please watch my testimony on our I Found Shalom web site and you will know why!

Please join me with your prayers and efforts in reaching out to a dark and broken world—to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.

Have a Happy New Year and know that our staff loves and appreciates you. We could not do all we do without your partnership.

Blessings in 2020—however long we have to enjoy it!

Your brother and fellow fanatic,

Mitch (Romans 1:16)

 

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January 15, 2020 · 12:21 PM

To the Jew First

Your Mission to the Jewish People has experienced more than 125 years of the
Lord’s loyalty and love! We have enjoyed a wonderful year of joyous celebration.
On November 15, we concluded our year of gratitude with a banquet in Brooklyn,
the birthplace of our ministry. We heard from Jay Sekulow, founder of the American Center for Law and Justice, and Janet Parshall of Moody Radio. Chosen People Ministries’ staff workers in Israel, former board members such as John Holbrook, as well as friends of our ministry including Ken Barun of the Billy Graham Association and Wayne Hilsden of the Fellowship of Israel Related Ministries (FIRM) gave testimonies of God’s transforming power through Chosen People Ministries in the lives of Jewish people worldwide. Finally, we “met” Leopold Cohn himself, our founder, through the one-man dramatic presentation by staff member Alan Shore.

Very Humble Origins

Chosen People Ministries was founded by Rabbi Leopold Cohn, who came to
the United States from Hungary in 1892. Not long after he arrived, he heard a Polish Presbyterian missionary and preacher on the Lower East Side of Manhattan proclaiming the gospel inside a Dutch Reformed Church. Once the Lord captured the rabbi’s heart, he committed himself to a lifelong ministry of reaching Jewish people with the gospel. Years of reports indicate that Rabbi Cohn had baptized almost 1,000 Jewish people before his death in 1937! His second eldest son, Joseph, led the Mission until his passing in 1953. Harold Pretlove, Daniel Fuchs, Harold Sevener, and Sam Nadler all faithfully led Chosen People Ministries, and in 1997, I became the mission’s seventh president.

Personally speaking, I know the significance of Chosen People Ministries. The
Mission discipled me, paid my way through Bible college, provided opportunities to serve the Lord, and has equipped me with the skills to lead and enable others to share Jesus with their Jewish friends and family.

My wife, Zhava, was raised in a Jewish home in Argentina and moved to Los Angeles with her family as a young teenager. She came to faith through the work of a Chosen People Ministries missionary. This missionary trained a group of Korean Christian teens to proclaim the gospel to Jewish people, and they shared the good news with their classmate, my wife.

As president of Chosen People Ministries for twenty-two years, I am excited as ever about the growth and potential of the mission. The world is changing dramatically and the Jewish community is too. Chosen People Ministries is changing as well, and its relevance continues today.

Yet, along with all the dynamism of change, the biblical essentials of the Mission remain the same as in the days of Rabbi Cohn! The board, leadership, and staff remain committed to the unchanging gospel best expressed in 1 Corinthians 15:3-4, where the Apostle Paul wrote:

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures….”

Our strategies, methods, and tactics are changing in order to reach a new generation of Jewish people with the gospel, but the message remains the same. The writer of Hebrews declared: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8).

My dear friends, we need your prayers more than ever to help us, support us, and love our people and ministry. Your partnership enables us to accomplish our calling. We are serving the Lord among Jewish people in more than twenty-five cities in North America and nineteen countries around the world. As we step into our 126th year of ministry, we are ready to serve Jesus the Messiah by initiating a Romans 1:16 “To the Jew First” campaign in 2020.

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December 6, 2019 · 11:41 AM

Jesus is the Reason for the Season

Shalom in the great name of Jesus our Messiah.

Can I tell you a very personal Jewish Christmas story?

I was raised in a traditional Jewish home in New York City. I was born in what I like to call the true Holy Land—Brooklyn, New York! Both of my parents were Jewish and fairly typical of their post-Holocaust generation. Although my mom was more religious than my dad, they were both very committed to their Jewishness and, as a family, we celebrated all of the Jewish holidays.

Hanukkah was, without a doubt, my favorite holiday. This eight-day festival of lights celebrates the great victory of the Jewish people over the Greco-Syrian “madman” Antiochus Epiphanes. We celebrated the holiday by lighting candles for eight days and by giving gifts to one another on each night. And there were the holiday foods—potato pancakes dipped in applesauce or sour cream and delicious jelly donuts, called sufganiyot—mmm!

Sound great? Family, friends, gifts, and very unhealthy food. There is nothing like it!

In New York City, Hanukkah menorahs or beautifully decorated Christmas trees grace the windows of homes and apartment buildings. It always gets dark early in New York around this time of year, so it is easy to see which holiday the families are celebrating.

I was raised as a Hanukkah loyalist, which I equated with allegiance to my Jewish people. When I began considering the gospel, I thought I would have to choose between Christmas and Hanukkah. At that time, I thought if I accepted Jesus and agreed to celebrate Christmas then I would be a traitor to my heritage and might be committing a version of ethnic suicide by believing in Jesus and observing His birthday.

Yet, God was working in my heart, and I was drawn to Him through the transformed lives of my two closest friends who had become believers in Jesus. It was still very hard to make the leap because I thought this decision would mean I was no longer Jewish. How would I ever explain this to my family?

I began reading the New Testament seriously and soon discovered that even Jesus celebrated Hanukkah, or the Feast of Dedication, as recorded in John chapter 10. At the heart of the holiday is the celebration of God’s deliverance of the Jewish people from those who oppress and persecute us. I also found out that the Old Testament, my Jewish Bible, predicted that the Messiah would actually be God in the flesh. Therefore, the whole idea of the incarnation was not foreign to Judaism but was there all the time in my Jewish Bible.

So, I embraced Jesus as my Messiah and discovered that it was possible to be Jewish and believe in Jesus.

You might ask, “What holiday do you celebrate now?” Both, of course! Why give away eight presents for one when you could have nine? Seriously, what greater present could even come close to the gift of eternal life resulting from a personal relationship with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob through Jesus the Messiah? Over the years, I discovered that it is easy to be Jewish and believe in Jesus. It is like the proverbial “hand and glove,” as Jesus is the fulfillment of all my people’s hopes and dreams. He is the Deliverer and Redeemer we are waiting for.

He is Messiah, Savior, and Lord. The son of Abraham and David, and the Son of God. As the great prophet Isaiah predicted, “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel” (Isaiah 7:14).

The prophet continued,

For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; and the government will rest on His shoulders; and His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this (Isaiah 9:6–7).

JEWISH EVANGELISM IN THE 21ST CENTURY

And now I have the joy of serving as the seventh president of our 125-year-old mission to the Jewish people, and we are about to begin our 126th year of faithful service among the Jewish people. Thousands of Jewish people have come to faith through the energetic, visionary, and faithful staff of Chosen People Ministries.

And we could not have done this without your faithful prayers and support.

THE ROMANS 1:16 TO THE JEW FIRST CAMPAIGN

During the next 12 months, we want to continue focusing on three special areas of ministry. Let me briefly tell you what they are now, and I will explain further in the months ahead.

ISRAEL

We are pouring financial and human resources into ministry among Israelis. Our twenty-five full-time workers in Israel are reaching Israelis day in and day out. We are also reaching Israelis as they travel after their army duty. We have been touching lives everywhere from the Upper West Side of Manhattan to countries such as New Zealand and India. Soon we will be starting a new ministry among Israelis traveling through Brazil. These young people are incredibly open, especially when they are away from home. Also, we are able, with a good-sized staff in Israel, to follow up with those who show interest in the gospel when they return home from overseas.

DIGITAL EVANGELISM

We are also investing heavily in the modern “Mars Hill” of digital evangelism through websites, video creation, and social media. God is leading us to thousands of Jewish people each year who we meet through the web and who are interested in the gospel. It is not cheap, but it is absolutely worth it. We have spoken now to tens of thousands of people through these ministries!

THE NEXT GENERATION

We are looking toward the future and providing training for the next generation of missionaries to the Jewish people. With a track record of 125 years of faithful service for the Lord, we fully understand the importance of passing the torch to the next generation. In light of this, we are continuing to train young people through our Charles L. Feinberg Center for Messianic Jewish Studies seminary program in Brooklyn. We are investing in the next generation of Israeli leaders through our Living Waters mentoring program in Israel and around the world via our global young adult conference, Muchan (Hebrew for “ready”), usually held in Europe. We are also providing a variety of internships and extending our outreach among Jewish students. We call this next generation effort The Joshua Initiative because we want to raise up a new generation of leaders like Joshua who will serve the Lord faithfully with courage and power (Joshua 1:5–6).

We can do this because of Him and your partnership and prayers.

YOUR FAITHFULNESS

May Jesus, the joy and reason for the season, fill your home with warmth, happiness, and grace during the holidays. I want to thank you for supporting Chosen People Ministries. You are an important part of our ministry family.

We are now serving in nineteen countries around the world and in twenty-five cities throughout North America. As we wrap up our 125th year of celebration and begin 2020, I cannot help but reflect upon His faithfulness, the amazing things He has done, and how much we have expanded the ministry, even this year. We want to be ready for tomorrow. And, by God’s grace, I believe if we embrace the opportunities of the New Year together, arm in arm, following in the Savior’s footsteps, we will.

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah!

Because God became flesh,
Mitch

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November 16, 2019 · 11:00 AM

A Vision for the Next Generation

Dear friends,

Shalom in His grace and Happy Thanksgiving. I am sure you are grateful for all the Lord has done in your life and in the life of your friends and family.

Years ago, I did my master’s thesis in seminary on Psalm 119. I examined the supposed synonyms for the Hebrew word Torah (Law) in this lengthy psalm of 176 verses! I concluded that the various terms that seemed to be interchangeable with Law—commandments, testimonies, judgments, etc.—were actually different parts of the corpus of the Law and not merely synonyms. It was a fascinating study and I learned to love the Word of God even more than before! But one of the added benefits of the project was that I regularly had to pass through Psalm 118 to get there!

Psalm 118, which invites us to thank God for His lovingkindness and mercy, and for His person, is quite different from Psalm 119, which teaches us to appreciate God’s Word. The two psalms are fairly close in theme and are great portions of Scripture to read and reflect upon during the Thanksgiving Day meal. Of course, if you read all of Psalm 119, your turkey might get cold!

David writes regarding the Law, the true love of his life:

O how I love Your law! It is my meditation all the day (119:97).

How sweet are Your words to my taste! Yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth (119:103).

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path (119:105).

Therefore I love Your commandments above gold, yes, above fine gold (119:127).

These are beautiful words and an invitation from the King to feast on Scripture and not just on mom’s delicious sweet potato casserole! I find myself grateful for His provision of the Bible as I am able to better understand the will and mind of God and be guided by His Word to live according to His holy plans and purposes.

I am thankful for the Word of God and the beauty of His person.

His nature is also revealed in Scripture and by His Spirit in my everyday experience. As the psalmist penned, “Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; for His lovingkindness is everlasting” (Psalm 118:1).

I rejoice this Thanksgiving because of Him. He is good and He is gracious! The Hebrew term chesed, translated lovingkindness, should be understood as “covenant loyalty.” I am grateful He is a loyal God who cares for His children. And further, His grace and loyalty to me and to the Jewish people extends throughout eternity.

125 Years of Service for the Lord on Behalf of the Jewish People

Your Mission to the Jewish People has experienced 125 years of this loyalty and love! In fact, we only have one more month to go in our celebration of 125 years of ministry to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. It has been a wonderful year of joyous celebration. On November 15, we concluded our year of gratitude with a gala in Brooklyn, where we were born as a ministry. We heard from Jay Sekulow and we were blessed by Janet Parshall of Moody Radio, America’s most beloved radio host. We heard testimonies from Chosen People Ministries staff workers in Israel and Brooklyn and from friends of our ministry who were able to testify to God’s transforming power in their lives through the work of this 125-year-old ministry among the Jewish people.

Very Humble Origins

As you know, we were founded by Rabbi Leopold Cohn who came to the United States from his native Hungary in the late 19th century. Not long after he arrived, he heard a Polish Presbyterian missionary and preacher on the lower side of Manhattan proclaiming the gospel inside a Dutch Reformed Church. Once the Lord gripped the heart of the rabbi, he committed himself to the lifelong effort of reaching his fellow Jewish people with the gospel, and before his death, baptized almost 1,000 Jewish people!

I am the seventh president of the Mission and grateful to be called by God to this incredible position. I know the value of Chosen People Ministries because it was this mission that discipled me, paid my way through Bible college, and gave me opportunities to serve the Lord. Chosen People Ministries also helped me gain the skills to help others who want to tell their Jewish friends about Jesus.

My wife came to faith in Los Angeles through the work of a Chosen People Ministries missionary who trained a group of Korean Christian teens at a very Jewish high school to share the gospel with the Jewish people and, praise God, they shared the good news with my wife.

I have been president of Chosen People Ministries for twenty-two years, and am as excited as ever about the growth and potential of our ministry. Of course, you have heard the aphorism, “Today is the first day of the rest of your life!” Funny thing about this…it is true. Walking with Jesus is never static; it is always dynamic. Our world is changing, the Jewish community is changing, and Chosen People Ministries is changing, too.

We are not changing or adapting the eternal message of the gospel, although our culture pressures us to do so each day. We remain more committed to the essentials of the gospel than ever! But our strategies, methods, and tactics are changing in order to reach a new generation of Jewish people with the gospel.

Without you, we simply could not do the ministry to which God has called us. Your Mission to the Jewish People is now in more than twenty-five cities in North America and in nineteen countries around the world serving the Lord among the Jewish people.

And as we step into 2020—our 126th year of ministry—we are ready, available to God, and thankful for the opportunity to serve our Lord, Jesus the Messiah.

Three Major Focuses in 2020 and Beyond

After a long season of prayer, planning, and discussions with our staff, board, and friends, we have decided to embrace three major areas of ministry starting in 2020 and beyond.

Israel

First of all, we are going to do all we can to reach Israel with the gospel. There are more than six and a half million Jewish people in Israel, and more are moving there all the time. Israelis are now more open to Jesus than ever before. I believe that it is the time to strike while the iron is hot—we are increasing our staff and establishing congregations and centers all across the country. We now have ministries in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and in the northern part of the country among young adults, children, Holocaust survivors, and more! We have more than twenty staff members serving the Lord in the Holy Land.

Digital and Social Media

We are using the power of digital and social media for His glory. We want to focus on evangelism, discipleship, and building community online for those who come to faith. We are having good success through our Facebook campaigns that engage people with Isaiah 53 and a new discipleship series entitled Follow Messiah. Soon, we will roll out other websites like Chosen People Answers, an almost encyclopedic apologetics website for Jewish people that I believe will revolutionize Jewish evangelism.

The Joshua Initiative

We are also investing in the next generation of Messianic Jews and leaders in the field of Jewish missions. This is why we started the Feinberg Seminary program in Brooklyn almost fifteen years ago, which has graduated thirty students, most of whom are serving the Lord in Jewish ministry. We are discipling new Jewish believers and helping them become part of our congregations and centers. We will also intensify our efforts on college campuses and emphasize children’s ministries through camping and providing educational resources. What a joy it is for us to train young people for the Lord.

The Future Is Bright for Israel and the Jewish People

According to the Apostle Paul in Romans 11:25–29, a day is coming when all Israel will be saved. But until then, please join me in praying, supporting, and helping us reach God’s beloved chosen people with the unchanging message of salvation through the death and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah.

On behalf of our staff, I cannot thank you enough for your faithfulness in response to His faithfulness.

Thankful to the Lord and for you.

Mitch

“Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation” (Romans 10:1).

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November 1, 2019 · 8:00 AM

We live in exciting times!

Dear friends,

Shalom in His peace.

We are excited and energized by new ministry opportunities in 2020! Allow me to quickly share some thoughts on three trends in Jewish ministry that profoundly impact our work and that we believe will lead us forward in new and dynamic ways!

Three Significant Trends

An increase in congregations and believers in Israel

When I first went to Israel as a believer in Messiah in 1976, there were fewer than 500 Messianic Jews living in the land and just a handful of congregations, especially Hebrew-speaking ones. There were some Jewish believers who survived the Holocaust and a few who had moved from North Africa to Israel, but most of the believers were not native Israelis. They had come to Israel as believers from other parts of the globe. Some came to be part of the great Israel experiment and others came to serve the Lord in the Holy Land. Now, 70 years later, there are more than 150 congregations and upwards of 25,000 Messianic Jews, most of whom came to the Lord in Israel. 

In fact, I believe we are in the midst of a second-generation outpouring of the Spirit that has transformed the national Israeli Messianic body within the Holy Land. This movement of the Spirit has also transformed our ministry in Israel. We continue to reach younger generations of Israelis along with hundreds of elderly Holocaust survivors whom we have served for more than twenty years. 

This second generation of Jewish believers were born in Israel, speak Hebrew as their first language, were raised in Israeli schools, and served in the Israeli army. They are young, bold, Israeli through and through, and willing to give their all for Jesus the Messiah! 

This is the reason we continue our Living Waters mentoring seminar each year and why we have a newly rented center in the greater Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Gan. Each month, we organize outreach Sabbath dinners, concerts, café nights, Bible studies, reading groups for mothers and children, and so much more.

New ministry opportunities among traveling Israelis

We are also reaching post-army Israelis by meeting these wonderful young adults in places like the Upper West Side of New York City or on the South Island of New Zealand. We are also meeting them in India, Australia, Germany, South America, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China. Additionally, we are about to open up a permanent mission station in Brazil to reach these young Israelis. We are sharing the gospel with them as they hike, over a BBQ, during hummus nights, through late night chats, or while enjoying a lovely meal of traditional Chinese cuisine! 

We engaged with 3,000 Israeli travelers this year, and we will be meeting more in 2020! Let me share a couple of stories:

“The Lord gave us such a wonderful surprise last weekend: an opportunity to host Idan.* Within 30 minutes of his arrival, Idan asked, ‘Why do you host Israelis?’ We love this question because it is such a catalyst to a deeper spiritual conversation with our guests. For the next two and a half days, our conversations about Jesus, the Messiah of Israel, were frequent! We quickly realized we were not the first to share with him. The reason our conversations were possible is because Idan was processing questions from the conversations he previously had with other Christian hosts. On the morning he left, Michael shared his testimony as well as the words of his very first prayer as a believer. We were able to give him a Hebrew New Testament as well as a copy of  Isaiah 53 Explained. Please pray for Idan as he continues to stay with other believing hosts in New Zealand!”
                        —Teresa and Michael, New Zealand

“Today I got an unexpected phone call from our Israeli friend, Tom, who wanted to congratulate us on our baby girl. Carissa and I met Tom on Christmas Day 2015 at the Shelter on the Lake where we were serving and sharing the gospel with backpackers from Israel and around the world. Those three weeks we spent in Bariloche, Argentina, were transformational. I got to teach my very first Bible lesson for seeking Israelis…on Christmas Day! We saw that hiking, rock climbing, and camping are strategic opportunities for sharing the gospel. We gained experience applying what we learned in Bible school. We stayed up until 2:00 or 3:00 AM many nights with Israelis talking about spiritual things.”
        —BJ and Carissa, Backpacking Ministry

An increasing openness toward Jesus and the gospel among Jewish young people

We are surprised by the great numbers of young Jewish people from all over the world who are responding to our social media and Facebook ads, as well as engaging with our new campus ministries. A Barna survey revealed that Jewish millennials (aged 23–38) are more open than their parents to the possibility that Jesus is both Messiah and God in the flesh. We also discovered that the majority of the more than 10,000 Jewish people we met online through our digital outreach campaigns are younger. These efforts include our Isaiah 53 Explained Facebook campaign in the United States and in Israel, as well as our I Found Shalom video testimonies broadcast on YouTube and other social media platforms.

I am also very excited about our new residential outreach ministry at New York University called The House of Living Waters. NYU has the largest concentration of Jewish students in the United States. We chose four young men to live in an apartment across the street from the campus, and they are actively engaged in sharing the gospel with dozens of Jewish students.  They also collaborate with and train Christian students to share the good news with their Jewish friends. 

Some of the conversations these godly young men are having are just wonderful:

“We met Isaac,* a young freshman photography major in nearby Washington Square Park. He was drawn to the Hebrew literature on our table. We showed him prophecies related to Israel and then had him read Isaiah 53. He was not sure who it was about, but, on reflection, he said it seemed like it could be Jesus. We asked him what he thought that would mean, and he said that if his family understood this connection they would not be happy. We gave him a copy of Isaiah 53 Explained and received his email address. Hopefully we will be able to meet with him in a few weeks and hear his thoughts about the book!”

“We met Eitan,* a young performer in Washington Square Park who sang us a song. We talked a little bit about I Found Shalom and what shalom is, and he expressed interest in receiving a book and making time for coffee. We had coffee the other day and began building a rapport with him. He is not particularly interested in spiritual things, but he said that recently he has gained more respect for the Jewish traditions of his youth. We gave him a copy of Isaiah 53 Explained and asked him if he would like to come to a Sabbath dinner, and he said that he would really enjoy that! We are going to invite him for the Sabbath in the next couple of weeks, and hopefully he will come!”

All of these opportunities and the openheartedness of a new generation give me incredible hope for the future of our ministry. Such new horizons build my faith in the Word of God where Paul tells us that the day is coming when “all Israel will be saved…” (Romans 11:25–29). However, we know what we need to do until that great day. By God’s grace, we must preach the gospel and be faithful to the unchanging message of God’s grace through Jesus the Messiah. 

With love and gratitude for His faithfulness and yours,
Mitch

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October 1, 2019 · 8:00 AM

It is often lonely being a Messianic Jew

Shalom,

I recently was reminded of the importance of what we do when I attended the funeral of one of my closest relatives. It was really painful.

It is often lonely being a Messianic Jew. Most of the people I love are not yet believers. It is so difficult to watch my parents’ generation pass away, as most of my loved ones do not believe in Jesus.

So, please pray for them…and for me! It hurts.

There is constant pressure on our staff to be more “accepting” of other faiths, especially Judaism, the faith in which I was raised. Yet, I know from Scripture and personal experience that Jesus is the Messiah and is the only way to be saved and to have a personal relationship with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I am pleased to serve with our 125-year-old mission to the Jewish people because we have not lost the fire as we share the gospel day in and day out with both Jews and Gentiles.

My wife, also a Jewish believer, was led to the Lord with the help of Chosen People Ministries. We even met at a Chosen People event! I was discipled years ago by a Chosen People Ministries staff member, and the Mission paid my way through Bible college! As a couple, we are grateful to the Lord for this ministry. In fact, our service to the Lord through Your Mission to the Jewish People is simply passing along the blessings that were bestowed upon us.

Chosen People Ministries is growing and continues to make the gospel known TODAY among the Jewish people in nineteen countries around the globe and in more than two dozen cities throughout North America.

  • We are working with students through our new House of Living Waters initiative on the New York University campus, which has the largest concentration of Jewish students in our country.
  • Our Israel team is serving throughout the Holy Land—in Tel Aviv, the Galilee, and in Jerusalem. We are sharing the gospel among young adults, Holocaust survivors, and conducting children’s camps six times a year, which serve hundreds of children.
  • I just returned from a training conference we funded and sponsored for Russian Messianic Jewish pastors, which was held in Kraków, Poland and attended by 150 servants of God from the former Soviet Union, North America, and more than forty were from Israel!
  • This summer, we had more than 125 staff and volunteers sharing the gospel in the greater New York area. The teams had more than 2,500 witnessing conversations in just two weeks!
  • We also had hundreds of Jewish seekers join us for a debate between Dr. Michael Brown and Rabbi Shmuley Boteach in August. Perhaps one day many Jewish people who were impacted this summer will look back, as I now do, with gratitude to the Lord for using Chosen People Ministries to introduce them to the Messiah!
  • Our ministry through the internet has touched the lives of thousands this year. In fact, we have connected with almost 100,000 people, including thousands of Jewish seekers through our online Isaiah 53 Campaign and our I Found Shalom video testimonies of Messianic Jews, which now numbers more than 100!

Whew! I can barely keep up. God is doing so much through our dedicated and visionary staff! And you make it possible through your support and prayers.

We hoped to reach 125,000 people this year and to get their contact information for follow-up, and we are rapidly approaching this goal! We expect to reach our objective before the end of the year. Most of these contacts come from our online campaigns, though hundreds were generated from Jewish people we met on the streets of New York City during our summer outreach.

We spent the last nine months reflecting on our wonderful ministry heritage, celebrating our 125th year of work among the Jewish people.

Thank you for your prayers and support. We would have never made it to 125 years without you and previous generations of Jesus-lovers who had a big heart for Israel and the salvation of the Jewish people. Ultimately, that is what this is all about—seeing Jewish people come to a saving faith in the Messiah.

Your brother in Yeshua,
Mitch

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August 30, 2019 · 11:34 AM

Equipping Russian Jewish Believers to Share the Gospel

Dear friend in the Messiah,

Shalom in His peace. I hope you had a restful and fruitful summer and that you are ready for the flurry of activities beginning this month—kids back in school, college students back on campus, and local churches beginning their sermon series, Sunday school, and small group programs. Busy!

Thank you for taking the time to read this note and to pray for Your Mission to the Jewish People. We have an exciting upcoming ministry opportunity among a very significant Jewish community that I want to tell you about!

Training Russian Messianic Leaders

By the time you receive this letter, I will be in Kraków, Poland, which was once a great center of Jewish life and is about a 45-minute drive from Auschwitz. I am in this very beautiful city for a week to participate in a training conference attended by 150 Russian Messianic leaders. The group includes pastors of Russian Messianic Jewish congregations from all over the globe: Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Germany, and more.

It is sad that the Jewish community calls Poland the world’s largest Jewish cemetery, as about 3 million Jewish people died there at the hands of the Nazis. There were 11 million Jewish people living in Russia and Poland prior to the Holocaust, and almost half of them were murdered. It is hard to say how many were left and found themselves stranded behind the atheist Iron Curtain. Millions.

After the crumbling of the Soviet Union in the 1990s, many of the Jewish people living in these countries left for Western Europe, the United States, and Israel. Surprisingly, almost like a modern-day reenactment of Acts 2, the Spirit began moving in the lives of Russian Jews around the globe.

We have experienced an out pouring of the Holy Spirit upon Russian-speaking Jews, and tens of thousands have come to faith in Jesus the Messiah. Hundreds of Messianic congregations have been planted all over the world. Chosen People Ministries has more than forty Russian-speaking missionaries around the globe serving in those countries with large concentrations of Russian Jewish people. This movement continues, and some wonderful leaders have emerged to lead this great work of God. For example, the directors of our works in Germany and Israel are both Russian Jewish brothers. We have congregations in Moscow, Russia, and many throughout Ukraine, and it is a joy for me and for Chosen People Ministries to be a part of it.

A similar movement took place in Brooklyn. We have more than 200,000 Russian-speaking Jewish people living in the greater New York area, with the highest concentration in Brooklyn. I personally know of hundreds of Russian Jews who have come to the Lord in New York City over the last 30 years.

This global outpouring of the Spirit upon Russian Jews has not stopped! We continue in our outreach to this very special and large group of Jewish people through evangelism, discipleship, congregation planting, mentoring young leaders, and social ministries, including working with families affected by addiction and crime. In Israel, we have an amazing ministry among elderly Russian-speaking Holocaust survivors, very few of whom will be left after the next five years, making this ministry extremely urgent!

We will continue these ministries among Russian Jewish people for as long as we possibly can in the countries of the former Soviet Union, North America, and in Israel, where more than 1.6 million Russian-speaking Jews have settled since the early 1990s.

I believe this training effort in Kraków is important. In fact, we MUST train these leaders who will in turn provide leadership for thousands of Messianic Jews! 

We offer training on biblical and practical subjects, taught by those with many years of ministry experience. This is exactly what they and their congregations need right now. 

Here is just one testimony from a Russian Jewish leader who attended one of these conferences:

It is great to be a part of such a conference, as you can hear a lot of lectures, discussions, and sharing from our brothers and sisters in Christ who live in different parts of the world, learn about different situations, and pray for each other. However, the biggest blessing for me was not only to see again my old friends and co-workers for the Messiah, Jesus, but it was exciting to meet new leaders: the number of them is growing every conference. Praise the Lord for His work, it is so visible in events like this. — Klaudia

The Jewish Holidays: Your Prayers Will be Appreciated!

The Jewish community will celebrate the High Holidays in just a few short weeks. The Jewish New Year—called Rosh Hashanah in Hebrew—will begin on the evening of September 29, 2019. Ten days later we will observe the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, and conclude the season with the Feast of Tabernacles, Sukkot, which begins the evening of October 13, 2019. All of these festivals are found in Leviticus 23.

The Chosen People Ministries staff will share the gospel with many Jewish seekers who will attend our Messianic High Holiday services. Our services will point attendees to Jesus, who beautifully fulfills the holidays, which I believe are a roadmap to redemption. This coming High Holiday season, I will be celebrating my 49th year as a Jewish believer in Jesus. The Lord used these Jewish holidays, which I observed my entire life, to help me recognize that Jesus is Jewish, celebrated the Jewish holidays, and is my Messiah!

Please pray for the many Jewish non-believers who will be coming to our services. Thank you again for caring and praying!

A Fruitful Shalom New York Outreach

Meanwhile, Your Mission to the Jewish People is rejoicing over the success of our recent outreach, Shalom New York. More than 125 staff and volunteers came from all over the globe to impact thousands of lives. In fact, things are just settling down, and our follow-up teams have remained in the greater New York area to administer what I call “spiritual triage,” making sure that we are caring for those who are genuinely interested in the gospel. Please pray these contacts will be willing to meet with us individually or attend our Bible studies.

Additionally, we have rolled out our new video-based discipleship series for new Jewish believers and seekers, called “Follow Messiah.” This new follow-up tool is already working well, and we actually assign a mentor to each Jewish person who enters into the Bible study series, which is based on the Sermon on the Mount. This is the first online Bible study and discipleship series tailored specifically to new Jewish believers and seekers.

We cannot continue this work without your faithful prayers that allow us to minister and help so many, including Russian Jewish leaders in Israel and around the globe. Thank you so much for your love and concern for God’s chosen people.

Like you, I am looking forward to all that is in store in the exciting days ahead.

Your brother in Messiah,

Mitch

P.S. I hope that you might consider coming to our gala on November 15, 2019 in Brooklyn to celebrate our 125th anniversary as a ministry. If you would like more information about this event, please visit chosenpeople.com/anniversarygala.

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August 19, 2019 · 4:31 PM

Ministry Update: Shalom New York & Oppose Antisemitism

Shalom from New York City, the home of more than two million Jewish people. Throughout July and August, we have enjoyed the privilege of sharing the gospel intensively with Jewish people throughout the metropolitan area. Our team of more than 125 staff and volunteers have spoken to hundreds of Jewish people about the gospel. I wish you could have been here!

Good News from the Streets of New York City

We are in the midst of following up with the many Jewish people who indicated they are interested in hearing more about Jesus.

We also had two major events that drew many Jewish seekers. We sponsored a well-attended dialogue between scholars about the value of the Old Testament Scriptures. We also held a debate between Messianic apologist Dr. Michael Brown, and Orthodox Jewish Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. The title of the debate was, “Is the New Testament Antisemitic?” This is a hot issue in the Jewish community today as antisemitism is on the rise. The purpose of this debate was to show that the New Testament and Jesus Himself are Jewish.

Showing Jewish People the Love of the Messiah

So, how do we respond to common historical and theological objections Jewish people have from considering Jesus? This is done one heart at a time. The Apostle Paul reminds us in Romans of the critical role believers, especially those who are not Jewish, play in the salvation of individual Jewish people. The Apostle writes:

“I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they? May it never be! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them jealous” (Romans 11:11).

This passage may encourage Gentile believers to share the love of Jesus with their Jewish friends from a heart of gratitude for what God has done through the physical seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

During our recent outreach campaign in New York City, we had dozens of Gentile believers on the streets of New York City speaking to Jewish people about the Lord. They also brought food to the poor and elderly and cleaned homes for those who cannot keep up because of age or illness. Showing love in practical ways gave power and authenticity to our proclamation!

Hundreds of us also marched over the Brooklyn Bridge in an effort to call upon the public and Christians to oppose antisemitism!

Oppose Antisemitism

Christian opposition to antisemitism is a powerful witness to our Jewish family and friends. This reshapes the gospel playing field by showing from the start that real Christians love the Jewish people and condemn antisemitism.

Would you stand with us against antisemitism? Believe me, our actions as the Body of Messiah will make a difference in how the Jewish people feel about the Messiah Jesus.

Think Globally, Act Locally!

You can help put a stop to antisemitism in your community! Let me suggest a few ways to do this:

  • Educate your church on the evils of antisemitism—we have great materials on our online store.
  • Encourage your pastor to preach about this issue from the pulpit.
  • Pray for the Jewish people in your community.
  • Attend Jewish community events in order to build bridges with the Jewish people.
  • Say something if and when antisemitism arises in your community.
  • Make sure the Holocaust is taught in your local school systems and especially at Christian schools and homeschooling associations.
  • Encourage your church or Messianic congregation to teach about the history and current expressions of antisemitism from a biblical perspective.

It is critical that we make our Christian community aware of the problem and that you positively engage the Jewish community where you live so that you can build loving and respectful relationships with the Jewish people.

Our love will be used by God to create a bridge for the good news.

Partners in the Gospel

Thank you for taking the time to hear my heart for my people! I hope you will pray for the Jewish people and for Your Mission to the Jewish People as we share the good news in nineteen countries across the globe.

I pray the Jewish people in your community will take notice of your efforts to stand with them and to finally see that true Christians love the Jewish people!

Thanks for caring!

Mitch Glaser

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August 1, 2019 · 10:21 AM

Holocaust survivors experience “heaven on earth”!

Zhava and I recently returned home after being in Israel for most of June. I am amazed by the wide range of people we are reaching for Jesus in the Holy Land. Our dedicated staff of about 25 workers, most of whom are Israelis, focus on reaching students and young adults. But they also conduct children’s camps and minister to very elderly Holocaust survivors.

It reminds me of the words of the prophet Joel who told us of the marvelous things the Lord would do for Israel and the world: “…I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind; and your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions” (Joel 2:28).

God promised through His prophet that His Spirit would touch the lives of people of all ages! Here is an update from one of our staff in Israel, Maxim Katz, who is leading many of these important ministries:

We just returned from Poland, where we spent ten days together with a group of twenty-three Holocaust survivors. This year marks the tenth year we have been bringing these groups to Poland. Many have not been back to Poland since the days of the Holocaust! You can only imagine the personal pain these mostly non-believers face on these trips. The Polish Christians who serve as volunteers are committed to giving the survivors an experience of God’s love by providing food, company, activities, and of course, some Bible studies. What an incredible testimony for the Lord! 

Even though it takes a physical toll on us, we persist because the need is urgent. The survivors are passing away at a rate of about 15,000 per year, which will only grow, and we think we have no more than five years for this ministry! 

During our worship and Bible study times, there was not one dry eye in the room! It is not insignificant to be shown love simply because you are Jewish, especially since they were once hated for the very same thing. This little group from Israel was provoked to jealousy, just as the apostle Paul wrote in Romans 11:11.

One lady even shared, “I did not expect to experience heaven on earth.”

Maxim and the Israeli staff are doing an incredible job of sharing the love of Messiah with so many who have lived lives of such profound loss. But as I mentioned earlier, they are not the only ones served.

In addition to our ministry to Holocaust survivors, we also minister to children, young adults, and families—both in Israel and abroad as they travel. We could not reach Israelis of all ages for the Messiah Jesus without your prayers and generous support.

Your love and faithfulness mean so much to us!

Yours in Messiah,
Mitch Glaser

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July 16, 2019 · 3:12 PM

Ministry Update from Israel

Shalom from Israel!

As I write to you, I am looking out over the beautiful Dead Sea. I am in Israel for several weeks to encourage our twenty-five staff members serving the Lord in the Holy Land. What a joy to see the power of God unleashed in Israel today.

But first of all, let me thank you for praying for Chosen People Ministries. We could not do this work without your love, encouragement, prayers, and faithful support!

I believe our ministry is in good health in all areas: spiritually, financially, theologically, and strategically. I thank God daily for the wonderful sense of unity within our ministry, from the board level to the staff. We have so much to be thankful for over the course of more than a century of ministry.

Our staff continues to be filled with vision for the future and an enduring passion for the salvation of our Jewish people. The heartfelt cry of those who serve with Chosen People Ministries resonates with the words of the great Apostle Paul who wrote: “Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them (the Jewish people) is for their salvation” (Romans 10:1).

Please allow me to reflect for a moment on some of what the Lord has accomplished through our dedicated staff this past year in His Land!

We maintain two outreach facilities: one in Jerusalem, which we own, and another in greater Tel Aviv, which we rent—the Ramat Gan Messianic Center. Through these facilities and others, we distribute food and relief across the country, sponsor concerts, Sabbath meals, Bible studies, and ministries to young parents and their children.

Our Isaiah 53 online campaign continues to reap good results in Israel. During this past fiscal year, we received more than 3,000 requests for the Isaiah 53 Explained book in Hebrew. Of these requests, 90 percent are from non-believers.

We continue a robust program of children’s camping programs in Israel, as well as trips for Israeli children to Poland and Germany. During this past year, we had more than 600 children and teens in our programs, with dozens of decisions for the Lord among the young people we are serving.

Our ministry among Holocaust survivors continues to thrive as we serve this rapidly diminishing community throughout Israel. We sense an urgency for this ministry, as Holocaust survivors will not be with us for much longer. Maxim Katz, our dedicated staff member who needs a kidney transplant, is the one who leads this ministry. He continues to need our prayers.

We are also serving the next generation of Israeli Messianic leaders by training them through our Living Waters mentoring retreats each summer. We usually take a group of 35–40 leaders, which includes husbands and wives, and oftentimes children. We usually go to a hotel on the beach for a retreat and provide a speaker from the United States who addresses a relevant topic. It is our vision to help equip both vocational Christian workers as well as those in a variety of occupations, including army careers, to develop in their leadership as they serve the Lord through their local congregations or in some type of ministry.

Our Partnership
Thanks so much for your prayers and faithful support. Without you, none of the above would be possible. We are partners in the gospel! We are looking forward to the most intensive outreach we have ever had as we bring more than 125 people to serve on the streets of New York City from July 27 until August 10, 2019.

Again, Zhava and I are grateful for the opportunity to serve with Chosen People Ministries in the United States and around the globe in reaching our Jewish people for Jesus! The fiscal year 2019 was a year of good growth and celebration of our 125 years of faithful service to the Lord, and we look forward to continued celebrations through the end of December. We are especially looking forward to our November 15 banquet in New York City, which is part of our Chosen People Ministries heritage weekend. For more information, please visit chosenpeople.com/anniversarygala.

Thanks for caring, and have a blessed remainder of the summer!

Your brother in the Messiah,

Dr. Mitch Glaser
President, Chosen People Ministries

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