Friday, May 4, 2018

More on the Tikkun Attack



Hannah Weiss is formidable in her research skills, but her 5-part series detailing every failure and bad report she can find on the web of the prophetic and apostolic movements in the United States does not mean she is correct in painting Asher Intrater and Dan Juster as just the same as all those. She will get no argument from me that there are plenty of failures and lack of accountability in the prophetic movement in the US. Not from me and certainly not from Asher and Dan either.
The problem I have with this series is she is building up a guilty-by-association case against two specific individuals, Israeli Messianic ministers Asher Intrater, Daniel Juster and by extension all the family of congregations and ministries connected with their Tikkun Ministries International. Her evidence against Asher and Dan is non-existent and only persuading readers on the basis of her pointing out the failures of US ministries and telling us Asher and Dan are just like them. That is ironic because Asher and Dan are also well aware of the failings of the prophetic and apostolic ministries in the U.S. and have been committed for decades to raising the bar on the issues that caused those failings. (As if Daniel Juster could be equated with those that gave Todd Bentley a pass for his immorality! Bentley could have been forgiven if he truly repented, but if he had been affiliated with Tikkun he would not have been restored to ministry.) It seems that for many who want to see this series go out far and wide, that anyone connected with prophetic or apostolic ministry are already heretics on that belief alone. Some in Israeli ministry do not want charismatic ministry gaining any ground in Israel. It is pretty clear that some want to destroy the reputations of Intrater, Juster and many of other ministers who are associated via Tikkun. Why? Probably because they are the most developed interconnection of ministries in Israel. This is called fruitfulness where I come from. But where I come from they also say, They only tackle the guy running the ball. Not only are the number of ministers who are affiliated with each other in Tikkun a sign of fruitfulness, but so is the number of people they are collectively reaching with the Gospel in Israel. There is also the matter of how many Christians in the nation are linking arms with the Tikkun ministries to support the vision for the salvation of Israel - both in the spiritual and political sense of that vision. That apparently scares some of the other ministries who cannot tolerate seeing what good things God is doing among the Tikkun Israel ministries. We all run our own race and will not win by trying to trip up others running in this spiritual race. Here is a thought for you: Tikkun means Restoration. From the beginning of their 40-something years together as Tikkun, the three main leaders, Asher, Dan and Eitan Shishkoff have shared a common vision for Restoration. They call themselves a Restoration ministry. Included in that classic Jewish concept of the restoration of the world, of the three Tikkun Messianic leaders is also their conviction that God is restoring the body of Messiah to the fulness of spiritual gifts and offices. Any believer can read that those things existed in the first century of the faith in the book of Acts, and many of us believe that in these last days God is restoring those again among His "one new man" in Messiah. So here is bottom line: the defaming and slanderous case that is being made against the Israeli Tikkun ministers is about those who consider gifts of the Spirit and offices of the prophets and apostles to be done away with; furthermore that any who believe and operate in there are heretics. Hannah claims she believes the apostolic calling remains relevant, yet she is intent of positioning Asher and Dan specifically in the framework she is presenting as unacceptable due to the failures of American prophets and apostolic networks. Is that it? The fact that there is a network of ministries must mean they are false prophets and apostles demanding all Israeli ministries come under their authority? That is not happening and you know it. Which is why I continue to condemn this series and why I am personally extremely disappointed in Kehila for publishing a series that specifically, personally seeks to destroy fellow Israeli ministers of the Gospel by name. It is incredibly hurtful to the targets and blows past all the accepted boundaries of how we are to handle disagreements in the body. Some that don't like my response to all of this have been deafening in their own silence about this attack series on Asher and Dan. In the greater world of faith in Yeshua there are many differences of conviction and expressions of faith. It doesn't matter what you personally believe, you have no right to judge Asher Intrater and Daniel Juster in this very public disgraceful witch hunt. And let's face it, all the rest of you non-Tikkun affilitated Israeli ministries who operate in the gifts of the Spirit, who believe in the restoration of the office of prophet and/or apostles, if you say nothing now on behalf of Tikkun ministries, take it to the bank you will be targeted eventually too. Anyone remember that famous Martin Niemoller quote from post-war Germany? I personally believe that God is going to rise up and defend Asher and Dan and all of Tikkun from this attack. But I also know that does not relieve me from standing up and opposing the evil that is being perpetrated against them. It is time to speak, not a time to fall silent.



1 comment:

Unknown said...

I know Asher from when I attended the Tifferet Yeshua congregation in Tel Aviv. I have always found him to be an honorable person well grounded with his Biblical teaching.
Something that many in America seem to not realize is that Messianic Jews are generally not welcome here in Israel, so to be the leader of a congregation here, a person needs to have an a very strong personality, which can sometimes cause friction between the different congregations.
Some leaders are not backward in coming forward to criticize others who do things differently, and I think that Asher has fallen foul of such criticism.