Jesus plays important role in the lives of some Jews

by Megan Kuhn
For The Post

"Be more Jewish … believe in Jesus," a billboard in New York City read. This billboard, with its unusual message, is part of a Jews for Jesus advertising campaign.

"The average Jewish person knows Jesus existed; he was a rabbi, a bit of a revolutionary. Most don't think he wanted to create Christianity. There's a mystery about him," said Josh Sofaer, a missionary for Jews for Jesus who visited Athens from New York City last week.

Sofaer gave a presentation explaining and demonstrating Christ's place in the Passover ceremony to about 40 people at Central Avenue United Methodist Church, 73 Central Ave., on Tuesday.

"[Jews for Jesus] kind of seems like an oxymoron," Central Avenue UMC member Becky Keyes said. "I thought the information was pertinent and made sense. The different elements really add significance to the past and to the history of Christianity."

Jews for Jesus exists "to make the Messiahship of Jesus an unavoidable issue to our Jewish people worldwide," according to the group's mission statement.

Moishe Rosen founded the ministry in September 1973 in San Francisco. Fifteen years later, an 18-year-old Sofaer had a religious epiphany while working on an apple farm in New Zealand.

"What appealed to me [about Jesus] is I read the things he said about a relationship with God and being able to know God. I thought, if that was true, I wanted it," he said.

Although Sofaer grew up in a Jewish household in Berkeley, Calif., his parents were not religious. When he returned home from New Zealand, his new faith was met with mixed emotions. While his rabbi told Sofaer he was welcome to the synagogue any time, his parents were upset that their son believed in Jesus.

"They were concerned I had not made a thought-out decision. People are saying Jews for Jesus is doing what the Nazis did, in the spiritual sense," he said.

At 33, Sofaer considers himself 100 percent Jewish and 100 percent Christian. Though he celebrates both Jewish and Christian holidays, he jokes that he is unsure how to celebrate Easter this Sunday.

"Decorating trees with eggs is beyond me," he said.

"As a Jew who believes in Jesus, [I'm] still in limbo," Sofaer said. "I still don't fit in. My value system is a different value system. My culture is a different culture. On the other hand, I'm shunned from my culture. I'm legally not considered Jewish by Israel.

"Judaism believes in a Messiah. If Jesus is the Messiah, which I do believe, then believing in Jesus is the most Jewish thing I can do," Sofaer said.