Called to Controversy (41 page)
“I wonder what they are cooking?” Moishe nodded his head to indicate people who were squatting next to small grills.
“I dunno, Moishe, c'mon, we want to go that way.” He pointed to an elaborate structure in the distance. But Moishe was still focused on the barbeque.
“Whatever it is, it smells pretty good.”
Jhan sighed as his boss made his way to the closest grill. The owner smiled up at him. Moishe pointed to the meat on the grill, then to himself, held up the requisite number of fingers and said, “Two.”
The man, still smiling, gave Moishe two portions of whatever it was in exchange for the bats Moishe pulled from his pocket.
“Here,” he said, offering Jhan half the grilled meat.
“C'mon Moishe, you're not really gonna eat that.” But Jhan knew that he would.
“Moskowitz, where's your sense of adventure? Wasn't it just yesterday that you rode an elephant?”
“Yeah, well riding an elephant is one thing. Eating monkey guts is another.”
“Monkey guts?” Moishe repeated scornfully. And he stuffed the mysterious piece of barbequed something into his mouth.
“Are you crazy man? How can you eat that?”
To which Moishe replied through a mouthful of BBQ, “If it won't kill him,” (gesturing to a Thai man who was eating with obvious relish) “it won't kill me.”
Jhan watched with concern to see if the food would have any adverse effects. It didn't.
After their sightseeing excursion, they headed back to the hotel.
“It's so much cheaper to get a tailored suit here than back home,” Moishe commented. “I think I'll get measured for some shirts and a couple suits at the hotel.”
“No, no!” Jhan protested. “They'll rip you off. Look, I found a place downtown where the guy's making me shirts for five dollars each. It's just a two-dollar ride downtown.”
Soon they were in a taxi, heading for the tailor. It was a small shop. High above the bolts of material was a shelf and on it sat a picture of the king and queen of Thailand, as well as a small statue of Buddha, with a few pieces of fruit set by as an offering. This seemed standard in most Thai businesses.
Moishe appreciated the people's loyalty toward their royals, but the ubiquitous altars for Buddha made him uncomfortable. Nevertheless he approached the proprietor and smiled. “My friend tells me you're making five-dollar shirts.”
Horrified, the tailor looked at Moishe and said, “No, no, no, no!”
“No? Are you telling me that you didn't agree to make my friend shirts for that price?”
“Yes, yes, for your friend, five dollars. For you, big man, I'm sorry, seven dollars and fifty cents.”
“Oh, I see,” Moishe replied, realizing that a shirt for him would require considerably more fabric than Jhan's. “Well, that's still a very fair price.” The tailor smiled, obviously relieved, and Moishe ordered several items of clothing.
When they left the shop, Moishe pointed to a tuk-tuk, “Want to try one of those?” he said. “It looks like it would be cooler than the taxi we took on the way here.”
“Yeah, sure,” Jhan agreed. The taxis were not air conditioned, and while the tuk-tuks had a roof overhead, they were pretty much open on the sides and back.
The ride back was cooler and considerably more exciting as the two Americans held on for dear life to avoid being shaken loose from the tuk-tuk. Moishe looked at Jhan and said, “Whoever would have thought that you and I would be here, sharing this adventure?”
It was 1980, and Moishe was in Pattaya to participate in a conference called COWE, the Consultation on World Evangelism. To understand COWE, it's necessary to backtrack. In June 1974, a group of evangelical Christians met in Lausanne, Switzerland. Their purpose was to revitalize an international fellowship of missionaries who could encourage one another, share insights, and keep the cause of bringing the gospel to all people moving forward.
Moishe was invited to that conference, but was reluctant to leave the country because Jews for Jesus was still less than a year old as an independent mission. He asked and received approval to send Tuvya Zaretsky in his place. Tuvya met a great many people and did not realize until years later that Moishe had relinquished to him a front-row seat from which he witnessed a significant moment in the history of world missions.
The 1974 group named themselves the Lausanne Committee on World Evangelization (LCWE) and purposed to meet again. The 1980 conference in Pattaya was the second meeting of that group. The conference included seventeen mini-consultation groups to focus on specific areas of world evangelization. Jews for Jesus was part of the group for reaching Jews with the gospel.
David Harley, then the principal of All Nations Christian College in England, was the COWE coordinator of the miniconsultation group on reaching Jews. He had met Moishe in the late 1970s when Moishe talked with people from CMJ, one the Jewish missions in the UK. To give his first impressions of Moishe, Harley named four things:
His size. He could barely fit into our car, which he described as a typical British missionary carâi.e., it was too small!
His warmth and friendliness.
His dislike of British food. He said he now understood that the British built an empire because they could not stand eating at home.
His passion to reach Jewish people around the world with the good news [of Jesus].
The last item made enough of an impression that when Harley was asked to organize study groups for COWE, he wrote to Moishe suggesting that some of the Jews for Jesus staff present papers on Jewish evangelism.
It was 1979, and Jews for Jesus was in the year of Avodah. Moishe required everyone to write a paper for the conference as part of the assigned studies. This was no small contribution to the preparations that Harley was making.
Susan Perlman had accompanied Jhan and Moishe to Thailand, and she recalled,
Moishe cemented relationships with other Jewish missions leaders in a way that only time away from the usual responsibilities could provide. Most of the miniconsultation groups had a minimum of fifty people; the Jewish consultation group had seventeen. But I think we were one of only two groups that actually had finished what they called an LOPâa Lausanne Occasional Paperâbecause we had done so much prep work.
The group for Jewish evangelism finished their paper the first day, and with more than a week left of the conference, Moishe and the others brainstormed, strategized, and got to know one another. Some participants decided to form a task force, so they could continue meeting for mutual encouragement and the added stimulus of cross-pollinating ideas and experiences. They called themselves the Lausanne Task Force on Jewish Evangelism, which later became the Lausanne Consultation on Jewish Evangelism (LCJE).
Commenting on Moishe's role at the conference and subsequent development of LCJE, David Harley recalled,
Incalculable! LCJE would never have come into existence but for the enthusiasm and support of Moishe. If I remember correctly, a small group [which included Moishe] met over a meal during the conference in Pattaya and discussed the possibility of forming an international task force on Jewish evangelism. Moishe was very enthusiastic about the idea from the start, and his subsequent support in terms of advice, encouragement, and financial commitment was invaluable. LCJE would never have . . . continued as one of the most significant products of the Lausanne Movement without Moishe's wholehearted involvement.
[Yet] he tended to keep more in the background because he was aware of the divisions within the USA among those who were engaged in Jewish evangelism and he did not want to put some people off because [he knew] they thought the group was dominated by Jews for Jesus.
Moishe played a key role in the LCJE not only because of the commitments David Harley mentioned, but also because he made many of the Jews for Jesus staff available to attend meetings and to do prep work for them. Soon the LCJE met internationally three times a year and regionally once a year.
The history of the LCJE helps demonstrate that whereas Moishe's identity was inextricably linked to his founding and leading the ministry of Jews for Jesus, his influence stretched far beyond that mission. He was an international force for the cause to which he devoted his life: making Jesus known to Jewish people.
At the meeting in Pattaya, Moishe read Ole Christian Kvarme's paper and commented that Ole was capable of great things. He was certainly right. From 1975 to 1981 Ole was a Lutheran pastor in Haifa and executive secretary for the United Bible Societies in Israel and the West Bank. He held other significant posts before returning to Norway in 1986, first as general secretary of the Norwegian Bible Society, then as dean of the Oslo Cathedral. In 2005, he became the bishop of Oslo in the Lutheran Church of Norway, a position he still holds at the writing of this book.
Offering his recollections of Moishe, including first encounters, Bishop Kvarme said,
Some of us Europeans came to our first encounter with him with great skepticism, critical of [what we'd heard concerning] the Jews for Jesus approach in reaching out to Jewish people. But obviously we had not been properly informed. The JFJ material in the preparations for the Pattaya conference had made us curious and prepared us for better things. Simply meeting Moishe together with Susan and Jhan changed everything, almost immediately. Obviously, the first impression was the size of the man. But it did not take long before I discovered a different kind of greatness, his spirit of mind. Here was a person who was deeply anchored in the gospel and evangelical theology, combined with a deep love for his people and Jewish tradition.
We could not help but listen to Moishe when he spoke, we sensed in his voice a spirit of wisdom and gentleness, but also a strong and creative mind. I also discovered a friend who was generous, who wanted the best for his colleagues and friends, and who gave of himself. . . .
Without Moishe LCJE would not have come into existence, or it would not have become the significant network it has been through these thirty years. I am thankful for his enthusiasm and creativity, thankful for his wisdom in leadership, sometimes exercised backstage, sometimes in front, always building bridges across organizational barriers and relationship with many churches for the sake of the Gospel to Jewish people. . . .
I regard getting to know Moishe in 1980 and having the privilege of working with him for almost two decades in the context of LCJE as a tremendous blessing and a high point in my own life and ministry. I am convinced that for many years to come we will see the fruits of his visions and enthusiasm, his creativity and gentle spirit.
Moishe's influence extended not only beyond North America, but also beyond the relatively small field of Jewish missions. He was particularly concerned about maintaining what, in evangelical circles, is referred to as a “high view of Scriptures” (that is, both Old and New Testaments of the Bible are inspired by God and without error). He was very interested in Bible colleges and seminaries that taught students to regard the Bible as the Word of God and to examine with a critical eye popular trends that viewed the Bible as anything less than what it presents itself to be.
One of the seminaries Moishe regarded most highly was Western Seminary, based in Portland, Oregon. Formerly known as Western Conservative Baptist Seminary, the school had a claim on Moishe, first of all, because he was loyal to the denomination that had first ordained him for ministry. Moishe also had a high regard for the seminary, its faculty, and its president, Earl Radmacher. He served on the board of directors of the seminary, and in 1986 the school conferred an honorary degree (Doctorate of Divinity) on Moishe.
Parallel to his strong support of the seminary, Moishe was a member of the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy (ICBI). The group was founded in 1977 to clarify and defend the doctrine of biblical inerrancy.
*
Moishe first read about the ICBI in
Moody Monthly
and
Christianity Today
. He became a supporter, not only financially, but with letters of encouragement and suggestions on how to gain more popular support for the cause. In 1979 he was invited to address the group. Soon after, he was asked to fill the spot of a charter board member who had died. This put him in close contact with well-known Christian theologiansâpastors, scholars, and authors.
**
