Misinformation, Disinformation

We live in an age of information

While today it seems like we are constantly plagued with media talking about peoples’ differences, there is perhaps one thing which we can all agree on – we live in an age of information. Or perhaps better put, overinformation. Personal information, work information, public information. We now know more than we have ever known in the past. We can find out which brand of toothpaste our favorite celebrity uses or how many minutes we spent in the REM phase of our sleep last night. We are bombarded with information, most of which we don’t really need or want. It reminds me of the statement that the angel made to Daniel about the “time of the end”. He said, “Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall increase” (12:4). Quite the description of life in the 21st century!

But the flood of information has brought with it a secondary flood: a flood of misinformation. Or, as it’s more popularly known, “fake news”. Information that is passed on that is, unintendedly, false. In an age of social media and Photoshop, it’s very difficult to know what is real and what is fake. To make it worse, we don’t just have misinformation, information that is unintendedly false, we also have disinformation, information that is purposely false. Information that is designed to deceive the people that it is passed on to.

We at Jews for Jesus come across mis- and disinformation all the time. Usually it has to do with us – over the course of my time in ministry I’ve come across people who think that we forcefully baptize Jewish people, and that we kidnap and brainwash them and bribe them to believe in Jesus. Disinformation becomes misinformation and causes many to have a barrier to the gospel before we even meet them. But there is also plenty of mis- and disinformation about Yeshua and the New Testament. I’ve been told that the New Testament was written in English 200 years ago, that Yeshua was a Gentile or a socialist, to name a few.

“In Israel, I grew up being taught that Jesus started a new religion for the Gentiles and that he broke the Law.”

One such person who had misconceptions about Yeshua is Abraham*. Abraham is a young Israeli who’s been living in Berlin for a few years. At a recent meeting, we were reading the book of Matthew together. As we read the start of the sermon on the mount, Abraham was amazed. “I’ve heard people say that Jesus went to India and learnt from Buddha, but I see here that he’s saying something different,” he said. “Buddha claims that all we need to do is look inside ourselves, but Jesus is saying we need to look outside ourselves, to God, for help!” As we continued reading, he exclaimed again, “In Israel, I grew up being taught that Jesus started a new religion for the Gentiles and that he broke the Law. But here, before I’ve read ten pages of this book, I see that he himself says that he didn’t come to abolish the Torah but to fulfill it!”

We at Jews for Jesus live for these eureka moments, where Jewish people discover the real Jesus. Not the one they’ve been told about, not the one they’ve made up in their minds, but the real one. Please pray with us that many Jewish people all over the world would put aside their preconceptions and bias and discover the real Jesus!

* name changed