Articles
Who are the Judaizers Today?
Who Are the Judaizers Today?
One of the great challenges the church faced in the first century was Judaizing teachers. Judaizing teachers tried to incorporate elements of Judaism into the gospel of Christ. After the apostle Paul had taught the gospel of Christ and churches were established in Gentile areas, false teachers quickly followed, teaching the binding of circumcision and customs of Moses upon the Christians. In the case of the churches of Galatia, some men of Jewish background were teaching it from impure motives – in order to escape persecution from their own kinsmen in the flesh (Gal 6:12).
May I suggest similar challenges exist today. Impure motive or not, teachers like the Judaizing teachers are active in the religious world today, working against the truth of the gospel.
Some teachers today teach the observance of the Sabbath. But the Sabbath was given to the nation of Israel when they came out of Egypt; it was not even given to their fathers (Deut 5:3). And here’s why it was given to Israel: “And remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day” (Deut 5:15). The Sabbath law was part of the law of Moses which was given to Israel, and that entire law was abolished at the cross (Eph 2:15). To teach Sabbath observance today is like being a Judaizing teacher of the first century.
Other teachers reach back into the Old Testament, in the law of Moses, and bring forward the use of instruments of music in worship to God. How often have you heard the use of instruments in the Old Testament as a defense for the use of instrumental music in worship today? As an example of the use of instruments in worship to God in the Old Testament, when Hezekiah stationed Levites in the house of the Lord with instruments of Music, he did so “according to the commandment of David, of Gad the king’s seer, and of Nathan the prophet; for thus was the commandment of the Lord by his prophets” (2 Chron 29:25). Hezekiah followed the commandment of the Lord in effect then. If we will please God, we will follow the commandment of the Lord in effect today. Search the gospel of Christ, and you will find neither command, approved example, or necessary inference of mechanical instruments of worship in worship to God. Teaching the use of mechanical instruments of music and using the Old Testament as authority for it is the equivalent of a Judaizing teacher.
Some churches practice the burning of incense during their worship. Where does this come from? It does not come from the gospel of Christ, from the New Testament. But you’ll find it in the Old Testament as part of the law of Moses. Unwittingly or not, they are like the Judaizing teachers of the first century.
The Bible is clear about the law of Moses. It was “abolished” (Eph 2:15). It was “a shadow of things to come” that Christ has “taken out of the way, having nailed it to the cross” (Col 2:17, 14). There has to be a different law in effect today: “of necessity there is also a change of the law” in order for Christ to be high priest today (Heb 7:11-14). That new testament and will of Christ is the new law, and it came into effect upon the death of Christ, the testator (Heb 9:16-17).
To bring these elements over from the old law, the law of Moses, and try to incorporate them into the gospel of Christ is really no different than what the Judaizing teachers did in the first century. The motive may differ, but to do so is to “pervert the gospel of Christ,” and the result is the same: “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed” (Gal 1:7, 8-9).
