MIA supporter says Woottens’ work under ‘diabolical attack’ 8

At least one backer of the Messianic Israel Alliance feels its founders, Batya and Angus Wootten, are under “diabolical attack.” In the meantime, that backer is lobbing out accusations against unnamed parties of “‘murderous’ assaults.” He urges supporters of the Woottens “to hold up their arms as did Aaron and Hur with Moses in the time of battle.”

An email newsletter sent out April 11 by Natan Lawrence to the Hoshana Rabbah list, titled “An important announcement to the General Body of Redeemed Israelites everywhere,” asks for daily prayer for the Woottens. He calls them “the instruments (God) has raised up in this generation to bring forth the message of the restoration and reunification of the two houses of Israel.”

But they’re not being treated properly, he says.

Sadly, the most recent attacks are not the first attack against them, but the last in a long series of “murderous” assaults going back for many years.  It has been our hope that the perpetrators of these most recent attacks would, if not repent (our sincere hope!), at least back off. Instead, they have intensified their attacks, and hence the reason for this prayer request letter.

Then he prays that those prayers will “go forth like a lethal arrow shot into the heart of the enemies of Yeshua!”

Mr. Lawrence  also claims the offenders are “doing Satan’s bidding by touching the spiritual parents of this movement.” He says that “Satan doesn’t want the message of the restoration of the two houses of Israel to go forth.”

Activists in the Two-House/Messianic Israel movement sometimes express the feeling they’re under attack within the messianic movement as a whole and are treated unfairly, even with “lies and hatred.” But it’s not the usual MIA critics Lawrence has a problem with. It’s people within the Two-House/Messianic Israel movement that he’s indicting in the newsletter dated April 11. They are, he says, “backing off” the message that God is uniting the houses of Judah and Ephraim through the Messianic Israel movement.

To wit, there are many spiritual leaders and teachers in the Messianic Israel/Hebrew Roots camp that are now backing off from this message because they, in their words, claim that “it’s too divisive.” Some major Messianic leaders/teachers have even removed from their ministry websites all references to Ephraim, Ezekiel 37, the two-stick message, the two houses and other such words and phrases. They now instead speak generically about “the Jews and the non-Jews coming together to become the one new man.” … Many are now backing away from the message of the two houses of Israel being reunited in Yeshua because for reasons of political correctness, political expediency and downright lust for money and power and, let me be perfectly blunt, the spirit of ecumenism! You see, if you don’t tell people the whole truth, but rather refrain from that which is not politically correct, you might get a larger monetary offering at the end of the day and sell a few more DVDs (the love of money is the root of all evil, as the Word of Elohim declares). …

Mr. Lawrence is making an interesting accusation: By “backing off” certain aspects of the Messianic Israel Alliance message, he says, some messianics are “doing Satan’s bidding by touching the spiritual parents of this movement” and being disobedient to their “spiritual parents who raised them up and placed them on a ministry platform.” In other words, by expressing their opinions in good conscience, perhaps in ways they feel backed by Scripture, and which may not even have any connection to the Woottens, these unnamed people are “doing Satan’s bidding”—simply because they aren’t toeing the MIA line or doing things the way Lawrence thinks they should be done or saying things the way he thinks they should be said.

Who are the guilty parties? He doesn’t want to say. In his response to an email I sent to him asking him to clarify matters, he wrote

As far as the letter that I sent out to which you obliquely make reference, as I recently told one of your cohorts, what I have written, I have written by the Spirit of the Living YHVH Elohim. It was confirmed before and after by his prophets, apostles, and elders in redeemed Israel. Beyond that, it was simply a prayer request on behalf of my friends, and so that people could pray on target, spiritual issues were delineated. None of the names of the antagonists were mentioned, so anyone’s assumptions regarding to whom I was making reference is pure conjecture on their part.

If you have any further questions, I suggest you take them to your Father in heaven and let his Spirit answer them for you. Until YHVH puts additional words in my mouth, I will have nothing further to say on this subject.

I also asked the Woottens several questions in an email about Lawrence’s message, but they declined to answer them, calling them “leading questions” and asking me to “please cease and desist in your unfair pursuit of us.” They also said that I had previously put up an “untrue” post about Mrs. Wootten, which must have been where I disagreed with her approach to dealing with other Christians over Easter.