Tomorrow, The Passion will be released. This movie can change your life, and maybe even change the church. It has that kind of power. It can do this because it will help to restore the cross as the center of our lives—so central that we will begin to truly take the cross up daily and carry it with us in all we do.

What we are doing on this earth is not about us—it is about Him. We have been purchased with a price, the greatest price that could have ever been paid—the life of the Son of God. We are not our own. We cannot go on living for ourselves. Our lives must be centered around and motivated by the Lord and His purposes.

We must behold the cross, and the price that He paid which demonstrates like nothing else ever could just how much He loves us and how much sin cost Him. This movie can help bring this reality back to our lives and our message. There is no greater message than the cross. It is the foundation on which everything else must be built, and if it is not built on it rightly, then it is a weak foundation at best.

Also, if we are going to walk in truth we must be delivered from a great source of deception—the tendency to get our understanding from the secular media instead of seeing by and through the Holy Spirit. We must start being discerning enough to recognize that when something becomes controversial it is often because it is something of great importance from God.

It is the devil who operates through fear, innuendo, and hearsay; the Lord has more class than that. When such controversy has been kicked up about this movie, it is often (but not always) because there is something very important from God which the devil is trying to turn us away from. The controversy being stirred up about The Passion is actually from the same spirit that persecuted and crucified the Lord.

This is not to imply that this is something especially embedded in the Jewish people, but there are some Jewish extremists who are still subject to this, just as there probably are in every people group. The extremists who are attacking The Passion are motivated by the same anti-Christ spirit that persecuted Christ. Some of the villains in this movie are Jewish, but so is the greatest hero in the movie, and in all of eternity. God came to us as a Jew! Not only was Christ Himself Jewish, the apostles, prophets, and everyone who wrote that which is now canon Scripture were Jews. All of those who were the greatest heroes in biblical history were Jewish.

Abraham was promised that his descendents would be a blessing to all of the families on the face of the earth. And they, the Jewish people, have been the greatest blessing to all of the families on the face of the earth. We all owe the Jewish people more than we owe any other race, culture, or people group on the planet.

We also need to understand that the Jewish people have been even more persecuted by Christians than any other religion—beginning with Peter the Hermit who led the first crusade, and formulated the diabolical doctrine that the Jews should be killed to atone for Christ’s death. For nearly a thousand years they were under a continuous threat of annihilation from those who called themselves Christians. They had their children and property taken from them, they were forcibly baptized, and if they refused, they were killed by those who called themselves Christians. Many credit the doctrines of Martin Luther for the Holocaust they experienced under the Nazis.

For this reason it is understandable that the Jewish people would have a knee jerk reaction to anything Christian, and especially anything that might again in any way incite the kind of persecution they suffered for nearly a thousand years. What Christians did to the Jews in the Middle Ages was far worse than the threats they now suffer from Islam, and in many ways worse than even what happened to them under the Nazis.

However, even though there is a need for understanding and repentance on the part of Christians for the way the Jewish people have been treated in the past, we cannot allow our own devotion to our faith to be controlled by this. Many Jewish leaders also understand that their best friends, now and throughout the Middle Ages, were Christians who were of a different spirit. They know, but seldom fully understand, that these Christians were not Christians because of their association with an institution, but because of a deep personal devotion to Christ. Those Christians who have this devotion have always had a deep love for the Jewish people through whom their Savior came.

I know many true friends of the Jewish people, who are true Christians, and are being offended by the Jewish response to The Passion. Others are asking questions about the Jewish control of Hollywood, the news media, and other such things that seem to be used to attack Mel Gibson, and this movie. We must not let the reaction of the extremists on either side drive a greater wedge between Christians and Jews. Our goal should be to overcome evil with good. There are some practical ways we can do this.

One way to do this is to contact the Jewish people you know, or who you may not know but are in your community, and express your appreciation for them, and the great blessing that the Jewish people have been to us all. In spite of the terrible way that they have often been treated, they have tended to be the best citizens and best neighbors in every nation in which they have sojourned. I think it would be appropriate to even send them a gift, or send an offering to the local synagogue. Also, if you have the opportunity, tell them you are sorry for the way they have been treated by those who have called themselves Christians—that you do appreciate the great blessing they are to your community. I have done this with remarkable results.

We also need to understand that it is the same anti-Christ spirit that worked through those who often claimed to be Christians, which have been seeking to destroy the Jewish people that also worked through the extremists among the Jewish people to persecute and crucify Christ. The same spirit that sought to destroy Christ is so intent on destroying the Jewish people because he knows the destiny of the Jewish people at the end. They will not only embrace Christ but will become the “one new man” (Ephesians 2:15) that Paul wrote about which will reveal Christ so powerfully at the end of this age.

Because it is the same spirit that is persecuting both Jews and Christians, some estimates are that just as many Christians died at the hands of the Nazis as Jews. We do have the same enemy! For this reason the enemy’s greatest victory is to turn Christians against Jews, or Jews against Christians. Let us determine that regardless of what the enemy tries to do, we will not let this happen.

As we proceed toward the end of this age, there will be more and more things arising that will try to divide Christians and Jews. The devil is attempting to use this movie in that way. But its ultimate result is actually going to give Christians a far greater appreciation of the Jewish heroes of humanity. It will also give the Jews a far greater understanding of true Christians, not just those who serve an institution which claims to be Christian.

Let us learn from this lesson, and resolve not to respond, to react, or to be controlled by the extremists on either side. The Christians that are trying to use this present controversy to illuminate “Jewish control” of the media are the same voices speaking through some of the Jewish extremists, both of which are trying to cause a greater division. Let us determine that we are going to use the whole thing to bring a greater unity. Let’s show our Jewish neighbors the true nature of Christ, who loved both them and us so much that He went to the cross. That is how true disciples will always be recognized.

"By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another" (John 13:34-35).