In preparing a message on science and theology to give to a Messianic congregation, I started to reach back to memories of things that fit a Messianic theme. Jewish evangelism is the topic of finding evidence for the Jewish Messiah in the Tanach (the Hebrew Scriptures, aka old covenant). Finding clues, as scientists and detectives do is important so maybe the better term in place of evangelism is “making connections.”

What needs to be made absolutely certain is one thing, a Jewish person who can ascertain the identity of Messiah, has found the Jewish Messiah. Bible readers know … “to the Jew first and then the Greek” reveals an order of awareness but not a difference in relationship to Messiah, to all this is personal.

Have I ever seen a casual witness to this identity?

Then it struck me, that there is a strong witness in one particular passage. In fact, many Jewish persons I know cite Isaiah 53 as one of the most significant pieces of the text … because this passage (actually starting back in Isaiah 52 around verse 12) presents the Messiah. Rabbis say this is about Israel, but the pronouns are masculine and the profile of this figure in the passage fits one person uniquely.

What might the famous writer Samuel Clements have to do with all this? Anything?

We know the name Mark Twain and some of us visit historical sites that present the humanity of this man. Many of us may never visit his home site in Hartford, Connecticut, but it’s there to explore.

On an upper floor is a study with desk and shelves and books. There is also a billiards table. Perhaps the writing mind needs a diversion to free up one’s thinking. In that room in a Hartford home, Mr. Twain had a rather large Bible. And for the open nature of this historical site, one of the curators appears to have decided to open this large tomb to a particular page.

Mark Twain’s Bible was open to Isaiah 53.

I recognized the potential impact of this for the passive Jewish visitor and to the Gentile who knows of whom the passage speaks. How many Jewish minds ponder that text? How many visit the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem to see a full representation of the original Hebrew scroll with all of Isaiah’s writings fully exposed?

How many in Hartford and and how many in Jerusalem meet their Messiah by reading this text?

Have you?

Have you shared this with someone who needs to ponder the fact that we can see Him in that text?

Perhaps Samuel Clements himself left his Bible open to that page … which is still true to this day.

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