What motivates Christian Zionists? 

By Shelley Neese 

I am a Christian. And I am a Zionist. But it took me years of being both to realize that I’m a Christian Zionist. Though I consider myself a strong Christian and a committed lover of Israel, out of college I was leery of calling myself a Christian Zionist. My definition of a Christian Zionist was unclear and muddled by stereotypes I had absorbed over time. 

Where I got those stereotypes is no mystery. Any time you hear interviews with prominent Christian Zionist leaders, certain questions are guaranteed to come up: 

“Gary Bauer from American Values, tell us why evangelicals are so eager for the apocalypse?” 

“Susan Michael from International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, is church support for Israel merely a tool to convert the Jews?” 

“Earl Cox from Israel Always, do Christian Zionists only support Israel to realize the scenario of Armageddon?” 

The...

The Dead Sea Scrolls Monument  
By Shelley Neese 
 

In 1946 or 1947—no one knows for certain—a Bedouin goatherd nicknamed Muhammad the Wolf led his flock around the cliffs lining the northwest edge of the Dead Sea. As the livestock grazed on sparse vegetation, Muhammad wandered around the boulders. According to one of several variants of the account, he hurled a stone into a cave to startle a stray goat and heard pottery shatter. Too frightened to lower himself into the cave alone, he returned several days later with at least two relatives from his Ta’amireh tribe. Though they fantasized about finding gold and silver, instead they stumbled upon a cache of oddly shaped clay vessels with bowl shaped lids. Inside one jar, they discovered three ancient leather scrolls, intact and wrapped in linen. 

The Bedouin carted their scrolls back to their camp. The tribesmen stored the bundle in a goat skin bag and hung it from a tent pole....

I am a Christian. And I am a Zionist. But it took me years of being both to realize that I’m a Christian Zionist. Though I consider myself a strong Christian and a committed lover of Israel, out of college I was leery of calling myself a Christian Zionist. My definition of a Christian Zionist was unclear and muddled by stereotypes I had absorbed over time.

Where I got those stereotypes is no mystery. Any time you hear interviews with prominent Christian Zionist leaders, certain questions are guaranteed to come up:

“Gary Bauer from American Values, tell us why evangelicals are so eager for the apocalypse?”

“Susan Michael from International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, is church support for Israel merely a tool to convert the Jews?”

“Earl Cox from Israel Always, do Christian Zionists only support Israel to realize the scenario of Armageddon?”

The answers to these questions rarely matter. The question itself attempts to unmask alleged...