Rabbi Dr. Stan Chester, head of Torah Light Ministries, appeared in the pages of the Record’s December issue as he celebrated Passover at St. Andrew’s, Penticton, B.C. But where did this interfaith relationship begin?
The Messianic rabbi was teaching in a local library one Friday evening in the fall of 2008. Kenny MacKenzie, an elder at St. Andrew’s, chose to attend.
“It was an eye opener to say the least!” MacKenzie told the Record in an email. “I kept attending and soon learned that the rabbi’s teachings and Presbyterian teachings were about 98 per cent on the same page with the only difference being that, as Jews, they keep the covenants which God made with the Jews and not with Gentiles.”
When the library rental fees were set to rise, MacKenzie approached the church’s session asking if Chester’s group could use the hall for Friday evening synagogue. The session approved the motion unanimously. Some of the Jews have begun attending St. Andrew’s Sunday morning services, and some Presbyterians frequent the Friday evening synagogue.
When the rabbi filled the pulpit one Sunday, he was one of the few preachers to be applauded by a Presbyterian congregation, MacKenzie noted. And what began as a joint Passover celebration between the Presbyterian and Jewish groups expanded the next year to include members of several other churches, including the Church of the Nazarene which hosted the event.
Chester, a former marine and physics professor, is fluent in Hebrew and founded Torah Light Ministries in 1972 as a way of helping both Christians and Jews better understand and appreciate each other. — C. Purvis with files from Kenny MacKenzie and torahlight.org
