The sins of Messianic Jews and of all Israel are far more dire and extensive than simply the record of individual human failings. The sins of all Israel, including Messianic Jews, include and indeed are foundationally our failure to live in covenant faithfulness with Israel’s God.

Do Jews need the atonement Yeshua provides? Yes, by all means, yes, but for reasons deeper than we have yet realized and proclaimed.

Jewish missionaries and Messianic Jews have always called for other Jews to repent and believe. But we fail to ask, “Repent for what?” By default, we would say, “Repent for being a sinner, for your sins,” or perhaps, “Repent for not recognizing the Messiah whom God sent for us.”

But this will not do, for we finally only know what sin is when we compare our conduct with what God demands of us. We, the seed of Abraham and Sarah, whose ancestors, standing at the foot of Sinai, said 

“na’aseh v’nishmah—we will do and we will hear/obey—all that the Lord has spoken we will do”

—must repent not of being sinners in general, but of being Jewish sinners specifically. The sins of all Israel, including Messianic Jews, include continual and pervasive neglect of the covenant to which we are all obligated (Dt 29:10-15). 

Although we may confidently say “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Messiah Yeshua,” we may not say “there is therefore now no responsibility for those who in Messiah Yeshua.” “Yeshua paid it all,” but not that we might go back to each of us turning to his own way (Is 53:6). 

Surely, if our sin includes covenant violation, should not our repentance include not simply faith in the sin-bearer, but also a return to that covenant-faithfulness from which we departed? 

And is it of no significance that it is precisely to the restoration of this kind of obedience (communally) that God’s consummating actions are directed?