The liberal Jewish city of Tel Aviv hosted an uncharacteristically charismatic bible event last night featuring Evangelical pastor Robert Stearns who won the hearts of the skeptical Jewish audience during his talk on “Christian Zionist Support of Israel” hosted by the Tel Aviv International Salon.

Stearns, the founder of Eagle’s Wings, a global ministry supporting Israel shared the stage with David Nekrutman, the Executive Director for The Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding & Cooperation (CJCUC) in Efrat, Israel.

While at first, the largely secular crowd of over one hundred young professionals were skeptical of the charismatic preacher, he addressed the issue of Christian missionary work in Israel. “In all my years of working on behalf of Israel, not once did I try to convert a Jew to Christianity. If I was a Christian missionary, I would be the worst one ever!” Stearns explained that the more than 100 million evangelicals around the world support Israel not for malicious purposes of killing or converting Jews, but to partner in creating a more secure Jewish State and to form a unified front against Western civilization’s mutual enemies.

For his part, Nekrutman explained that Jews have much to learn from their spiritual brothers and that the unity between Jews and Christians is the second greatest miracle in this generation, behind the birth of the State of Israel. Nekrutman’s organization, The Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding & Cooperation was founded by prominent Orthodox Jewish leader, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin.  According to their website, “The CJCUC is for the first time in history reciprocating back to the Christians who have a heart for Israel and the Jewish people, by initiating a center of relational dialogue in order to clarify the theological and faith areas in which we agree and in which we disagree in order to cement our common goals of religion for peace and security for the embattled State of Israel.”

Nekrutman and Stearns explained that they were old friends who clearly got along well with each other from their collaborative work and their mutual goals. Stearns Eagle’s Wings organizes the annual Day of Prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem, which is observed each October and is a growing coalition of 1,200 major global leaders of influence in the Christian church focused upon prayer for Jerusalem and all her inhabitants.

By the end of the night, Stearn earned himself a round of applause for his heartfelt rendition in Hebrew of the classic Israeli song, “Jerusalem of Gold.” To listen to Robert Stearns singing “Yerushalayim Shel Zahav” click here: