Category Christianity

Sep 14 2012

Karmiel September visit

Although it may seem summer has finished in UK, its still extremely hot in Israel and this time of the year.

I have a list of about 9-10 IT related jobs in our large warehouse at the north of the country in Karmiel again.

Therefore I schedule a time to do some preventative maintenance up there, and get all the small jobs fixed.   I had to set up PCs for a two new members of staff, one of the PCs has the VNC remote software not working so it required a site visit.    In the picture I am changing out defective cooling fans in PCs as the heat and dust puts extra strain on our PCs here used for keeping inventory of our food distribution, databases of families we help and donations amongst other things.

Lunch time.   For me, I stretch lunch break very slightly to do some procurement of parts.   I got 3 new cooling fans for the PCs here, two I ended up using straight away, also a hardware store just by this nice junction meant I could get some insulation tape some electrical plugs also.

I needed to set up and test Skype with the other two buildings, also install Dropbox and few other apps, test and inspect two small UPS systems which are defective and need to scrapped.   I have two more UPS units I can send up from another building.

This is outside our Karmiel warehouse, it doesn’t look that big, but it contains a lot of space on the inside.

Later, I went and stayed with one of the volunteer staff from this site:

Outside the place I stayed.   All these flats look brand new.   Karmiel is a fast expanding city.   this balloon thing in the distance is a fancy sign post advertising flats for sale.

Unlike what you see in the news, this part of town has Arab Bedouin families but they seem to live side by side without any troubles.

Getting up in the morning I can hear people using power tools and roosters crowing.

The outskirts of the town, more construction going on.  This is a Jewish neighborhood with most of the people working in construction are Arab.

Arab towns (several less than a couple of miles away) are expanding too of course.

Karmiel isn’t particularly religious city, but religious Jews and religious Arabs with often 5-10 children mean rapid expansion of housing is necessary.

Beautiful rolling hills in the distance from this junction by the industrial estate.

Well got most of the work done, making some adjustments to the wireless routers will be another day as well being able to monitor the VOIP telephone system switch and get a better UPS back up power system.

Time for some much needed couple of days off while I am working away to see a few places….

Off to Tiberias again next……

Aug 12 2012

Riding on a Colt

Zechariah 9:9 from the OT talks about a prophecy of a future Messiah of Israel:-

9 Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion!
Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

In my neighbourhood I noticed this:-

This banner on the car says “Baruch ha ba melech moshiach”   in English:  Welcome to king of the messiah.

My thinking is the Ukrainian Rabbi fella (actually he died in about 1994) which some religious Jews think is the Moshiach and maybe someone’s interpretation of the scriptures here was the Moshiach would come on this Mitsubishi Colt!! *

Actually I do get Arab children coming up my street on a donkey sometimes.

The New Testament explains the fulfillment of this:-

Matthew 21

21 As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, 2 saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her. Untie them and bring them to me. 3 If anyone says anything to you, say that the Lord needs them, and he will send them right away.”

4 This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:

5 “Say to Daughter Zion,
‘See, your king comes to you,
gentle and riding on a donkey,
and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’”

6 The disciples went and did as Jesus had instructed them. 7 They brought the donkey and the colt and placed their cloaks on them for Jesus to sit on. 8 A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. 9 The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted,

“Hosanna to the Son of David!”

“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”

“Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

10 When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and asked, “Who is this?”

11 The crowds answered, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.”

Talking of the Mount of Olives, further up this street is a park you can stand and see across Jerusalem.   This Google Streetmap below shows the Mount of Olives, you can see by the ‘whiter’ area of the hill, as it contains thousands of graves.

* My mistake, this is actually a Mitsubishi Lancer.

Aug 10 2012

I tell you the truth

Early this year I went to see my Dad at a prayer conference at a hotel by Mount Scopus.

As I was cycling back, I went through the Ultra Orthodox area of Meir Shereem, which looks a bit like this, except it was about 11pm:

Without asking for a directions, an older Hassidic gent with usual black hat, garb and bushy grey beard came up to me and asked me something, when I asked him if he spoke English, he asked me if I was lost, I said I was just looking to get back to the town centre and despite riding through this street a couple of times before I had lost my bearings.

The man was helpful and also seemed kind as I didn’t ask for assistance he approached me.   He wasn’t a native Sabra Israeli, he had a strong Eastern European accent, perhaps Hungarian.

It was only as he gave me the last part of the route he said I needed, he exclaimed “I tell you the truth….”

This shocked me quite a bit.   Probably I know its maybe the most common phrase spoken by Jesus.  Its in Matthew 18:3,  24:40, 25:45, Luke 9:27, 12:44,  21:3, John 6:26, 32, 45, 53.  13:21. 16: 7,  20, 23. 21:18.

Not sure how you would say this in Hebrew, but anyway its just very interesting to see some of the things I imagined from Jesus’ time would be said today.   Actually if you are curious you can try this Google search:

This is in all through the first bits of Gospels but I don’t see it in Mark.   I guess as Matthew, Mark and Luke report on parallel parts of Jesus’s life, but from different viewpoints from the perspective of three men who observed Jesus’s life, a taxman, a teacher and a doctor, maybe explains it.

Aug 2 2012

Judah’s visit to Jerusalem

This is my friend Judah Gabriel Himango, he is a fellow believer from the US I have known for about a year or so, we are quite similar sharing a keenness for problems solving in IT, although Judah is a web designer and programmer.

Hes likes to use his coding skills not just at his regular job, but also to serve the Lord, which one of these is his excellent Chavah Radio site an online radio station with Hebrew worship muisc, listeners can just hear what being played and add their own choices of songs to be played next.    Judah is using the same web site model to providing Arabic worship music to Egyptian Christians too, as well as other web sites teaching on which guitar chords to play this type of music too.  I think radio has always had exciting potential for providing worship material and teaching to those who can’t get it.

As well as we have similar interests in biblical theology and technical things, Judah happened to be flying on over to Eretz Israel to do some IT training courses, so stopped off on the way to stay at my place in Jerusalem as he needed a place to stay and didn’t mind my couch, it was fun to show him around places, we must of done 8-10 miles of walking easily I think.

Here is Judah close to the Pillar of Absalom with the Mount of Olives in the background.   I like to often get several pictures to join together to make a panoramic image, but as they were at a slightly odd angle I couldn’t quite cut the edges without losing detail, so its left as it is 🙂

We saw the UN HQ near my house, the Haas promenade, many bits of the old city including Jaffa Gate, praying at the Kotel, bartering Arabic quarter, grab food, then off to my church King of Kings Jerusalem.

Here is the Golden gate again, this is the place where our Lord Jesus will come back according to scripture.   Doesn’t matter its bricked up  and has an Arab cemetery in front.    I am sure there are spiritual power tools to make a way through 🙂

While we were there, I have just noticed this sign, whats odd, is the bit that says the “last path” (up to the Mount of Olives) and the other one “Gate of Mercy”  I have not seen this before!  interesting clues of the future!

We had enough time to quickly show him around the ministry I work for at Bridges for Peace and the nice old historic building which belong to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

Later we had dinner with our mutual brother in the Lord and wonderful musician Teddy Chadwick of Yerubilee blog who produces worship music on a harp.   A small country like Israel and things like Facebook frequently mean you find different groups of friends who know each other from wildly different places.   This bit was a new experience for me as this was a brand new Yemenite restaurant in Jaffa Street which I have never had food from Yemen before.  He later went off to see some of his family, then headed to Netanya to see other friends and do his IT training.

He is a terrific guy I finally met in the flesh and love his enthusiasm for sharing his love for the Lord and writing about his experiences.   We will stay in touch and hopefully meet again another time 🙂

Here’s some of his writings of his experiences:

http://judahgabriel.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/israel-liveblog-divine-presence-at.html http://judahgabriel.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/israel-liveblog-mt-of-olives-islamic.html http://judahgabriel.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/israel-liveblog-finding-my-brother-in.html http://judahgabriel.blogspot.co.il/2012/07/israel-liveblog-mediterranean-delights.html

Jul 29 2012

Return to Nazareth – 6. Today’s Nazarenes

Seems that I have neglected to write a conclusion to one of my previous trips, as this has been in the unfinished pile for about 8 months.  I passed this church on the bus out of Nazareth last time I came here, and was curious to know when a service was here again.

I have always wanted to find out where there are Arab Christians who are real spirit filled believers and love the Jewish people and Israel.  One is among my friends here, but how about in an mostly Israeli Arab city such as Akko, Jaffa or Nazareth, or even an a Palestinian city in the West Bank?   I was curious to know if a revival could happen in and amongst these ancient white-stoned buildings today.

I work for a Christian organisation that provides food to needy Jewish population as poverty is 23% in Israel, where as I take an interest in the Hebrew roots of my Christian faith, I do often think about what happens with Arab believers here.   I go to an active church in Jerusalem that is mostly Western in style although it has English and Hebrew worship music, there are Arab people there, and I live on the outskirts of Jerusalem’s Talpiyot district which is just 50 yards away from Arab areas, and I pass through parks where I see Jewish and Arab people, so I feel an obligation to pray for both type of people.  I don’t think its fair to people to criticise Christians working with the Jews to not be interested in helping Arab people, any more than someone ministering to the Irish should feel obliged to reach out to the Scottish, after all we all only have so much resources!

My first time joining in some lively Arabic Christian worship music!

This church is fairly small but I think there was about 130 people there, completely packed full!   Quite a a decent sized number of youth too, there are a few British and American Christians also here volunteering at nearby ministries too, I got chatting to.   After the service I got a small tiny cup of Arabic style coffee which is just a reminder of the traditional part of culture here.

Why the ‘Today’s Nazerenes’ for the title of of this article?  –  well as well as the expected name for people who from Nazareth, either today or from the past, it is the Hebrew word for Christian, but these people seem to really fired up for the Lord even I was only able to hum along to the praise and worship!!

נוצרי

As a newbie Hebrew student, that’s Nun,Vav (a vowel), Zayen, Resh, Yod – ie pronounced: Natzari!   The names of the equivalent symbols in Arabic I think are very similar.

I now need to visit church with another type of ancient Semitic language, the Amharic speaking Ethiopians next I reckon!

I feel really blessed that the Lord made perfect timing for me to get here 5 minutes before it started.   I missed my last bus home, after asking some local people, they told me its best to get a taxi to Afula and get a bus back to Jerusalem from there.

After my disappointment in not finding many active Christians in the youth hostel, it was wonderful to find people worshiping Jesus in the town of his youth.

1. The Fauzi Azar – 2. The uglier sides of Nazareth – 3. Welcoming the king with palm leaves? – 4. Looking for the Jesus village – 5. The replica village of Jesus – 6. Today’s Nazarenes

 

Jun 18 2012

Skype and voice over IP services in Ethiopia banned

This apparently is my 500th blog post, wow.    I have never really had much of an opinion about control of the internet by governments, until I saw this yesterday;

Ethiopia bans Skype; 15 years of jail time possible

This is very sad as I have a close friend who used to live in Israel who is of Ethiopian origin who has gone back there.   The above article mentions 700,000 out of 84m people, (less than 1%) have internet access.

Last time I called him on Skype a few months ago I missed his call, then he was offline as  the internet connection was too unreliable for me to call him back, so I rang him from my Skype account to his mobile using some credit which worked pretty good.   So this is a good solution although can’t remember how much I spent last time.

With violence at a high amongst believers in Ethiopia, its sad that cutting off a cheap form of communication makes things harder for families on either side there.  Foreigners should be careful what they say on the phone to friends there as its likely all calls are monitored.

There is only one ISP in Ethiopia and its owned by the government, there is an interesting wiki article here about the laws of the web in the north eastern African state.

This really awful for African Jews in Israel who almost certainly still have family and friends back there.   Israel has 1.5% Jews of Ethiopian descent, and there are many more who want to come back soon.

Note to anyone in Ethiopia who has any type of computer, especially Christians doing ministry projects out there, get yourself a free piece of software (Windows or Mac) called Truecrypt to encrypt drives (internal or external) on your computer, if you are worried about any information which is sensitive in case a computer is seized by any form of hostile government.

A blogger who writes on Ethiopia mentions more on this here: http://transformingethiopia.wordpress.com/2012/06/14/new-telecom-crime-bill-grossly-criminalising-individual-liberty-at-stake/#more-5785

 

Jun 13 2012

Pastor Uman from Uganda speaks about attack on his life visits Jerusalem

Last week I went to an event at Christchurch put on by Christian Friends of Israel which is in the old city in Jerusalem, to hear an African man speak who is visiting Israel.  Hes an ex-Muslim who knows Arabic and studied the Koran, accepted Jesus in the early 90s and runs a church in Uganda, he also supports Israel, and because of his belief in Jesus, he has had no less than nine attacks on his life, more recently resulting in deliberately someone tipping a bucket of acid on him scarring up horribly and losing sight in one eye.

Hes in Israel to give his testimony as well as receive specialised surgery to rebuild his face which is costing in the region of $128,000, in which the government of Israel paid $100k of it.

Pastor Uman Mulinde wears a kind of surgical stocking on his face, and one of his ears is shriveled, but he still speaks confidently, and is awaiting three more surgery sessions here in Israel, and his survival and determination serves as powerful witness to the doctors and surgeons in Israel treating him.

A little oddly perhaps, there wasn’t that many people I knew at the meeting, this might sound strange but actually the body of believers in Israel is quite small, so its like most people know most other people, both foreign Christians involved with probably at least 50 ministries here as well as local Israeli believers.

On the screen a little later there was a shocking picture of a pile of charred bodies, probably in excess of 100 of Ugandan Christians murdered by Islamic terrorists in this country in their church.   An awful tragedy perhaps necessary into giving Christians in western nations a sense of urgency into praying regularly for protection of those in danger, and for the hearts of those to be changed causing violent attacks.

Here at Christchurch inside the Jaffa gate of Jerusalem’s old city, Pastor Uman speaks abount his testimony and the attack.

He doesn’t speak to any kind of bitterness or revenge, just for the west not to be duped into accepting Islam as something that would ever compromise or be prepared to coexist with other cultures.

These days many people consider Israel to be the worst nation in the media today for accusations of ‘apartheid’ and ‘ethnic cleansing.’    Sometimes groups aiming to do “peace and reconciliation” are more there to delegitimise Israel both vocally, including sadly, some Christians and attempt to sanitize it completely from the scriptures, being completely unaware of terrible things that happen in mostly Islamic countries today.

This article from another blog explains it well:

http://www.calvinlsmith.com/2012/06/why-on-earth-are-we-wasting-time-on.html

This was a really good event that Christ Church put on, and it was a priviledge to see this brave man speak.  I don’t have a web site for him, I will see if I can find and add this later, hes still needs prayer and donations for his treatment and for his ministry to carry on.

Jun 4 2012

Red Sea dwelling Jellyfish in Eilat

Jellyfish I think are the weirdest of God’s creatures ever.

They aren’t fish, they some completely different genus from shellfish, their transparent gloop-like elasticy of their bodies make them completely unique.

There is no skeleton or rigid structural parts to their bodies, nor do they have any obvious things like eyes and mouth.   The four ‘gland’ type things I can see I wonder is their brain, breathing, reproductive and digestion components?

These ones are everywhere in Eilat, in the top of Red Sea, and they are purply colour.   This adult one is about ten inches across, like a typical sized dinner plate.

Apparently they do sting, but very mildly like a slightly unpleasant rash.    These ones are more like inverted flowers rather than the long decorative tentacle draped lampshade-like ones people think of has been exotic and deadly.

Anyone who knows me well, knows I can’t swim.   This is always and awkward subject, as people look in astonishment and tell me its “easy” and ‘I came 1st in XYZ swimming competitions… blah blah…..”    Geez thanks people.   Shall I go up to a disabled person and laugh and say “haha!! you can’t walk!!”

I had a fear of drowning as a child, combined with the evil swimming teacher woman from hell circa 1985 when I was about 9, in addition to not seeing now how my average 5’10” frame can propel in the surface of the sea without me getting into a panic of inhaling water.   Yes – I have tried.  But prefer to admire the sea no deeper than my knees which suits me fine.

Before I got to see the incredible exotic fish here which rival the sort you would expect from being in the Caribbean or a Pacific Island, I didn’t get to visit the Marine aquarium this time, but the Jellyfish and serene stripey and mauve fish that are a complete world away from fish you see in Southern England are a real treat to see.

Jun 3 2012

Cowboy bus driver in the desert

This was our driver who took us from Jerusalem to Eilat, a fairly punishing 311Km trip all the way down the Negev desert to the very south point of the country.   And I do mean a ‘point’ as that’s exactly the bottom shame of Israel’s Red Sea city tightly between Egypt and Jordan.

There is something a little unconventional about this driver’s uniform.

Stopping at a petrol station for a bathroom stop, (4 and 3/4 hours, no toilet on the bus)  made me think we were in the Nevada desert rather in the holy land.

Actually judging by his accent, this gent was a regular Sabra Israeli, ie: not an immigrant from anywhere else.  I think he likes his job as a cowboy driver across the desert.

To be honest, as we alotted seating, I was on the very back seat in the middle which is not so good for seeing scenery, it was full so there was no chance of moving later.

Actually this man reminds me of another driver, this time of a well known black GMC van.

Mr T became a Christian back before the A-Team, there is a good article here.

Athough not in the newest A-Team movie, he hasn’t aged that much, and as he is a leadership position in his current church, I think it would be good if he could lead Christian groups to Israel and hire the above chap as the tour bus driver!

I can just picture this; “I pity the fool, who follows BDS!!”  if you want to obey God, you need to pray and support Israel Sucka!!!

Apr 28 2012

Holocaust remembrance day

At work, we were asked to stop for a few minutes when the siren goes off to remember the six million who perished in the holocaust, so me and some colleagues walked about 200 yards into the centre of town.

Just 10 minutes from my office is Zion Square, a junction between Ben Yehuda Street and Jaffa Street, which more recently is now completely car free, just an electric rail system passes through.

People just stop what they are doing, when the siren goes off.

In other parts of the country, people stopped their cars in the middle of the highway and stood on the road with doors open.

The noise is a chilling drone, probably coming from two directions, aimed mainly at alerting the public if a threat of war necessitates people needing to get into a bunker.   Its an awful noise, but serves as a reminder of the worse tragedy in history.