AUSTRALIA
A Letter Written to a Friend
by Avram Yehoshua
Date: Wed, 24 Feb 1999
This happened yesterday Mike and I thought you might like to know:
God has given us some opportunities. We had just come from the center of
Jerusalem yesterday, where our post office box is, to a grocery store
that is near where we live, about three miles south. We took the number
18 bus and got off a few stops before our normal one, so we could pick
up some oranges, avocados, and other foods. The store has much of their
fruit outside it, and so we got a cart and were putting the oranges and
tangerines in it when two teenage girls came up to us and asked us if we
had time to answer some questions for them about the life in Israel.
We told them we did and then Hana began by asking what we thought about
living in Jerusalem and how were we going to vote in the upcoming
elections. Ruti shared that we had only been back for about a month and
a half, but that we had lived in Jerusalem for two years, a year and a
half ago, and we loved being in Israel.
Then Ruth, the other teenage girl, asked how we were going to vote. I
told her that we weren't going to vote and that we left those things in
God's Hands. The girls were Jews from Australia and had been here for
about two weeks, and of course, they were wanting to know how people
liked it here in the Land, because they might one day want to live here.
Hana asked how we'd vote if we did. I turned it around and asked them
how would they vote if they could. They both said they'd vote either
Labor or Meretz, and I knew we were in trouble. Labor is the party that
wants to give 'land for peace,' and Meretz would give all Israel to the
Arabs for 'peace.'
I shared with them about the history of Israel, being reborn in 1948,
after six Arab nations made war upon the tiny State. And how the United
Nations put a plan, a partition plan, before the Arabs that lived here,
before the war, that they would have half the land, and the Jews the
other half. But the Arabs would have none of that, being told by Syria,
Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran and Jordan, that they were to leave
their homes and 'get out of the way' because they were coming in and
throwing all the Jews into the sea (the Mediterranean Sea). But as God
would have it, they couldn't do that, and those Arabs were caught in
between a rock and a hard place when the war ended, as none of their
Arab brothers in those countries wanted them. They just used them as
pawns. In that war, Jordan captured land west of the Jordan River,
biblically known as Judah and Samaria, what the papers call, 'the West
Bank.' But even then, no nation, not even the Arab nations, recognized
Jordan's claim to the land. And Jordan also got the eastern part of
Jerusalem, which they immediately desecrated by destroying all the
synagogues there. And for 20 years, no Jew could go to the Wailing Wall
and pray because it was in Jordanian hands.
In 1967, when the Arabs were looking to beat up on tiny Israel, after
they tried in 1948 and 1956, Israel captured Judah and Samaria and the
eastern part of Jerusalem that is the Temple Mount area, along with the
Old City; with it's four quarters: Arab, Christian, Armenian and Jewish.
Ruth interrupted and asked me, 'Shouldn't the Palestinians have a land
of their own?' and that took us to the Scriptures. I said the Land of
Israel doesn't belong to the Arab people, and it isn't owned by the
Jewish People but it belongs to the God of Israel who gave it to the
Sons of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to dwell upon it and possess it. And
that no one had the right or authority to give away the Land that God
had given to the Jewish People. Not even the Jewish government.
And then we got into other things like, 'is there really a God?, and the
Bible is, 'really just written by men so how can we be sure?' And to our
delight, a few more teens joined us, all from the same group from
Australia, and I began to share with them that the only way for true
peace to come would be when our hearts become like God's. I shared with
them about what God said through Ezekiel, how He would bring us back
from all the lands where He had scattered us, and that He would sprinkle
clean water upon us; and just then, a man from the store, because the
sun was going down in the sky, began to roll back the awning above us,
and water began to fall upon some of us, and the point was not missed by
a girl named Ereet. She had been smoking and playing the 'cool one' but
as I shared about real Life from God, I could see in her eyes that her
heart was yearning.
I continued and told them that God wanted to take out their hearts of
stone and replace it with a heart of flesh and that He would put His
Spirit within us.
And then, a few more of them joined us and before we knew it, I was
speaking with about 12 to 14 teens. And I told them that there can be a
great deal of difference between religion and God. And that I knew God
personally, by His Spirit and His Word. And it was the Spirit that made
His Word come alive, and that God wanted them to have His Spirit also.
That they might come to really know the God of Israel, just as Moses and
Isaiah and all the Prophets.
We began to go down some other rabbit trails, as Michael said, 'I can
see that you really believe in God but that might be just for you. You
are strong in your faith.' And I told him, 'No I'm not. I have walked
with God for 23 years and I know how weak and sinful I really am. When I
first came to God, I thought I was strong, but I have come to really see
my weak, wandering, rebellious heart.
Hana said that we must be the Light to the nations and so shouldn't we
let the Palestinians have their country? And we went down another rabbit
trail of bringing in the Golden Age of Brotherhood among Mankind. But I
told them that if Man hadn't been able to do this in 6,000 years, it
wasn't going to happen now. Man is wicked all over the world. The
Germans don't like the French and the Japanese look down upon the
Koreans and the British look down upon the Americans, and etc. etc. etc.
Man's heart is evil and there is only one cure, and that is from God. It
is only through the Messiah that we have hope of that new heart. And
then I shared with them that we had found the Messiah of Israel in
Jesus. I waited, not knowing how they'd react. They didn't and so I
continued.
I asked them if they knew that there were two streams of Messianic
thought in Rabbinical Judaism and none of them knew that, even though
many of them had studied in the Synagogue. I told them that the ancient
Rabbis had seen two different streams of thought on the Messiah in the
Scriptures and they had come to the conclusion, because they were so
irreconcilable, that there must be two different Messiahs. One, Messiah
the Son of David, And the other, Messiah the Son of Joseph, because like
Joseph who was sold into slavery by his brothers, yet rose to second in
command of all Egypt because God had a plan to save his brothers through
Joseph, so too Yeshua.
He too was rejected by his brothers, us Jews as a nation, and yet He
rose from the dead by the mighty Power of the God of Israel, to prove
that He was God's Messiah King. I told them that we weren't there and
didn't see it, but that if they would seek the God of Israel, and ask
Him if Yeshua was their Messiah, that they would come to know for
themselves.
We must have talked for an hour. Ruth asked Ruti about women's lib and
Ruti shared that she thought she was free when she wasn't walking with
God, but had only come to know true freedom by giving her heart to
Yeshua.
By the end, some had left, but many stayed, even to the point of being
late for their next excursion, that's how riveted they were, the Holy
Spirit being amongst us, watering their souls with Living Water. I gave
them our names and telephone number and told them to call us if they had
any other questions or if they wanted to get together and talk some
more. Please pray for them, especially the ones whose names we got:
Michael, Hana, Ruth, Carli and Ereet.
Avram
I have desired to reach out to the Jewish People with the Gift of Life in Messiah Yeshua for many years. The Lord led me in 1987 to begin sending the Jewish Newsletter to the Jewish People of Tulsa, OK. That has grown to include Jews in 34 states of the United States and four other countries; Canada, Israel, Australia and South Africa.
The Jewish Newsletters now have the format of being four pages of biblical understanding, centering around a person or event or passage of Scripture from the Tanach ('Old Testament'). I explain what it meant to ancient Israel and than go on to reveal how Jesus the Messiah is in the midst of it.
If you know of Jewish People that need Yeshua, send me their name and postal address and I will place them on the mailing list. If you have access to a Jewish Directory (of names and addresses), send them to me and they will get the Newsletter. It goes out four times a year.
If you would like to be placed on the Jewish Newsletter mailing list, as there are a number of believers on it interested in seeing what the Newsletter presents as well as keeping us with us here in Israel, send me your name and postal address.
If you would like to see what the Jewish People have read in the Newsletters over the years, click Jewish Newsletters. Once there, click on any title that catches your interest. Feel free to download any of them and share it with your Jewish friends or just read them for a better understanding of your ancient Hebraic heritage. And if you have any questions about either how to share Messiah with them, or the Newsletter in general, please feel free to contact me. Thank you for your prayers that our outreach may be effective in bringing many Jewish People to Messiah Yeshua.
If you'd like to help Avram and Ruti in their Work, click here.
Email Avram — avramyeh@gmail.com