 |
The Jerusalem Prayer List – November 18, 2010
by Joseph Shulam
Isaiah chapter 32 has an interesting approach to the Spirit of God. The first part of the chapter describes the condition of the people and especially the women of Jerusalem in the days of Isaiah. Isaiah singled out the women of his day and I don't really know why, although I do have an idea that he looked at the women as the source of inspiration for the family and the house and spirituality in the home. I suppose that if Isaiah would have lived today and written such caustic words, or painted such very strong word pictures about the women of today – he would have been called a chauvinist pig for sure. Here is what Isaiah writes about the women of Jerusalem of his day:
“Rise up, you women who are at ease, Hear my voice; You complacent daughters, Give ear to my speech. In a year and some days You will be troubled, you complacent women; For the vintage will fail, The gathering will not come. Tremble, you women who are at ease; Be troubled, you complacent ones; Strip yourselves, make yourselves bare, And gird sackcloth on your waists. People shall mourn upon their breasts For the pleasant fields, for the fruitful vine. On the land of my people will come up thorns and briers, Yes, on all the happy homes in the joyous city; Because the palaces will be forsaken, The bustling city will be deserted. The forts and towers will become lairs forever, A joy of wild donkeys, a pasture of flocks ― Until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, And the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, And the fruitful field is counted as a forest. Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, And righteousness remain in the fruitful field.” (Is. 32:9-16)
Isaiah wrote these hard words on the eve of exile, a time when Jerusalem would be abandoned by the elite of the Israeli society and their homes would be, as Isaiah says a home for wild donkeys and pasture for flocks. But, the most interesting thing to me in this prophecy is that he sees the end of this condition coming “until the spirit is poured upon us from on high.” There is s dimension in these words that changes the formula and paradigm of the way we think things happen in our world. As you can see in this text the condition of the homes and the families and the city itself is so very bad, and it will happen “on all happy homes in the joyous city,” “Until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high.”
The people will receive the Spirit from on high and the hint is that it will be poured out from on high without too much involvement on their part. There is no self-made spiritual revival here in the words of Isaiah from the 8thcentury B.C. It is something that happens from above, from on high, and not something that we the suffering human citizens of Jerusalem in the days of Isaiah had to labor and strain to bring down, but we would obviously be willing to receive that Spirit poured upon us from on high.
It is interesting that the passage that is quoted in Acts of the Apostles chapter 2 by Peter has some of the same elements as this passage in Isaiah.
“And it shall come to pass afterward That I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your old men shall dream dreams, Your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days. “And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the LORD. And it shall come to pass, That whoever calls on the name of the LORD ,Shall be saved. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be deliverance, As the LORD has said, Among the remnant whom the LORD calls. 3:1 “For behold, in those days and at that time, When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem, I will also gather all nations, And bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat; And I will enter into judgment with them there On account of My people, My heritage Israel, Whom they have scattered among the nations; They have also divided up My land.”(Joel 2:28-3:2)
Please don't miss the work “afterward” in Joel 2:28, because like the word “Until” the word “afterward” is a time word and time is very important because time is the lego cubes from which our lives are built – time in fact is the only real money which is given into our hands to spend almost as we wish to spend it. “After . . .” what is the prophet Joel talking about? Just look at the previous verse. Look at Joel chapter 2:27, “Then you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel: I am the LORD your God And there is no other. My people shall never be put to shame.” Here too the verse starts with a time word, “Then” but it brings a dimension of knowing that God is in the midst of Israel and that He the LORD is the only One and there is no other. This is interesting to me because now it is past the middle of the month of November and the Land of Israel has had less than 10% of the annual rain fall for this season. The Sea of Galilee, the Kinneret in Hebrew, is nearing critical low levels. Leaders of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, in Israel gathered yesterday for a day of fasting and prayer for rain over this land. There are places in the world where there are floods that kill people and devastate houses and fields and overflow rivers, and here in the land of Israel we are simply dry. Reading Isaiah and Joel in the context of the outpouring of the Spirit on the people of Jerusalem brings to my mind the larger context of both of these texts. The result of the pouring out of the Spirit on the people comes with a blessing on the land both in the words of Joel and in Isaiah 32.
“Fear not, O land; Be glad and rejoice, For the LORD has done marvelous things! Do not be afraid, you beasts of the field; For the open pastures are springing up, And the tree bears its fruit; The fig tree and the vine yield their strength. Be glad then, you children of Zion, And rejoice in the LORD your God; For He has given you the former rain faithfully, And He will cause the rain to come down for you ― The former rain, And the latter rain in the first month. The threshing floors shall be full of wheat, And the vats shall overflow with new wine and oil. “So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, The crawling locust, The consuming locust, And the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you. You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, And praise the name of the LORD your God, Who has dealt wondrously with you; And My people shall never be put to shame.” (Joel 2:21-26)
In Christianity the tradition inherited from Greek methods of interpretation is to spiritualize everything. They spiritualized the land, the first rain and the last rain, and prosperity, and fertility, and the wars, and the victories, everything. When I read this text like every Jew two things are evident, one is that God's promises are all true, and when I say true, it means that they are all to be fulfilled as spoken over the Land, over the Children of Zion, over the fig tree and the vine that will yield their fruit, and a real rain will come down and bless the land, and God's people shall not be put to shame. Generally speaking this is the way that Jews according to tradition interpret Scripture.
The reason that I bring these texts up from Isaiah and Joel (and there are others like them) is that I want you all to pray for rain and a good winter over the land of Israel. This will bless not only the Jewish population of this land, but also the Arabs, and Christians and the country of Jordan that receives much of it's water from the Sea of Galilee. So, when you pray for us please pray in this order:
1. That we shall all know that the LORD is our God, and seek to know Him intimately.
2. That the rain, the physical rain will fall and bless the land.
3. That the Spirit of the LORD will be poured out on us all in a greater measure and with deeper understanding and in a more biblical fashion.
The conference for the Anussim (Marrano Jews) in Portugal is taking place in the beginning of December 2010. We have a delegation from Israel of 15 people, a delegation from Brazil of near 50 people, a delegation from the United States of at least 6 people, a delegation from Korea of more than 10 people, and a delegation from Japan of at least 2 people, and some from Hong Kong, Spain, Italy, England, Holland, and may be other places too. It is a great big challenge for prayer. I look at myself in the mirror and say to myself, “Joseph – you are crazy” - what makes you think that you can bring any change to this hundreds of years old problem?” Than I say to myself, God can use crazy people like me because He is the God of the impossible. And much of the good that exists in this world started from the impossible and God made it possible. Just less than 100 years ago to have a Jewish State in the Land of Israel was considered impossible and one crazy fool like Theodor Herzel, only a journalist, was able to change the tide and start something that he himself never lived to see – a Jewish State resurrected in the Land of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So, here I am another fool, and crazy dreamer, and that is why I need your prayers and the millions of Marrano Jews need your prayers, and the more millions of Christians in the world who need to mobilize and provoke Israel to jealousy need your prayer. Of course we do our part and trust in God that He will do His part because without Him, and His participation and without His Spirit being poured out on us we are helpless.
Please pray for our sick. We have our dear brother David S., whose foot was ran over by a car and now he is in bed, in pain and he can't walk, but he has to travel with us to Portugal to participate in the conference. Pray for Judah a dear brother from the Negev who had some strange internal bleeding incident where he had to receive four portions of blood. We prayed and the bleeding stopped, but the doctors don't know how or from where this massive bleeding came. So, there will be more tests. Pray for Grace our dear sister – the LORD partially answered prayers, but she still needs the LORD's polishing touch for a final healing. We continue to pray for healing for all those who are chronically ill among our brothers and friends: Dr. Tim Tucker – who has improved but still needs so much improvement. Ruby our dear sister – who is suffering pain so many years needs our prayer for a full and speedy miracle of healing. Ahuva, Liora, Leah, Ilana, Sarit, Sara, Zvi, Jo and all her family, and Paulo in Brazil. Keijo our dear brother in Finland who has undergone a double knee replacement surgery this week needs prayers for a speedy recovery and strength to bear the pain. Always pray for Marcia my wife, and Danah my daughter, and Noaam, and for Barry who also had surgery last week, but he is doing better, and for Joey, Beth, and Marcia's mother June, and her father Horace.
We have not forgotten the burden that the Lord has given us for the older generation of Israeli believers in the city of Jerusalem. We have only in our congregation at least five people who are over 80 and some even over 90 years old who need care, need a home where someone can care for them. We have a dear family in Switzerland who have this burden and they are praying, but we need you too to pray for a home for the elderly brothers and sisters in Jerusalem. We could actually start a home like this in Jerusalem or near Jerusalem if the LORD would provide us with at least 15,000 dollars per month. The old people who are going to be in the home will share some of their social security to cover expenses.
The Soup-Kitchen is functioning and feeding people with good food. Yuda our youth minister and director of the Soup-Kitchen is actually thinking to have the social workers of the city of Jerusalem do the screening of who receives food in our Soup-Kitchen and that way the most unpleasant and hard task in the Soup-Kitchen will be done by professionals. Please pray for the Soup-Kitchen.
Well, I know that your prayers are effective and very important for the Kingdom of God. Please continue to life us up and lift up all of Israel and the need for rain, and the political situation between the Obama administration and our P.M. Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu, and the oral promises that are being made for support of Israel and are refused to be written down. God only knows that it has never been wise to put our trust in man and in the strong arms of weapons and other countries, like in our past history Egypt and Assyria or Babylon. Only you the Disciples of Yeshua can understand and pray with wisdom for Israel and for the Arabs and for the whole situation here in the Middle East. Those who don't study the Bible and don't really know the background of these wars here can not have the wisdom to pray according to God's will for this situation.
May God be with you and bless you and heal you and prosper you and multiply your blessings 100 fold for all that you have done, are doing and will do for the salvation of Israel and the whole World.
Joseph Shulam
Your Subscription:
ABBA COPY YOUR STUFF HERE
|
|
