- World Outreach Headquarters?
- A Personal Plea to Return
- Before & After
- Download July Newsletter as a PDF
World Outreach Headquarters?
As part of the restoration of all things, the ancient biblical Prophets write that the worldwide center of gravity in the Spirit will shift back to Israel, where it all began. The words of Isaiah are arresting in their clarity:
“Now it shall come to pass in the latter days
That the mountain of the Lord’s house
Shall be established on the top of the mountains,
And shall be exalted above the hills;
And all nations shall flow to it…
For out of Zion shall go forth the law, And the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” (Isaiah 2:2,3)
Therefore, we do not view our country of Israel in the same light as every “mission field” around the world. Furthermore, we invite our honored brothers and sisters from the Nations, to view it similarly, and to help restore “world outreach headquarters” to Israel instead of seeing Israel as “just another mission field.” From the Tents of Mercy Network of Congregations and Humanitarian Aid In the first century, the Good News spread, beginning with the original Jewish disciples in Jerusalem, who went through Judea and Samaria, and ultimately to the ends of the earth. By the grace of God, Yeshua is still being proclaimed to the farthest corners of the globe.
Meanwhile, Israel has not completed her calling — disrupted by 18 centuries of unbelief regarding Yeshua and virulent anti-Semitism from the historic Church. And Isaiah speaks again, exhorting Israeli believers to arise, after returning from lengthy exile.
“Arise, shine; for your light has come!
And the glory of the LORD is risen upon you…
The Nations will come to your light…
And they shall call you the city of the LORD, Zion of the Holy One of Israel.
Whereas you have been forsaken and hated,
So that no one went through you, I will make you an eternal excellence…” (Isaiah 60:1-15)
These words grip us with a “now” destiny. Isaiah sees Israel as the focal point, drawing the nations, rather than simply being another place where Yeshua’s message is to be shared. The task of Gentile Christians is not to convert Jews to another religion but to bring Israel to jealousy so that she can fulfill Isaiah 60 for God’s glory.
“I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Nations. Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Nations, how much more their fullness!” (Romans 11:11-12)
Watching groups of true Christians come to Israel over the years, one notices how their considerate and loving behavior makes Jewish people envious. The genuine concern for others that is characteristic of Jesus followers, feels like a fresh breeze in the heat of Israel’s many challenges. Even the Israeli government now recognizes that our best friend internationally is not any one nation, but those Evangelical Christians who see Israel as a fulfillment of God’s covenant promises. They perceive a renewed biblical drama unfolding on the stage of this tiny country.
Thus, the partnership of Yeshua’s disciples in Israel and the Nations will restore Israel as “world outreach headquarters.” When God told Moses that we are to be a “kingdom of priests,” He intended for us to be His messengers to all the world (Exodus 19:16; I Peter 2:9). What began 2000 years ago and earlier, is being revived today. We are being joined together to finish the commission Yeshua entrusted to His original disciples.
“…you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)
A Personal Plea to Return
“Surely the Lord God does nothing, unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets.” (Amos 3:7)
A Zionist prophet is still revered in Israel. Streets are named after him, and a museum in Tel Aviv tells of incredible things this one man did during his life time. That man was Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky.
In the late 1930’s Jabotinsky crisscrossed Europe, warning Jews to get out.
“Vladimir Jabotinsky was a powerhouse of Zionist vision, rhetoric and action. He trained and inspired modern Israeli leaders like Menachem Begin. When much of European Jewry was enjoying a false security at the end of the l9th century,… Jabotinsky was screaming at the top of his lungs: ‘The ground of Europe is burning under your feet! Get out while you can! Let us rebuild our homeland!’ Jabotinsky saw what very few around him could see – the disasters that were unfolding – even though they were all looking at the same thing.” (quote from Messianic leader B. Cohen)
Jabotinsky delivered a touching and sad speech in Warsaw Poland on Tisha B’av, 24 October, 1938. This was his prophetic warning, spoken in Yiddish, to his people:
“It is already three years that I am calling upon you, Polish Jewry, who are the crown of World Jewry. I continue to warn you incessantly that a catastrophe is coming closer! I become gray and old in these days, my heart bleeds that you dear brothers and sisters do not see the volcano which will soon begin to spit its all – consuming lava.”
Ze’ev died on August 4, 1940. Thankfully he was not allowed to see the horrors of what took place in Europe, especially in Poland where 3,000,000 Jews perished in the Holocaust.
What an awesome safe haven America has been for the Jewish people until NOW – but no longer! Because, my dearest brothers and sisters, the safe haven for the Jewish people is now the State of Israel; no longer the USA, no longer France, Germany or England, no longer South America or Australia, or any other nation in the world. The Father is calling…to leave the Diaspora and to come home.
We urgently address Jews reading this to leave America and Europe! (Isn’t the same orchestrated madness that led up to World War II – pressing in on the Jews to flee Europe today?) I call to my fellow Jews everywhere to quickly prepare to come to Israel with honor, with your belongings, with your self-esteem, with your credentials and diplomas. Time is short, and this increasingly chaotic world is about to spin out of control. This is an emphatic, passionate summons to return home! Respond with faith and action to the call of the God of Israel through the voice of His servants, who like Jabotinsky, are even now travelling throughout America and Europe with His prophetic warning. Don’t doubt or ignore it. We don’t want to be like the 10 spies who resisted God in fear and unbelief. They were part of an entire generation who wept and murmured against Him and also died in the wilderness. Rather, believe and proceed in faith like the two good spies in Numbers 13. Their names were Calev and Joshua.
Today, in Israel two leading attorneys who help Jews enter into the Promised Land in the Aliyah process, are named, appropriately, Calev and Joshua. Our modern day Calev said: “Don’t believe an evil bad report about Aliyah for believers. This is not the time to wander in the desert and believe lies. God is a miracle maker and many success stories are being made in Israel. Don’t believe you can’t move there, learn Hebrew, get educated, find a job, provide for family, and serve your community.” (Millions, yes millions, have done it before you!)
To sum up this prophetic warning: I have lived in Israel for over 33 years and enjoyed seeing and experiencing miraculous provision, progress and change since our family made Israel our home. My husband and I left all that was dear to us behind, to join this young nation and to help her grow. Now the prophetic hour is late. Anti-Semitism again spreads across the continents. Don’t wait until disaster strikes suddenly and irreversibly as it did in World War II.
The dangers are all around us. We need to pray and seek the Lord for His direction. We need to consider what He has promised us in His word concerning those who are willing to leave behind houses and even family relatives (Luke 18:29).
Love, in His unfailing love,
Terri Morey
PS – And to our beloved Gentile brothers and sisters in the nations: We encourage you to stand with your Jewish exiled brethren in any way possible. At the same time we encourage you to be the righteous remnant in your nation, contending for God’s full destiny on all those around you, and for the full extension of mercy and revival in the midst of coming judgements.
shaveitzion.org | info@shaveitzion.org | P.O.B. 9609, Haifa 3109601 Israel |
Before & After
Many see the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost as having ushered in the era of the Church. However, a distancing from what came before Pentecost has also brought alienation from the Biblical/Jewish foundation and from the broader narrative described in the Bible.
Pentecost is Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks – one of the 3 pilgrimage feasts described in the Bible that God commanded His people to observe throughout their generations (Exodus 34:32). In the book of Acts we read that the followers of Yeshua faithfully continued observing this holy day. This was the reason why they and many others were in Jerusalem during that time of the year … culminating in the miracle of Pentecost.
When looking at the Book of Acts through a Jewish lens, we see that after Pentecost, the Messiah’s disciples did not cease to be Jewish nor did they sever their connection with the people of Israel. The only difference (though an important one) was being immersed into the Holy Spirit, setting in motion the work of sanctification in the disciples’ lives and the power to fulfill the great commission.
The New Covenant confirms the promises made to Abraham and his descendants, the people of Israel. It also includes additional conditions for His followers and provides the means for fulfilling the Lord’s commission to the whole world. Preaching the Good News is an essential part of it. Israel’s call to be a light to the world was further magnified in the life of the first followers of the Messiah as God enabled them to perform mighty miracles (Isaiah 60). Their ministry was overcoming the dark stronghold of this world – its anti-God mentality. Everyone immersed into the Holy Spirit has now become part of this great call. This is why Paul when writing to the Colossian believers, reminded them that God “delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love” (Colossians 1:13).
To the End of the Earth
“But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be witnesses to Me in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8).
Almost two thousand years later, we are witnessing a re-emergence of the first century trend. God is raising up Jewish disciples of the Messiah who will go forth from the Land of Israel, bringing the living Word to the end of the earth. There is a growing hunger in many nations for the Word of the Lord from Zion.
Years ago when Dan Juster and Eitan Shishkoff were talking about the rise of the apostolic in Israel, I remember having reservations. But by His grace, even our small congregation of 150 has begun to bring the Word of the Messiah to distant lands.
In May 2016, after Passover, our congregation was blessed with the opportunity to send our ministers on short missions abroad with the sole purpose of bringing the Word of the Lord from Israel.
“For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.” (Isaiah 2:3)
God sent a stiff-necked Israeli named Jonah out of Zion, to the nations, to bring the entire city of Nineveh to repentance. He can do similar things again, in our day!
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