Inside Israel

I had listened to a stirring account given by a man on the radio news this morning.  He said that in the first day of the war alone he lost 85 of his friends, family and unit.  The interviewer asked how he had survived and he immediately said, “That was only God.”

It was better then listening to the news where I heard a disappointing statement given by our Defense Chief this week saying that Israel can depend on no one but herself, her capabilities and the IDF (our military).  I gasped with grief, not a mention of The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  God have mercy!

I said out loud: “We depend on You Lord!  Our eyes are upon You!”

I wrote the above several days ago and then time ran out and I lagged several days behind.

“Succot Sameach. Happy Succot!” we said yesterday to bus drivers, vendors and strangers on the street, rushing home after work to prepare the dishes to bring out to the sukka. There was a heavy air between my husband and me this year as we put up and decorated our succa. Some family issues weighed heavily upon us, as well as the uncertainty concerning our move and the lack of family with us tried to block out the joy of the holiday.  Finally, however, the succa was up, and I added new scripture verses this year to the ones I normally hang in Hebrew and in English. Our visitors usually include local believers, Christians from the nations here for the MANY feast related meetings and prayer watches, and local friends and neighbors who are not yet believers, some of whom don’t yet know what we believe.

The scriptures therefore have a multifold purpose: to glorify Him, to remind us of why we are sitting in the succa, to spur us to Him, to declare Him and His purposes both to those who come in and go out and to the very heavens above, to stand in agreement with Him.

So I carefully pin the computer generated hangings I too hastily put together on our walls made of strips of different material I have collected over the years.  My husband cuts the palm branches from a few date palms around our house and puts them on top of the lattice of loose sticks that are laid across our clothes line.  Usually I am able to get some willow and other branches added in, but this year it is just date palm.  As tacky as it sounds, I then put up the ‘plastic’ fruit hangings − grapes, pomegranates, peppers etc. − I have collected over the years, much like Christmas ornaments. Then I put up the fresh fruit I bought at the shuk yesterday: pomegranates with their stems and leaves and boughs of early yellow dates.

Finally, I head out through the area in search of boughs and colorful flowers.  I come back with lots of fragrant myrtle, branches from the red pepper trees laden with red peppercorns, a blue hanging flower, and various lovely leaves and fragrant herbs, and I hang them where there are spaces.  I have to be careful that the pomegranates are not hung above where someone will sit as they can HURT when they fall!  Bowls of huge sweet grapes, dates, all colors and varieties of fruit and nuts sit on the table. The living Thanksgiving offering is prepared in a living tabernacle to house living stones hoping to be a sweet smelling savor to Him.  Time to enter in.

This is my “close up view” of yesterday’s preparations.

Around us swirl a huge flurry of events including a spiraling amount of convocations hosting Christians from around the world.  What a cacophony of activity.  When we first made aliyah, there was ONE Christian Feast of Tabernacles’ conference which hosted believers from all around the globe. It was one of the biggest events in the general Jerusalem calendar yearly.  Over the past few years groups have split off and other groups have come in, depending upon persuasion and emphasis of doctrine, and perhaps geographic area of the world. The result has been multiple large conferences going on simultaneously.

How blessed we are to have many, many thousands of believers from all over the world gathering to pray and intercede for the nation and to worship The King.  Although we don’t often get to go to partake in any of the meetings due to work constraints and so forth, we often get meet encouraging visitors during the holidays. Our kehila will be full of visitors tomorrow night.  One was with us last night in our succa from California.  She joined, with a pastor friend and his wife, as we sat under the Jerusalem stars sharing The Word, testimonies, and His glory.

Along with the Christian feasts, there are both huge and small Jewish gatherings in individual and group succas.  The secular make it a “nature feast” and travel and camp and have fun.  Each morning thousands of people wend their way to the Western Wall or to synagogue with their “four species:” a palm branch, called a lulav,  two willow called the aravot,  minimum of three myrtle branches called haddasim , and finally one citron  called an etrog. They pray and say special blessings. There will also be the ‘Blessing of the Cohenim, the proclaiming of the priestly blessing over the people sometime later this week at the western wall.

AND there will be the Jerusalem March where believers come front and center: marching through the streets of Jerusalem often in traditional dress depicting their home countries and with banners proclaiming scriptures and promise. The streets are all closed and lined with joyful spectators, amazed that Christians come to bless them. What a season!