“Behold
the tabernacle of God is among men. And He will dwell among them, and they
shall be His people, and God himself will be among them” (Rev. 21:3).
Hey
Gang: If that does not build a fire in
the depths of your innards, you had best check yourself into the nearest
emergency ward and see if your thumper is still thumping.
When I was in
the fourth grade, we began our days with the Pledge of Allegiance, several
verses from the Bible, and the Lord’s Prayer.
We also had a morning update on what was happening in the war zones –
WWII. In one fateful day, the teacher
announced that General McArthur had thrown in the towel and left the Philippines,
but on his way out he made a vow to return soon, a promise he fulfilled.
Does it not
fill your heart with joy when you read the words of the angels who were there
when Jesus ascended back to the Father and took His rightful place at the right
hand of God? “Why do you stand looking into the sky? The angels asked. This Jesus, who has been taken up from you
into heaven, will come in the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven”
(Acts 1:11).
In the early
years of developing the Village we had reached a point of near exhaustion. God knew that and sent an angel across our
path. You do know that God sometimes
uses homo-sapiens to be stand in angels, don't you. His mission was to expand our horizons and
give us a fabulous blessing at the same time.
He said, "I am putting together a crew of people to go to Israel
and work in a Kibbutz south of the Dead Sea and prepare it for future groups to
come visit and help at the Kibbutz.”
But, let me
warn you, this is not a tour-driven escapade where you stay in five star
hotels, travel in the elite buses, eat at the finest restaurants and don't get
your hands dirty. He was one hundred
percent correct! In route to the kibbutz
our bus had a flat tire and, when we finally arrived at the Kibbutz, the sewers
were plugged; the housing facilities consisted of Mobil homes that had been
through several wars and they looked like it. The lighting for the entire
campus was four candles, one at each corner (just joking of course but not a
great deal better).
We had to be
careful where we walked because there were miles of barbed wire strung
throughout the kibbutz. As we drove
onto the kibbutz it was pitch black but the lights from the bus sent a clear
message that this was not the Hyatt Regency!
After traveling from Chicago to Tel Aviv, from Tel Aviv Airport to Ir Ovot,
(the kibbutz), we were so tired we could have slept on the ground. BUT, we had
no idea what a mess we had volunteered for.
By the time
we reached Ir Ovot we had already had several unique and rather exciting experiences
to write in our logs. I can attest to
the fact that we did not have one convenience on arrival at Ir Ovot, but I also
want you to know - I did not hear one word of complaint. Not even when we, who were 56 strong, learned
that there was only one rest-room facility operational with two heads.
The previous
day we left our homes, with all the conveniences, traveled for more than twenty
hours, arrived at a place that did not have one convenience, but we slept
soundly and prepared for what was to come in the morning. In our first morning devotion our leader made
his first assignment by reading from Isaiah 60:10 "Foreigners will build up your walls". We were about to be ‘fulfillers of prophecy’. Wow, what an awesome memory! To be in the land where our Lord lived, died
and was resurrected and will come again one day soon, and fulfilling one of the
many prophecies of the Word - that my friends is a feeling that is hard to
describe!
Blessings,
Gramps
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