Jerusalem where the Bible is alive
Dec 03, 2004
AT Entebbe airport, I had asked pilgrims from Kampala Pentecostal Church how they felt on the eve of going to the holy land.
By Joe Nam
In Jerusalem
AT Entebbe airport, I had asked pilgrims from Kampala Pentecostal Church how they felt on the eve of going to the holy land. “It is the fulfilment of a life’s time dream,†Rosemary Kainembabazi said. Emmanuel Nyirikindi answer was “I can’t describe my excitement.†And Benjamin Okwir’s, “The Lord showed me in 1980 that I would visit the holy land. I am dumbfounded that it is happening now. â€
On the evening of our third day in Israel, we were entering Jerusalem, (pronounced Yerushalayim in Hebrew).
At dinner that evening, we were asked to share our experiences of the past few days and the joy of being in Jerusalem. “I felt the presence of God at the mount of transfiguration,†Christine Mugabi said. “it was real.†“The bible is now more real to me than before, and I am going back a changed person,†Elizabeth Okwir said.
Jerusalem is a city of great controversies. It has been destroyed 10 times by conquering armies.
All major world religions converge here. And prophecy has it that the last great battle, the Armageddon, will happen here when 200 million Chinese troops move against Israel. The current controversy is between the Jews and the Palestinians each claiming it as their capital.
Our team had come to celebrate with Canadian missionaries the opening of their Inner City meeting place (called the Pavilion) for evangelicals and messianic Jews (Jews who have dared to believe Jesus (Yeshua in Hebrew) is the messiah promised by God. There was a demonstration against the pavilion opening by Orthodox/Hassidic Jews. Yuri Stern, a member of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament), however, came to the pavilion and appealed to Ugandans and the nations to stand with Israel in her troubles.
Jews have reasons to distrust Christians. Over the years of Christendom history, the massacre of the Jews, the crusader wars, to the inquisition, to the pogroms and the horrendous holocaust during world war II were all carried out by Christians. The Palestinian Muslims have taken over since 1948 with terrorist attacks and suicide bombings.
There are about 200,000 Jews worldwide, who believe Yeshua is the Messiah. Out of six million Jews living in Israel, only about 10,000 are believers in Yeshua. Most Jews are quite surprised at the obsession of Christians with Yeshua. Toni Gafni, a devote Jew in Haifa told me Jesus is ‘just’ one of the famous Jewish teachers. “He is not the messiah, the Messiah will bring peace, there has been trouble and chaos for the last 2000 years since this man came. even worse, he predicted that his followers would not circumcise, †he said.
This is even more comprehensible ones in Jerusalem with the awareness that Jesus walked the very same streets. The Jews knew his parents, playmates, girlfriends and boyfriends. How could Yeshua then one day return from the wilderness and pronounce himself Son of God.
One of the many things Judaism share with Islam is a firm rejection of this claim. And so the Jews still await the messiah, pounding their heads at the wailing wall in Jerusalem, in prayer for a messiah.
We visiting Ugandans were mainly eager to retrace the steps of Yeshua our Lord and Saviour from his birth at Bethlehem, now under Palestinian authority. It was excitement seeing the birthplace of Jesus at the Church of the Nativity, which is partitioned between Orthodox and Catholics to ‘please every body’ according to our guide. Important sites here are the pool of Bethesda where Jesus once healed a paralytic, the via Dolorosa, the passage where Jesus carried his cross to crucifixion, the garden tomb where he was buried and the mount of olives, where he ascended to heaven.
I am a dreamer, so resting in my hotel room at the luxurious Novotel that night, I wanted to make sure I was really in Jerusalem. Had I truly seen all these things I had read about since childhood or was I in some kind of prolonged dream?
Had I really ventured out of my hotel that night and met that Orthodox Jew with a flowing beard and Jewish attire whom I met. He had spoken in broken English but gladly volunteered to lead me to the Novotel when I got lost. “Where come?†he had asked.
But he did not know ‘Ouganda’ when I told him my country. Later in the conversation, he had said, “Bush good, Sharon good, America good.†If this was a dream, it was a pleasant nice and true dream.
The scriptures jump out of the bible and come alive when you visit Israel.
In Jerusalem
AT Entebbe airport, I had asked pilgrims from Kampala Pentecostal Church how they felt on the eve of going to the holy land. “It is the fulfilment of a life’s time dream,†Rosemary Kainembabazi said. Emmanuel Nyirikindi answer was “I can’t describe my excitement.†And Benjamin Okwir’s, “The Lord showed me in 1980 that I would visit the holy land. I am dumbfounded that it is happening now. â€
On the evening of our third day in Israel, we were entering Jerusalem, (pronounced Yerushalayim in Hebrew).
At dinner that evening, we were asked to share our experiences of the past few days and the joy of being in Jerusalem. “I felt the presence of God at the mount of transfiguration,†Christine Mugabi said. “it was real.†“The bible is now more real to me than before, and I am going back a changed person,†Elizabeth Okwir said.
Jerusalem is a city of great controversies. It has been destroyed 10 times by conquering armies.
All major world religions converge here. And prophecy has it that the last great battle, the Armageddon, will happen here when 200 million Chinese troops move against Israel. The current controversy is between the Jews and the Palestinians each claiming it as their capital.
Our team had come to celebrate with Canadian missionaries the opening of their Inner City meeting place (called the Pavilion) for evangelicals and messianic Jews (Jews who have dared to believe Jesus (Yeshua in Hebrew) is the messiah promised by God. There was a demonstration against the pavilion opening by Orthodox/Hassidic Jews. Yuri Stern, a member of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament), however, came to the pavilion and appealed to Ugandans and the nations to stand with Israel in her troubles.
Jews have reasons to distrust Christians. Over the years of Christendom history, the massacre of the Jews, the crusader wars, to the inquisition, to the pogroms and the horrendous holocaust during world war II were all carried out by Christians. The Palestinian Muslims have taken over since 1948 with terrorist attacks and suicide bombings.
There are about 200,000 Jews worldwide, who believe Yeshua is the Messiah. Out of six million Jews living in Israel, only about 10,000 are believers in Yeshua. Most Jews are quite surprised at the obsession of Christians with Yeshua. Toni Gafni, a devote Jew in Haifa told me Jesus is ‘just’ one of the famous Jewish teachers. “He is not the messiah, the Messiah will bring peace, there has been trouble and chaos for the last 2000 years since this man came. even worse, he predicted that his followers would not circumcise, †he said.
This is even more comprehensible ones in Jerusalem with the awareness that Jesus walked the very same streets. The Jews knew his parents, playmates, girlfriends and boyfriends. How could Yeshua then one day return from the wilderness and pronounce himself Son of God.
One of the many things Judaism share with Islam is a firm rejection of this claim. And so the Jews still await the messiah, pounding their heads at the wailing wall in Jerusalem, in prayer for a messiah.
We visiting Ugandans were mainly eager to retrace the steps of Yeshua our Lord and Saviour from his birth at Bethlehem, now under Palestinian authority. It was excitement seeing the birthplace of Jesus at the Church of the Nativity, which is partitioned between Orthodox and Catholics to ‘please every body’ according to our guide. Important sites here are the pool of Bethesda where Jesus once healed a paralytic, the via Dolorosa, the passage where Jesus carried his cross to crucifixion, the garden tomb where he was buried and the mount of olives, where he ascended to heaven.
I am a dreamer, so resting in my hotel room at the luxurious Novotel that night, I wanted to make sure I was really in Jerusalem. Had I truly seen all these things I had read about since childhood or was I in some kind of prolonged dream?
Had I really ventured out of my hotel that night and met that Orthodox Jew with a flowing beard and Jewish attire whom I met. He had spoken in broken English but gladly volunteered to lead me to the Novotel when I got lost. “Where come?†he had asked.
But he did not know ‘Ouganda’ when I told him my country. Later in the conversation, he had said, “Bush good, Sharon good, America good.†If this was a dream, it was a pleasant nice and true dream.
The scriptures jump out of the bible and come alive when you visit Israel.