TULIP GEMS

“But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.”  (2 Peter 3:18)

REPORT FROM JERUSALEM

(Voice in the Wilderness) 

Shalom from Jerusalem
Antony Simon, Voice in the Wilderness

Here in Israel the work goes on. The Passover is over, Passover is very important in the Jewish calendar and in many households families gather together to remember this great event in the history of Israel, their redemption from Egypt. Many Jews are secular and don’t believe that it was a historical event, like the tour guide I met recently at the Garden Tomb which we visit every Friday with are tour group.  

One of the workers had a book on Angels so I asked to see it and she asked me if I believed in Angels, of course I do I replied, the Israeli Jewish tour guide that was standing next to us suddenly entered the conversation and proclaimed that he did not believe in angels and that also all other miracles in the Bible are explainable. They take some parts and reject others but on no scientific basis, He gave me an example, the Red Sea, at night it looks real blood, this was his explanation for the first plague.  

Ok I said, but it says that all the rivers turned into blood and also that all the fish died. He was silent, his ignorance showing up he gave no answer, then he promptly tells us that he is an atheist, so sad, the fact that he is a Jew is enough proof for the existence of God.

I found that growing up in a traditional Jewish home I naturally believed in God, I did not have any arguments for or against but to me there was a God, it was as clear to me as the nose on my face. I remember the day my parents told me the shocking news that they wanted to get divorced, I went to the bathroom and cried out to God to take my life, I was eleven and he answered my prayer seven years later, he gave me new life.  

We celebrated the Passover and all the traditions but they were just a ritual, a rite to perform, and not a spiritual experience and not as a way to get close to God, there was no connection. Some would say you did not experience the Passover with orthodox Jews; I did after I became a believer.  

My friends decided they wanted to rescue me from Christianity; they wanted me back to how I was before I believed, so I went to visit a local Rabbi, I spent some time with him and I became friendly with his family. They invited me to celebrate the Jewish Holidays at their house but I only saw emptiness in their religion.

After I became a believer I printed my testimony and placed it in all the doors in the local community with the address of the congregation, which I was attending. The local Jewish press printed lies about me. In the testimony that I wrote I said that I went to see a rabbi in Kafar Habad, which is a village associated with the Habad movement whose leader Menahem Schneirson they proclaim is the Messiah, he died a few years later and even though they thought he would rise from the dead, he is still dead.  

The meeting with this rabbi in Kafar Habad left me even more convinced that Jesus was the Messiah, because the answers he gave, could NOT answer my questions. I was not even a believer yet and did not know the Bible well but God was with me and helping me find the truth. So when the Lubavitch in Manchester read the testimony they wanted to take the small congregation to court for slander. 

The elders were afraid and became angry with me for using their address and I thought what would happen if we had lived in Hitler’s Germany, would they also be angry with me and hand me other to the authorities. There were some Christians who told Jewish believers not to associate with them because of fear of the Nazis. I decided to take the law in my own hands and speak directly to the Lubavitch. I found the head of the Lubavitch / Habad in Manchester and I spoke to them and said that I wrote the tract.  

They brought me into a room with about ten men and brought out a book with pictures of the Yeshiva in Kfar Habad (Jewish theological school for the learning of Torah and Jewish literature), teachers and Rabbis from Kefar Habad yeshiva. In the front of the book and the back of the book they had a picture of their Rebbe Menahem Mendel Shnierson. After a short time someone new came in the room and asked me if I had found the one, I said I had and showed them the picture of their Rebbe, then I heard a chorus of very bad language. Of course I hadn’t found the picture of the exact rabbi I had spoken with but it helped crack the ice.

As a result of that meeting in Manchester we became good friends and I went to the house of the head of the Habad in Manchester and his daughter and son-in-law invited me often but they were more interested in business than in God. The head of the Habad had known my mother, as she had been his secretary before she married my father. So I experienced orthodox Jews and their life.  

I think the gospel is far superior and can help us in a real way in life. I remember once a friend of mine who I had helped in a big way, something which he would have never received without me. Later he left our friendship, I heard a comment he made - that I would go back to Judaism. He can’t have known me well.  

But my faith in the Messiah is something that sets me free, and sometimes when you help people they return evil for good but we must always return evil with good, but it is hard, it is more natural to kick back. But I must forgive and always extent my hand, seventy times seven, which means first and foremost, always. I to my brother and we each to each other. It is the Gospel that makes forgiveness possible, without it we are as hard as stone. It is a gift of God.

Back to Passover and Easter both arrived at the same time this year. Easter in Greek is pasxa, which is the Greek for Passover because Passover was the time when the Messiah was crucified; the root word in the Greek has the idea of suffering. This year Passover and Easter occurred about the same time as the orthodox Easter, it is usually a week later because of different calendars. Jerusalem was full of Pilgrims from all over the world.  

Incidentally Israel is a safe place to come for your holidays, a lot safer than most major cities in the world. Come and visit us and support the country. But He must be so sad at this time, in the Holy Sepulcher the traditional site of the Death Burial and resurrection there is an idol’s temple, they have a stone at the entrance in the middle where they say that our Lord’s body was laid which is a lie.  

The stone is resent and people come and kiss it and pour oil crosses and books and other objects on it. I saw one woman who poured a bottle of water on the stone and wiped it up with a cloth and placed it in a container and there is silence, no voice for the truth, they opened the elaterium, where you can pay and pray to the saints and their body parts, so sad.

Every year the Greek orthodox or acting head of the Greek orthodox church goes in into the Holy Sepulcher alone and comes out with fire which they say comes down from, which is just a trick and know yet many people say we know the orthodox faith is true because of the fire. On the night before the fire, Dona and I and are three children went to the Old City to do something and we passed by the Holy Sepulcher, there was a big crowd of people and we wondered what was happening. Our youngest son could not see above the crowd and a kind man helped him by putting him on his shoulders.  

It turned out that this man was a professor at the Anglican college in Jerusalem but this man was an unbeliever. He told us all religions are the same, when you go up a mountain you can take many paths but from the top it is all the same, we quoted John 14 verse 1, “I am the way ……. “. Oh Jesus never said that he said, then I quoted Acts 4:12, Paul was wrong? It was not Paul, it was Peter, then it is wrong, he was the judge about what was biblical and not in the bible, so sad, and he was an ordained minister.

How can he teach in a theological college? As Jesus said, Blind leaders of the Blind, the question is what did Jesus say? For this man, in the end we have nothing, no word, no saviour, no hope all men most miserable.

We have just begun outreach in a new area with the Jesus video and so far we have had a good response, over 35 people have ordered the film. We usually go out twice a week for several hours and so far we have had a good response, usually mostly Russians speakers respond but this time it is Israelis Hebrew speakers.  

We have had a little problem now and then. One day we were attacked by an orthodox Jew, he came up to one of the members of our team and asked him what is this letter you are placing in letter boxes, he answered that it was an advertisement for a free video.  

After a few minutes the man appeared and said take them all out of the boxes you are a missionary, but rightly our team member refused, anger the orthodox man then grabbed him and shouted for the police, (by the way it is not illegal to preach the Gospel in Israel as some would like it to be) and said to his son call someone, there was a struggle but the man would not let our team member go, but he struggled in a Christian way and the orthodox man’s keys fell on the floor and our team member escaped , without any hurt.  

Praise the Lord. This particular work is a combination of donations from the congregation towards the materials needed, gifted materials and lots of legwork. We have currently used up all our gifted materials and will be needing to fund more.

We continue with our tours to the Old City and Ein Kerem every Friday. A few weeks ago we had a special tour on Saturday and there were 160 people from Haifa 100 of whom were not believers. We were able to distribute bibles and other literature, all of which were happily received.   

We are starting something new; we are going to bus people in from other cities to come to our tour on a Friday. We went to the town to distribute invitations and we had a massive response. Our leaflets state that this is a tour of “Christian” holy sites in Jerusalem so that people who come are well aware of who we are and what we are about.  

We have a brother who has an old van who will help us but he also works some Fridays but we need people who will sponsor this venture. Twenty unbelievers hearing the Gospel and receiving literature every week. Also in the month of June, we are going to begin bring groups from Haifa each week in cooperation with a local Congregation. Please pray for this extension of our work and that the Lord will be glorified through it.

We went to a concert in Tel Aviv it was a free concert held in a park, there was a few hundred thousand people expected. We handed out many thousands of invitations and literature for the Jesus Film and had many opportunities to testify of our faith personally. One young man was very open his name is Alex I gave him my email so we can continue with our discussion, please pray for his salvation.

Very few organization and missions here in Israel have such a good opportunity to preach the gospel and we thank the Lord that we can do this but we need your help. There are so many people who support good work organizations who are ashamed of the Gospel but very few who support those involved in spreading the Gospel message.  

Big newsletters are full of all the good works done, which is good, but all the love and good works in the world are nothing without the Messiah Slain and His redemptive message, the Gospel Message, Which alone has the power to save souls.


I am currently living on what I can make and saving to pay for things, which are not endless. Until things are settled otherwise I covet your prayers for our provisions. If you can please help further, whatever, or sponsor a project of ours, it is for the furtherance of the Gospel. We live a simple lifestyle, sorry to be so direct but we do have a needs. As the Lord leads you.

May you receive blessings from above
Antony Simon


**Just want to add that there are many good congregations and Missionaries who are serving the Lord faithfully and there are some that deny the very basics

Latest Prayer Requests and update on Evangelism in Shterot   http://www.voice-wilderness.com/prayer.asp

by Tony Simon of Voice in the Wilderness

 Web Site: www.voice-wilderness.com

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