Conviction

This morning I began reading The Heavenly Man which about a chinese believer, brother Yun. I want to let you read part of the second chapter I read this morning about his first years as a christian, because these five pages broke my heart today.

Background: brother Yun's mother became a christian when she was young but she drifted away shortly after all the Christians were heavily persecuited and forcefully removed from the country. A number of years later, married and with five kids, her husband was dying from cancer and the doctors told her there was no hope for him to live. Finally, after weeks of anguish, she remembered Jesus and turned to him in prayer. She told her children that their father's only hope was with Jesus; they spent the entire night praying "Jesus, heal our father. Jesus, heal our father." The next morning their father was healed completely and the whole family devoted their lives to Jesus. Yun was the fourth child and received Christ at the age of 16 and he desperately wanted to know who Jesus was. He would ask his mother about all that she knew, which wasn't much, and he was left hungry to know who this Jesus was.

The Heavenly Man:

    I asked if there were any words of Jesus left that I could read for myself. She replied, "No. All his words are gone. There is nothing left of his teaching." This was during the Cultural Revolution when Bibles could not be found.

    From that day on I earnestly wanted to have a copy of my own Bible. I asked my mother and fellow Christians what a Bible looked like, but no one knew. One person had seen some hand copied Scripture portions and song sheets, but never a whole Bible. Only a few believers could recall seeing Bibles many years before. The Word of God was scarce in the land.

    I was so hungry for a Bible. Seeing my desperation, my mother remembered an old man who lived in another village. This man had been a pastor before the Cultural Revolution.

    Together we started out on the long walk to his home. When we found him we told him our desire, "We long to see a Bible. Do you have one?"

    He immediately looked fearful. This man had already spent nearly 20 years in prison for his faith. He looked at me and saw that i was so young and poor, with tattered clothed and bare feet. He felt compassion, but still didn't want to show me his Bible.

    I don't blame him because in those days there were very few Bibles in the whole of China. Nobody was allowed to read any other book than Mao's little Red Book. If caught with a Bible, it would be burned and the owner's whole family would be severely beaten in the middle of the village.

    The old pastor simply told me, "The Bible is a heavenly book. If you want one, you'll need to pray to the God of heaven. Only he can provide you a heavenly book. God is faithful. He always answers those who seek him with all of their heart."

    I fully trusted the pastor's words.

    When I returned home i brought a stone into my room and knelt down on it every evening for prayer. I had just one simple prayer: "Lord, please give me a Bible. Amen." At that time I didn't know how to pray, but I continued for more than one month.

    Nothing happened. A Bible didn't appear.

    I went back to that pastor's house again. This time i went alone. I told him, "I've prayed to God according to your instructions, but I still haven't received a Bible I want so much. Please, please show me your Bible. Just a glance and i will be satisfied! I don't need to touch it. You hold it and i will be content just to look at it. If i could copy down some of the words i will return home happy."

    The pastor saw the anxiety of my heart. He spoke to me again, "If you're serious, then you should not only pray to the Lord, you should also fast and weep. The more you weep the sooner you'll get a Bible."

    I went home, and every morning and afternoon i ate and drank nothing. Every evening i ate just one small bowl of steamed rice. I cried like a hungry child to his heavenly Father, wanting to be filled wiht his Word. For the next one hundred days I prayed for a Bible, until i could bear no more. My parents were sure i was losing my mind.

    Looking back years later, i would sau this whoel experience was the most difficult thing i've ever endured.

    Then, suddenly one morning at 4 am, after months of begging God to answer my prayers, i received a vision from the Lord while kneeling beside my bed.

    In the vision i was walking up a steep hill, trying to push a heavy cart in front of me. I was heading towards a village where i intended to beg for food for my family. I was struggling greatly, because in my vision i was hungry and weak by constant fasting. The old cart was about to roll back and fall on me.

    I then saw three men walking down the hill in opposite direction. A kind old man, who had a very long beard, was pulling a large cart full of fresh bread. Tow other men were waling on each side of the cart. When the old man saw me he felt great pity and showed me compassion. He asked, "Are you hungry?" I replied, "Yes. I have nothing to eat. I'm on my way to get food for my family."

    I wept because my family was extremely poor. Because of my father's sickness we'd sold everything valuable to buy medicine. We had little to eat, and for years we'd been forced to bef for food from friends and neighbors. When the old man asked me if I was hungry i couldn't help but cry. I'd never felt such genuine love and compassion from anyone before.

    In the vision the old man took a red bag of bread from his trolley and asked his two servants to give it to me. He said, "You must eat it immediately."

    I opened the wrapping and saw there was a bun of fresh bread inside. When i put the bun in my mouth, it instanly turned into a Bible! Immediately, in my vision, i knelt down with my Bible and cried out to the Lord in thanksgiving, "Lord, your name is worthy to be praised! You didn't despise my prayer. You allowed me to receive this Bible. I want to serve you for the rest of my life."

    I woke up and started seaching the house for the Bible. The rest of my family was asleep. The vision had been so real to me that when i realized it had only been a dream i was deeply anguished and i wept loudly. My parents rushed to myroom to see what had happened. They thought i had gone crazy because of all my fasting and praying. I told them about my vision, but, the more i shared, the crazier they thought i was! Mother said, "The day hasn't dawned yet and no one has come to our house. THe door is firmly locked."

    My father held me tightly. With tears in his eyes he cried to God, "Dear Lord, have mercy on my son. Please don't let him lose his mind. I'm willing to be sick again if it will prevent my son from losing his mind. Please give my son a Bible."

    My mother, father and i knelt down and wept together, arm in arm.

    Suddenly i heard a faint knock at the door. A very gentle voice called my name. I rushed over and asked through the locked door, "Are you bringing the bread to me?" The gentle voice replied, "Yes, we have a bread feast to give you." I immediately recognized the voice as the same one i had heard in the vision.

    I quickly opened the door and there standing before me were the same two servants i had seen in the vision. One man held a red bag in his hands. My heart raced as i opened the bag and held in my hands my very own Bible!

    The two men quickly departed into the still darkness.

    I clutched my ne Bible to my heart and fell down on my knees outside the door. I thanked Go again and again! I promised Jesus that from that moment on i would devour his Word like a hungry child.

    Later i found out the names of those two men. One was brother Wang and the other brother Sung. They came from a village far away. They told me about an evangelist whom i'd never met. He had suffered terribly for the Lord during the Cultural Revolution, and had nearly died while being tortured.

    About three months before i received my Bible this evangelist had received a vision from the Lord. God showed him a young man to whom he was to give his hidden Bible. In the vision he saw ourhouse and the location of our village.

    Like many Christians at the time, the old man had placed his Bible inside a can and buried it deep in the ground, hoping the day would come when he could dig it up and read it again. Despite this vision, it took the evangelist a few months before he decided to obey what the Lord had told him to do. He asked two other Christian men to deliver it to me. They then walked throughout the night to reach my home.

   From that moment on i prayer to Jesus with a faith-filled prayer. I fully trusted that the words in the Bible were God's words to me. I always held the Bible. Even when i slept i laid it on my chest. I devoured its teachings like a hungry child.

    This was my first gift i ever received from God in prayer.

What to blog about?

So much has happened the past few days I hardly have time to blog about it. Today is Monday. Hmmm.... well, my last blog was on Tuesday writing about last Sunday. Phew. Well, most weekends we have a field study trip on either Saturday or Sunday; however, this weekend was one of our few weekends off, so three quarters of the school disappeared from campus. The 12 of us who were left spent a relatively quiet weekend relaxing with minor escapades in between movies and food.

This Friday evening marked the beginning of the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah. Unlike our New Year, the Jewish New Year is a solemn time to prepare for Yom Kippor, the day of Atonement where you hope your name is written in the book of life. They don't have a glass ball or yamika or something that drops from the western wall with confetti. In fact, they nearly all spend the night either in a synagogue or at home since Friday is Shabbat.

Saturday a few of us decided to check out the city to see what we could see since Saturday marked the beginning of the Islamic month of Ramadan. During this month the Muslim community will fast and pray from 4:00 am until about 4:00 pm, when they feast.

Here are some pictures from our Saturday outing:

Four of us guys went - Ben, Benaiah, Josh, and myself

Being guys we couldn't stick to normal streets and somehow ended up smack in the center of the Old City meat market. There is an entire alleyway/street devoted to meat. You have to walk a little on the side of the street because of the "water" draining down the center doesn't look entirely sanitary. I apologize if anyone is grossed our by the picture, but trust me that I left off the more disgusting ones.

Our trip led us into the muslim marketplace where we wandered the packed streets for about an hour.

You can see Benaiah and I on the left buying candy for one of our fellow students. I love bartering with the shopkeepers : )

Next we jumped ship from the market street to a small orthodox church immediately adjaent to the church of the Holy Sepulchre. They have the oddest decorations in that place. Here they have a clock/large watch on the wall where all the worshipers would have been facing?

Another interesting picture in the place is Jesus holding the holy handgrenade - Monty Python?

We found a German hostel we were able to get into and the view of the city was incredible. We were incredibly close to the Dome of the Rock, and from a side a different side of the city than we usually go to see the Dome. The old city of Jerusalem is unique from any other city I know because the entire city is enclosed within the walls and in a matter of minutes you can go from one people group to another. One street will be too noisy to talk or think, but one road over will be completely silent and calm. What a city.

The last place we went before heading back to campus was the Temple Mount. As close to the Temple Mount as we are allowed to go. There are certain areas where the general public is allowed to go during certain times of the day, but the Dome itself is entirely off limits to non-muslims. This gate is guarded by Israeli soldiers to keep any non-muslims from entering the Dome. Ben took this picture of what I think is the stairway leading to the Dome. On the bottom left you can see one of the soldiers guarding the door.

Yesterday, Sunday, was a whole other adventure I'll have to write about later. Here's a question I've been pondering a great deal recently that I would like anyone's imput on who's willing to give it: does the Old Testament require that sins be atoned for through blood? or can there be atonement without death? - the book of Hebrews excluded. - simply because that is the book Ben and I are studying which sparked these questions - Hebrews 2:17 - any imput on the atonement and blood would be great.

Benjamin

Did you know...
somewhere around sixty percent of all Bible stories that can be places on a map took place in the land given to the tribe of Benjamin? Which happens to be where we went for our field study this Sunday after our expidition around Eilat. Other than being completely exhausted, the day was incredible. And aparently we picked a good weekend for Eilat because this upcoming weekend starts off the holday season here that goes on for weeks, which means the beach will be uber-crowded on the weekends. This weekend will certainly be interesting. Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, is this Friday/Saturday. Three quarters of the students here at JUC will be gone this weekend, but the city's population will likely triple or quadrupal. Ben and I were walking around today and we saw hundreds, and we heard there were thousands, of school kids from various parts of Israel running around the Old City on field trips. Should be a fun weekend...

Back to Sunday:



We started off the morning with a hike along the old Jericho Road. We walked about a third of the way from Jerusalem to Jericho in the "coolness" of the morning.



This is the road we walked along. You know, I never knew how narrow the road was from Jerusalem to Jericho. Looking again at the parable Jesus told of the good Samaritan, the priest and Levite would have had to literally step directly over top of the injured man. The "passing by on the other side of the road" was more like squeezing beside the bloodied man along the cliff edge. Brings a whole other meaning to the story.




This is the cliff edge along the side of the road. The view was great!



We met this guy along the road who let the girls sit on his donkey and tried to sell the guys some head coverings. Benaiah looked pretty good in it, so we both bought one the next chance we got :)



These are Bedouin "houses." They're scattered all along the wilderness to the east of Jerusalem.
We also saw the remains of one of Herod's palaces.


I'm not positive, but I think this is the ancient style toilet. I mean, this stuff is top of the line; high class.




This is the Central Benjamin Plataue where hundreds of Bible stories took place. From here - Nebi Samwell - we could see for miles the various cities and villages that we read about in the Bible stories.



Next we went to Gezer, which is near the coast. The city off in the distance is Tel Aviv. This place was nice because it is in the plains/foothills of the mountains and the change of scenery was good for us.




Here's a synagogue. And here is a mosque. It serves as both without trouble between the Jews and the Muslims. Interesting? The news reports that we see in the states are incredibly skewed. Yes, there are problems here. Big problems. But nothing like the constant fighting and terror the news portrays it to be.



"Danger of falling! No Passage!" - i love these signs. They're all over the various archaelogical dig sights and if you zoom in on the symbol on the right you can see a man in mid-flight after falling off a cliff. To me it's histerical, because they're usually in rather random places which almost never have cliffs.




This was our last stop for the day. These are either stones from a temple or stones of remembrance. We spent a good deal of time talking about the importance of having things in our lives to remind us of the things we have seen God do so that we would not forget Him in our business. The weight of the command to not neglect our great salvation has been pressed on my mind considerably the past few weeks. I look at my life and at the church and see such a strong tendancy toward complacency. I want to maintain a fear of rejecting/presumming upon the grace of God. A praise from last week: God has given me an increasing sense of peace in my life neary every day now. I love being calm and at peace, but I do not want to lessen my pursuit of God as a result. Just a few of my thoughts.

Thursday - Saturday : Eilat

Apart from running around constantly trying to get seventy million things, I didn't do a whole lot last week. This weekend a group of us went down to Eilat, which took a great deal of planning and insanity on my part. Since Wednesday morning, today is the first time I've had time to sit back and chill for a while. Thursday afternoon we left class early so we could get to the bus station on time to catch our 5:00 ride down to Eilat. We suffered terribly down in Eilat this whole weekend. It's only a beautiful harbor on the Red Sea surrounded by the mountains of Jordan, Egypt, and Israel. Plus we slept outside under the stars and woke up to a sunrise over the tops of those mountains surrounding us. Then we felt compelled, since we were in the area, to go snorkling in the crystal clear water and to go hiking around the mountains overlooking Egypt and the Rift Valley. All in all we had a pretty rough time :)
My heart goes out in pity to anyone who never has an opportunity to see the land of Israel. Not that this land is more holy than any other or a special anointing falls on those who are here, but to look out and see where all those flannel board stories we were told as kids actually happened is an amazing opportunity. And of course there's that open door to hang out in one of Israel's best resort areas for three days and only pay somewhere around sixty or seventy dollars :)

Pictures:


Seven of us went to Eilat, four guys and three girls. Us guys slept outside and woke up to this coming over the mountains. I chose to gape in wonder rather than go back to sleep, even though it was six in the morning.



Since we were camping on a free beach, these became our showers for the trip. Not bad I'd say.



This is where we went snorkling. The mountains line the edge of the Red Sea and this coral reef runs along its edge. The snorkling was great!
We found out a little later that this is the norternmost coral reef in the world.



Benaiah, now my good friend and fellow adventurer, is a certified diver, but he's still odd. Which means he fits in great with me and Ben.



This is our group that went down to Eilat. From left to right: Emily, Kristen, Benaiah, Becky, Ben, and Ben. Emily reminds me of my sister Laura every time I look at her. So I ended up thinking about my sister a good deal on this trip.



I couldn't believe how close the mountains and the beach were to each other. It was nice. We hiked and then cooled off in the Sea.


The beginning of our hike began with a steep climb basically straight up, but after that things leveled out a bit and the view was incredible!


Ok, so it leveled out and became extremely narrow, but that was fine because the view was still incredible.



The ridges we stood on were by far the windiest places I've been in my life. Here is Ben being blown in the wind.



Then there's the other Ben, also being blown in the wind. He is one of the graduate guys here at JUC and an awesome brother. Anytime he sees me he gives me a big hug to say hello. All his words are words of encouragement and admonition; I just love being around him.



We "conqured" this mountain, which of course means I gave a hollar almost as loud as I could before they told me to stopping shouting, and took a picture from the top. Directly to the left of my head you can see the beach we slept on.



My good friend Benaiah, as always, looking like a mad man.


Our one glimpse into Egypt; though it was tempting to see if we could hike our way in through the mountains.



The Jordan flag, perhaps 500 yards away from where we slept at night. I thought of the song "On Jordan's Stormy Banks" and sung it the rest of the night. In case you've never heard it before, I'll include the lyrics below. This is one of the few songs I feel ever enraptures my soul when I sing it.

"On Jordan's Stormy Banks"

On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand,
And cast a wishful eye
To Canaan’s fair and happy land,
Where my possessions lie.

All o’er those wide extended plains,
Shines one eternal day;
There God the Son forever reigns,
And scatters night away.

No chilling winds nor poisonous breath
Can reach that healthful shore;
There sickness, sorrow, pain and death,
Are felt and feared no more.

When shall I reach that happy place,
And be forever blessed?
When shall I see my Father’s face,
And in His bosom rest?

The "Citadel of David" and the "Tomb of Solomon"

Other than attending classes for eight and a half hours this Tuesday, I also took it upon myself to explore two new locations: "David's Citadel" and "Solomon's Tomb." They're both in quotations because David didn't build his citadel nor was he alive anywhere near the time it was built, and becuase Solomon isn't buried in his tomb, or this one at least, and neither is anyone else, which makes it a rather odd sort of tomb when you think about it. David's Citadel is a towering fortress we see every time we go into the Old City through the Jaffa Gate, so we decided to check it out.

How the day went:


The gate to David's Citadel. The place is basically a castle fortress minus the king and water for the moat. Classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays don't start until 1:00 pm, so this was a morning outing with Ben, Becky, and I.


This, my friends, is David's Citadel. The view is absolutely spectacular from the walls, which makes sense considering it was created to be the main northern defense.



And, like always, Ben took endless quantities of pictures of random objects, such as this replica of the citadel.



Then we rushed back for lunch and classes. After which the real fun began...


Solomon's Tomb - although, as i discussed earlier, it does not and never has contained Solomon. five of us went on the escapade: Jon, Nate, Becky, Mary Joe, and myself. The gaping hole at the top is the first floor of the building....



So we climbed into it....



And went up three stories to the top, where we took a picture :)
We're about forty, maybe fifty, feet up right now.


After all that climbing we were pretty worn out so we decided to go back to JUC


Unfortunately, along the way we saw another cool historical spot we could climb into, so we did.
These are my fellow conspiritors Jon and Mary Joe.



During the daytime, this is what our next location looks like



And once we snuck in, there were cool grates to hang from.



Which naturally lead to another group picture



We had so much fun sneaking around the Kidron Valley for three hours. The nights here are incredible!



A few more night shots. This is the Temple Mount from the cave we were hanging out in.



And the moon over Southern Israel.


Well, two weeks have gone by and the report is still the same, though perhaps with slightly more intensity: there is far too much here to take in and absord. I am constantly surrounded by two cultures entirely different from my own while living in the land where the Bible was written. Please pray for me: I have an undergirding anxiety around me all the time, a lack of peace if you will. Not that I have a lack of peace about being here, but somehow I cannot relax here, even when alone. I've prayed long and hard, but to no end. My whole body is tense and sleep does not come easily. Pray that I will rest in Christ and delight myself entirely in him. Thank you so much for ya'll's support. I've received so many encouraging emails and comments and I have been deeply encouraged. So thank you.

Trekin through the Old City lookin at walls

These pictures are from the field study we did on this previous Sunday. Basically we walked around the Old City looking at walls and old archealogy sites with parts of walls. Although the topic sounds incredibly boring, which it did to me at the time as well, we had a blast running around the city trying to identify how many thousands of years this or that stone block has been around. Since Israel has had people living in it consistently for thousands of years, it makes an interesting subject for observation.

The Pictures:

Apparentlty, when good rocks were in short supply, the current occupent would simply utilize whatever stones happened to be available... such as grave stones. There are a number of grave stones stuck in the walls around city. Poor dead people. No stones.



Some of my fellow students: Jonathan, Meredith, Benito - whom many of you know-, Chad, and Matthew. We're chillin outside the archealogical park where we started our main wall observations.


My friend, Benia. The MK from the Philipines. Behind him is the fig tree we raided when we diverted from our group. The branches were a little far for either one of us the reach so we took turns extending the other over the little ledge; they were worth it.



Ancient lamps. Actually I was dinking with my camera again , trying to get cool pictures so I figured I'd put one up :)



This is the Temple Mount wall built by Herod the Great. The thing is utterly massive. I stood at the bottom and gawked at how huge the thing was. One of the stones on the wall is about half the size of an average person. Huge. Indestructably huge. The pride of Israel during Roman rule huge.


This is the road beneath that monstrosity. These are the original stones that were laid here. Translated to mean: Jesus walked here. On these very stones. Looking up at that same massive mount as we were.
The cracks are from when the huge, indestructable Temple Mount walls were destroyed by the Romans. They pushed the stones over from the top, all the way down to the bottom where the stones literally crushed the stone road. It gave a new meaning to the destruction of the temple in 70 AD and Jesus' words concerning it.



I figured I would see just how heavy those stones really were. They were pretty heavy. Heavy enough that when they built the thing they didn't have to use any sort of morter or concrete; they just stacked them on top of each other and they stayed put.


We are standing in the pool of Siloam. I don't know where the pictures are, but immediately before this we were walking/ducking through a tunnel built through the ground by Hezekiah from a spring outside the walls into this pool, which is inside the walls. The tunnel was long and narrow and we were happy to see the sun again.
This is Ben, Becky, and Barrett


The tunnel was fun, but the hike back to the top of the "hill" where our school is proved to be a difficult task...