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Arrows: Anniversaries to Remember
Arrows Summary August 7, 2026 Anniversaries to Remember
Aug 2, 2026: My favorite American traditional Jewish commentator, Jonathan S Tobin has written something very close to my heart this morning. I cried reading his editorial just now about the 25th year anniversary of the Sbarro Pizzeria bombing in Jerusalem on August 9, 2001. Since writing this a couple of days ago, I have learned that the son of a well known Israeli Messianic figure was one of the first responders to arrive at the horrific blast scene. Terrorism creates hell-scapes.
Within a week of that bombing I would launch the first Weekly Summary of Prayer Requests from Israeli Ministries. A handful of us would meet every Thursday to pray for them who were in the midst of continual terror attacks all around the country.
My 50th birthday was 2 days before Islamist terrorists chose to bomb a pizzeria filled with women pushing baby strollers. The bomb killed “16 people, including eight children and a pregnant woman, and wounded another 130 persons.” [I’m 75 today! Next week is the 25th Anniversary of the prayer summary!]
Read this article in full on this blog link in the Israel & the Church Category where you can explore my other Israel-oriented articles.August 7, 2026
Arrows from Zion Summary of Prayer Points for Israeli Ministries
Prayer Requests & the Chronicles of the Remnant of Faith in Israel
Arni Klein of Emmaus Way summed up the same thoughts I have at this time: “The longer we live, the more rivers we cross, the greater our experience of Father’s ever-present faithfulness. Looking back over our lives… His evident care and the clarity of His leading at every turn and juncture have deposited in us a testimony of notable depth and breadth. Without question, one would expect the recipient of such blessed experience to abide effortlessly in the light of his glory. In truth, this has not been my (Arni’s) reality. Despite all the manifest miracles, blessings, and confirmed prophetic directive words, I lived with a lingering expectation of impending disaster, basically from morning to night. The process of coming to this deeper awareness of my inner state ….Beyond question, it was an excruciatingly wonderful divinely-appointed moment of sovereign intervention that continues to bear the fruit of ever-increasing peace and freedom. I write this with a sense of a circle being closed and a fullness of time reached, propelling me into an actualization of lifelong passion and calling never before experienced. I hope that the testimony of coming to this defining moment at the onset of my 80th year of life and in my 54th year of faith and 57th year of marriage will actually be an encouragement and not a lament at how long it has taken to get this place in life, even for someone completely given and committed from day one. I have the strong sense that it could not have happened one day sooner. This has been a perfectly designed life discipleship course. And each and every one of us has such a divinely-ordained pathway to prepare us to be God’s dwelling place on earth and friend forever.”
“Truly truly, the days between our trips to Africa seem to fly by. We love being at home…whether here or there. Our next sojourn is currently planned for August 7-September 15. . . . Robert and Esther who are founders of a fellowship of likeminded brethren known as Arise & Build. . . .For some years they’ve had a vision to build a training center. . . .When we told Robert and Esther of our history and vision, they shared that years ago the Lord spoke to them concerning the Tabernacle of David, saying that He would teach them about it. It seemed once again that this was that. They have proceeded to engage an architect to map out possible plans. . . .With that all as a backdrop, we look forward to meetings and gatherings with congregations, networks, ministry teams and individuals. . . .a four-day seminar with the leaders of a network of about 30 indigenous messianic congregations that meet on Shabbat, keep the Feasts, read the Parasha, and have a heart for Israel. There is likely not another community like this in all of Africa. . . .four days scheduled with a group of intercessory leaders in Jinja, which is at the headwaters of the Nile. . . .a retreat at Vision for Africa’s prayer mountain … a four-day celebration of the Feast of Trumpets with Robert and Esther’s community.
As we formerly wrote, a pressing need is to have our written and spoken materials accessible in the local language, Luganda. The “Preparing the Way” booklet is now ready for printing. The “Israel Revealed” course is translated, awaiting a final edit. The eight-session video seminar is getting a Luganda voice-over. Once that is completed we will do voice-overs for the 52-message Foundations Course. We are also working towards having the recorded messages transcribed into book form. The cost of voice-overs for fourteen hours of teaching is a fraction of what it would be elsewhere…about 800 US$/Euros. However, the other side of the picture is that with people’s income being so low, we receive virtually no offerings to offset this and our flight costs. We pray that the Lord will speak to some of our friends to come alongside and help plant this precious seed in the most fertile ground we have ever encountered. We are so blessed and thankful to be part of what the Lord is doing in this amazing hour. -
On Nicaean Council Ruins
Ruins of the Church of the Nicaean Council Hidden Underwater (Video Screensave)
Did you know that after the first century apostles died that there was a gradual loss of connection among the churches established by the Apostle Paul and others among the non-Jewish churches?
Before Paul was arrested in Jerusalem and imprisoned in Rome, he established an offering be set up among all the churches he established. The offerings were collected over about a three year period before Paul, along with representatives from each church, brought the donations to Jerusalem. The donations were for the Apostles to administer. The purpose was to help sustain “the poor” body of Messiah to continue to minister in Israel.By 318 AD no churches had continued sending financial assistance, even though Paul knowingly paid for delivering it with his freedom.
As he made his journey to Jerusalem to carry the FIRST donation from ALL the Churches, prophets came out warning Paul that if he continued forward, he would be arrested. Paul already knew there would be harsh consequences for him delivering this important financial gift to the Apostles in Jerusalem for sustaining their ministry and for assisting Jewish believers in Israel.
In Paul’s letters to the churches four out of six times that Paul uses the phrase, “the poor,” he is clearly in context referencing the poor believers in Judea. One of the remaining two is in reference to himself. (Ro 15:26, 1 Cor 16:1, 15; 2 Cor 9:1, :12-13). They were of the Jewish people, but were shunned because of faith in Yeshua. It has been much the same today as then and it the reason for much of the lack of financial blessing among the body of Messiah and their ministries in Israel. -
Seed Bed of Genesis
Grok created image “In the Beginning”
Last Days Content Found “In the Beginning”
From the Seed Bed of Genesis Part 1I began to reread the Genesis chapters about God’s call on each of the Patriarchs beginning with Abram wanting to confirm the accuracy of my memory and verify my facts. It was to make sure the article I was writing, the Barren Matriarchs of Israel, was true to the biblical account. The details of how Abram’s call by God was necessary. As I began to reread about Abram’s call, I found much, much more than I had ever seen before. It was supposed to be a ‘quick’ fact check but God had other plans. When I came upon The War of the Kings it was out of nowhere! I did not remember ever really seeing it, but as I saw it now, it was clear to me it had application for the days we live in. The deeper I studied the brief account, the more convinced I became that it was something we needed to know for the days we live.
That discovery made me slow down in my reread of Genesis to take a more focused sweep of God’s “seed bed” of all his plans. In the past I learned that God progressively revealed His plans throughout the Bible and throughout the expanse of human history. Genesis is the seed bed of the main thing God is doing among us. He is creating a family. Genesis is the account of the first human beings God chose for His family. That makes their experiences of critical importance to us because He is still in the process of forming us for His family too.
God’s purpose in calling out Abram is the same purpose He called you out too: ‘in order to form a more perfect union’. We are to be a unity of Jew and the peoples of the nations who are God’s family. It is a family that transcends the families of Adam and Eve. God is going to restore the Garden of Eden for a family He has formed for Himself. Whether you are a Messianic Jew or a Christian in any nation, it will serve us well to look earnestly at the way God “formed” the first individuals chosen to be in His family.
Referring to accounts in Numbers 16 and 25, Paul tells the Corinthian church, 1 Cor 10:1-4,
“I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud, and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. “
The scripture did not say in vain: their lives were recorded to be examples for us who followed in covenant faith in Jesus. Paul tells them explicitly a few verses later in 10:11:
“Now these things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come.” -
Two Shall Become One
Consider the mystery of Ephesians 2:15-16 making of Jew and Gentile “one new man” with Ephesians 5:32 “great mystery” of “Two Shall Become One”
For months I have heard Christian prophets giving me wonderfully encouraging words that built me up in the midst of relentless warfare that has been beating me down.
My mind was set to endure all things for the sake of what God has given me to do, but at times the mental exhaustion of it has had me really worn out. I have struggled to overcome the realization that my mailings on behalf of Israeli believer ministries has just about been wiped out. But I have had no real way to assess just how wiped out the lists actually are.
I just knew I had to find an alternative way to keep moving in advocacy for the body of Messiah in Israel.
Of course this was not the entirety of the battles I’ve faced. The beat down was happening on many fronts.
But back to the encouraging words of the Christian prophets. I haven’t paid any attention to Christian prophets for years – a decade and a half probably because I was so put off with the ZERO understanding most have for Israel’s place in God’s full vision for us. I only started listening to Christian prophets again after the attack on IHOPKC/Mike Bickle shut down the leading Christian prophet (of the slim to almost none) who ever considered Israel and how God cherished the Jews and His intent to restore Israel.
It flabbergasts me still that there is so much God has revealed in His Word about that, and in the biblical prophecies that have unfolded in our natural eyes in the past century. How could a prophet miss such things? -
Paradigm Shift: God’s Family
True in the Natural and in the Spiritual Marriage/Family
Here’s a thought for you.
You know how churches that committed to true racially integrated congregations did away with thinking in terms of “white church” or “black church”? I just had the thought, and I will gladly say it was more likely a God-thought than a Donna-thought, that until we can get to the point that we can see ourselves as God’s whole family, a unity that transcends even “Israel and the Church” we are not going to move into a LOT of things God wants for us.Until we understand and embrace that we are moving toward the magnificent climax of the crescendo we are already in the midst of, we will not be living out the things God wants from us ahead of the Second Coming.
Yes, the unique aspects of Israel and the Church will still exist, just exactly as the differences between husbands and wives continue after marriage changes their relationship and status in the eyes of God.Saved Israel and the Church, like husband and wife, are in a union, but only in a unity when we are seeing ourselves as God views the oneness of a marriage. After marriage we are increasingly becoming a family, and saved Israel and the Church will only ever come close to being in the spiritual state and position God wants us in when we see ourselves not as entirely separate entities, but as a whole family.
We have to have a paradigm shift. There was the Israel history and then there was the Church history, but now we are clearly headed into a whole new realm of God’s kingdom. We must start looking at ourselves as a whole people – a whole Family of God.