1 00:00:04,360 --> 00:00:06,880 You know, sometimes I turn on the on the television and I feel 2 00:00:06,880 --> 00:00:12,320 like I am reading a book that's about 600 pages and I just 3 00:00:12,360 --> 00:00:16,720 jumped in about 450 pages in and I don't, I don't really know 4 00:00:16,720 --> 00:00:19,480 what I'm reading, but I feel, I feel like I should. 5 00:00:20,080 --> 00:00:22,000 And then I feel like I should have an opinion on what I'm 6 00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:23,960 reading and I really have no idea. 7 00:00:25,840 --> 00:00:28,080 Welcome back to another episode of the Grace Church Members 8 00:00:28,080 --> 00:00:30,080 Podcast. I'm Chris Rivers, your host for 9 00:00:30,080 --> 00:00:33,240 today and excited to be with you for another conversation. 10 00:00:33,720 --> 00:00:36,040 If you're new to our podcast, we're glad you're here. 11 00:00:36,240 --> 00:00:39,960 Our goal on every episode is to address discipleship issues in 12 00:00:39,960 --> 00:00:42,320 the life of Grace Church and discuss how to be more fully 13 00:00:42,320 --> 00:00:44,800 devoted to God. This episode is a little 14 00:00:44,800 --> 00:00:48,000 different because we're tackling a current event, the war in 15 00:00:48,000 --> 00:00:49,760 Israel. Now, this is the most 16 00:00:49,760 --> 00:00:52,840 contentious land in the world, and the debate surrounding the 17 00:00:52,840 --> 00:00:56,480 existence of the State of Israel and the Palestinians is also 18 00:00:56,480 --> 00:00:59,200 contested. In this episode, we are trying 19 00:00:59,200 --> 00:01:02,520 to accomplish a couple of things, and we're purposely not 20 00:01:02,520 --> 00:01:04,599 addressing many things. And let me start with the 21 00:01:04,599 --> 00:01:07,080 latter. The massacre and the kidnapping 22 00:01:07,080 --> 00:01:10,120 that took place amongst the civilian population of Israel by 23 00:01:10,120 --> 00:01:14,400 Hamas is not the subject of this podcast, mainly because we don't 24 00:01:14,400 --> 00:01:17,800 have words to add to the horrors that have already been reported. 25 00:01:18,200 --> 00:01:21,960 We also are not trying to speak on just war theory or tackle 26 00:01:21,960 --> 00:01:24,960 this from a political or even theological perspective. 27 00:01:25,400 --> 00:01:28,040 Our purpose is more basic. I think many of you will 28 00:01:28,040 --> 00:01:30,240 resonate with our opening quote from Scott. 29 00:01:30,440 --> 00:01:34,560 The attack from Gaza on Israeli citizens thrust all of us into a 30 00:01:34,560 --> 00:01:38,200 centuries old story that you simply may not be familiar with 31 00:01:38,320 --> 00:01:42,200 yet can't and shouldn't escape. So our goal is really twofold, 32 00:01:42,600 --> 00:01:46,120 #1 give you a historical overview of the region and some 33 00:01:46,120 --> 00:01:50,920 facts and geography around how we got here, and #2 help you 34 00:01:50,920 --> 00:01:54,440 place our ministry partners, a group of Arab Christians based 35 00:01:54,440 --> 00:01:57,800 out of Nazareth in that region as they await in an uncertain 36 00:01:57,800 --> 00:01:59,640 future. In the room, we have Scott 37 00:01:59,640 --> 00:02:01,520 Mazingo and Tim Wardle. Welcome, guys. 38 00:02:01,760 --> 00:02:04,240 Hey, Chris, good to be with you. Thanks for having me here. 39 00:02:04,240 --> 00:02:06,560 Yeah. Well, Tim, you are a member of 40 00:02:06,560 --> 00:02:10,560 Grace Church's Pelham campus, and you are also the chair of 41 00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:13,280 the religion department and associate professor of New 42 00:02:13,280 --> 00:02:16,800 Testament at Furman University. So we thought you would be a 43 00:02:16,800 --> 00:02:19,320 great candidate for a conversation to help our church 44 00:02:19,320 --> 00:02:22,520 think about this topic. So could you just begin by 45 00:02:22,520 --> 00:02:24,720 telling us about your connection to Israel? 46 00:02:25,520 --> 00:02:29,360 Sure. So my wife and I moved to Israel 47 00:02:29,360 --> 00:02:32,080 in 1999 and we lived there until 2001. 48 00:02:32,480 --> 00:02:34,800 And I was a master's student at the Hebrew University of 49 00:02:34,800 --> 00:02:39,640 Jerusalem. I went there to learn I had no 50 00:02:39,640 --> 00:02:41,920 preconceived ideas of what what that would look like. 51 00:02:42,720 --> 00:02:45,600 I just wanted to learn more about Judaism, about my faith, 52 00:02:45,760 --> 00:02:50,320 about the Bible, and so I did a 2 years a master's degree there. 53 00:02:51,000 --> 00:02:54,640 And then in 2015 started going back more regularly. 54 00:02:55,440 --> 00:02:59,960 And so once or twice a year now I help lead groups to Israel, 55 00:03:00,200 --> 00:03:03,200 sometimes with Grace Church, sometimes with Furman students 56 00:03:04,040 --> 00:03:07,400 or from an alumni. This past July I participate in 57 00:03:07,400 --> 00:03:09,600 an archaeological dig in the north of Israel. 58 00:03:10,280 --> 00:03:12,640 So I try and go in various capacities. 59 00:03:12,640 --> 00:03:17,280 OK, what was what was that like? It was really hot, really hard, 60 00:03:17,560 --> 00:03:18,880 and I would do it again in a heartbeat. 61 00:03:19,680 --> 00:03:24,840 Did you did you find anything? I found a Roman coin, a Roman 62 00:03:25,000 --> 00:03:29,240 vase that was all smashed up. And I found a lot of dirt, a lot 63 00:03:29,240 --> 00:03:32,440 of dirt. That's that's what I would 64 00:03:32,440 --> 00:03:36,760 expect on an archaeological dig. Tim, we wanted to have you in. 65 00:03:36,760 --> 00:03:39,640 I mean, you're not a geopolitical expert. 66 00:03:39,640 --> 00:03:44,480 You're not necessarily a expert on the history of the state of 67 00:03:44,480 --> 00:03:47,040 Israel. That's not what you teach, but 68 00:03:47,040 --> 00:03:50,360 you do have a lot of knowledge in your around the subject and 69 00:03:50,360 --> 00:03:52,840 so much more qualified than Chris and I. 70 00:03:52,840 --> 00:03:56,200 But let's go back to your time, their connection, sense. 71 00:03:56,960 --> 00:03:59,600 Do you have friends that are still in the region? 72 00:04:00,280 --> 00:04:02,240 Yeah, we do. Cher and I both have good 73 00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:05,800 friends who are still living in Jerusalem and the area around 74 00:04:05,800 --> 00:04:08,680 it. They have a various or a variety 75 00:04:08,680 --> 00:04:13,280 of occupations. Some are pastors, tour guides, 76 00:04:13,280 --> 00:04:15,680 professors, but others are midwives. 77 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:19,680 Nurses, businessmen, non profit workers. 78 00:04:19,680 --> 00:04:24,240 So they their occupations cut across a huge swath of Israeli 79 00:04:24,240 --> 00:04:27,720 and Arab society. So let's let's work on some of 80 00:04:27,720 --> 00:04:31,120 our our terminology, so Israeli and Arab. 81 00:04:31,120 --> 00:04:33,520 Let's start there, kind of define those terms for us. 82 00:04:33,520 --> 00:04:36,200 Sure. So Arab is a very broad term and 83 00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:38,960 it refers to anyone who originally came from the Arabian 84 00:04:38,960 --> 00:04:40,960 Peninsula. So Saudi Arabia would be the 85 00:04:41,040 --> 00:04:44,400 origins, but now it refers to anyone who lives. 86 00:04:45,240 --> 00:04:47,520 In a mostly Arab speaking country. 87 00:04:48,120 --> 00:04:52,640 So think about Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, those 88 00:04:52,640 --> 00:04:54,000 kinds of countries. They're all Arab. 89 00:04:54,560 --> 00:04:58,640 And within that then you have like Lebanese Arabs, Syrian 90 00:04:58,640 --> 00:05:01,360 Arabs. And so for Israel, what you'd 91 00:05:01,360 --> 00:05:05,560 say is you've got Palestinian Arabs, OK, And where does that 92 00:05:05,560 --> 00:05:09,440 term Palestine. It's actually an it's an old 93 00:05:09,440 --> 00:05:13,440 term in the time of Jesus. So in the in the 1st century, 94 00:05:13,680 --> 00:05:16,880 the Romans were in control of what we now call Israel, and 95 00:05:16,880 --> 00:05:18,800 they called that the province of Palestine. 96 00:05:19,480 --> 00:05:22,800 And so the term Palestina goes back to the Roman period. 97 00:05:22,800 --> 00:05:25,480 So it's a very old term, but it's become a more political 98 00:05:25,480 --> 00:05:28,120 term recently when you talk about a people group who live 99 00:05:28,120 --> 00:05:29,600 there who are now called Palestinians. 100 00:05:29,680 --> 00:05:34,040 OK, so we have Palestinian Arabs and we have Israelis. 101 00:05:34,040 --> 00:05:39,200 Israeli is a nationality. Israeli is a political term and. 102 00:05:39,640 --> 00:05:41,960 Speaking about someone who has Israeli citizenship. 103 00:05:41,960 --> 00:05:43,720 Well, someone who's in citizenship in the Land of 104 00:05:43,720 --> 00:05:46,960 Israel, right? So there are a lot of Jews who 105 00:05:46,960 --> 00:05:50,200 have Israeli citizenship. About 80% of Israeli citizens 106 00:05:50,200 --> 00:05:53,960 are Jewish, but about 20% of those Israeli citizens are Arab. 107 00:05:54,760 --> 00:05:57,760 And so you've got Palestinians on the one on the ones one 108 00:05:57,760 --> 00:06:01,040 category, then you've got Jews who are Israelis in another 109 00:06:01,040 --> 00:06:03,200 category. Then you also have Arabs who are 110 00:06:03,200 --> 00:06:06,000 Israelis in a third category. They identify with the 111 00:06:06,000 --> 00:06:08,760 Palestinian people, but they have Israeli citizenship. 112 00:06:09,600 --> 00:06:14,800 So when we are talking about our Partners Association of Baptist 113 00:06:14,800 --> 00:06:20,200 churches, mainly around the Nazareth area, they identify as 114 00:06:20,200 --> 00:06:24,480 Arab Christians. So Arab by nationality, 115 00:06:24,760 --> 00:06:27,960 Christian by faith. But there's Israeli citizens, 116 00:06:28,240 --> 00:06:29,400 correct? So what is? 117 00:06:29,440 --> 00:06:32,840 What does that mean for them? It means that they have certain 118 00:06:32,840 --> 00:06:36,640 rights that other Palestinians do not have, so they can vote in 119 00:06:36,640 --> 00:06:40,200 Israeli elections. They can be conscripted into the 120 00:06:40,200 --> 00:06:43,800 army, although most are not. They have to pay taxes to the 121 00:06:43,800 --> 00:06:46,440 Israeli state. And so when I say Israeli, 122 00:06:46,480 --> 00:06:49,040 almost always that means a Jewish, so a Jewish state, 123 00:06:49,040 --> 00:06:50,520 right. So they're kind of caught 124 00:06:50,520 --> 00:06:54,000 because they identify more with their Arab brothers and sisters, 125 00:06:54,760 --> 00:06:58,120 but they live in a in a society where they are surrounded by 126 00:06:58,120 --> 00:07:01,800 Jews. So they are a minority of a 127 00:07:01,800 --> 00:07:04,200 minority. Yeah, Arab Christians are 128 00:07:04,200 --> 00:07:08,000 definitely minority of minority. Because the the Arab part, 129 00:07:08,040 --> 00:07:10,920 they're Arab Israelis, so they're 20% of the Israeli 130 00:07:10,920 --> 00:07:15,840 population, so minority there, but most Arabs are Muslim and so 131 00:07:15,840 --> 00:07:19,480 if you're an Arab Christian, you're also in the minority in 132 00:07:19,480 --> 00:07:21,080 Nazareth. It's probably, I don't know the 133 00:07:21,080 --> 00:07:23,760 numbers for sure, but I would guess it's about 80 to 90% 134 00:07:23,760 --> 00:07:31,320 Muslim, 10 to 20% Christian, OK. And just for context, I think 135 00:07:31,320 --> 00:07:35,840 the there's about 18 churches represented in the association 136 00:07:36,320 --> 00:07:41,520 about 1000 baptized believers about 3000 in their community, I 137 00:07:41,520 --> 00:07:43,320 believe is what they would say according to their website. 138 00:07:43,320 --> 00:07:47,080 And we'll have the website URL link in the notes and also some 139 00:07:47,080 --> 00:07:50,000 specific prayer requests that we'll revisit at the end of the 140 00:07:50,480 --> 00:07:52,400 episode from our partners over there. 141 00:07:52,800 --> 00:07:56,600 So, OK, so that sets the stage a little bit and uses some terms 142 00:07:56,600 --> 00:07:59,040 that that get thrown around. Hopefully that's been helpful so 143 00:07:59,040 --> 00:08:01,560 far. So when we talk about the land 144 00:08:01,560 --> 00:08:05,520 of Israel, let's go, we'll go all the way back to the Bible. 145 00:08:05,760 --> 00:08:09,960 All right, So this is, this is the land of David. 146 00:08:10,480 --> 00:08:14,320 This is the land of Solomon. This is the land of the divided 147 00:08:14,320 --> 00:08:19,560 Kingdom, post exile. This is Ezra, Nehemiah. 148 00:08:20,040 --> 00:08:23,360 This is the land of Jesus, Jesus and the disciples. 149 00:08:24,800 --> 00:08:31,000 So what happens around 8070, the years leading up to that that 150 00:08:31,120 --> 00:08:34,919 that changes the dynamic in this area and then kind of walk us 151 00:08:34,919 --> 00:08:37,120 through maybe some stages that happened after that? 152 00:08:38,000 --> 00:08:41,720 Yeah, so the year 70 AD is an important one for Jews and 153 00:08:41,720 --> 00:08:45,160 Christians. It's the year when the Romans 154 00:08:45,560 --> 00:08:48,480 marched into Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple and the 155 00:08:48,480 --> 00:08:50,800 city. They did it because there was a 156 00:08:50,800 --> 00:08:54,320 Jewish revolt, and so the Romans came in and wanted to put down 157 00:08:54,320 --> 00:08:55,840 the revolt to make sure that they could. 158 00:08:56,600 --> 00:08:58,400 Maintain their dominance in the region. 159 00:08:59,120 --> 00:09:01,680 But what it did for Jews and Christians is it moved 160 00:09:01,680 --> 00:09:04,280 Christians and Jews out of Jerusalem and out of Israel 161 00:09:04,280 --> 00:09:06,200 proper. They didn't all leave. 162 00:09:06,800 --> 00:09:09,480 Some of them stayed, but a lot of them fled to neighboring 163 00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:11,320 countries or just neighboring areas. 164 00:09:12,920 --> 00:09:17,000 So then who fills the the vacuum in the years after that? 165 00:09:17,920 --> 00:09:21,400 Good question. So between the year 70 and the 166 00:09:21,400 --> 00:09:25,920 year like about 3:20. There, Jerusalem is not a very 167 00:09:25,920 --> 00:09:28,560 populated place. Israel's not that populated. 168 00:09:28,560 --> 00:09:31,880 The Roman army is the 10th, the 10th Legion is stationed in 169 00:09:31,880 --> 00:09:33,560 Jerusalem. They're just kind of maintaining 170 00:09:33,560 --> 00:09:36,120 peace and order in the empire, but it's not an important place. 171 00:09:37,200 --> 00:09:42,280 In the three 20s, the Roman Empire became Christian, at 172 00:09:42,280 --> 00:09:44,480 least the Byzantine part of it. So you've got what you call 173 00:09:44,480 --> 00:09:46,800 Byzantine Christianity for about 300 years. 174 00:09:47,280 --> 00:09:50,280 So Christians control Jerusalem and Israel more broadly. 175 00:09:51,120 --> 00:09:56,440 And then in the six and 638, the Muslims take over Jerusalem and 176 00:09:56,440 --> 00:09:58,880 they are in control Jerusalem for about 400 years. 177 00:10:00,240 --> 00:10:03,600 And so there's various Muslim dynasties that rule. 178 00:10:04,880 --> 00:10:08,840 And then in 1099 The Crusaders come, The Crusaders from Europe 179 00:10:09,360 --> 00:10:12,240 and they control Jerusalem and the surrounding areas until 180 00:10:12,240 --> 00:10:15,600 1187. So lots of dates here. 181 00:10:16,600 --> 00:10:20,240 And then from 1187, when the Muslim armies defeated The 182 00:10:20,240 --> 00:10:23,720 Crusaders, you've got Muslim control of Jerusalem again. 183 00:10:24,240 --> 00:10:28,400 And that Muslim control of Jerusalem extends from 1187 up 184 00:10:28,400 --> 00:10:31,640 until 1917, so for a long period of time. 185 00:10:31,640 --> 00:10:34,200 So we start out with the Byzantines, and Constantine 186 00:10:34,200 --> 00:10:36,400 might be a name that folks recognize from that period of 187 00:10:36,400 --> 00:10:39,160 time. And then we have the Muslims, 188 00:10:39,160 --> 00:10:43,280 and then we have The Crusaders. Crusaders and Jews. 189 00:10:43,680 --> 00:10:45,360 How'd that? How'd how'd that go? 190 00:10:45,520 --> 00:10:48,240 Did not go very well. This is one period of time when 191 00:10:48,240 --> 00:10:50,880 Jews were not allowed to live in Jerusalem, and they didn't 192 00:10:50,880 --> 00:10:54,280 really want to because The Crusaders viewed them as 193 00:10:54,280 --> 00:10:58,360 enemies. The Crusaders viewed Muslims and 194 00:10:58,360 --> 00:11:00,920 Jews and Eastern Christians as enemies. 195 00:11:01,120 --> 00:11:03,240 And so the initial wave of Crusaders came. 196 00:11:03,240 --> 00:11:05,840 They just slaughtered everyone that they that didn't look like 197 00:11:05,840 --> 00:11:07,800 them. After a while, they began to 198 00:11:07,800 --> 00:11:10,080 realize that was a bad policy, so they began to get along with 199 00:11:10,080 --> 00:11:13,320 the Arabs near them. But yeah, they were a rough 200 00:11:13,360 --> 00:11:16,000 group. And so going all the way back to 201 00:11:17,000 --> 00:11:22,680 what we might call the diaspora, or the scattering of Christians, 202 00:11:22,680 --> 00:11:26,600 we think about the Christians. We think about the Great 203 00:11:26,600 --> 00:11:31,640 Commission and how God used the persecution, basically pushing 204 00:11:31,640 --> 00:11:35,000 Christians all over the world. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, ends 205 00:11:35,000 --> 00:11:37,080 of the earth. And so here we are, right ends 206 00:11:37,080 --> 00:11:39,160 of the earth. We're in the upstate of South 207 00:11:39,160 --> 00:11:43,400 Carolina. As followers of Jesus, we don't 208 00:11:43,400 --> 00:11:46,520 really think a lot about what happened to the Jewish people. 209 00:11:46,960 --> 00:11:50,240 So where did the Jewish? People go, yeah, good question. 210 00:11:50,320 --> 00:11:53,920 The Jewish people, they they always see, they've always seen 211 00:11:53,920 --> 00:11:56,040 Jerusalem and Judea as their homeland. 212 00:11:56,440 --> 00:12:00,360 So every time they celebrate the Passover meal, they talk about 213 00:12:00,360 --> 00:12:02,440 next year in Jerusalem. So Jerusalem has always been a 214 00:12:02,440 --> 00:12:07,600 central idea, but Jewish Jews have not been in Jerusalem a 215 00:12:07,600 --> 00:12:12,000 very prominently since the year. Well, starting in the year 70, 216 00:12:12,400 --> 00:12:16,000 up until the year 1948, it was a long period of time when Jews, 217 00:12:16,080 --> 00:12:19,360 some Jews were living in Jerusalem, but not a lot. 218 00:12:19,400 --> 00:12:21,880 And so they were spread into various countries. 219 00:12:21,880 --> 00:12:24,800 So they went into what we now call the Middle East. 220 00:12:24,800 --> 00:12:29,480 So Arab, Arab speaking countries today, they moved to Europe and 221 00:12:29,480 --> 00:12:31,360 then they moved even farther like to the to the United 222 00:12:31,360 --> 00:12:33,560 States, but they just spread all over the place. 223 00:12:34,240 --> 00:12:36,560 So in in Europe, there's heavy populations. 224 00:12:36,560 --> 00:12:37,880 In what? Russia. 225 00:12:38,080 --> 00:12:39,640 Poland. Yeah, and Eastern Europe, 226 00:12:39,640 --> 00:12:43,480 Eastern Europe, Eastern Europe and Spain was actually a huge 227 00:12:43,480 --> 00:12:47,080 Jewish centre until the Inquisition. 228 00:12:47,080 --> 00:12:50,080 And then they were forced to leave in the 14, about 15 229 00:12:50,080 --> 00:12:51,600 hundreds. And is it? 230 00:12:51,600 --> 00:12:56,200 Is it true that there are different approaches to viewing 231 00:12:56,200 --> 00:12:59,560 the homeland? Like some religious Jews, 232 00:12:59,680 --> 00:13:02,800 they're like, hey, that's God's deal and he's going to bring us 233 00:13:02,880 --> 00:13:06,640 into the homeland when he's ready and God's in charge of 234 00:13:06,640 --> 00:13:08,840 that. And then there are other, maybe 235 00:13:08,840 --> 00:13:12,960 more secular Jews that have a little more independence and 236 00:13:13,000 --> 00:13:16,360 kind of move more aggressively towards returning to the 237 00:13:16,360 --> 00:13:18,080 homeland. Is that is that fair to say let? 238 00:13:18,280 --> 00:13:19,680 Me give you. I'm going to go back a little 239 00:13:19,680 --> 00:13:20,640 bit. Historically, yeah. 240 00:13:20,840 --> 00:13:23,680 So there's the the rise of Zionism. 241 00:13:24,120 --> 00:13:27,800 Is a movement that began in force in the late 19th century. 242 00:13:27,800 --> 00:13:30,520 So 1880s, eighteen, 90s, something like that and that and 243 00:13:30,520 --> 00:13:33,440 that the word that's important because that word gets used a 244 00:13:33,440 --> 00:13:37,080 ton right now. So Christians and Jews both have 245 00:13:37,240 --> 00:13:41,240 various forms of Zionism. I mean, so Zionism really just 246 00:13:41,240 --> 00:13:45,680 means the desire to live in Zion or to live in Jerusalem, OK? 247 00:13:46,400 --> 00:13:48,920 Or you could say Israel more broadly, right? 248 00:13:48,920 --> 00:13:51,520 So for Jews, it was this desire to return to their homeland. 249 00:13:52,760 --> 00:13:56,000 But there were various kinds of Zionism or forms of Zionism. 250 00:13:56,840 --> 00:13:58,800 And so, Scott, that's partly what you were getting at. 251 00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:02,160 Some of the more religious Jews said we don't really think we 252 00:14:02,160 --> 00:14:03,960 should have a political state of Israel. 253 00:14:04,440 --> 00:14:07,280 We think that when the when the Messiah comes, he will create 254 00:14:08,040 --> 00:14:09,920 the land of Israel. Then we can all come back and 255 00:14:09,920 --> 00:14:11,960 it'll be this theocracy where God rules. 256 00:14:12,960 --> 00:14:16,440 But many other Jews said we cannot wait for the Messiah and 257 00:14:16,440 --> 00:14:18,480 so we need to create facts on the ground. 258 00:14:18,480 --> 00:14:21,960 So they started moving to Israel in the early 1900s. 259 00:14:22,960 --> 00:14:26,560 Mid 1900s. So when as there's persecution 260 00:14:26,560 --> 00:14:30,320 in Europe, especially in Western Europe, sorry, in Eastern Europe 261 00:14:32,120 --> 00:14:36,200 you start to see waves of of Jews slowly immigrating. 262 00:14:36,440 --> 00:14:39,240 All right. So in the in the late 1800s, 263 00:14:39,560 --> 00:14:43,560 eighteen 80s, eighteen 90s, you see a series of pogroms that are 264 00:14:43,560 --> 00:14:47,360 beginning in Russia, Poland, that area, it's called the Pale 265 00:14:47,360 --> 00:14:49,760 of Settlement. So Jews are starting to leave 266 00:14:49,760 --> 00:14:52,560 that area of Europe. And and they're trying to either 267 00:14:52,560 --> 00:14:55,600 moving to either Western Europe or they're trying to move to 268 00:14:55,600 --> 00:14:57,360 places where they're safe. And one of the places they 269 00:14:57,360 --> 00:15:00,960 wanted to move was to Israel. And so you start to see Jewish 270 00:15:00,960 --> 00:15:04,760 immigration to Israel in the late 1800s, early 1900s. 271 00:15:05,000 --> 00:15:08,640 It's not always legal and so Jews can't always get there, but 272 00:15:08,760 --> 00:15:12,760 the desire is really is really increasing. 273 00:15:13,000 --> 00:15:15,360 And so you see Zionism increasing as a as a religious 274 00:15:15,360 --> 00:15:18,320 movement. And when they are, when they get 275 00:15:18,320 --> 00:15:20,880 there, you know what? What do they find? 276 00:15:20,880 --> 00:15:24,320 Like, like who's living in the land And how did they begin to 277 00:15:25,040 --> 00:15:26,760 change the land? Yeah. 278 00:15:26,760 --> 00:15:29,520 So when when Jews began to immigrate to Israel and there 279 00:15:29,600 --> 00:15:31,040 there weren't, it was not in great numbers. 280 00:15:31,040 --> 00:15:34,320 But when they started to come, what they found were a lot of 281 00:15:34,320 --> 00:15:37,440 Arabs living in the land, along with some Jews living in the 282 00:15:37,440 --> 00:15:40,400 land. But it was not well populated. 283 00:15:40,520 --> 00:15:42,720 I mean there were various, there were villages, there were towns, 284 00:15:42,720 --> 00:15:46,920 but there weren't big cities. And so when Western Jews, 285 00:15:46,920 --> 00:15:49,040 meaning European Jews when they start moving. 286 00:15:49,840 --> 00:15:53,320 Into Israel, they start to buy up land as much as they can, 287 00:15:53,320 --> 00:15:55,440 'cause that was the system in Europe, right? 288 00:15:55,440 --> 00:15:57,800 You you wanted to own the land so that you could farm the land. 289 00:15:58,120 --> 00:16:01,360 A little different system had applied in Israel that time. 290 00:16:01,360 --> 00:16:04,520 And so the day I just the idea of buying land and owning land 291 00:16:04,520 --> 00:16:09,000 and not letting people on your land was a new a newish kind of 292 00:16:09,000 --> 00:16:13,880 thing that made these Western Jews not very welcome among both 293 00:16:13,880 --> 00:16:16,040 the Jews who had been living there and among the Arab 294 00:16:16,040 --> 00:16:21,880 population. Because before that, everybody's 295 00:16:21,880 --> 00:16:24,240 getting along pretty well. They are getting along pretty 296 00:16:24,360 --> 00:16:27,800 well, that's right. And so just some numbers, I 297 00:16:27,800 --> 00:16:32,120 think these are probably close enough to to say publicly 1880, 298 00:16:32,200 --> 00:16:39,520 about 500,000 Arabs, 10% Christian and about 20 to 30,000 299 00:16:39,520 --> 00:16:42,320 Jews. And so both the Jews and the 300 00:16:42,320 --> 00:16:45,800 Christians are minorities, but everybody's, everybody's working 301 00:16:45,800 --> 00:16:48,600 together to just live peacefully in the land. 302 00:16:50,200 --> 00:16:52,720 Doesn't mean there wasn't tension or strife. 303 00:16:52,720 --> 00:16:55,040 I mean that's going to happen within different people groups. 304 00:16:55,600 --> 00:17:00,240 But it seems like as the economy began to change, then the 305 00:17:00,240 --> 00:17:03,160 religious differences began to get greater between those 306 00:17:03,160 --> 00:17:06,480 groups. Just for just for size. 307 00:17:06,480 --> 00:17:08,760 I meant to say this earlier, but Israel? 308 00:17:08,960 --> 00:17:11,040 Roughly the size of New Jersey. That's right. 309 00:17:11,520 --> 00:17:14,720 So Israel's roughly, roughly the size of New Jersey with a 310 00:17:14,720 --> 00:17:16,839 current population of about 9,000,000. 311 00:17:17,720 --> 00:17:21,599 So just for comparison, South Carolina is just a little over 5 312 00:17:21,599 --> 00:17:25,880 million. So New Jersey with like twice 313 00:17:25,880 --> 00:17:27,960 the size, twice the population of South Carolina. 314 00:17:28,160 --> 00:17:36,000 So it's a good number of folks. OK, so then take us up to kind 315 00:17:36,000 --> 00:17:38,840 of World War One and where what's England's role? 316 00:17:38,840 --> 00:17:44,960 England plays a pretty big role in this changing of the the, the 317 00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:47,360 land that we now call Israel. What take? 318 00:17:47,400 --> 00:17:48,840 Walk us through a couple of steps there. 319 00:17:49,120 --> 00:17:52,840 Sure. So the Ottoman Empire fought on 320 00:17:52,840 --> 00:17:58,040 the side of the Germans in World War One, and as it turned out 321 00:17:58,040 --> 00:18:00,520 that they were on the losing side, The British and the French 322 00:18:00,520 --> 00:18:04,200 were on the winning side. Came to what we now call the 323 00:18:04,200 --> 00:18:06,480 Middle East and they began to carve up the Middle East into 324 00:18:06,480 --> 00:18:09,480 certain areas. And so when the Ottoman Empire 325 00:18:09,480 --> 00:18:11,520 disintegrated, they were the ones who controlled Jerusalem 326 00:18:11,520 --> 00:18:16,120 and Israel. The French took everything north 327 00:18:16,120 --> 00:18:19,120 of what we now call Israel. So Lebanon and Syria became 328 00:18:19,280 --> 00:18:23,720 French controlled and then the countries of what we now call 329 00:18:23,720 --> 00:18:28,440 Israel, Jordan, parts of Egypt, parts of Iraq even became became 330 00:18:28,440 --> 00:18:30,360 under British control. So after after World War One, 331 00:18:30,360 --> 00:18:31,840 you get something called the British Mandate. 332 00:18:33,120 --> 00:18:36,760 OK, so that's a pretty big area for Britain to control. 333 00:18:37,600 --> 00:18:44,360 And so then what are what are they saying about promoting the 334 00:18:44,360 --> 00:18:46,520 migration of Jews back into the land? 335 00:18:47,080 --> 00:18:49,880 About 1917 there's something called the Balfour Declaration. 336 00:18:50,160 --> 00:18:54,960 So a guy named Edward Balfour wrote this memo back to Britain 337 00:18:54,960 --> 00:18:58,240 and said, hey, we support the creation of a Jewish state. 338 00:19:00,000 --> 00:19:04,360 At the same time, you get a different British politician 339 00:19:04,640 --> 00:19:07,680 making promises to Arab peoples who live in the same land. 340 00:19:08,080 --> 00:19:10,080 And so right in the right, in the beginning of the British 341 00:19:10,080 --> 00:19:13,680 period, British are trying to establish their their control 342 00:19:13,680 --> 00:19:15,880 over the region, and they're making promises to both people 343 00:19:15,880 --> 00:19:19,120 groups, which doesn't lead to good things in the end, Yeah, 344 00:19:19,120 --> 00:19:22,040 but it sounds very political. It's very political. 345 00:19:22,040 --> 00:19:24,760 Yeah, very political. So. 346 00:19:25,720 --> 00:19:30,480 So Britain's a major player in how this area is getting carved 347 00:19:30,480 --> 00:19:32,960 up. I mean, and literally when we 348 00:19:32,960 --> 00:19:35,960 talk about carved up, we're creating boundary lines, 349 00:19:35,960 --> 00:19:38,160 national boundary lines. Yeah, they took maps and just 350 00:19:38,160 --> 00:19:41,040 drew lines, just drew lines on maps, which I mean, it's just, 351 00:19:42,040 --> 00:19:45,880 you know, like just different different way of thinking about 352 00:19:46,360 --> 00:19:48,320 where we landed, where we are now. 353 00:19:48,800 --> 00:19:52,240 And so and then we have a terrible, a really, really 354 00:19:52,240 --> 00:19:56,240 terrible time in history leading up to World War 2. 355 00:19:56,240 --> 00:19:58,720 So just kind of kind of walk us through some of what was 356 00:19:58,720 --> 00:20:00,680 happening. And I think that's probably a 357 00:20:00,680 --> 00:20:04,240 time to introduce anti-Semitism. Can you give us, you gave us a 358 00:20:04,240 --> 00:20:06,200 good definition of Zionism. Can you give us a good 359 00:20:06,200 --> 00:20:10,880 definition of anti-Semitism? Yeah, anti-Semitism really just 360 00:20:10,880 --> 00:20:13,280 means anti Jewish sentiments, right? 361 00:20:13,280 --> 00:20:16,640 So things where you're blaming Jewish people for certain 362 00:20:16,640 --> 00:20:19,320 things, you can take a lot of different forms. 363 00:20:19,840 --> 00:20:21,800 There is something called Christian anti-Semitism that 364 00:20:21,800 --> 00:20:23,440 goes back to like the 2nd century. 365 00:20:23,440 --> 00:20:27,440 It's it's a very deeply established and tragic thing. 366 00:20:28,080 --> 00:20:33,240 But anti-Semitism, in terms of anti Jewish sensitivities began 367 00:20:33,240 --> 00:20:36,400 to really ramp up in the same time that Zionism is becoming a 368 00:20:36,400 --> 00:20:38,280 really important thing. And those two things go together 369 00:20:38,280 --> 00:20:40,440 right, Right. So as Jews are feeling more 370 00:20:40,440 --> 00:20:44,200 pressure, they're feeling discriminated against. 371 00:20:44,200 --> 00:20:49,240 Some of them are being bullied or are being killed at the same 372 00:20:49,240 --> 00:20:51,160 time that that's happening, they're thinking we need we need 373 00:20:51,160 --> 00:20:52,760 to go somewhere, we need somewhere safe. 374 00:20:52,760 --> 00:20:53,400 Sure. Yeah. 375 00:20:53,640 --> 00:20:57,040 And so the rise of Zionism in the late 1800s, early 1900s is 376 00:20:57,360 --> 00:20:59,000 happening. At the same time we're starting 377 00:20:59,000 --> 00:21:02,000 to see a lot of anti Jewish sensibilities, especially in in 378 00:21:02,000 --> 00:21:05,000 Western and Eastern Europe. Yeah, so they're just they're 379 00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:07,560 looking for a place to go. They do not have a home. 380 00:21:09,280 --> 00:21:12,680 Even here in the United States, there's strong anti-Semitic. 381 00:21:13,840 --> 00:21:16,520 Sentiment. And then of course we we know 382 00:21:16,520 --> 00:21:18,360 about what happened during World War Two. 383 00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:24,760 We know the Holocaust. Take, take what I said earlier 384 00:21:24,760 --> 00:21:28,120 about the population of South Carolina, I think 5.2 million. 385 00:21:28,840 --> 00:21:32,720 So 6 million Jews die in the Holocaust. 386 00:21:33,920 --> 00:21:41,400 It's just unfathomable, right? And so that definitely changes 387 00:21:41,400 --> 00:21:46,600 the dynamic as far as. How the Jews are viewed in some 388 00:21:46,600 --> 00:21:48,040 circles on the words world stage. 389 00:21:48,040 --> 00:21:49,080 Is that correct? That's right. 390 00:21:49,120 --> 00:21:53,600 And so the best tell us about the United Nations. 391 00:21:53,600 --> 00:21:57,560 What role are they playing? Why do they even come into the 392 00:21:57,560 --> 00:22:00,280 conversation? What's the role between United 393 00:22:00,280 --> 00:22:05,080 Nations and Britain on the heels of World War 2? 394 00:22:05,760 --> 00:22:09,760 So the United Nations is this, this collective body that 395 00:22:09,760 --> 00:22:13,760 individual countries have given have ceded certain control or or 396 00:22:13,760 --> 00:22:17,640 powers to them to make decisions, make a global or 397 00:22:17,640 --> 00:22:21,280 universal decisions. The United Nations has a role to 398 00:22:21,280 --> 00:22:23,360 play or had a role to play in the creation of the State of 399 00:22:23,360 --> 00:22:26,600 Israel because the various countries that are in the United 400 00:22:26,600 --> 00:22:29,960 Nations wanted, a lot of them wanted Israel to be. 401 00:22:30,360 --> 00:22:32,240 They wanted a safe place for the Jewish people, right? 402 00:22:32,320 --> 00:22:33,800 Right. They wanted this, this land to 403 00:22:33,800 --> 00:22:35,200 be or this country to be created. 404 00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:37,520 Particularly on the hills of what it particularly on the 405 00:22:37,520 --> 00:22:40,920 heels of the Holocaust, right. So there's a lot of sense of 406 00:22:40,920 --> 00:22:44,280 compassion, of horror and what happened. 407 00:22:44,600 --> 00:22:48,040 And so this this guilt really too, we need to do our part to 408 00:22:48,040 --> 00:22:50,440 protect the Jewish people because we haven't done a good 409 00:22:50,440 --> 00:22:52,280 job of it. And so that's how a lot of 410 00:22:52,280 --> 00:22:55,400 European countries, especially Western European countries, got 411 00:22:55,400 --> 00:22:56,920 behind the creation of the state of Israel. 412 00:22:56,920 --> 00:23:01,440 Britain was the biggest backer, the US was a very strong backer. 413 00:23:02,280 --> 00:23:05,640 So you got various countries who are really pro of the creation 414 00:23:05,640 --> 00:23:07,840 of the state of Israel. At the same time, in the United 415 00:23:07,840 --> 00:23:09,800 Nations, you've got a a collection of countries that are 416 00:23:09,800 --> 00:23:11,800 very opposed to the creation of the state of Israel. 417 00:23:11,800 --> 00:23:12,920 So it was a very contested thing. 418 00:23:12,920 --> 00:23:16,520 In the United Nations, the vote was definitely not unanimous. 419 00:23:17,400 --> 00:23:20,360 But what the United Nations did 'cause they had the they had the 420 00:23:20,600 --> 00:23:23,800 collective authority to make some decisions. 421 00:23:23,800 --> 00:23:28,160 They said we think the British Mandate, meaning the land that 422 00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:31,720 is in what we now call Israel, that it should be divided 423 00:23:31,720 --> 00:23:35,120 between Jews and Arabs. And so they came up with a plan. 424 00:23:35,120 --> 00:23:42,360 They drew lines on a map. And the Arab people, the Arab 425 00:23:42,360 --> 00:23:44,880 people who are in control in Israel at the time, they 426 00:23:44,880 --> 00:23:48,360 rejected the plan because it wasn't in their favor. 427 00:23:48,520 --> 00:23:51,760 They were going to lose stuff. They had, they had the majority 428 00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:56,720 of the population, but they were getting slightly less than 50% 429 00:23:56,720 --> 00:23:57,840 of the land. Yeah. 430 00:23:57,920 --> 00:24:00,160 I mean up until that time they own all the land, right, Right. 431 00:24:00,160 --> 00:24:03,040 So any, any division of the land they were opposed to, but 432 00:24:03,040 --> 00:24:05,560 especially the way it was being divided because it wasn't a fair 433 00:24:05,560 --> 00:24:08,040 share, right say. So what happens next? 434 00:24:08,800 --> 00:24:11,920 There's a war? Yeah, so the war goes by 435 00:24:11,920 --> 00:24:15,080 different names. In 1948, the British have Now 436 00:24:15,120 --> 00:24:19,280 they've left Israel, there's a power vacuum. 437 00:24:19,600 --> 00:24:23,440 That and that's important because they have been involved 438 00:24:23,840 --> 00:24:29,880 post Ottoman Empire, British Mandate, but basically they kind 439 00:24:29,880 --> 00:24:32,120 of washed their hands of the whole situation they did. 440 00:24:32,520 --> 00:24:35,960 And they just left. It was not a the British just 441 00:24:35,960 --> 00:24:38,560 wanted out, sure, Yeah, they wanted out, man. 442 00:24:38,840 --> 00:24:42,560 And they had supporters of the Jews and the supporters of Arabs 443 00:24:42,560 --> 00:24:44,680 in their army. I mean part of, I mean, you said 444 00:24:44,680 --> 00:24:46,080 earlier use the word mass, Chris. 445 00:24:46,120 --> 00:24:48,520 I mean, part of this conversation is this show. 446 00:24:48,800 --> 00:24:53,280 It's been a mess for a long time, and there are human 447 00:24:53,280 --> 00:24:57,120 decisions and historical decisions that, and sure, 448 00:24:57,120 --> 00:24:59,320 there's different perspectives and different interpretations 449 00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:03,160 and how things came about, but but there are factual things 450 00:25:03,160 --> 00:25:06,240 that happened that have created a lot of this, lot of this mess. 451 00:25:06,680 --> 00:25:09,560 Which when you, you know turn on cable news and you're like Oh my 452 00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:13,200 gosh, I I see no end game. I see no way out of this apart 453 00:25:13,200 --> 00:25:16,600 from Jesus. This is we're just trying to get 454 00:25:16,600 --> 00:25:19,000 catch you up a little bit on the history of how we how we even 455 00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:23,440 got here. So we have we have a war in 48. 456 00:25:24,320 --> 00:25:27,000 We have a war now So what's happening during the war? 457 00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:28,360 What's it? What are some of the natural 458 00:25:28,360 --> 00:25:31,000 consequences of war in 1948 or now? 459 00:25:31,080 --> 00:25:35,440 Sorry, now 1948. OK, so in 1948 there was a war 460 00:25:35,440 --> 00:25:39,600 between Jews and Arabs, and there the goal for both is to 461 00:25:39,600 --> 00:25:41,040 take as much land as they can get. 462 00:25:42,680 --> 00:25:46,360 The Israeli side won the war, so they call it the war for 463 00:25:46,360 --> 00:25:49,520 independence. And so it celebrated every May. 464 00:25:49,520 --> 00:25:53,280 Something. I forget the exact date on the 465 00:25:53,280 --> 00:25:57,120 Arab or Palestinian side, They refer to that conflict as the 466 00:25:57,120 --> 00:26:00,120 catastrophe, the Nakba, right? Because they lost. 467 00:26:01,080 --> 00:26:03,560 And what what ended up happening is Israel actually took even 468 00:26:03,560 --> 00:26:06,640 more land than the UN had partitioned for them, right? 469 00:26:06,640 --> 00:26:08,840 So they've got even more land. The Arabs got even less. 470 00:26:09,280 --> 00:26:13,520 And one of the effects of that war, which really leads to some 471 00:26:13,520 --> 00:26:17,680 of the contemporary conflicts that you see today in Gaza, is 472 00:26:17,680 --> 00:26:21,440 there was a refugee crisis. And by how large of a crisis? 473 00:26:21,720 --> 00:26:27,560 So when Israel took as much land as they did, most Arabs who 474 00:26:27,560 --> 00:26:30,360 lived in that land fled right? For very. 475 00:26:30,360 --> 00:26:33,680 I mean, it's war, right? They they fully assumed that 476 00:26:33,680 --> 00:26:35,680 they would be allowed back into their land at some point when 477 00:26:35,680 --> 00:26:38,440 the hostilities were over. That never happened. 478 00:26:38,840 --> 00:26:41,000 And so it created this refugee problem where you got about 479 00:26:41,000 --> 00:26:48,240 700,000 Palestinians who flee to various countries or well, 480 00:26:48,440 --> 00:26:53,360 various countries around Israel. So Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and 481 00:26:53,360 --> 00:26:56,240 Egypt are the places where those where those people fled. 482 00:26:56,640 --> 00:27:01,800 OK, so at that. So hundreds of thousands of 483 00:27:01,800 --> 00:27:05,040 people, 700 thousands of people that are fleeing natural 484 00:27:05,040 --> 00:27:10,760 consequences of war, some migration, some are displaced, 485 00:27:12,200 --> 00:27:17,160 borders are set looking to return back and that's just not 486 00:27:17,160 --> 00:27:19,640 possible. For for for a number of them. 487 00:27:21,840 --> 00:27:26,000 So then what happens next? What happens next? 488 00:27:26,000 --> 00:27:27,640 Well, let me back up and say one other thing. 489 00:27:27,840 --> 00:27:31,960 So most Palestinians fled. Some of them stayed in their 490 00:27:31,960 --> 00:27:34,040 land, right. And so the the people who now 491 00:27:34,040 --> 00:27:38,320 live in Nazareth, who are partners with Grace Church, they 492 00:27:38,320 --> 00:27:39,680 were part of the contingent who stayed. 493 00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:43,040 So they didn't flee. So if you if in 1948, if your if 494 00:27:43,040 --> 00:27:45,800 your family fled, you're now called a refugee. 495 00:27:46,280 --> 00:27:49,200 If your family stayed, you're an Israeli citizen, right? 496 00:27:49,200 --> 00:27:50,880 So that you're an Israeli Arab. Really. 497 00:27:50,880 --> 00:27:53,160 That's that's the IT goes to 1948. 498 00:27:53,960 --> 00:27:58,720 Between 1948 and 1967, the neighboring Arab countries 499 00:27:58,720 --> 00:28:03,680 around Israel are unhappy about Israel controlling the land that 500 00:28:03,680 --> 00:28:08,680 they do right because up for for 1300 years or so that landed all 501 00:28:08,680 --> 00:28:11,440 of an Arab and now all of a sudden this Western group, 502 00:28:11,440 --> 00:28:13,600 really that's how they thought of the Jews coming in. 503 00:28:13,600 --> 00:28:16,960 They thought of these Europeans who are coming in and taking 504 00:28:16,960 --> 00:28:18,880 land from them. And are there still a good 505 00:28:18,880 --> 00:28:26,640 number of the refugees from the war that are living in Jordan or 506 00:28:26,640 --> 00:28:28,440 other neighboring countries at that time? 507 00:28:28,440 --> 00:28:28,960 Yeah. Yeah. 508 00:28:29,160 --> 00:28:31,440 So. So Arabs who were forced to flee 509 00:28:31,440 --> 00:28:35,040 from their homeland, their ancestral home, right. 510 00:28:35,040 --> 00:28:38,720 They are living in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt. 511 00:28:38,720 --> 00:28:40,080 Right. So they were forced to flee. 512 00:28:40,080 --> 00:28:41,760 Or sometimes it depends on who you ask. 513 00:28:41,800 --> 00:28:43,840 They voluntarily flee. Were they forced to flee? 514 00:28:43,960 --> 00:28:45,960 Exactly. But they became refugees, they 515 00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:47,360 were not allowed back into their land. 516 00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:52,920 So in 1967 this growing anti Israel sentiment, it's been 517 00:28:52,920 --> 00:28:55,520 growing in the Arab world, especially led by Egypt. 518 00:28:56,080 --> 00:29:01,400 And in 1967 you get Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt all 519 00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:04,280 attacking Israel at the same time. 520 00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:09,760 Israel. Israel started the war, you 521 00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:12,120 could say, because they hit the Egyptians first, but it was 522 00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:14,760 really, it was because the Israelis knew this was coming, 523 00:29:15,160 --> 00:29:18,480 OK. In 1967, it's called the Six Day 524 00:29:18,480 --> 00:29:22,040 War because in six days Israel doubled in size. 525 00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:25,360 They took an area of length called the Golan Heights from 526 00:29:25,360 --> 00:29:27,440 Syria. They took what's called the West 527 00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:31,640 Bank from Jordan, and they took the Gaza Strip from Egypt. 528 00:29:31,640 --> 00:29:33,480 All right. So all three of those 529 00:29:33,880 --> 00:29:37,680 territories became part of Israel proper, or at least they 530 00:29:37,680 --> 00:29:39,640 were. They weren't necessarily legally 531 00:29:39,640 --> 00:29:42,160 annexed, but they they became under Israeli control. 532 00:29:44,240 --> 00:29:48,040 And this is a this is a really big defining moment for this 533 00:29:48,040 --> 00:29:51,920 newer Jewish state. I mean they they see God's hand 534 00:29:51,920 --> 00:29:55,640 provision, I mean miraculous in in in six days they're able to 535 00:29:55,640 --> 00:29:59,600 turn back enemies from all sides and take the land. 536 00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:06,840 And is it fair to say that that Zionist sentiment, maybe this is 537 00:30:06,840 --> 00:30:11,360 how God is securing their final place in the land, is through 538 00:30:11,360 --> 00:30:13,680 this? Through war season like this. 539 00:30:13,960 --> 00:30:17,480 That is certainly how a lot of Christian Zionists saw it, and 540 00:30:17,480 --> 00:30:21,000 Jewish Zionists, right both. Up until this point, there were 541 00:30:21,000 --> 00:30:24,760 a number of very religious Jews who had who had decided not to 542 00:30:24,760 --> 00:30:27,280 support the state of Israel because it had been of human 543 00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:30,280 creation. But in the Six Day War, what 544 00:30:30,280 --> 00:30:34,280 they what they claimed was that they saw God's hand in allowing 545 00:30:34,280 --> 00:30:36,120 Israel to defeat their enemies in six days. 546 00:30:36,120 --> 00:30:38,560 And so they So some of these religious Jews said, OK, we're 547 00:30:38,560 --> 00:30:41,120 on board now. It's not just this human thing 548 00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:42,680 that's happening. God must be involved. 549 00:30:42,680 --> 00:30:47,080 So Zionism, you would say that you are incorporating more 550 00:30:47,080 --> 00:30:49,440 branches of the Zionist movement into support of this? 551 00:30:49,480 --> 00:30:52,200 Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. And so I think for the first 552 00:30:52,200 --> 00:30:56,480 time we've mentioned Gaza Strip and West Bank. 553 00:30:56,480 --> 00:30:59,920 Give us just quickly, geography. Where is Gaza? 554 00:31:00,040 --> 00:31:01,320 Where? What's West Bank? 555 00:31:01,320 --> 00:31:02,320 Of what? Sure. 556 00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:05,200 So the West Bank is much larger than the Gaza Strip. 557 00:31:05,280 --> 00:31:08,680 The West Bank is means the West side of the Jordan River. 558 00:31:09,360 --> 00:31:11,680 So the east Bank of the Jordan River is the country of Jordan 559 00:31:11,680 --> 00:31:13,760 today. The West side was part of 560 00:31:13,760 --> 00:31:16,880 Jordan. But then when Israel conquered 561 00:31:16,880 --> 00:31:20,040 that territory in 1967, it became part of Israel. 562 00:31:20,040 --> 00:31:21,560 But it's designated differently. It's not. 563 00:31:21,760 --> 00:31:23,640 But what you call it matters, right? 564 00:31:23,640 --> 00:31:25,880 So you can call it the West Bank, the Occupied West Bank, 565 00:31:25,880 --> 00:31:29,920 the Palestinian territories, or if you're a strong Zionist, you 566 00:31:29,920 --> 00:31:32,680 might call it Judea and Samaria, called by its biblical names. 567 00:31:33,120 --> 00:31:37,240 And this is where like the city of Bethlehem, the birth place of 568 00:31:37,440 --> 00:31:40,040 of Jesus would be great point. So Bethlehem is in the West 569 00:31:40,040 --> 00:31:42,280 Bank, Jericho's in the West Bank. 570 00:31:42,600 --> 00:31:44,800 There's a bunch of biblical sites that are in the West Bank. 571 00:31:44,800 --> 00:31:46,600 That are in the West Bank. And then what about Gaza? 572 00:31:46,840 --> 00:31:49,360 So Gaza was a very small piece of land. 573 00:31:49,360 --> 00:31:53,440 It's about 25 miles long and about 6 miles wide. 574 00:31:54,200 --> 00:31:57,160 And you have roughly 2 million and you've got 2 million people 575 00:31:57,160 --> 00:31:58,800 living in that small strip of. Land. 576 00:31:58,800 --> 00:31:59,960 Right. Half of which I think they say 577 00:31:59,960 --> 00:32:01,320 are children. Yeah. 578 00:32:01,440 --> 00:32:03,960 Yeah, yeah. So the Gaza Strip then became 579 00:32:03,960 --> 00:32:05,680 this. It had been part of Egypt. 580 00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:07,560 Israel took that land from Egypt. 581 00:32:08,360 --> 00:32:10,440 They took even more. They took the Sinai Peninsula as 582 00:32:10,440 --> 00:32:14,280 well. But what happened then is a lot 583 00:32:14,280 --> 00:32:18,640 of the original Palestinian refugees who had fled to this 584 00:32:18,640 --> 00:32:23,240 place called the Gaza Strip in order to flee the Israelis, 585 00:32:23,240 --> 00:32:24,880 they're now under Israeli control. 586 00:32:25,480 --> 00:32:27,560 And the Israelis aren't very happy about it because there's a 587 00:32:27,560 --> 00:32:29,480 bunch of Arabs that are now under their control and they 588 00:32:29,480 --> 00:32:31,680 don't know what to do with them. The Arabs aren't happy about it 589 00:32:31,680 --> 00:32:33,160 because they're under Israeli control. 590 00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:39,040 So even starting in 1967, it was kind of a a mess in some ways in 591 00:32:39,040 --> 00:32:42,440 terms of what do you do with this land that we conquered, but 592 00:32:42,440 --> 00:32:44,280 has all these people here that we don't? 593 00:32:44,440 --> 00:32:46,000 I mean, if you're on the Jewish side, you say that we don't 594 00:32:46,000 --> 00:32:46,880 really want. Right. 595 00:32:47,000 --> 00:32:49,080 Yeah, 'cause there's always security concerns here. 596 00:32:49,920 --> 00:32:53,400 A lot of, a lot of fighting. Just just all the just tension 597 00:32:53,520 --> 00:32:59,880 all the time. OK, so then where where does 598 00:32:59,880 --> 00:33:05,840 Hamas as it relates to Gaza? Tell us about The Who is Hamas 599 00:33:05,840 --> 00:33:07,240 in The Rise of Hamas. Sure. 600 00:33:07,560 --> 00:33:09,920 So Hamas is part of a larger movement. 601 00:33:09,920 --> 00:33:11,360 It's called the Muslim Brotherhood. 602 00:33:11,760 --> 00:33:14,280 The Muslim Brotherhood started in the 1920s. 603 00:33:14,280 --> 00:33:17,440 It was an Egyptian thing, and it spread to a lot of different 604 00:33:17,440 --> 00:33:20,040 Arab countries. And so you see branches of the 605 00:33:20,040 --> 00:33:23,400 Muslim Brotherhood in, you know, in various countries today, most 606 00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:25,680 governments don't really like the Muslim Brotherhood. 607 00:33:26,160 --> 00:33:30,000 They're more revolutionary, they're more reactionary, and 608 00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:33,040 they're more of a kind of return to very conservative Islam in 609 00:33:33,040 --> 00:33:34,760 some ways. Yeah, they have strong religious 610 00:33:34,760 --> 00:33:35,880 beliefs. They really do. 611 00:33:35,960 --> 00:33:38,760 Yeah, right. And so for Hamas specifically, 612 00:33:38,760 --> 00:33:42,200 the, the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood is Hamas. 613 00:33:42,760 --> 00:33:47,480 And Hamas was just one among several political parties among 614 00:33:47,480 --> 00:33:51,480 the Palestinian people until, well, they were just one of many 615 00:33:51,480 --> 00:33:55,520 until 2005. In 2005 Israel, who has been 616 00:33:55,520 --> 00:33:59,160 controlling the Gaza Strip they decided to pull out of the Gaza 617 00:33:59,160 --> 00:34:01,280 Strip and just leave it at the give it over to the 618 00:34:01,280 --> 00:34:04,640 Palestinians. They were tired of trying to not 619 00:34:04,640 --> 00:34:07,440 really police it because they weren't they were trying just to 620 00:34:07,440 --> 00:34:10,679 make it secure for Israelis but they were trying to secure from 621 00:34:10,679 --> 00:34:12,040 the inside. So they said, wait, this is 622 00:34:12,040 --> 00:34:13,480 crazy. They pulled out. 623 00:34:13,480 --> 00:34:16,040 So we're going to put up borders, big fences and walls. 624 00:34:16,520 --> 00:34:19,719 And and so in the, as the Israelis were pulling out of the 625 00:34:19,719 --> 00:34:23,639 Gaza Strip, you start, you have Palestinian elections in the 626 00:34:23,639 --> 00:34:26,400 Gaza Strip, right, Because there has to be someone to take over 627 00:34:26,639 --> 00:34:31,280 and Hamas ends up taking over. So the Palestinian Authority had 628 00:34:31,280 --> 00:34:33,840 been kind of the other main, that's the other main party. 629 00:34:33,840 --> 00:34:36,040 They had been in control and then they lost the elections to 630 00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:37,960 Hamas. And since 2005, there's not been 631 00:34:37,960 --> 00:34:39,199 any elections. Hamas has. 632 00:34:39,199 --> 00:34:40,520 Just kept control. Yeah. 633 00:34:40,520 --> 00:34:45,560 So for almost 20 years. But specifically as it relates 634 00:34:45,560 --> 00:34:48,679 to their existence, in their charter defining their 635 00:34:48,679 --> 00:34:53,880 existence, they call for the eradication of all Jews, 636 00:34:53,960 --> 00:34:55,960 correct. They do so in their charter. 637 00:34:55,960 --> 00:34:57,840 Yeah. They said that they want to. 638 00:34:57,840 --> 00:35:00,920 I mean one of the slogans right now is to free Palestine or or 639 00:35:00,920 --> 00:35:04,680 Palestinian or Palestine all the way to the sea or something like 640 00:35:04,680 --> 00:35:06,520 that. That's that's a Hamas charter. 641 00:35:06,520 --> 00:35:08,600 They're saying that we don't want the state of Israel to even 642 00:35:08,600 --> 00:35:10,760 exist. We want all this land back. 643 00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:14,560 And so Hamas is a is a very militant group, but it's 644 00:35:14,560 --> 00:35:16,600 complex. They're not just military, 645 00:35:17,240 --> 00:35:20,880 they're also they're they're in charge of the education system 646 00:35:20,880 --> 00:35:22,920 in Gaza. They're in charge of all the 647 00:35:22,920 --> 00:35:25,360 civic kind of things. Like they do a lot of stuff. 648 00:35:25,360 --> 00:35:26,960 Yeah. Like the humanitarian stuff, 649 00:35:26,960 --> 00:35:29,000 Yeah. But they have a militant side to 650 00:35:29,000 --> 00:35:31,720 them that has not endeared them to many people. 651 00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:35,400 And I think that's what where people say, well, do people do 652 00:35:35,400 --> 00:35:37,400 folks living in Gaza do, do they? 653 00:35:37,600 --> 00:35:39,760 What do they think of Hamas? Well, I mean, I don't know that 654 00:35:39,760 --> 00:35:41,840 they have much of A. Much of A choice. 655 00:35:41,840 --> 00:35:44,000 You probably wouldn't get a straight answer if you ask them 656 00:35:44,240 --> 00:35:46,680 because they live, many of them live in fear of Hamas. 657 00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:49,520 Now some of them are supporters, but a lot of them live in fear. 658 00:35:49,520 --> 00:35:52,600 So Hamas isn't. I mean all Hamas people are 659 00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:54,840 Palestinian, right? But not all Palestinians are 660 00:35:54,840 --> 00:35:56,840 Hamas. In fact, a very small number of 661 00:35:56,840 --> 00:35:59,640 Palestinians are Hamas. It's probably it's in the of a 662 00:35:59,640 --> 00:36:03,480 of a place that's 2 million people in the in the Gaza Strip. 663 00:36:03,960 --> 00:36:08,200 If I were to venture a guess, I would say 10 to 20,000 are 664 00:36:08,200 --> 00:36:11,720 hardcore Hamas supporters and then you got millions. 665 00:36:11,960 --> 00:36:14,320 I mean 1.8 million or at least 1.9 anyway. 666 00:36:14,320 --> 00:36:15,520 A lot. It's not great at math. 667 00:36:15,960 --> 00:36:18,640 A lot are they're just they just happen to live there, right? 668 00:36:18,720 --> 00:36:20,480 That's right. And they can't leave because 669 00:36:20,760 --> 00:36:24,360 Israel controls the borders and Egypt controls the border 670 00:36:24,360 --> 00:36:27,720 crossing, and so Palestinians who live in the Gaza Strip are 671 00:36:27,720 --> 00:36:29,880 stuck. Yeah, and they're different from 672 00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:31,400 Palestinians that live in the West Bank. 673 00:36:31,760 --> 00:36:37,360 Those two are not connected. And there are a number of folks. 674 00:36:37,360 --> 00:36:39,520 West Bank, like you said, is a much larger territory. 675 00:36:40,360 --> 00:36:43,000 OK. So then just real quickly, as we 676 00:36:43,160 --> 00:36:46,240 as we kind of wrap up this portion, how do we get from 2005 677 00:36:46,240 --> 00:36:50,600 to now? Any thoughts on what you've seen 678 00:36:50,600 --> 00:36:55,880 most recently in the deterioration of the talks idea 679 00:36:55,880 --> 00:36:59,120 of A2 state solution, any any thoughts on that? 680 00:37:00,200 --> 00:37:02,760 So A2, the idea of A2 state solution is that there would be 681 00:37:02,760 --> 00:37:05,440 at some point in the future a Palestinian state and an Israeli 682 00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:08,880 state right side by side. That is becoming increasingly 683 00:37:08,880 --> 00:37:12,720 unlikely, mostly because of what are called Israeli settlements. 684 00:37:12,720 --> 00:37:15,440 So Jews going in and living in parts of the West Bank and they 685 00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:16,800 used to be living in the Gaza Strip. 686 00:37:17,560 --> 00:37:19,320 That's what they, when they pulled out the Gaza Strip, they 687 00:37:19,360 --> 00:37:24,200 they left all their settlements in terms of like, how we got to 688 00:37:24,200 --> 00:37:26,960 like the conflict just in the last three weeks, Right. 689 00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:32,280 So once Hamas took over in the Gaza Strip, what you see is 690 00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:36,800 continual conflict between Hamas and the Israeli government which 691 00:37:36,800 --> 00:37:38,600 really just means Israel proper, right. 692 00:37:38,880 --> 00:37:41,600 And so Hamas will shoot rockets into got into Israel now and 693 00:37:41,600 --> 00:37:44,960 again is what will respond with much greater force to try and 694 00:37:44,960 --> 00:37:48,120 put it down And that that conflict has been simmering 695 00:37:48,120 --> 00:37:51,800 since 2005 or 6 it erupts every now and again. 696 00:37:51,800 --> 00:37:57,280 So in 2009, two thousand and twelve 2014, two 1019, you see 697 00:37:57,280 --> 00:38:00,960 some sometimes where Israel respond with more force, right. 698 00:38:01,800 --> 00:38:05,360 And So what happened and three weeks ago was above and beyond 699 00:38:05,360 --> 00:38:06,600 anything that had happened before. 700 00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:10,680 So Hamas really has been contained in the Gaza Strip and 701 00:38:10,680 --> 00:38:15,640 they were they were able to in various ways leave the Gaza 702 00:38:15,640 --> 00:38:19,520 Strip and come and slaughter a bunch of, I mean 1300 Israelis. 703 00:38:19,960 --> 00:38:23,400 And so in previous conflicts, you might have had like 5 704 00:38:23,400 --> 00:38:28,200 Israelis die and there was a strong response, 1300 people 705 00:38:28,200 --> 00:38:30,840 dead and then about 200 plus hostages. 706 00:38:31,720 --> 00:38:33,520 It's a different, it's a different kind of thing, yeah. 707 00:38:33,520 --> 00:38:35,280 It's unfathomable what's happening, right. 708 00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:37,080 So that's what leads to where we are now. 709 00:38:37,080 --> 00:38:38,760 It's kind of stuck because Israel doesn't. 710 00:38:38,960 --> 00:38:41,200 Israel wants to go in and free their hostages and get rid of 711 00:38:41,200 --> 00:38:42,760 Hamas, but they don't have an end game. 712 00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:45,320 And so they, I mean they don't want to go, they don't want, 713 00:38:45,320 --> 00:38:47,760 they do not want to go in and occupy the the Gaza Strip again. 714 00:38:47,760 --> 00:38:52,480 Right. And again, you have a number of 715 00:38:52,480 --> 00:38:58,480 Palestinians, Arab Palestinians, that would not support. 716 00:38:58,840 --> 00:39:02,040 What Gaza has done by any, by any means correct, a lot of 717 00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:04,960 people in Gaza and a lot of you in the West Bank, Palestinians 718 00:39:05,200 --> 00:39:07,600 would say that is that is totally against who we are as a 719 00:39:07,600 --> 00:39:09,000 people. Yeah, which just adds to the 720 00:39:09,000 --> 00:39:11,840 complexity. And then we come back to our to 721 00:39:11,840 --> 00:39:16,480 our friends or Arab Christians what, what, what would, what do 722 00:39:16,480 --> 00:39:18,840 you think life is like for them now? 723 00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:23,720 And then Chris recently this summer was part of a a trip to 724 00:39:23,720 --> 00:39:26,000 go over and support them. And so we'll talk a little bit 725 00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:28,280 about. What that was like and but what 726 00:39:28,280 --> 00:39:30,720 do you what do you think the type of tension that they're 727 00:39:30,880 --> 00:39:33,200 that they're feeling now they're in the north, so they're 728 00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:36,000 shielded from a lot of the violence which is down in the 729 00:39:36,000 --> 00:39:40,280 South or the threat of violence. But, but I know I'm asking you 730 00:39:40,280 --> 00:39:44,080 to, you know, speak into their world a little bit. 731 00:39:44,080 --> 00:39:48,880 But what do you think? I mean, Arab Israeli life is 732 00:39:48,880 --> 00:39:51,320 difficult, whether you're Christian or not. 733 00:39:51,320 --> 00:39:53,200 If you're Christian, it's even harder, 'cause we talked about 734 00:39:53,200 --> 00:39:56,320 how they're minority within a minority, right, Earlier on this 735 00:39:56,320 --> 00:39:59,080 podcast. But even if, But even if you're 736 00:39:59,080 --> 00:40:03,000 just like Muslim or Christian, if you're an Arab Israeli, you 737 00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:06,040 are looked at suspiciously. So you have citizenship, but 738 00:40:06,040 --> 00:40:07,600 you're really a second class citizen. 739 00:40:08,520 --> 00:40:10,320 You don't. I mean, in theory you have all 740 00:40:10,320 --> 00:40:11,960 the rights, but in practice you don't. 741 00:40:11,960 --> 00:40:14,880 Really. Nazareth is not as clean as 742 00:40:14,880 --> 00:40:17,520 other Israeli cities because these Israelis don't put as much 743 00:40:17,520 --> 00:40:20,320 money into it, right? So there's a lot of things where 744 00:40:20,560 --> 00:40:25,000 they already feel marginalized. And an event like what happened 745 00:40:25,000 --> 00:40:28,760 in what is happening between Gaza and Israel, those same 746 00:40:28,760 --> 00:40:32,520 suspicions that are placed upon Hamas and Gaza are sometimes 747 00:40:32,520 --> 00:40:34,640 also placed upon Arab Israelis living anywhere. 748 00:40:35,360 --> 00:40:38,440 Like we can't trust them, they might turn against us. 749 00:40:38,480 --> 00:40:43,840 All those things are feeding into the strong sense of being a 750 00:40:43,840 --> 00:40:46,960 minority in Israel. And and they're living outside 751 00:40:46,960 --> 00:40:51,000 of the West Bank. Real quickly some of your 752 00:40:51,240 --> 00:40:54,120 friends that live in like Bethlehem like their life is 753 00:40:54,120 --> 00:40:58,600 even more challenging as a era Christian in the West Bank. 754 00:40:59,400 --> 00:41:02,040 Just like transportation wise, like just tell us a little bit 755 00:41:02,040 --> 00:41:05,040 of like what what that would be like to have work and go to a 756 00:41:05,040 --> 00:41:09,080 job, right. So if Grace Church were to go to 757 00:41:09,080 --> 00:41:11,760 Israel today, which we can't, but if we were to go just right 758 00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:15,600 just today or tomorrow, we could very easily cross from Jerusalem 759 00:41:15,600 --> 00:41:17,360 into Bethlehem. There is a border. 760 00:41:17,360 --> 00:41:18,920 Our bus just sails right through. 761 00:41:19,360 --> 00:41:24,000 If you are, if you happen to be an Arab or just a Palestinian 762 00:41:24,000 --> 00:41:27,720 living in Bethlehem, and you work on the Israeli side of the 763 00:41:27,720 --> 00:41:31,720 border, which is something which many do, you might have to get 764 00:41:31,720 --> 00:41:34,800 up at 4:00 AM to get in line at the border crossing because it 765 00:41:34,800 --> 00:41:37,720 might take you about 3 hours to cross because the Israeli 766 00:41:37,720 --> 00:41:39,560 soldiers are checking everyone's ID. 767 00:41:40,480 --> 00:41:43,640 Then you work and then to get back, it might be another two 768 00:41:43,640 --> 00:41:46,400 hours at the border to get back. And so just life is difficult 769 00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:49,080 and just the things we take for granted like transportation, 770 00:41:50,800 --> 00:41:53,720 it's it's not for granted for them, right. 771 00:41:55,080 --> 00:42:00,000 Just life is difficult. Yeah, Chris, what did you, what 772 00:42:00,000 --> 00:42:01,080 did you witness? What did you feel? 773 00:42:01,080 --> 00:42:04,120 What did you experience when you were over there visiting our 774 00:42:04,120 --> 00:42:06,560 partners? Yeah, I would, I would say 775 00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:10,520 definitely a group of people that are humble, kind, faithful 776 00:42:10,520 --> 00:42:12,880 in the small things. Vulnerable. 777 00:42:12,880 --> 00:42:15,480 I mean, you talked about being the minority of the minority, 778 00:42:16,200 --> 00:42:21,400 but I mean they have such joy and their smiles are never 779 00:42:21,400 --> 00:42:24,240 stopping. They. 780 00:42:24,720 --> 00:42:29,840 It was interesting to be there and to experience that region. 781 00:42:29,840 --> 00:42:33,920 So we got there, we went in July and we got there and went to 782 00:42:33,920 --> 00:42:36,440 Nazareth. Nazareth Baptist House Seminary 783 00:42:36,440 --> 00:42:38,800 is where ABC has kind of headquarters. 784 00:42:38,800 --> 00:42:43,560 So we got to meet. Bedere Mansour, who is the 785 00:42:44,280 --> 00:42:49,960 development officer there for ABC, and he introduced us to the 786 00:42:49,960 --> 00:42:52,080 many different churches that are in this network. 787 00:42:52,080 --> 00:42:56,040 So there's 18 churches that they support within ABC. 788 00:42:56,480 --> 00:43:03,440 And we stayed in Tehran, which is north of Nazareth and that's 789 00:43:03,440 --> 00:43:05,560 where we were a home. We had that as a home base. 790 00:43:05,560 --> 00:43:09,800 So, you know, just meeting Ziad and his wife Rhonda and Josh 791 00:43:09,800 --> 00:43:11,920 and. Just a handful of people living 792 00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:15,640 there they their church is a three story church so they have 793 00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:18,400 the at the bottom they have where children's student 794 00:43:18,400 --> 00:43:19,840 ministry meet. In the middle is where the 795 00:43:19,840 --> 00:43:22,440 church is and then at the top was a place that we slept as a 796 00:43:22,440 --> 00:43:26,440 team and so just meeting them and connecting with them they're 797 00:43:26,440 --> 00:43:32,880 just so kind feeding us want to have a meal every, every time we 798 00:43:33,000 --> 00:43:36,160 we are with them, they. You know that it's about to be 799 00:43:36,160 --> 00:43:37,960 good when they pull out the Coke, OK? 800 00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:40,040 They pull out a Coke and they pull out these little shot glass 801 00:43:40,040 --> 00:43:44,160 plastic cups, which is what they pour the Coke in and it's 11:00 802 00:43:44,160 --> 00:43:46,960 at night and it's time to drink Coke and have a good time and 803 00:43:46,960 --> 00:43:50,800 hang out. And so they are doing great work 804 00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:54,360 there. We went there for Avbs. 805 00:43:54,760 --> 00:43:58,800 That was at a church in Benny. So Benny is north of Nazareth as 806 00:43:58,800 --> 00:44:02,640 well. Rama Church is another church 807 00:44:02,640 --> 00:44:05,640 that was in this area and so we went to support them. 808 00:44:05,640 --> 00:44:07,640 So it was a little bit of a different trip than we've ever 809 00:44:07,640 --> 00:44:11,600 done at Grace because we went there solely to support them in 810 00:44:11,600 --> 00:44:15,560 this VBS. They had 85 kids at this VBS at 811 00:44:15,560 --> 00:44:19,360 A at a woman's house that she let them use the field because 812 00:44:19,360 --> 00:44:22,240 they don't actually have a physical building for the church 813 00:44:22,240 --> 00:44:25,640 in Benny. And just to see the student 814 00:44:25,640 --> 00:44:30,080 leaders that they started this about 10 years ago and to see 815 00:44:30,080 --> 00:44:33,120 the leaders now who had started at the very beginning, 10 years 816 00:44:33,120 --> 00:44:37,960 ago now leading, translating it was it was a joy. 817 00:44:37,960 --> 00:44:40,400 I mean it was, it was absolute joy to see and it was the 818 00:44:40,400 --> 00:44:42,120 hottest. I think they had record heat 819 00:44:42,120 --> 00:44:43,440 index. It was as you said. 820 00:44:43,440 --> 00:44:44,560 Yes, might have been there at the same time. 821 00:44:44,560 --> 00:44:47,320 Yeah, it was. It was hot and but just to see 822 00:44:47,320 --> 00:44:49,480 the work and what God was doing there. 823 00:44:49,480 --> 00:44:52,360 I think the most compelling thing that I saw is their vision 824 00:44:52,360 --> 00:44:54,840 for children. And to see the next generation 825 00:44:55,240 --> 00:44:59,400 raised up to follow Jesus and you know the cities and Tim, you 826 00:44:59,400 --> 00:45:00,520 probably could talk more about this. 827 00:45:00,520 --> 00:45:03,720 But in Benny, Tehran, these different areas, those cities 828 00:45:03,720 --> 00:45:06,360 are large. So you're in community houses 829 00:45:06,360 --> 00:45:09,800 are right up next to each other. And so to say, hey, we've got a 830 00:45:09,800 --> 00:45:12,960 week where your kids can come spend time with us and play and 831 00:45:12,960 --> 00:45:15,520 hang out and. I mean I don't think they they 832 00:45:15,520 --> 00:45:18,920 do care that they're hearing Christian the gospel. 833 00:45:19,200 --> 00:45:23,120 But you could tell the first couple days, just the excitement 834 00:45:23,120 --> 00:45:25,560 there were so many kids there that don't know Christ. 835 00:45:25,880 --> 00:45:31,040 And so to see their the leaders there and just to be a part of 836 00:45:31,040 --> 00:45:34,680 the work that God's doing there and just very raw, very basic. 837 00:45:35,040 --> 00:45:37,320 You know, we're not talking a lot of production. 838 00:45:37,320 --> 00:45:38,320 Right, That's right, I. Mean. 839 00:45:38,320 --> 00:45:39,440 It is. It is. 840 00:45:39,480 --> 00:45:42,240 You're in a room and it's hot, and there's a machine that has 841 00:45:42,240 --> 00:45:44,880 ice in it that's blowing cold air and you're just hoping that 842 00:45:44,880 --> 00:45:46,040 it's going to cool down. Yeah. 843 00:45:46,920 --> 00:45:50,720 But it is just relating, having fun, relating and connecting 844 00:45:50,960 --> 00:45:52,480 back to the stories in the Bible. 845 00:45:52,480 --> 00:45:53,800 That's right. And the person of Jesus. 846 00:45:53,800 --> 00:45:56,000 That's right. You talk about a group of people 847 00:45:56,000 --> 00:45:58,480 living as exiles. You know, we can we can read 848 00:45:58,480 --> 00:46:02,000 that in in First Peter and try to try to emulate that. 849 00:46:02,520 --> 00:46:04,520 But that is their. That is their life. 850 00:46:04,520 --> 00:46:05,400 That's right. Yeah. 851 00:46:07,520 --> 00:46:12,160 OK, well, we didn't solve any problems here today and no one's 852 00:46:12,160 --> 00:46:15,080 asking us to, thankfully. But what we wanted to do is we 853 00:46:15,080 --> 00:46:17,080 wanted to walk through some terms. 854 00:46:17,080 --> 00:46:18,920 We wanted to walk through a little bit of history. 855 00:46:20,240 --> 00:46:22,680 You know, sometimes I turn on the on the television and I feel 856 00:46:22,680 --> 00:46:28,120 like I am reading a book that's about 600 pages and I just 857 00:46:28,120 --> 00:46:32,520 jumped in about 450 pages in. And I don't, I don't really know 858 00:46:32,520 --> 00:46:35,320 what I'm reading, but I feel, I feel like I should. 859 00:46:35,880 --> 00:46:37,800 And then I feel like I should have an opinion on what I'm 860 00:46:37,800 --> 00:46:39,760 reading. And I really have no idea. 861 00:46:40,320 --> 00:46:43,320 And so we just wanted to really try to give you the Cliff Notes 862 00:46:43,320 --> 00:46:48,760 version. We really wanted to reintroduce 863 00:46:49,040 --> 00:46:52,480 our partners and our friends at the Associated Baptist Churches 864 00:46:52,480 --> 00:46:54,480 in Israel located out of Nazareth. 865 00:46:55,160 --> 00:46:57,840 And we just want to close our time and we just want to, we 866 00:46:57,840 --> 00:47:00,320 want to pray for them and we want to pray for the region. 867 00:47:01,040 --> 00:47:04,400 And we want to pray for peace. And so if you would allow us to 868 00:47:04,400 --> 00:47:08,240 do that, we would just encourage you to pray with us as we close 869 00:47:08,240 --> 00:47:09,960 our time. So Chris, would you get us 870 00:47:09,960 --> 00:47:11,560 started? Yeah, let's do that. 871 00:47:12,000 --> 00:47:15,400 Lord, thank you so much for the people that you love. 872 00:47:15,400 --> 00:47:19,120 And I want to just lift up people like Neria Samaria. 873 00:47:19,720 --> 00:47:25,640 I want to lift up Tarneem. Lord, I want to lift up Ziad and 874 00:47:25,640 --> 00:47:28,720 Rhonda. I want to lift up Bouchara and 875 00:47:28,720 --> 00:47:32,240 Rhonda. I want to lift up Tony, Lydia. 876 00:47:32,520 --> 00:47:38,600 There's so many names Iman, Lord Juliet who hosted the VBS, Lord 877 00:47:38,680 --> 00:47:42,680 Bouchara as he has been through so much recently. 878 00:47:43,160 --> 00:47:46,080 But God you are restoring him. But I just want to. 879 00:47:46,200 --> 00:47:49,760 I just want to thank you for Bedere and his wife, Rhonda, as 880 00:47:49,760 --> 00:47:52,680 they. Are helping lead an organization 881 00:47:52,680 --> 00:47:56,360 that is trying to support this church, these churches. 882 00:47:56,360 --> 00:48:00,520 I pray for Luna as she helps develop student leaders in that 883 00:48:00,520 --> 00:48:03,080 area. Lord, I want to pray for Fadi 884 00:48:03,120 --> 00:48:06,200 and just There's so many names that I could share. 885 00:48:06,200 --> 00:48:09,040 God, I just lift them up to you. Pray that you would encourage 886 00:48:09,040 --> 00:48:11,920 them in their faith, that you would draw them close to you, 887 00:48:12,040 --> 00:48:16,480 and that Lord this time would be a time where you restore to them 888 00:48:16,480 --> 00:48:21,600 the joy of your salvation. God, we do pray for safety for 889 00:48:21,600 --> 00:48:25,040 all of our friends, those that follow Jesus call the name of 890 00:48:25,080 --> 00:48:30,640 Jesus specifically that they would be salt and light, that 891 00:48:30,640 --> 00:48:34,160 you would shield them from any of the extremism and hatred 892 00:48:34,280 --> 00:48:37,600 especially amongst the young population that is so prevalent 893 00:48:37,600 --> 00:48:39,400 and the heightened tensions during war. 894 00:48:40,280 --> 00:48:43,760 God, we pray for for peace for the whole area, but we play pray 895 00:48:43,760 --> 00:48:48,880 specifically that our. Our friends, our, our brothers 896 00:48:48,880 --> 00:48:53,360 and sisters in Christ could be they could, they could be 897 00:48:53,360 --> 00:48:57,760 peacekeepers. That they would be effective 898 00:48:57,760 --> 00:49:01,560 witnesses to the peace that comes from Jesus. 899 00:49:02,120 --> 00:49:03,880 That you would allow them to love. 900 00:49:03,880 --> 00:49:05,440 You would allow them to spread hope. 901 00:49:05,680 --> 00:49:10,760 You would allow them just to be different in in a time of war. 902 00:49:11,720 --> 00:49:20,040 Father, we have never seen war. I'm just thankful that Lord my 903 00:49:20,240 --> 00:49:23,280 my children have never seen war and I can't imagine living 904 00:49:23,280 --> 00:49:28,200 through that. And so we ask that that it would 905 00:49:28,200 --> 00:49:31,160 come to an end and that there would be peace, there would be 906 00:49:31,160 --> 00:49:36,080 security for the entire region. That only through Jesus is this 907 00:49:36,600 --> 00:49:40,480 conflict that we have outlined in some really broad strokes is 908 00:49:40,480 --> 00:49:42,040 there going to be hope in a future. 909 00:49:43,320 --> 00:49:46,200 But I want to pray, as Bedere has asked us, to pray that the 910 00:49:46,200 --> 00:49:51,280 Son of Righteousness will rise with healing in its rays, and 911 00:49:51,280 --> 00:49:54,480 that the name of Jesus would be known and glorified throughout 912 00:49:54,480 --> 00:49:57,320 this entire region. Father, I echo these prayers. 913 00:49:58,160 --> 00:50:01,680 We do pray for peace. You tell us that blessed are the 914 00:50:01,680 --> 00:50:05,160 peacemakers, and I pray that in ways big and small, that we can 915 00:50:05,160 --> 00:50:08,880 be involved in that both here in Greenville and in other parts of 916 00:50:08,880 --> 00:50:12,040 the world. So pray for safety, for peace, 917 00:50:12,320 --> 00:50:16,800 and or your tender work in people's hearts, drawing them to 918 00:50:16,840 --> 00:50:21,040 to draw them to yourself and to give people hope and security as 919 00:50:21,040 --> 00:50:22,240 well. Amen. 920 00:50:23,040 --> 00:50:23,200 Amen.