Tish’a b’av 2012’
Dearest sisters and brothers,
I do greet you with love and pray that this will be an encouragement to some to pray. To me, the greatest blessing that I can receive is something that truly spurs me to prayer…real prayer…or a correction that enlightens my eyes so that a blockage between The Lord and I might be removed…and I can pray. Perhaps some of you are the same?
Tisha b’av, or the 9th day of the month of av on the Hebrew calendar, is quickly approaching and it’s signs are seen as religious and many non religious are reading psalms and scriptures of repentance on the bus and train.. Sunday is the fast day but my chances of writing will be very slim, so I want to drop you a short note now. I know that I have written a great deal about this day…the day that ‘remembers’ so many of God’s judgments upon the Jewish people…but it bares noting since we are, again, as a people, committing so many of these same sins; will you pray for us and our blinded (by God) eyes? Will you pray for our traditionally strong wills (or perhaps stiff necks??) not to mention our rebellion and unbelief? Will you pray for the breaking down of the false religious spirit that can so easily masquerade for godliness? Like ALL generalizations, this is NOT true of every one, and this prayer request is NOT meant to be ‘finger pointing’ or judgmental in any way, but God’s Word is so clear in calling us to Himself and into walking in His Truth and separating the Holy from the profane and the flesh from the Spirit…and we KNOW that coming to Him in His Light is the only way.
Tisha’b’av commemorates, most of all, the destruction of, not only the FIRST, but the SECOND temple in Jerusalem and the expulsion of the Jews into exile. “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept when we remembered Zion. We hug our harps upon the willows in the midst of it. For there those who carried us away captive asked of us a song. And those who plundered us requested mirth, saying ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’…” (Psalm 137) Daniel (to whom it was given to recognize the times), Esther, Nehemiah, Ezra, Zechariah, Jeremiah himself, who’s account is so vivid and whose grief is recorded along with his HOPE in Lamentations. Lamentations is the main book that is read and prayed through during the fast. Many also read Job, as well as MANY other scriptures. This morning as my bus passed the yet-shuttered shops, I saw that scripture was spray painted (in Hebrew) on one “I have loved you with an everlasting love…YET…” the bus passed too quickly to see WHICH of the ‘pleading’ scriptures it was, but it was one calling us as a people to return (most likely from Isaiah…I will try to see tomorrow). Traditionally, the sin of ‘brother against brother’ has been named as the thing that The Lord has hated the most in our people, and truly it is alive and thriving today with secular against religious, division among rich and poor, political opinions flying…it is grievous. There has been a rash…epidemic really…of suicides and attempted suicides since the death of Moshe Selman, the man who burned himself to death at the ‘social protest rally’ expressing the deep frustration with so many over prices spiraling out of control and the inability to pay for the barest necessities although we work as hard as we can, while luxury apartments are being grabbed up with no shame by the rich. Indeed today a new 1% rise in general sales tax was announced. It was ‘justified’ by the announcement that a 2% tax was levied on those earning more then 100,000 shekels PER MONTH! (equal to 400,000 USD/month). I don’t need to continue…we are seeing a rise in anger…a rise in crime and hopelessness…
GOD is our ONLY answer, but He always HAS been our ONLY answer.
The longer that I live here the scriptures speak so clearly that I can not believe how blind I was concerning the connection between ALL of the promises, the Jews, the land,…THE TEMPLE. I know that MANY MANY anticipate the building of the third temple in Jerusalem, but I have come to firmly believe that the third Temple IS being built and IS here now! “…for YOU are the temple of The Living God…” 2 Corin 6:16 that the Third Temple is truly HIS temple, His body being built up here for His glory…and surely this temple requires no less for Him to inhabit it then did the first and second, so perhaps you would also pray for the body here as you pray for the people. I am so sorry that I am simply pulling these scriptures off ‘the top of my head’ as my Grandson is here…talking much as I type…but I have written more completely over the years.
There is so much written…if you wish more information you can google tisha b av for basic information and I can send anyone who wishes old emails of mine.
Please keep in mind that this day is considered a DANGEROUS day by our people and a day in which our enemy seems to have had the upper hand if God were standing to judge. Below is a VERY short list of historical events noted by our people on this date.
I must close to RUN and make dinner. God be with each one of you to bless with more of Himself for His glory! Lovingly, your sis
PARTIAL LIST FROM RANDOM INTERNET SITE:
1. The sin of the spies caused God to decree that the Children of Israel who left Egypt would not be permitted to enter the land of Israel;
2. The first Temple was destroyed;
3. The second Temple was destroyed;
4. Betar, the last fortress to hold out against the Romans during the Bar Kochba revolt in the year 135, fell, sealing the fate of the Jewish people.
5. One year after the fall of Betar, the Temple area was plowed.
6. In 1492, King Ferdinand of Spain issued the expulsion decree, setting Tisha B’Av as the final date by which not a single Jew would be allowed to walk on Spanish soil.
7. World War I – which began the downward slide to the Holocaust – began on Tisha B’av.
ani b’derek
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