May 18, 2011

It was a wake up at the crack of dawn, although, I think the sun rises earlier here, because there was already some light in the sky over Jericho when we arrived in the dining room for breakfast. The dining room is yellow and called the Lemon Grove, completely irrelevant information, but perhaps it will give you a glimpse into our lives over here in the Holy Land.

We arrived at World Vision Headquarters and received a presentation about their programs in the area. Then, our superhero of a bus driver Saleem wove our BIG bus around the tiny streets of this Palestinian city…we’re talking about a big bus on skinny roads filled with oncoming traffic, pedestrians, and a herd of goats and cows. He earned the applause we gave him.

After HQ fed and watered us and informed us on their many amazing programs in community development and sustainability we met with church leaders and municipal leaders in a Christian village. Throughout our journey we have been hearing about how Western Christians come to Israel and ask Palestinian Christians “When did you become a Christian?”. For evangelicals this is an important part of our stories and how we discuss our faith stories, but when we ask a Palestinian Christian “when did you become a Christian?” it comes off that we are assuming they were Muslim and then converted to Christian. For these Christian Palestinian’s, because of their LONG LONG history of Christianity in their families (some for centuries), it is offensive to have people come and assume they do not have this history. It is a simple misunderstanding due to language, and context, but it makes the Palestinian Christians feel forgotten.

After our discussion with the leaders we went around and visited some of their projects. The enthusiasm of the men, women and children involved was actually so contagious that Darlene got down on her hands and knees and tried to learn the skills the women were practicing…there are videos, if you contact her I’m sure she’ll send you a copy (tell her Katie said so). If not, Dwayne has a copy too.

We then went for lunch at one of the parks that World Vision helped the community builds and we partied with the locals. Translation: we enjoyed their hospitality, welcome, and enthusiasm. We were treated like celebrities, greeted by everyone, given seats of honour (I sat on the ground once, and like 10 women jumped up and screamed no and gave me a chair). There was singing and dancing and great food. In our orientation beforehand we asked “What can we do?” and we were told: “Come back, give us this smile, this hope”. I thought this was just a pithy saying, but actually there, visiting this community I saw that our presence actually brought smiles and hope. We were blessed by their generosity, and all we had to give them in return was our promise to them to not forget.

Read more about the Park we saw at this link:

http://meero.worldvision.org/news_article.php?newsID=2254&countryID=15

We have heard repeatedly “Please don’t forget us, tell others about us” as we have met with the Living Stones here in Israel. They do not want us to feel sorry for them, because that would be denying Jesus’ presence here with them. They do not want to perpetuate or support anti-Semitic beliefs, attitudes or behaviour because that denies the will of Jesus to love one another, and will never lead to reconciliation. They want to be remembered. They want Western Christians to pray for them, to acknowledge them. It is a simple request: Do not forget them.

In the evening (yeah it was a long one but a good one) we heard from Pastor Jack Sara of the Jerusalem Alliance Church. He is a significant leader in the Arab Israeli and Palestinian Christian movement among the Evangelicals. You can read about their ministry at the following site: http://www.each-cma.org/ministries/JAC.htm