Chairman's Update
from Dr. Theresa Newell
Shoresh Study Tours to Israel
Five of our CMJ USA Board members have led Shoresh study tours to Israel in the last few months. I teamed up with Bishop Neil and Mrs. Marcia Lebhar for a terrific tour June 14-26. The first tour to Israel that we had done together was in 1981!!
This inter-generational 2010 trip was extra special with lots of families and young people. It was hot so we drank gallons of water, wore our hats and ate lots of ice cream bars! All the time our Bibles were open and our feet moving over stones and dusty paths and up mountains and into cool swimming pools at our kibbutz guest house on the Sea of Galilee.
The Next Generation – we called them “Futures”
– enjoying a ride on a “Jesus Boat” on the Sea of Galilee
Biblical insight came through Bishop Neil and Marcia and our superb guide known to us in Hebrew as Kishkush – Hebrew for a “doodler” (she is a cartoonist as well as a Shoresh guide).
Pastor Bill Driscoll reading the Psalms of Ascent as we went up the original steps of the South Wall of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, just as pilgrims, including Jesus, did in His own day; Kishkush teaching about “Living Water” at the Spring of Dan in the far north of Israel; and Marcia Lebhar reading in that spot from John 7: 37: “If any man is thirsty, he may come to me and drink!”
How can I describe the awe of seeing and being in such places? And such wonderful fellowship? Even with two busloads of us and a hot hamsin wind that blew in for a few days while we were in the desert areas, we experienced God’s presence with us and the Holy Spirit binding us together in love.
CMJ is committed to making Jesus known in our churches and among His Jewish people. The Shoresh study tour program is only one instrument which makes this possible – but it is a very good one. “Never will the Bible be the same to me” so many said as we returned. Join us on one of our next Shoresh tours. You won’t be disappointed!
Here are some more of the smiling faces of our USA group in June:
“The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD turn his face toward you and give you peace.”
The Aaronic blessing from Numbers 6: 24-26
Theresa