Dear brothers and sisters,
Shalom and warmest greetings to you in the
Name of our Lord and Savior YESHUA the
Messiah. Thank you very much for all your
support by prayers and faithful financial
help. I pray that God will bless all of us
to continue partnership together. Thank you
very much for being co-laborers with Lord’s
ministry. May the God richly and abundantly
bless you as He promised in Genesis 12:3 and
in the Psalms 122:6.
On February
28, from sunset, we are going
to start to celebrate a great holiday –
Purim, (Fast of Esther will be on Tuesday,
February 27). I want to speak
about this holiday in a short way of how it
connects with the Messiah, with Israel and
all of us. The Purim did not command from
the Lord to celebrate as other necessary
Feasts (Lev.23). Purim is a more national
holiday. Book of Esther talks about this,
and constantly of this holiday was important
for the Messiahs coming, because on this
time G-D saved Jewish people from total
destruction. Purim received its name from
the Persian word Purr (the lot) whom Amman
threw away to find a date for the
destruction of Israel. If not The Lord,
Israel would not live. But “He who keeps
Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep”
(Psalms 121:4). The Lord himself has the
swearing of Amalek, his descendants and all
of the anti-Semites. “Because the Lord hath
sworn that the Lord will have war with
Amalek from generation to generation”
(Exodus17:16).
When Amman lifted his hand to Israel, he
lifted it against the God of Israel. We
understand, who used Amman. Devil wanted to
use him to destroy God’s people that the
Messiah would never come and God’s plan for
salvation would not happen. The Lord on his
almighty used a Jewish Girl to destroy
Amman. Her name was Ester (Hadassah). Ester
risked her life to enter before the king and
save her people. “My maidens and I will fast
likewise; and so will I go in unto the king
which is not according to the law: and if I
perish, I perish!” (Esther 4:16b) Here we
see the high spirit and her love to her
people. Powerful Amman was slain by the
girl, because who raises his hand to Israel
that it concerns the pupil of the eye of the
G-d himself. For thus says the Lord of
hosts: “After the glory hath he sent me unto
the nations which spoiled you: for he that
toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye”
(Zechariah 2:8). It is also a warning for
all people who hate Jews. This is the short
story of the Purim. It’s coming time when
antichrist's going to try exterminate all
Israel as a nation when God will judge his
own people -Israel, and will bring them by
his mercy to repent and salvation in Yeshua
our Savior! Pray for this glorious day on
the Earth!
In the last month God blessed us by His
grace to witness more than to 500 people. We
had outreaches in Cleveland, San Francisco,
Sacramento and Portland. As I mentioned in
my previous letters I am going to share
testimonies mainly from the last year which,
I believe, will bless and encourage you.
Minneapolis, MN is one of the strongest
cities in USA with LGBT community
leadership. It’s always heavy opposition
there when we preach Gospel. Last time we
were witnessing during homosexuals
celebrated Halloween, in October 2017. They
were wearing different costumes, but a lot
in witchcraft. It did not surprise me,
because Halloween itself is a satanic feast.
My goal was to remind all of them about Lord
Jesus who paid a price for all of us by
taking our sins and transgressions, and
about the hope we have in Christ who
forgives and commands to all people
repenting! But we saw only aggression, hate,
hearing bad words and seeing middle fingers.
Some of them were drunk, and tried to attack
us. But we proclaimed Kingdom of God, His
glory and grace. We also met other people
who accepted Christian literature and
Scriptures we were distributing. We have
videos about the outreach on our Youtube.
You could visit our channel and watch.
In Spokane, WA with a help from Slavic
church, we had a special project outreach of
homeless. We called the project
“under the bridge”, because a lot of
homeless have a special place sleeping under
the bridge in downtown Spokane. The church
prepared food and drinks, and more than 60
homeless people came. Sure, our target was
first of all to share Gospel. A lot of
homeless people accepted Scriptures and
brochures. We prayed and sang. We don’t need
to forget that good work and compassion are
also very important parts of Christianity.
Later, on the same day, we went with a youth
group, to witness in a veterans nursing
home. It was very blessed opportunity to
preach and pray for them.
One day, at very late, my son Rafael told me
that he is hungry and have a desire to order
pizza. It was late, and cold outside, but
the pizza store was not far away, and I
chose to drive there. While I was ordering
pizza I met a family, mother and son,
Palestinian Muslims. During time while we
were waiting our orders, we sat at a table
and had a very important Bible conversation.
I felt the Holy Spirit presence, and I knew
that I needed to be in the store at this
time to meet them. And the family accepted
at the end of the conversation Arabic New
Testament and other Christian literature in
Arabic language. It was blessings because
the store owner also was a Muslim and got
Arabic NT. I
am very happy returned home with a chicken
Pizza and thank Rafael that he was hungry
exactly on the right time to send me to the
store. God is good. Amen!!! Thank you very
much for your faithfulness and partnership,
prayers and support.
P.S. At the moment of my writing you this
letter, donations we received to support
Bethel ministry are much less that we need
for January 2018. Please continue to pray,
and if God leads you to start or continue
send your contributions to help Bethel
Messianic Congregation and Ministries,
please send it to P.O. Box 360165, Cleveland
Ohio 44136. We need solid prayers and
financial help. All donations are tax
deductible.
Happy Purim!
