My dear readers,
1. Global “Hot Spot” simmering
In 1948 the Jewish people, for twenty centuries “a people without a land” resurrected, phoenix-like, in the “land without a people” to become Modern Israel. Since then it has been the focal point of Middle East tension and conflict, surviving five eruptions of an ongoing plan by the Arab powers to destroy Israel as a national identity.
Israel’s main supporter and guarantor of survival has been the USA which pours in billions of dollars each year and stands by the beleaguered nation in security matters. Forty years ago, Israel amply demonstrated her ability and will to fend for herself and more than survive by the short and sharp “Six Day War.” But that has not removed the underlying and undying Arab determination that Israel must be wiped off the map before peace can come to the Middle East. The euphoria of 1967 is far from a surety for Israel’s future security as the correspondent of the Herald Tribune reports.
2. “Euphoria of 1967 replaced by anxiety”
This article by Steven Erlanger (Herald Tribune 11 June 2007) caught my eye, in flight to Kuala Lumpur for Calvary Jurong’s Family Bible Camp.
“JERUSALEM: In the months before the Six-Day War in 1967, Israel was in a spiral of self-doubt, the 19-year experiment of an independent Jewish state looking shaky.
There were existential worries about destruction by Arab armies, fierce denunciations of the political leadership and deep anxiety about a sinking economy.
Forty years later, Israel is rich and its army is one of the best in the world, yet the public mood is oddly similar. There is a quiet panic about a potentially nuclear Iran, condemnations of the leadership as weak, indecisive and corrupt, and deep concerns about there being “two Israels” – religious versus secular, settler versus beachgoer, Jerusalem versus Tel Aviv, Jews versus Arab.
Of course, Israel is no stranger to anxiety or complaint. A small nation built on the ashes of the Holocaust, many of its citizens are ready to fear the worst.
But as Israel marks 40 years after an extraordinary victory, there is far less exultation than questioning about the war’s impact on the country and grave doubt about the future. There is a debate about what kind of country Israel is, and about the impact those 40 years of development, immigration, war, settlement and occupation have had on the dreams of those who chose to make their lives here. And there is a wide-spread feeling that both the left and the right are out of answers.
The left says that Israel must reach out to the majority of Palestinians who want a two-state solution and that the right is too despairing about the possibility of reaching peace.
The right, which remains somewhat more popular, believes that the left was seduced by the dream of normality in the 1990s, after the Oslo accord with the Palestinians, and that the siren song of peace and coexistence is softening the Israeli character.
Israel, the right says, will never be like other countries – both because of Jewish history and because the neighbourhood is getting more threatening, not less, with radical Islam and an Iran with nuclear ambitions. Israelis, conservatives say, cannot sit around Tel Aviv cafes and let their children avoid serious military service.
“What everyone feels, no matter their politics or their understanding of the 1967 war, is a deep disappointment in themselves,” said Yossi Klein Halevi, an Israeli writer and analyst on the center right. “As a people, we haven’t carried on this story with the gravitas it deserves. We’ve been flippant. There’s a sense that all of us have abrogated responsibility for the Jewish story.” (End of Article)
3. “Our fellow workers”
Our Sunday morning congregation has grown in numbers, by God’s grace. The Apostle Paul, God’s “master builder” says to us all, “I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour. For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building” (1 Cor 3:6-9 ).
Challenge to readers: How many among our thousand-strong morning congregation are “labourers together with God?” You ask, “How can I be one?” Answer: By more fervency in the Sunset Gospel Bible Fellowship (SGBF) and Tuesday night Prayer Meeting. When you are heart and soul serving the Lord “fervent in spirit” you become a labourer together with God. God bless the hundred-odd who swelled last Sunday’s night SGBF Service. May the Spirit move more to be faithful. Will you come tonight?
Missions Night Tuesday 26 June is your rare opportunity to hear of God’s mighty acts in Saipan, Guam, China, Cambodia, Jordan and Cyprus. Pastor Pang Kok Hiong will tell of God’s Spirit moving in these global mission fields, showing VIDEO CLIPS of the latest happenings. The Lord of the harvest reminds us: “The harvest is plenteous and white. Pray ye the Lord to send labourers into His harvest.” God bless all readers.
Lovingly in the Lord
Dr SH Tow, Senior Pastor
At SGBF, we shall be singing God-honouring hymns by Martin Luther, Isaac Watts, Horatio Spafford, Henry Lyte, Joseph Scriven & other hymn writers. We invite you to join us.
You will Be Refreshed!
Whenever King Saul was depressed, under the oppression of the evil spirit, David took his harp and played with his hand; the evil spirit departed and Saul was instantly refreshed.
Martin Luther not only gave his people God’s Word, but also taught them the love of godly music. Luther explained that the devil, the author of worries and distressing thoughts, flees at the singing of godly hymns, even as he flees at the preaching of God’s Word.
At SGBF, tonight and weekly for the next 12 weeks, we shall sing Godly hymns, and hear the preaching of God’s holy Word. THIS WILL DRIVE AWAY YOUR SADNESS AND WORRIES.
WHY BEAR YOUR BURDENS ALONE? COME! JOIN WITH GOD’S PEOPLE TO SING THE SONGS OF HEAVEN AND YOU WILL BE REFRESHED!