Blessing Israeli Believers – April 2024

Passover ~ Resurrection Greetings!
Passover 2024 begins the evening of April 22

Dear BIB Friends and Partners,

This year Passover came weeks after the traditional Christian Resurrection celebration. However, we know that our risen Savior Yeshua is the Lamb of God and that He rose during the Passover Unleavened Bread Holiday on another Biblical Holiday called First-fruits. May we never forget that the Lamb’s blood has provided eternal life for any Jew or Gentile who will apply the blood of the Lamb to the doorpost of their hearts.

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! John 1:29

But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 1 Corinthians 15:20

Also, may we not forget how important this Passover is for Israel during this critical wartime. Truly, one of the best ways to bless Israel is to bless Israeli believers in Messiah Yeshua (Jesus) the Passover Lamb. Chag Pesach Sameach—Happy Passover Holiday!

Dov Schwarz

An interview with Pastor Oded Shoshani, King of Kings Jerusalem

I'm thankful and grateful for your long-term support in prayer and in deeds. As you know, we’re in the middle of war, a war that seems to be of no end, not in the near future.

I was a child when the six-day war started in June 1967. I was a teenager at the Yom Kippur War, which was October 1973 and now I'm a grandfather at this war. So I have some perspective, though this war is definitely very, very clearly a bad war for us.

When the war erupted, the army mobilized hundreds of thousands of Israelis into battle and lo and behold, we didn't have enough equipment for everybody, and a lot of donors from around the world,

a lot of them were Christians who love Israel, donated to clothing, donated all kinds of equipment that allowed many of the units to go into battle better equipped. So that’s on the physical level.

There's another aspect of it, of the spiritual level, and this one is a more profound one. On October 7th, I called the people of our congregation to prayer because, we knew something was going on. We knew something was going on in a big scale, but we didn't know how big and how bad it was.

We called the people for prayer and we spent an hour in prayer, and while we were praying, everybody was using their phones to find out more update information, by the time we finished an hour, we realized, this is serious stuff. I didn’t have to say anything, let's meet tomorrow morning. So we are meeting every morning, including the weekends for prayer. But as we prayed, slowly we could see better spiritually as we were praying. We first were praying for the army, for the forces, for the Messianic soldiers, for a lot of real needs.

But as we were praying, we realized we knew it was true. But this time it was like blinking signs saying, this is a spiritual warfare. What is at stake is not the people of Israel, but it’s the God of Israel. It's the name of the God of Israel, and Islam is challenging the glory and the power and the uniqueness of the God of Israel. Well as I said, the war caught the entire country unprepared. So a lot of our men were called in to the Army October 7th or October 8th, but a lot of them were called, most of them spent at least three months in active duty. Some of them were in combat units, some of them were in supporting units, but still not able to get on a leave, you know, to get some time with their families.

The wives were in dire straits. One wife, especially in particular, lived outside of Jerusalem and she had no car. She had no means for any transportation. We mobilized people voluntarily to deliver food. There were other families that getting food was okay, they could do online shopping.

But the mothers, especially the mothers, they had their hands full caring for their families alone in the midst of this war. So we actually used some of the funds donated by BIB to provide some childcare and house cleaning for these mothers so they can have a bit of breath in the midst of this tense situation.

So, summarizing what I’ve said, it’s not only that you are praying for the people of Israel, which is a good thing, it's a good thing to pray for the people of Israel. It is the final call of God on the world. The people of Israel are back in the land. But you also have to realize this is a challenge on the uniqueness of the God of Israel over the entire globe. So when you pray for Israel, when you support Israel, when you support the believers in the land of Israel, you're not just doing what the scripture tells you to do but you're also supporting God, the name of God and the reputation of the God of Israel, the uniqueness of the God of Israel, and the challenge that has been given all over the world, including the western world of who God really is.

We can talk about the United States and moral issues, we can talk about Europe, etc., but remember this, this is not just a physical support of the people of Israel. This is a spiritual support of the glory of the God of Israel.