“…whoever
touches you touches the apple of His eye.” (Zechariah 2:8)
You may want to ignore this topic, and I'll admit this isn't well written and alot is borrowed material due to my time constraints...but please take a deep breath and dive in. At the end is some good, encouraging stuff, I promise.
Once upon a time...not so long ago- an evil man and his minions murdered and robbed millions of people. Jews. Not only jews either- and it wasn't only Hitler's military men and women who slaughtered these people, no it was also your every day Joe...because of ignorance, anti-semetism in the church which is still alive today, and peer pressure, the every day people of the time in some places murdered their neighbors and stole their things. It was a sick time. The rest of the world turned a blind eye. Sound familiar? It should. Or maybe you don't know your history, or your current events for that matter.
The Nazis did horrible experiments on people. Tortured them, gassed them, operated on them while awake! They had everything stipped from them- family, dignity and material wealth. They were forced to slave labor, starved, and if you think this kind of criminal behavior can't happen again- rethink! How did most of the world ignore this??!!
Their hair was shaved and sold in large shipments. Disgusting. Little grandmothers, used to dignified treatment forced to be stripped naked in public and watch as their daughters and granddaughters were raped.
Please read on. I have taken great liberties with the material below from the Messianic Bible newsletter. http://messianicbible.com/index.htm)( I just don't have the time to write my own words with all the people I'm caring for in my home right now. But I feel SO strongly about this I needed to share a bit. DON'T FORGET!
Today Israeli Jews and Arabs alike
will stand still for a moment of silence.
It’s a silence which, without even
a word, speaks of the unspeakable.
Under the direction of Adolph Hitler, German Nazis tortured and murdered
Jewish
men, women and children – called the
apple of God’s eye, God’s own ‘segulah’
(special
treasure).
“For you are a people holy to the Lord your
God. The Lord your God has chosen
you out of all the peoples on the face of
the earth to be His people, His
treasured possession [segulah].”
(Deuteronomy 7:6)
The Nazis also murdered many other
people who they considered inferior to the
‘Aryan race.’ Such as anyone, blind, deaf, physically or mentally impaired in any way...
There were, however, a few brave souls
with the courage to risk their lives in
order to help Yeshua’s (Jesus’)
brethren in their time of desperate trouble.
They believed Yeshua meant it when He said, “He who tries to save his life will
lose it, and he
who loses his life for My sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:39)
The Ten Boom family, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and others like them, gave
their
lives to be ‘set apart’ from the group.
Set apart is actually the meaning of
the Hebrew word for holy
(kadosh).
Irena Sendler, a Catholic
social worker who was also
a member of the Polish resistance, smuggled
2,500
Jewish children out of the Warsaw Ghetto with the
help of the
resistance. She provided them with false
identity documents and with housing
outside the Ghetto.
For this, the Nazis tortured her and sentenced her
to
death. Nevertheless, she did survive the war.
These righteous Gentiles, and others like them,
dared to stand with the
Jewish people in the Holocaust and to resist
the evil forces that were trying
to destroy them.
Their names are honored at Yad Vashem
(Holocaust Memorial Museum
in Jerusalem).
~_______________~
Warsaw Ghetto
Uprising
This day was chosen to commemorate the Holocaust because it is the
anniversary
of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
On April 19, 1943, the Germans entered the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland to
deport
the surviving Jews to the death camp called Treblinka.
A year earlier, in 1942, 300,000 Jewish men, women and children had
been
rounded up by the Nazis and deported to the death camp.
In January 1943, however, Warsaw ghetto fighters resisted another attempt
to
round up more Jews for slaughter. After that they prepared for future
resistance.
On the morning of April 19, when 2,000
well trained, heavily armed German
troops entered the Ghetto with tanks and
flamethrowers to carry out the
final deportation.
However, 750 resistance fighters armed with nothing more than
Molotov
cocktails, 17 rifles, and a handful of pistols fought for the lives
of everyone
in the Ghetto.
Warsaw Ghetto burning: Captured
Jews in
the Warsaw Ghetto are led by
German soldiers to
deportation. The
woman on the left
at the head of the
column is holding onto the right arm of
her mother-in-law, and
her child is in
tow. The child's father can be
seen to the
girl's left.
Of the four, only he
survived the war.
The Germans were forced to
withdraw and returned with ever increasing
firepower. They were,
nevertheless, unsuccessful.
Several days later, the German
commander, General Jürgen Stroop, gave the order
to burn the ghetto to the
ground building by building.
Warsaw’s brave resistance fighters
held out for 27 days against this
overwhelming force.
On May 16, Stroop announced that the “the Jewish quarter of Warsaw no
longer
exists. (Jewish Virtual Library)”
We want to believe that such events are past and can never happen
again.
Shockingly, today Israel and
the Jewish People still face Muslim Arab enemies
that would like to deport
and annihilate them. Sadly, there are Christians
who support this
ungodly agenda.
~_____~
Are the Jewish People Lost and Cursed
by God?
Today, there are Christians who
believe in Replacement Theology, a errant idea
that the
Church has replaced Israel, and that the Jews are now cursed by God.
Some people think that the Jewish People deserved what happened to
them during
the Holocaust, and that the Holocaust is evidence of God’s
judgment of their
stiff-necked, sinful ways.
The Word of God is very clear that God
has a plan for Israel, and that He isn't
finished with the
Jews:
"I ask then:
Did God reject his people? By no means! I am an
Israelite
myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. God
did not
reject his people, whom he foreknew.... Again I ask: Did
they stumble so
as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all!"
(Romans 11:1-2, 11)
"I do not want you
to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers and sisters, so
that you may not be
conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part
until the full number
of the Gentiles has come in, and in this way all
Israel will be
saved." (Romans 11: 25-26)
~______________________~
How do I know that the Lord hasn't forgotten His people, Israel? Because of who He is. Please don't be ignorant of history, and don't be ignorant of what the Bible says. Study to show yourself approved. (that's in the Bible *U*)
Hebrew has a word for life-long love that is richer and deeper than English has
ever conceived of—hesed (HEH-sed). Based in a covenantal relationship,
hesed is a steadfast, rock-solid faithfulness that endures to
eternity:
“Though the
mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love
(hesed) for you will not be shaken” Isaiah 54:10.
Hesed is a love that is so enduring that
it persists beyond any sin or betrayal to mend brokenness and graciously extend
forgiveness:
“No one is cast off by the Lord forever. Though he
brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love
(hesed).” (Lamentations 3:31-32)
Hesed is to love as God loves. When God’s
presence passed by Moses on Mt. Sinai and revealed his very essence, God
proclaimed his great hesed. (Exodus 34:6) Biblical scholar John Oswalt
describes it this way:
The word hesed…[is] the descriptor par
excellence of God in the Old Testament. The word speaks of a completely
undeserved kindness and generosity done by a person who is in a position of
power. This was the Israelites’ experience of God. He revealed himself to them
when they were not looking for him, and he kept his covenant with them long
after their persistent breaking of it had destroyed any reason for his continued
keeping of it. …Unlike humans, this deity was not fickle, undependable,
self-serving, and grasping. Instead he was faithful, true, upright, and
generous—always.(1)
Like other Hebrew words,
hesed is not just a feeling but an action. It intervenes on behalf of
loved ones and comes to their rescue. After Abraham’s servant miraculously found
a wife for Isaac by bumping into her at a well, he praised God “who has not
abandoned his kindness (hesed) and faithfulness to my master” (Genesis
24:27). Because hesed is often active, it’s translated as “mercy” or
“loving-kindness,” but neither of these words fully convey that hesed
acts out of unswerving loyalty even to the most undeserving.
