The Porch and the Altar

In the middle of the night I woke up with an insight of how we all can relate to the city of In the middle of the night I woke up with an insight of how we all can relate to the city of Jerusalem. I

shared this morning on the bus. I started off by asking Shany how often Jerusalem has been destroyed. She said 43 times. That is a lot. I looked back over our group and said, “I was thinking about the men and women on this trip. Some of you, I know your stories. I know that many you have been at times completely and utterly destroyed and yet they you have been rebuilt. Many times you have to bulldoze the destruction and rebuild on the rubble.” I also thought of the many times Jerusalem has been owned by someone other than Israel. And looked out over our precious pilgrims, there have been times that you have been enemy-occupied territory by things that are in control of your life that are not God. That is not you. These outside sources that seem to take over your life. As we are speaking of Jerusalem, we have so much on common when we can look upon those things.”

Pastor Jerry came up and asked if anyone had a prayer for our morning. Pastor Kim immediately raised his hand. He began to pray, “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord and He

delights in his way. Lord, we know that you have numbered our steps today. We know that you have ordered our steps today. May we get to all that is on Your heart.”

Pastor Josephine spoke up next and began to praise the Lord: “Look at you, Jesus! Look at you! Look at what You have done in getting us here. How many have been invited to Your house, but didn’t come? Yet, look! Here we are! I believe I am walking in a dream come true. We have been drawn by You to be here.”

Molly came up to the front and ask us to join her in a prayer of worship: “Revelation Song”

“Holy, holy, holy

is the Lord God Almighty,

who was and is and is to come.

Filled with wonder awestruck wonder

At the mention of Your name.

Jesus, Your name is power.

Breath and living water

Such a marvelous mystery”

We proceeded through the Old City by way of the Dung Gate (the one right beside the Western Wall). We went into the Archaelogical Park there. Shany pulled us aside and began to share with an overview of history of this city inreference to some familiar Bible characters. She beautifully wove a birds eye view of the comings and goings of this city. First she introduced us to Avram (Abram) of a region that is now most likely modern day Iraq. Avram of Iraq.She asked us what did Avram do when God told him to pack up his family and move this direction? Everyone was like, “he went!” She responded, “No! He ran away!” We all laughed. Then she unloaded on us, “The problem with having a calling, is that the calling will find you.” It will hunt you down. It will come to find you. James leaned over to me and said, “Make sure to write THAT down.”

Shany continued. A couple of years later after Avram was able to move his family and settle near hear. God asked him to this mountatin to sacrifice Isaac. What did Avram do? He obeyed. Because his heart had been trained to follow the voice of God. To obey. (Praise the Lord!)

Avram did not run this time and when he didn’t, his name was changed to Avraham (Abraham). She said, “It is not just a calling anymore.” When God is obeyed it changes your identity.

She continued, Jacob had four wives and twelve sons they moved from this land to Egypt because of drought and famine in the land. They leave Jerusalem and the land of Father Abraham. They got to Egypt and start off working as farmers, but over the course of 400 years, as their numbers increase, they are slowly shifted to workers and then to slaves. But a man named, Moses, hears a voice calling to set the people free and return to the land of their Fathers. What does Moses do? Yep. He runs! She said, you can run, but the voice was still calling Him to something more.

On Mt Sinai, God gave to Moses the Torah and guidelines for how these people were to become a nation. They then spent 38 years in the wilderness learning the lesson of Abraham and Moses: to obey God.

Joshua leads them into the Promised Land. The people needed to conquer this land, Once installed,

they needed to learn how to work as a people, a nation. They used judges, prophets and kings. This was the pathway in becoming a people, but at some point they decided they needed a king. King Saul became king due to the peoples request, but he wasn’t necessarily the people’s favorite. King David came along. He returns to this mountain. He enters the Jebus city. He called it  Jerusalem. They left here as a family and returned as a nation. Joshua brings them back to the Promise Land but it is King David that reclaims the city. We then talked about the fact that David wasn’t worried about his own palace, he longed to build God’s house on this holy mountain- The Temple. He has a great desire, but him being a warrior. He cannot build it because of the blood on his hands. So Solomon builds it. It united the tribes into one kingdom

The history of this city is in the rocks and we have to dig down to find information and insights into the layers of the city and of her history. So that is what we did. We descended under ground to look at Jerusalem’s foundation.

We went into the underneath museum area. We watched the movie of what it might have been like to come to the temple in the days of the Second Temple. There are parts of the movie that always resonate with me. It is a story about a simple man from Galilee that comes to make a sacrifice at the Temple. He has never seen so many people. He is overwhelmed that this is his nation, his people, his God. They do a great job of capturing the nervous electric wonder that this house of God had to have inspired. He purchases a lamb and goes through the mikvah (ritual cleansing). And then makes his way to the temple. Beautiful.

Pastor Thomas began to share with us: “It all happened here. It was on his heart that we go through all of the things that happened just outside of the temple. (We will get to that in a minute) but it all happened here.

In the days leading up to the Lord was talking to him about the why these specific dates were chosen for this trip. 3.17.17. At some point, he was drawn to what was happening here 100 years ago. He got to 1917. This was the year of the Balfur Proclamation. The British were in power in this region. The Balfur Proclamtion basically stated that the Jewish people had a right to establish a national home here in Israel. This became a vital order in matter of years as the Israelis fought  for independence. And even the vote of the United Nations for the establishment of the State of Israel referred to this proclamation. God worked providentially.

Fast forward, 50 years, 1967. The Yom Kippur war. Even though Israel, had reclaimed the nation it had yet to reclaim Jerusalem. It was 50 years ago that the Jewish people were able to come to the Western Wall (of where the Temple once stood.) There is an amazing recording of these first moments and you hear the electricity and beauty of the moment.

I find it fascinating here that Shany walked us throught the ancient commings and goings of the children of Israel and this city and here Pastor Thomas continued of when Jerusalem was reclaimed by the Jewish people in 1967.

Add 50 more years and here we are in 2017. We stand here at a new hour. Many believe that there is a possibility of Jerusalem becoming the capital of Israel. It has been Tel Aviv. There are no embassies in Jerusalem, but there is a move to potentially make the U.S. Consulate the new U.S. Embassy. Moving it from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Many believe that this would basically be the U.S. casting their vote for Jerusalem to be the capital of Israel. We are standing here at a decisive hour.

Israel has a right to exist and we add our prayers to this reality. Pastor Thomas began to share on 2 Chronicles 7:15-16

“Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to prayer made in this place. For now I have chosen and sanctified this house, that My name may be there forever; and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually.”

We come when we are supposed to, we do not just decided to come when we want to.

Pastor Jerry gets up to share and explains that God has been cultivating this word in his heart for us. He said that Pastor Aaron Simms had referred to this scripture and Pastor Jerry said God began to open it up for him in a new way. He felt drawn to share that. It caught in his heart.

Joel 2: 15-17

Blow the trumpet in Zion,

Consecrate a fast,

Call a sacred assembly;

Gather the people,

Sanctify the congregation,

Assemble the elders,

Gather the children and nursing babes;

(Pastor Jerry: If the nursing babies are included, that means no one is left without excuse. Everyone must come. God wanted everyone included)

Let the bridegroom go out from his chamber,

And the bride from her dressing room.

Let the priests, who minister to the Lord,

Weep between the porch and the altar;

Let them say, “Spare Your people, O Lord,

And do not give Your heritage to reproach,

That the nations should rule over them.

Why should they say among the peoples,

‘Where is their God?’”

Pastor Jerry brought our attention back to this phrase of “weep between the porch and the altar.”

Here above us would have been Solomon’s Porch. The altar just beyond that.. I cannot think of a better place to have this conversation of standing between the porch and the altar. This day He is calling for weeping from us between the porch and the altar.

The porch represents the people. The nations. Anyone could come and go on the porches, but the altar… it represents God. And somewhere in between, the people and God is where He is wanting us. He is wanting those to intervene. You do not weep casually. It lets you know something is serious, when people weep.

Ezekiel says that God sought for a one who would intercede, intervene. When God does the searching, it goes way beyond Google. He is looking for someone to stand in the gap. Ezekiel says God is looking for someone to stand in the gap BEFORE Him. And it says, He found no one. If you are trying to answer the call to pray and to intervene it is a rare thing in this world. Many people, this is not their focus. Intercession is not their focus. Standing in the gap.

We do not come just for adventure, sightseeing or education. Those are all wonderful things. I am  not trying to be superior in this, there are places for all of those things. We are coming to stand in the gap.

As we were listening to him, there was a nice little incident of Israeli traffic jam behind Pastor Jerry. Israeli drivers love to lay on the horn. Pastor Jerry is trying to continue but the horns are winning. Brent spoke up from  the back, “Blow a trumpet in Zion!” We laughed.

Pastor Jerry continued. We are here on a serious assignment. If you feel you cannot take another step then, that itself is apart of the assignment. It is not jet lag, it is the assignment.

If you are weary, it is the assignment of what we are under. There is room for rejoicing. We cannot allow ourselves excuses in this. We need to carry out the assignment. We need to have a willingness to weep and intervene when the time comes.

Pastor Jerry said he has been doing a study on the history of anti-semeitism (hositility against Jewish people). He asked Shany earlier, if there was a count of how many times people throughout history have decided they would do away with the Jewish people completely. She responded, “There are too many to count.” Why is this? The simple principle: that which God loves, people hate. God loves the people of Israel, this world is going to hate them for it.

Pastor Jerry shared with us that the holiday of Purim had just ended. It celebrates what Queen Esther and how she saved the Jewish people. It is the first time anyone stood in the gap for the Jewish people as a nation from being wiped out. She was the first to stand between the porch and the altar. For such a time as this.

When the Jewish people review the story of Esther, whenever the name of Haman is said, people yell and make noises because they do not even want to hear his name.

Pastor Jerry said, “do not waste your time getting between people and the devil. Do not try to get between. You need to get between the people and God. Esther did not get between Haman (the devil) and the people. She did not try to deal with him. She went to the King and he took care of it. We need to be going to the king to take care of these things. God will take care of those who have a heart to destroy. He will avenge.

Life changing words can come from here. It is an important date and time.

We then shifted to the pinnacle of the Temple. I walked alone with Shany to the next spot. She shared with me, “Usually, I am not emotional with groups, but you guys just get to me! I am not joking about that.” I was kind of blown away that she was being so forthright. (I talked to Dale later and said he noticed her tearing up as Pastor Jerry was sharing about standing between the porch and the altar and how Queen Esther did this. Pastor Jerry’s love for Israel and the Jewish people was very stirring.)

I shared with Shany that the man of God, Rev. Loran Helm, that got us to Israel... our rabbi (she said that is a good description). He instilled in us a love for Israel and the Jewish people. I told her that my dad and Pastor Jerry learned this from him, and they trained us: my sister Mari, Molly and Taylor in loving Israel from a very young age. We teach the children of our churches about it. I shared with her about Pastor Aaron and the children of Parker City Christ Fellowship that brought the best gift they could offer at Christmas to give as an offering. And that that offering was given to be able to send to the needs of the children in Israel.  He is carrying their offering with him. Shany said, “oh wow. I feel

that.”

We went to the area of the pinnacle of the Temple. This is an amazing place to me. It is as if the corners of the pages of history fold in and meet together.

The pinnacle of the temple was the highest corner of the building. There is an inscription in the stone that was at the top that said: "to the place of trumpeting". It was an amazing deiscovery when they did the excavating here. Because it was the first stone that was toppled. And it was the last stone they found. They would blow the shofar from this point to announce holidays and when the sacrifice for Passover had been made.

This was also the place where the devil brought Jesus in his attempt at temptation:

Matthew 4:5-7

Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written:

‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ and,

‘In their hands they shall bear you up,

Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ ”

Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’ ”

I always found Jesus’s answer a little perplexing. What was the temptation here?

Many times over the years God will have waking words for me (like what started today of us being like the city of Jerusalem. Torn down and rebuilt), but a month before our last trip there was a phrase awaiting me as I woke up that was so specific it needed to be examined. I saw the words before me “Josephus wishes to pay his respects to James in Jerusalem.” What? … Where did that come from? So I did, what we do now: I googled Josephus, James, and Jerusalem. The third listing said this: “Josephus’s account of the death of James in Jerusalem.” Now it was getting wild.

James the Just was the borhter of Jesus. He was the first bishop of Jerusalem. While the apostles went forth, he stayed and oversaw the Christians in  Jerusalem. He was respected by all the seven sects of Judaism at that time including the Pharisees and Sadducees. They were very concerned with this growing church problem. They wanted it dealt with once and for all and thought they had an idea. They asked James to speak from the pinnacle of the Temple. The following is an exerpt from the website I found:

“They brought him to the top of the temple, and they shouted to him from below:

"Oh, righteous one, in whom we are able to place great confidence; the people are led astray after Jesus, the crucified one. So declare to us, what is this way, Jesus?"

Obviously, this wasn't a very wise thing for them to do. James was ready to take full advantage of such a wonderful opportunity as this!

His words are memorable:

Why do you ask me about Jesus, the Son of Man? He sits in heaven at the right hand of the great Power, and he will soon come on the clouds of heaven!

The Pharisees were horrified, but the people were not. The began shouting, "Hosanna to the Son of David!"

The Pharisees, realizing the awful mistake they'd made, began crying out, "Oh! Oh! The righteous one is also in error!"

You can probably guess that this had little effect on the crowd. So the next obvious thing to do was to push him down from the temple, letting the people know exactly what happens to those who dare to believe in Jesus.

They climbed the temple as the people shouted, reached the top, and threw James from the pinnacle of the temple.

It didn't kill him.

He rose to his knees and began to pray for them. "I beg of you, Lord God our Father, forgive them! They do not know what they are doing."

T

his would not do! The Pharisees on the ground began to stone him as he prayed, while those from the roof rushed down to join the execution.

One of the priests, however, a son of the Rechabites mentioned by Jeremiah the prophet (ch. 35), shouted, "Stop! What are you doing! The righteous one is praying for you."

It was too late. A fuller (i.e., launderer) took out one of the clubs that he used to beat clothes and smashed James on the head, killing him with one blow.”

This happened during the time gap between one Roman governor and another. It was considered as one of the reasons Rome destroyed the temple and the Diaspora began. The diaspora was when the Jewish people were split up and take to foreign lands. It was a method of Rome to divide and conquer. They scattered the people all across the Roman Empire so they could not form as a nation. Here was this theme again. Because for 2000 years there wasn’t a Jewish homeland until the establishment of Israel and there wasn’t a Jewish Jerusalem till 1967.

So back to Jesus and the temptation. I believe that God is the same yesterday today and forever. I believe that when the enemy took him up there, he very well could have seen his own brother fall. He could have seen the pinnacle, the temple, the house of His father fall. This was the temptation. Spare your brother. Protect your Father’s house. Protect the people of Israel from being scattered.

“If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written:

‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ and,

‘In their hands they shall bear you up,

Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ ”

Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’ ”

The angels did bear James up. Taylor pointed out to me a year ir so ago that this is the James that wrote the book of James. His words are all the more profound when we hear his story:

James 1:2-5

My brethren, count it all joy when you FALL into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

James ‪1:12-18

Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. …

Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.

Pastor Aaron read the scriptures from Mark. It also happened right here. Just like James the Just igniting Rome to act. Right here Jesus, provoked the Pharisees to start plotting his crucifixion:

Mark ‪11:15-19

Jesus Cleanses the Temple

So they came to Jerusalem. Then Jesus went into the temple and began to drive out those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. And He would not allow anyone to carry wares through the temple. Then He taught, saying to them, “Is it not written, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’ ”

And the scribes and chief priests heard it and sought how they might destroy Him; for they feared Him, because all the people were astonished at His teaching. When evening had come, He went out of the city.

We went up to a new section of the western Wall where men and women are allowed to pray together and we prayed over your prayer requests. Pastor Fleming read another set of scriptures that happened in this place, but she also testified of it. The following video is beautiful:

Shany shared with the whole group what she had shared with me of how much she was enjoying her time with our group. And no she doesn’t say that with every group. I think she gets us and I love that.

We then took your prayers to the Western Wall and had an anointed time of private prayer.

We had lunch in the Jewish Quarter and then a visit with Rabbi Moshe which is always most enlightening. (I am hoping to get the video up soon.)

We then went to the Israel Museum to see the model of the city and the Dead Sea Scrolls. It was on Pastor Thomas and Pastor Jerry’s heart that we pray for the Knesset which is basically Israel’s Congress. We have a spectacular view of the Knesset from roof of the building that houses the Dead Sea scrolls. We took time for prayer. I hope the power of this moment comes across in the video. (ran out of upload power... I'll add the video later)

Shany later thanked us as a representative of an Israeli citizen for our prayers. It was a powerful moment.

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Well breakfast awaits! And so does the bus! And so does the City of David!

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