Christpolis

Hi Everyone!!!

…I don’t know how to start - since You got the last mail a lot of things happened, and if I should tell all the stories that happened I couldn’t finish the next two weeks… - and I think You don’t like to read ten thousands of pages - so I will keep this mail short - maybe only ten pages, o.k.? )

…o.k.. let’s start two weeks ago…

While travelling from palmyra to Hama we passed huge desert areas full of military actions.
the syrian army practiced, and we saw lots of soldiers, tanks, airports and rocket bases. Drones (that are automatically flying jet fighters without pilots) started only several 100 metres away into the sky…
Evening came, and the night began and we could see the lightnings of the rockets and the grenades in the sky.
we knew against which enemy these technics of war were practiced…

On the road drove trucks carrying mobile rocket starter bases with direction to lebanon. We wondered if they were only on the road because of the army manoeuvre, or if their destination were Hisbollah - Bases in Lebanon.

when we left the desert and drove on the highway from hama to damaskus - only twelfe km away from the lebanese border we suddenly saw quite a lot of lightnings that came from lebanese terrritory. We wondered - what about the signed ceasefire? The war in Lebanon should have stopped!
Was it only a thunderstorm with natural lightnings?
Some lightnings seemed to be natural - others looked war-made. Later we read in a newspaper that the Israeli Army attacked some Hisbollah bases in this region - but 24 hours before we passed this region. What did we see??? A lebanese couple told us that the Israelis bombed the whole weekend - and that there was not only this single attack described in the newspaper.
we don’t know what it was until now -
- but we know that the walls between people are rising with every shot that is fired -
and this is why we are here, this is why God wants us to build bridges and to overcome walls and canyons of fear and hatred.

Finally we arrived in ma’alullah, an old christian village north of damaskus.
A village that was founded because of saint teklah. Saint teklah lived long time ago and was persecuted and was protected by a rock that opened a canyon for her just in the moment her persecutors tried to capture her.
Here it was again, like in Goereme in Turkey, persecuted christians who were protected by god.
A lot of monestaries all around.
And here we met iraqi christians who fled as result of the war and the persecution they had to suffer from islamists.
Strange, but true. A christian president once said that he wanted to bring democracy to Iraq - but instead of democracy he meant oil - and the result of this lie is right now 100.000 killed Iraqis, continuing torture and continuing terrorism.
And even growing Islamism and growing persecution for the Iraqi christians there…
We meet a guy that was taken as a hostage some months ago. His family paid 120.000 $ to liberate him, and after his liberation he fled to syria.
In ma’alullah we walked on some mountains, and there Till told me that he had the vision that we would be able to fly across the huge valleys between the mountains.
That we would be able to build bridges. - Bridges between cultures and denominations, I thought…

We continued our route to damaskus, spending one day there.
Walking through the old city and the souks was beautiful.
But I got just the same feelings I described in my last mail. Hisbollah soldiers stood in the city centre trying to get more new soldiers for their “holy war” against Israel.
God, will this hatred ever stop, and when will this take place???

A day later we arrived in jordan.
We decided to go to a little hotel in the mountains just to rest for some days.
And there we met ayman and mohammed - two angels - and we felt like in heaven…
They both are Egyptians.
Ayman is a protestant christian, Mohammed is a muslim.
Ayman told us that the christians in Egypt get a tattoo after being baptized. So everyone knows that they are christians and no christian can hide his belief anymore.
And he told that the situation for christians in Egypt is more easy right now, but a lot of christians still have their weapons hidden in the house in fear of islamist attacks.
But instead of mistrust between them, ayman and mohammed are the best friends I ever met. A christian and a muslim, both with wide open hearts, with hearts full of love, full of joy, full of serving others.
They served us, prepared meals for us, made their hotel our home - for free, joked with us, even did crazy water battles in their hotel with us (after that the whole hotel was full flooded with water ).
All of us thought we knew each other since we were children.
I think the aim of our next trip might be Egypt…

Then at Friday, one week ago, Stuffi and Ivonna decided to stay in Jordan, and the rest of us started to enter Israel…
At the Israeli Border station we went through a heavy security check.
we arrived at 8.00 a.m.
we had to put all the stuff out of the Ford Transit, and we, our stuff and the transit were totally checked and scanned…
the procedure ended at 15.30 p.m. …
…and after 7 1/2 hours the Israeli border police suddenly found out that my father and no one of us is the owner of the Ford Transit - so they decided that we need a special permission from my father to drive the car, authenticated by a lawyer.
we got crazy: we had already passed 9 countries without any border problems, had all kind of papers with us, but not a “lawyer-approved” permission from my father.
we telefoned my parents - it was my fathers birthday, and I hate to destroy my fathers birthday, but I did… You know, my parents are those kind of persons who always do everything they can for others, and there are always others who want something to get from my parents.
And now I destroyed his birthday - I asked him to send a lawyer-approved permission by fax. But it was Friday evening - there was no lawyer working anymore in Germany. Finally a good friend found a lawyer in Goettingen who still worked. And my family did everything they could. Finally the lawyer in Goettingen was not able to send a fax to the Israeli border police.

… At 19.00 o’clock we had to turn back to jordan.
we drove to the south-eastern side of the dead sea - and felt totally wrecked.
we knew our next attempt would be not before monday - three long days in the desert.
In a visible and in an invisible, spiritual desert.

You know, on the one hand we really saw a lot of miracles happen during the convoy.
But on the other hand the whole convoy was a heavy fight. And we all were totally drained - drained to death. And 2 weeks ago my intestine illness started again and became worse - so I felt totally weak and like a burden for my sisters and brothers.
You know, we could see the lights of Jerusalem shining in the night, we could see the holy city, but we couldn’t enter it - after having travelled for nearly six weeks and passed quite a lot of difficulties.
we felt exactly like the Israeli people 3000 years ago, not being allowed to enter the promised land. When we saw the sign for mount Nebo we thought about Moses who sat on the mount Nebo and looked in the promised land, but wasn’t allowed to enter it.
And we asked God: “God, what is wrong, what do You think about us? Which sin detains You to work with us?”
But we didn’t hear any answer from god. Only desert, a hot and merciless sun.
Suddenly we remembered the prophecy we got for the convoy. Several people had the same. This prophecy told that the convoy would constantly go down, down, down all the way until the deepest point - but then catapulted up into the sky!
We never had the idea that the deepest possible point in this prophecy was also meant to be the geographical deepest point
I think You know - the dead sea really is the deepest point on earth - about 400 m below the mean sea level.
When we discovered this, we thaught that might be right here was the turning point of the convoy. We asked: God, please help us!
We suddenly could enjoy the beautiful desert nature around us. The dead sea, where You can lay and walk on / in the water without sinking. And I remembered: God solved every problem we had on our journey, he carried us. He told the ravens to provide us, and they did…
On Monday we did quite a long time of worship and decided to show God our love no matter what will happen, no matter if we ever would get into Israel or not. God longs for our true love!
Then my mother telephoned and told me that finally the lawyer from Goettingen sent the fax to the Israeli border police.
I have wonderful and hard fighting parents!!!

And after another 8 hours of security check on the Israeli border
WE FINALLY GOT IT - GOD, MY PARENTS AND MY BROTHER IN LAW TOGETHER OPENED THE WAY!!! We arrived in Israel.

The next day we met the other “half” of the convoy. You know, Emma, Maren, Barbara, Judith and Lena were waiting for us for already 2 1/2 weeks in Israel. After freakstock they went to Israel by plane.
It was a real great party and a lot of laughing when we met each other again!!!

In the evening Emma brought us to a peace camp in the north of israel, 15 km away from the lebanese border. It was a miracle what happened there!
Young israelis and young arabs, young jews, christians and muslims came together, celebrating forgiveness, only some weeks after the end of the war!!! …dancing together, laughing together, loving each other… INCREDIBLE!!!!
The following two days we spent time with the peacemaker team, joining them into different towns and villages.
I just felt like being catapulted a little bit tooo fast into heaven…
This peacekeeper organisation is built up by jews, muslims and christians.
They are working since a couple of years, organizing camps with jewish, muslim and christian children, teenagers and young adults.

After that we went with some jewish peacekeepers to the lake kinnereth.
We had a very good time together, just being together and talking about God, the love of God and the Messiah as result of this love. I tried to walk on the lake kinnereth like Jesus did, but I didn’t manage it - maybe I need some belief practice or I ate too much at the peace camp, I didn’t find out yet )

going to the north 15 km away from the lebanese border - arriving in the peace project

Thursday we drove through the west bank to Jerusalem. Mistrust, fear and hatred could be seen again everywhere. Weapons, military, security zones and high protected jewish settlements everywhere, and palestineans and jews living in constant fear.

In the night we arrived in Jerusalem at the Mount of Olives at Ibrahim.
Ibrahim is an angel. He is an old man, a peacekeeper, and travelled all over the world in order to strengthen peace between jews, christians and muslims in the middle east and all over the world.
He himself is a muslim, but he has very strong and good relationships with a lot of jews and christians in jerusalem. He is known everywhere in Jerusalem, and almost everywhere all over the world, I think.
He has a wide open house for everyone and prepares everything for his guests - for free, that’s sure.
And he knows how to handle people - we found out yesterday…
…yesterday afternoon we found one window of the Ford Transit wide open and broken. The whole caravan was a huge chaos. Someone burglarized the caravan right in the afternoon and found one portemonnaie and some other stuff from us with little value and stole all.
When we told Ibrahim he just disappeared with another man in the streets…
…15 minutes later he came back, carrying the portemonnaie and giving it back to us. Everything was inside, except some shekel. Another 15 minutes later some teenagers arrived, bringing back every single missed piece.
Ibrahim told us with a smile: “We don’t need a government, we are our own government…”
Today Anne and me visited the old town of Jerusalem.
Our heart was touched when we saw the crying jews standing at the west wall longing for the Messiah! God, reveal Yourself to Your people, reveal Your love!!!
In the church of the holy sepulchry we watched a procession of munks.
A lot of people were there, just kissing the place where the body of Jesus probably lied. I hope they knew he died for them and loves them…

…o.k., Thanks for Your attention, You finally reached the end of my mail )

We only have one last request:
we need urgently money to get back to Germany.
There seems to be no possibility to leave the Ford Transit in Israel, so the Transit will probably go by ferry from Haifa to Greece. The price for the ferry is between 1000,- and 1500,- Euro, and we don’t have the money yet!
Thank You!

Let’s thank God for every miracle he did!!!
And please pray for our next steps. The next week we will spend in Hebron and other places of conflict.
May God bless all of You so much!!!!! ))

Jonathan

P.S.:
Our bank account for donations
(We finally have the IBAN and the Swift-Code for international transfers!)

Account-owner / Kontoinhaber: Clemens Rabe

German Account-No. / Konto-Nr.: 145 099 901
International bank account no. (IBAN): DE94240900410145099901

German Institute-Code / BLZ: 240 900 41
International Institute-Code = SWIFT-Code: GENODEF1LUE

Institute: Volksbank Lüneburg

Der Beitrag wurde am Sonntag, den 3. September 2006 um 02:34 Uhr veröffentlicht und wurde unter unterwegs, Israel-Convoy abgelegt. Du kannst die Kommentare zu diesen Eintrag durch den RSS 2.0 Feed verfolgen. Du kannst einen Kommentar schreiben, oder einen Trackback auf deiner Seite einrichten.