Part Three: Cry for Zion Prayer Rally

An outstanding part of my experience in Jerusalem in October was the Cry for Zion prayer rally.

 Doron Keidar

 John Enarson, Nancy, and Doron

 Our Cry for Zion shirt

 Our banner for the Jerusalem March

John Enarson and Nancy

Doron Keidar, Lars and Harriet Enarson's son-in-law, is the Executive Director of the Cry for Zion ministry. John Enarson, Lars and Harriet's son, is the Christian Relation Director. Their purpose is advocating for freedom of worship on the Temple Mount, the holiest spot on the face of the earth! The Jews have had two temples there, but on October 13th, UNESCO, the cultural arm of the U.N., passed a resolution stating that there is no Jewish connection to the Temple Mount! The Supreme Court of Israel has ruled that the Jews can pray on the Temple Mount, but this ruling is not enforced. A Jew is forbidden to bring a Bible or a prayer book there, and if a Jew even moves his lips in silent prayer, the Israeli police will remove him from the Mount! The security situation is very tense. The Muslim Waqf  are the custodians. Israel has sovereignty over the Mount but does not enforce it. If you want to add your voice to the cause of freedom of worship on Mt. Zion, go to this site - Cry for Zion

Our group had a prayer rally at the Goldman Promenade, the hill across from the Old City and the Temple Mount. In our first teaching session earlier, Lars Enarson likened Israel to God's timepiece in the countdown to the return of the Lord. Lars said that the rebirth of Israel in 1948 was the hour hand on the clock. The reuniting of the city of Jerusalem and regaining the Temple Mount and Western Wall in the Six Days War of  1967 was the minute hand on the clock. At the present time what happens concerning the Temple Mount is the second hand on the clock!

Doris Murdoch and Nancy at the Cry for Zion prayer rally

Our group walked the ramparts of the Old City and prayed (Isa. 62:6-7). A woman named Elly gave a testimony of how the Holy Spirit gave her a burden to pray and ask God's forgiveness for Israel when they gave the Temple Mount back to the Muslims right after they obtained it in the Six Days War of 1967. She was weeping profusely during her encounter with the Spirit.

On the ramparts - Elly testifying

On our way up to the Temple Mount, I came face-to-face with a strong advocate for freedom of worship on the Temple Mount, Rabbi Yehuda Glick, who is now a minister in the Knesset. He made aliyah from America and was the Director of the Temple Institute, as well as a tour guide. I knew that he had sustained four gunshot wounds to the chest at close range by a terrorist about two years ago. I told him that I had prayed for him and was glad to see him looking so well! He wanted to know what I do. I told him I taught the church about our Jewish roots and had written a book, Why Christians Should Care About Their Jewish Roots. He was interested and wanted me to email him. He handed me his card, and I handed him mine. We noticed he had body guards! Pray for this man.

MK Rabbi Yehuda Glick talking to Nancy

Doron, John, and Yehuda Glick

Stay tuned for continuing blogs on my eighth trip to Israel for the Jerusalem Sukkot Celebration.

Part 2 - Celebrating and Giving Thanks Like the Pilgrims Did

 John Enarson teaching the men how to wave the lulav.

Our beautiful sukkah after we decorated it.

 The sukkah is in the courtyard of the AMI Center in the heart of Jerusalem.

Three new friends, Kathy Markward of Tennessee, a lady from Texas, and Joke de Vos from Holland.

Nancy and Doris sat at the head table with Lars & Harriet Enarson and Henry from Canada.

Lars offering thanks for the bread.

Lars and Harriet Enarson, our hosts.

Doris Murdoch and Nancy.

The Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot) is the final feast of the seven annual "feasts of the Lord" (Lev. 23:34-43), and its fulfillment will be in the reign of King Jesus on the earth. It lasts for seven days, and it is to commemorate God's provision and protection in the wilderness wanderings of the Israelites on their way to the Promised Land. The Israelites were commanded to build sukkot (booths or tabernacles). The event I attended was unique in that our group had our own sukkah. We decorated it, and we had meals and celebrated in it. Another biblical aspect of our enactment of the feast, besides dwelling in the sukkah, was the waving of the lulav, which consists of the etrog (fragrant lemon-like fruit of the beautiful tree), and branches of the palm, myrtle and willow trees (Lev. 23:40). John Enarson taught the men the proper way of waving the lulav, which he said was like a rehearsal for welcoming the Lord on His arrival in Jerusalem! At His first coming palm branches were waved before Jesus as He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey (Matt. 21:7-9).

John saw "a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands" (Rev. 7:9). Did you know that all nations will celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles every year when Jesus is on His throne in the New Jerusalem? Here is what the prophet Zechariah declared: "And it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations [after Armageddon] which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles" (Zech. 14:16).  So we were rehearsing!

Did you know that the Pilgrims likely fashioned their first Thanksgiving on the model of the biblical Feast of Tabernacles? They saw themselves as new Israelites in a new promised land. I found a wonderful article about this, Here is an excerpt:

In Jewish tradition, the Festival of Sukkot is a joyous occasion to give thanks and praise to the Source of Creation for the bounty we enjoy. In fact, we are told that during Sukkot, "you shall have nothing but joy." [Deut. 16:15] Jews erect a sukkah, a harvest booth, in which they eat their meals, and sometimes sleep, during the festival. It is a reminder of the booths in which their ancestors are said to have dwelled during their forty-year Sinai sojourn. It is also precisely the kind of structure farmers in the Middle East still construct at the edges of their fields as crops come ripe and the need to rise early for harvesting makes it prudent to sleep nearby.... The sukkah is a temporary structure, hung with fruits and symbols of the harvest season. Its roof is thinly covered with branches, admitting sunlight, starlight, wind, and rain, reminding of us the precariousness of our existence in the face of the forces of nature. ... There is a strong thread which runs from the Israelite wilderness experience to that of the Pilgrims and the harsh years they endured as they strove to sink roots in this new land. Like the ancient Israelites of whom they read in the Bible, they were people of great faith who believed themselves to be sustained through God's great mercy and beneficence.

That they should rejoice and give thanks at harvest time was as natural an impulse for the Pilgrims as it was for the ancient Israelites.  By Rabbi Elias Lieberman

PERSONAL BLOG: My Experience in Jerusalem for the Feast of Tabernacles

I was blessed to speak at my church last night and show 72 pictures of my experience in Jerusalem for Lars Enarson's Jerusalem Sukkot Celebration, October 14-15, 2016. I packed all I could into 50 minutes, but there is still a lot to tell. My blog so far has been a teaching site, but I now would like to change it to a personal blog, another way to fulfill my calling as a "Mizpah" for Israel. I hope you will stay with me as I relate my experiences during my EIGHTH TRIP TO ISRAEL. My new friend, Doris Murdoch, and I had an exciting time!

Background: Curtis and I have known Lars & Harriet Enarson and their children, Josefin, Johanna, and John, since they moved from Sweden to Columbus, Mississippi, where we were pastoring, in 1992. Lars greatly influenced me in my understanding of Scripture in relation to Israel, my Jewish Messiah, and the Jewish people. His world-wide prayer ministry, the Elijah Prayer Army and The Watchman International (thewatchman.org), began to develop while they were in Columbus.

Curtis took six of us from the church to Israel in 1994. After returning, I began to study modern Hebrew, and my first teacher was the Swedish tutor who had come to provide schooling for the Enarson children. God called me as a Mizpah (watchman and witness) for Israel in 1995.  In 1996, I led a mission to Jerusalem with Curtis and four other church members. The Enarsons moved to Israel in 1997. I went by myself to Israel in 1998 and did volunteer work in Jerusalem, staying with two different couples, one of them being Roy and Mary Kendall (more on them later). Then I went to Haifa to visit the Enarsons.  In 2002, I went with two sisters from Huntsville, Alabama, to Israel for Lars Enarson's Passover Prayer Tour -Convocation- and outreach conference. In 2003, my Messianic Jewish friend, Janice Bell, and I were given checks for $3,333.33 each by an anonymous donor for a trip to Israel!! Then in 2007, Janice and I took our husbands, Jack and Curtis, to Israel, on another self-designed tour. You can read about my adventures on all these trips in my book (see sidebar), Jewish Roots Journey: Memoirs of a Mizpah.  In 2012, my friend, June White, and I went to Israel and stayed with Roy and Mary Kendall.

How I got my traveling companion: I really wanted to go to Lars Enarson's Jerusalem Sukkot Celebration this year, but I knew my husband Curtis was in such bad health that I couldn't leave him. After Curtis went to be with the Lord in April, I began to consider it again. (Although Curtis refused to renew his passport three years before, he insisted that I renew mine. He was looking ahead for me, bless his heart!) Strangely, the desire to go to Israel again had faded, and I didn't want to go. However, I prayed that if the Lord wanted me to go, I would do it. I gave Him one condition: I must have someone to go with me!

It wasn't long until I got an email from my publisher at Energion Publications, Henry Neufeld. He said one of his authors, Doris Murdoch, wanted to contact me. Because of my love for Israel, she thought I might provide the answer to a question she had. Doris and I began corresponding, and one day I wrote her and asked if she would like to go to Israel with me. She replied that she had just been to Israel in January, so it would be too soon to go back. Then later she wrote again and said when she told her husband Jerry about my invitation, he said she really needed to think about it! She thought about it and decided to go!

It looked like God had answered my prayer. Yes, He wanted me to go to Israel again. I wanted to be double sure that Doris and I would be compatible, so on a trip through Florida, Janice and I paid her and Jerry a visit at their home in Live Oak. She was a marvelous hostess, and we had great conversation. I felt right about us traveling together to Israel. That was in August. In September, Jerry and Doris visited me in Petrey. On October 13th, Doris and I flew out of Atlanta to Israel! The adventure began.

I could not have had a better traveling companion than Doris. Please continue to check this site for the unfolding of my adventures in Israel!