It seems to be all catching up.

Shabbat Shalom. I love Friday nights and Saturday for the simple fact that I can say "Shabbat Shalom" everywhere I go. haha. It's quite fun.
Yesterday we woke up at 10:15 (woo hoo!) and at 11:15 went to the Ethopian quarter of Jerusalem to do a community service project of picking up trash. We are partnered with a Messianic Jewish church here run by John and Calev Myers (Calev spoke at SEU graduation last year about Israel). I'm not going to lie, in the beginning I was a little non-supportive of the whole activity. I was tired and sore from our bedouin experience just the day before and all I wanted to do was rest. We got there and were given XL bright blue shirts that said in Hebrew "Citizens of Jerusalem" of which we are not and made the community members very confused as to why we did not speak Hebrew. We started picking up trash on the side of the road and then moved into a parking lot of an apartment complex. It was very run down and overgrown with bushes. There was a HUGE mess in the corner and it was in dire need of some assistance... so that became our first project. As we were cleaning, different people started to come out and look at what we were doing. I found out very quickly here that Israeli people are natrually VERY curious about everything! As we finished with that job, we started on the sidewalks a little closer to the house. This woman walked up and somehow we communicated through the assistance of Dr. van der Laan and she asked us to clean up the mess in front of her apartment. It was crazy. There was trash imbeded into the ground all along the front doors of these apartments. We found some pretty interesting things. As we were working a young woman came out of her apartment with a liter bottle of coke and some cups and gave it to me. I said "thankyou so much" and she said "thank YOU." It was then that I realized that we weren't just cleaning up, but we were being the hands and feet of Christ. I never really understood the reality of that statement until I came here. I may have mentioned this before, but in Israel you aren't able to openly declare your faith if you are a Christian, therefore you have to SHOW love to the people of Israel. I've never experienced this because I've always been able to show love through service but than talk about Jesus but because of the language barrier here there is nothing I can do but love and serve.
After we left the neighborhood we got on the bus and were ready for a falafal!!! There is a woman who lives down the road from us and makes the BEST spicy falafals.... but she is jewish- she wasn't open because Shabbat was about to start. That was quite disappointing, but it worked out well. That night we had a debriefing session in the common room and had a guest speaker, Jordana and Shannon McMillen. They are recently married and Jordana is actually from Southeastern. They were speaking about why they are in Jerusalem and they got on the topic of the people, particularly the Orthodox Jews. It was crazy because I learned so much about them and just have such a burden to pray for them. It seems almost impossible for them to know or see Jesus but as Shannon said, just as God can make a green grass grow in the rockiest parts of the desert that has no rain so can he change the hard hearts of even the most orthodox jewish man. Today was a lazy day and we went to the Messianic church again tonight. We were singing a song and I was watching the people worship God and it moved me to tears. The earnestness that these people seek God with is so overwhelming. Not with an overconfidence, but a humble and unworthiness to come before a king. I pray for Israel.. that they would see that this is God's chosen land and they are God's chosen people. I pray they would see the Messiah, Yeshua. Father, you are my hope.