March 31, 2005

20 Adar II, 5765

Dear Praying Friends and Tent Pegs*,

Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."  And He said, "Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you."  So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him.  Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.  And Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you."   (Gen. 22:1-5)

If you have been following our journey over the past few months, you are aware that since the beginning of February, we have not received sufficient financial support to cover the rental cost of the facilities we inhabit and steward.  As we have prayed and fasted over this period, none of our team or partners have heard (or at least shared) that the Lord had given any indication of a coming major (external) change in the structure or functioning of the ministry.  In the past year in particular, the Lord has unearthed and removed many deep hidden things in all our lives, so we are confident in our ability to hear His voice.  Also, because every aspect of our activities has been deepening and prospering, we’ve expected that after God accomplished what He was doing in this trial, the well of provision would open up.  We are still holding on to this hope. 

However, having said all that, yesterday we met with the board of brethren that oversee the running of Esther House (where we are located).  We have arrived at Mt. Moriah.  The worship center, or at least our connection with it, is on the altar.  We discussed the possibility of reducing our space to lower our rent, but the fact is that it is not possible to make any changes that would bring us into a range we can presently afford and have the ministry intact.  We would consider moving our offices into our residence, but without a financial miracle (of a slightly smaller nature) the situation would be essentially unchanged.

So beloved friends, in two weeks, if God doesn’t intervene, the Emmaus Way Worship Center in Tel Aviv will cease operation as we have known it for the last five years.  The cry of our hearts is simply for the Lord’s will to be made known and accomplished, and for the necessary grace to walk in whatever it might be.  We have dearly loved our work here and have never thought of making any changes whatever.  We also, in looking back over our history and relationship with Esther House, do not find any crossroads or directional decisions we made about which we would say we missed the Lord.

We ask those that have the Lord’s heart for what we have been about to please pray and ask Him if there is a response of some sort that He would like you to give in answer to this immediate situation.

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The God we serve is sovereign and able to deliver us from this fiery furnace.  But if He does not, even if we have no understanding of why, we will still worship and serve Him with joy all the days of our lives.  For He is good and everything He does is right.

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May God bless you from Zion!   

                                                                        Your servants...

                                                                            For the Glory of His Name,

                                                        Arni and Yonit