Taking chances from impossible situations...

Sometimes in life you need to take your chances from an impossible situation!

One of my all-time favourite players!

Super Goals - Gerrard and Cole!

China, India, and Israel

A famous Israeli politician and leader once met Chinese and Indian officials at a global summit. They were sharing how their three cultures were among the very oldest in the world and do still exist today. The Israeli then asked how many Chinese and Indian people there were in the world today. There are around 1 billion Indian and perhaps over 1.3 billion Chinese people. The Jewish people, however, number only around 12 or 13 million worldwide (80% of which live in either Israel or the US). The question then asked by the Israeli was simple: how come the Chinese and Indian make up over 2 billion of the almost 7 billion people worldwide, but the Jewish people make up only a tiny fraction of these figures? The main answer was (is!) simple: land. While the Chinese and Indians always had their land, Israel did not.

Tisha B'Av

On this remarable date in the Hebrew calendar, 9th of Av, several events took place in history that shook the Jewish people: the Destruction of the First (587 BCE) and Second Temple (70 CE), as well as the expulsion of all Jews from Spain in 1492 - around the time Colombus set out to discover what later became a key safe-haven for global Jewry. It shall be remembered this week.


Shalom,
Gordon

Arafat's Deceptions

This interesting link shows a PA (Palestinian Autority) lawmaker exposing Yassir Arafat's deceptions on 'peace.' All they really want is what his organisation stood/stands for: a liberated Palestine, which leaves no room for Jews or the State of Israel. The misuse of women and children in this unholy war is outrageous. It was recorded how Arafat spoke of peace in English and of war in Arabic, how he urged women to give birth to ten kids and give him eight of them to establish a free Palestine. Unless Europeans see this side of the struggle Israel is facing, their picture of the Middle East conflict and their attitude towards Israel and Jews is unbalance, subjective, and partly deceived - and that is why there is such room for emotional manipulation that drives ordinary people to even hate Jews and Israel. All this shows the negative influence of media, its subjectivity, and possibly the manipulation by those who want the facts to be presented the way it suits them, rather than evaluating all facts to have a more objective picture. Israel is fighting a terrible war since its founding in 1948 and they know best how to survive it; who are we in the West to condemn them for what they have to do for their survival? As has been said, When they are actually trying to kill you, it's no longer about Islamophobia...

My prayer is for peace on Israel and the Arab world, yet not a political one - that seems impossible - but one that requries a change of heart and attitude, in which others can be accepted for what they believe rather than being persecuted, terrorised, and murdered.


Shalom,
Gordon

The Righteous among the Nations (Gentiles)

What it can take - Bonhoeffer

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a man who took a stand, spoke out against what is wrong, didn't count the cost and paid the ultimate price. But as is clear from Tom Cruise's new movie Valkyrie, it's better to die for what is right than to live and support what is wrong (my conclusion).

What will it take?

What will it take for you to change your life-style and do something against that which is wrong? This is what it took for Oskar Schindler:

At the Foot of the Cross

Schindler's List

Schindler's List is a must-see movie for everybody, especially those who deny Israel their right to have their own country where they can be secure and defend themselves as appropriate. Even though some question the appopriateness of their actions, yet, as has been said, when they actually try to kill you every day, it is no longer about Islamophobia...

What Jesus has to offer

This story of the woman at the well is a story about what Jesus has to offer. He uses the well and its water as a figure and illustration of the indisensibility of spiritual life thjat comes from God: as humans can't live without water, they can't live without God.

Jesus appraoched this individual and with it crossed boundaries of gender, culture, and religion. He didn't care what fellow Jews thought, but reached out to an indiviual as the 'Saviour of the world' - the whole world, as people soon reconginsed Him. Jesus simply loved people and demonstrated the love of God for all humanity. For God so loved that the world that He sent Jesus to redeem them by dying a criminal's death on the cross. The love of God gives - it gives everything. Love is giving and that's what God did through Jesus; He gave His very Son, and with Him He gave us everything else we need, too.

Jesus has so much to offer: He reached out to a suffering individual and offered restoration, healing, and a new life. Obviously, marriage and relationships didn't work for the woman, yet Jesus didn't reject her for it, He rather praised her for her honesty. Yet honesty isn't enough; she wanted that water that would quench her thirst. The woman was thirsty for something real, lasting, and deep - that was what Jesus offered to her. That 'water,' the very life of God, Jesus offered would satisfy eternally. The woman would no longer need to run around, try this, that, and the other, but could find eternal satisfaction through the life of Jesus.

I don't know about you, but I can so well relate to a life empty of meaning, devoid of life, and ever-seeking-never-finding stuff. Until I found that 'living water' Jesus offered - the true life with the God-dimension - I was lost in seeking satisfaction here, there, and everywhere, only to be bitterly disappointed by the empty promises of the world. But with that Jesus-encounter everything changed - and never disappointed!

Though this story took place 2.000 years ago, Jesus is still the same today and can meet your every need. You don't have to sing a long with the Rolling Stones, 'I can't get no satisfaction,' because Jesus breaks that cycle of emptiness, loneliness, and meaninglessness. You can change that song into: 'I found Jesus, and satisfaction!' We can turn the US tune 'I still haven't found what I am looking for' into 'I found what I was looking for.'

Once we see Jesus and understand who He really is, we can say with C.S. Lewis - a former atheist (!) - 'I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.'


Shalom,
Gordon

Jesus and a Woman

The story of 'the woman at the well,' as it usually called, is very interesting, and very relevant for us today in many ways. I call this message: 'Jesus and a Woman.' It could have been any individual; it could have been you or me! It's amazing to see how Jesus cared for individuals, how He took time to relate to people and their personal and individual needs. Like a shepherd cares for His sheep, so Jesus cared for His, figuratively speaking, 'flock,' that is, His people - people He loved, and that would include each individual who ever lived. Of course, at one point in history Jesus was a man for some years and related specifically to the people in Israel at the time. However, how He related shows us His character - and the Being of God - and how He relates to us still today.

He came along Jacob's well and was tired from the journey between Judea (south) to Galilee (north): see it on the map. Well, unfortunatelty there was tension between Jews and Samaritans at the time, yet this was no hinderance for Jesus to relate to a Samaritan as a Jew. He crossed those racial boundaries set up by men as He reached out to a precious individual. The lady was surprised, to say the least (and so were His disciples once their returned from lunch).

The well, Jacob's well, proved a brilliant way of showing a greater spiritual reality behind the essential and indispensable resource of water in a desert place. Jesus came to bring a spiritual reality to people who asked for it; those who were hungry for it.

Jesus said, "Everyone who drinks this water [from Jacob's well] will get thirsty again and again. Anyone who drinks the [spiritual] water I give will never thirst - not ever. The water I give will be an artesian spring within, gushing fountains of endless life" (MSG).

The pricture of the well served to illustrate a spiritual reality: God will give inner satisfaction that will last - forever! Some things have obviously gone wrong in the life of this woman: marriage, for example. She had 6 men and it didn't work for her. After six relationships one might be pretty hurt and dispair. It's an unfortunate reality that this is so in today's society. What people do, as a result, is to blame the institution of marriage. Yet that is not a wise conclusion, for who would altogether reject driving cars or travelling by plane because of car and plane crashes? It's not the driving or flying as a whole that is wrong, it's individual mistakes that make some journeys go wrong, sometimes fatal. In the same way, marriage is not the problem, but doing marriage wrong is the issue. It's obvious that some things make marriage work and other things destroy it. One cannot be selfish and only seek his or her own pleasure, but has to learn a great deal of respect, humility, servanthood, and sacrifice - all possible through genuine love!

The good thing was that the woman was honest about an area in her life that was obviously pearshaped, to say the least. Did Jesus condemn her? NO! He sought to offer her a way beyond the natural availabilities of life, a life filled with divinity, a dimension not-of-this-world. No, no alien stuff, but a God-reality that can transform an individual and turn something bad into something beautiful. It's the kind of power that breaks bondages and sets people free! There is tremendous satisfaction to be found in God. People don't have to try one empty thing after the other only to get hurt again and again, and more and more. There's an another way to live life - a life with the God-dimension!

Jesus used the illustration of water to make His point: water is essential, indispensible. People in Africa understand this much better than people in the West! 2.000 years ago in the Middle East water was a comodity (actually, it is one today, too, although most people don't value it as such). So just was water is indisensible for natural existence, so is the God-dimension for the spiritual, metaphysical, non-material part of life - we need God to be complete, fulfilled, and have meaning and purpose in life. That's what Jesus offered - the God-life inside a human being. It's a spiritual fountain that will never dry out, always satisfy - despite bad circumstances - and spring up into eterity!

All one needs to do is to ask God for it - it's that simple! Again, Jesus said:

"If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink [spiritually]. Rivers of living water will brim and spill out of the depths of anone who believes in me this way, just as the Scripture says" (Jn 7:37 MSG)

He was, of course, speaking about God's Spirit whom those receive who believe in Him (v 39); and to believe in Him is to actually received Jesus in to our hearts and souls (Jn 1:12-13), an ever-present, eteral fountain of life. It's a satisfaction found nowhere else; one that cannot be compared to anyone or anything; one that those who find would never trade for anything else in this world! JESUS IS ETERNAL LIFE!


Shalom,
Gordon

The one and only Stevie G!

Gerrard NOT guilty!

I am so glad that Steven Gerrard - the heart of Liverpool - was found not guilty! Just was Beneitez is relieved at the news, so am I and millions of other Liverpool fans across the world - especially my brother!

The League would have been over before it started without Gerrard, but now the Premier League and Champions League titles are up for graps for the mighty Reds!

You'll never walk alone

The Foolishness of Prejudice and Generalisation

Here's a funny story to show the foolishness of prejudice and generalisation, one of many stories shared by Dr Brad H Young in class...

An American man stood up in a bus, walked up to a Korean man, and slaped him. The Korean man was shocked and asked, 'What was that for?' The American said, 'For Pearl Harbour!' The Korean man said, 'But that was the Japanese; I am Korean!' The American responded, 'Japanese, Korean, you Asians are all the same...'

Then one other man observing the incident got up and hit a Jewish man on the head. The Jewish man looked at him bewildered and ask, 'What was that for?' The man replied, 'For the Titanic.' 'The Titanic, sir,' the Jewish man responded - even more bewildered. 'What on earth did I have to do with the sinking of the Titanic?' To that the man responded, 'Goldberg, Iceberg, you Jews are all the same...'

Further comments or explanations needed?

Amazingly beautiful...

A most beautiful song...

Martin Luther King - a short note

'There is no right way to do the wrong thing.'

This 'quote of the moment' is so true in life - there is simply no right way to do the wrong thing. King and their human rights movement has shown us that there is no right way to do the wrong thing: racial discrimination, in their case.

In our relativistic society today people say that what is right for you may not be right for me. How are we to respond to such a philosophy? Well, in some situations it is true, in others it is not - and the difference is crucial. It is not right to harm others, steal from them, lie, or cheat. There is simply no right way to do such wrong things. We therefore need to take a scrutinising look at society today and rethink some of the social consequences of our so-called 'tolerance' and think ahead whether such policies and worldviews will be beneficial in 10 or 20 or 50 years time. Simply changing laws because people think and want to live differently doesn't necessarily benefit society in the long-run. It would be absurd to change traffic laws just because people want to speed or drive through a red light. Equally don't we change laws just because some things have become a common practice; some things are simply wrong and their consequences catastrophic. While some things, to be sure, need up-dating and some form of adjustment, we cannot reject good timeless values that protect people from a misuse of tolerance, freedom, and relativism.


Shalom,
Gordon

Martin Luther King Jr