Too Good To Be True | Mission Sunday

Good morning, KCC.

I'm gonna invite you if you're out in the foyer to come in and grab a seat.

We're gonna worship together this morning.

Are you guys ready for Sunday?

Are you ready for Sunday?

Yeah, we're gonna all stand up.

We're gonna worship together.

We have an awesome service plan, so let's all join in.

The team is ready for you.

Of weight, it was my truth till I made you.

I was writing but not alive.

And all my years I tried to hide.

Oh you call my day.

I needed rescue, my sin was heavy, but chains break out of the weight of your glory.

I need a shelter, I was an orphan.

Now you call me a citizen of heaven.

Well I was wrong, you were my king, I said, the same God that never fails will not fail me now.

You will fail me now, in the waiting.

The same God who's never late, is working all things out.

You're working all things out.

Oh yes, I will lift you up in the lowest body.

Yes, I will bless your day.

Oh yes, I will seek for joy when my heart is heavy all my days.

Oh yes, I will Jesus I will I kill thee.

The same God that never fails, will not fail me now.

You won't fail me now in the way.

The same God is never late, it's working all things out, you work it all, yes, okay.

Oh yes, I will see for the joy is heavy.

Oh yes, I will not choose to rest, to glorify, glorify above yet, I choose to get to glorify, glorify above death Nothing can stand against Oh yes I'm all the double shelters.

Oh yes, we will rest.

Is your faithful I will rest in your promises my confidence is your faithful come on our rest and I will rest in your promises, my confidence is your faithfulness, and I will rest in your promises, my confidence is your faithfulness, and I'll rest in your promised my confidence, Jesus Is your faithfulness, and now it will rest in your promised death, my confidence, is your faithfulness, beautiful, you are beautiful forever you will be for you know your promises are yesterday.

All your promises And all your promises are yes to name Jesus All your promises, ah yes and name Jesus.

I will search and stop and earn you're just not that hard to find I will praise you on the mountains, I will praise you in the mountains in my way, so you're the summer where my feet are So I will praise you in the valleys all the same, no less God within the shadows, no less faithful in the islands be astray, you're the heaven where my heart is in the islands and the heart is all the same.

Oh how far beneath your glory Does your kindness extend the eye from where you feel rest on the sunrise to where you sweep the sinners past?

And know how fast you come running if justice shot on me through the night to trace my steps through all my failures and walk me out the other side Who could dare ascend that mountain that validale Calvary But for the one I call good chapter Who like a lamb was safe for me?

Oh I'll praise you on the mountains, I'll praise you in the mountains in my way, you're the sun where my feet are So I'll praise you in the valleys all the same, no less God within the shadows, no less faithful when the night leads me astray.

Cause you're the heaven where my heart is in the islands and the hearty of the same tea dead Whatever I walk to wherever I am Incluma's wherever I stay If ever I walk to Valley of Dead I think the time is my song of stead Whatever I walk to wherever I am in aunties, wherever I stay never I walk to the valley of dead I think I started, I start dead singing out my song of the stead from the gravest of all lives come the pastors we call grace a mighty river flowing upwards from a deep body, a deep earth.

I will praise you on the mounting.

So I will praise you in the father's own singer.

Oh praise his name forevermore, forever stays we will sing your praise, oh Lord, all the Lord our God and on earth and break up the Son of Heaven rose again, O trample where is your stake the angel for Christ the King.

In rooms of wise.

Blazing sun shall appear and I will run space.

Amen.

Praise the name of the Lord.

The Bible says, I will praise him.

Lift up your soul and praise the Lord.

How many of you, your soul is alive this morning?

Your soul, it's your will, your emotions, your expression that says, I will praise the Lord.

Would you just raise up another sound of praise to Jesus?

Today, we love you, Lord.

We love you, Lord.

Hallelujah.

Would you just take a moment and take a seat here to the congregation?

We're going to take a moment here and take communion together.

The team's going to continue to worship, and I'm just going to invite you to sing along with them as you receive communion this morning.

Good morning, church.

And you know, there are so many trends.

How many can relate to that?

There's so many trends on ways to make you live long, to be healthy.

And I can tell you, I have an email box full of different ones.

And I've been there, I've done them.

And we all want to experience this health, this joy, and the thriving relationships.

And I think of it like a five, you know, lane highway where traffic's going and we're going, and everyone's going fast and moving and passing and bumper to bumper, going in this one direction.

And we're chasing the latest trends.

And it could be for health or self-help or happiness, or maybe it's you know technology that gets your steps in so that you can create new habits.

And I mean, all those things are beneficial and great, but in the end, they'll all fall short.

And it'll just be temporary.

And the reason why these don't fulfill us is because they're man-created methods.

And when they're man-created methods, it doesn't work.

God came and he created the earth with his word.

But when man sinned, everything broke.

It created systems that are broken.

So when we seek to heal relationships, we'll always, or to heal our mind through the broken systems, we'll always fall short.

So there's another way.

And we talked about that highway that the world is running on, racing on, but leads you disappointed in the end because it's a broken system.

But there's another way, and how many of you are grateful for the other way?

And the other way is not a highway.

The Bible calls it a narrow way.

Would you just turn your neighbor and say it's a narrow way?

It's a narrow way.

So I'm inviting you today to take an exit.

Get off the grind.

Get off the busy way and get onto that narrow way.

And that narrow way is a way of connection that's on a personal level.

It's not fancy, it's not uh busy, it's intimate, it's close, it's what the communion table is all about.

It's between you and Jesus.

And this narrow way, uh, when we remember what Jesus did on the cross, we're reminded that it was the blood that was shed.

His word created, but his blood redeems.

And the word created this world, but the world was broken because of sin, and we needed a redeemer.

So the blood came to redeem us.

It gave us a fresh new start, a fresh beginning.

So when we recognize and we we celebrate the cross, we enter into that full redemption.

We enter into that place where we move from being lost to the Bible talks about us being uh orphaned in our heart.

We're just looking for a father.

And the Bible says that it's the redemptive work of the cross, it's the blood of Jesus that brings us and makes us a part of his family.

That we become restored back to our original design where we cry out to God, Abba Father.

He becomes our family today.

And so if we could celebrate the blessing of the cross when we go into communion, our encouragement is not for you to say, all right, how can this make, how can I become better?

There is nothing you can do to become better.

And there's nothing you can do to shroud or cover your uh in your your broken pieces.

God already knows you're broken.

It's no surprise to him that you're broken.

But the good news is that we can go to him broken, and he can make us whole again.

Amen.

We can go to him dead, and he's the one who can bring us life.

So we're gonna go into communion today, and uh Natalie's gonna lead us uh into this first step with the bread.

So would you take the bread in hand today?

For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you.

The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread.

And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

Amen.

Would you take the bread in hand?

And let's just give thanks today.

Let's give thanks today.

Thank you, Father, for fresh beginnings.

Thank you for a new body, a new hope, a new future, new dreams, a new beginning.

We thank you, Lord, that you took upon your body the weight of the world, and now we can celebrate it today at this meal.

Amen.

In the same way, after supper, he took the cup, saying, This is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.

For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

Amen.

Amen.

Are we proclaiming we're proclaiming the wonder the Bible says it is foolishness, the cross is foolishness to those who don't know any better, but to those who know better, to those who understand the good news, this is salvation, this is a new covenant.

So, Father, we thank you for the new covenant, a new beginning, new blood.

We thank you that we've been taken off the slave block and we've been brought bought and paid for completely and brought into your family, that the new blood is in us, an eternal blood.

We've been made sons of the most high.

Amen.

And we thank you, Father, for this new relationship with you today.

We call out Abba, Father.

You're our hope, you're our help today.

And we celebrate you in Jesus' name.

Amen.

We take the cup together.

Amen.

The Bible says that this cup is to be celebrated.

This meal is to be celebrated.

So, what I'd like you to do is to stand up and just greet some of the people around you and celebrate together.

Give them a high five, give them a handshake, give them a hug.

Let them know that they're loved.

Amen.

Welcome to the second showing.

Um my name's Andrew Green.

If you don't know, I'm on staff with the society here.

And um quite a few weeks ago I was talking with Brody, and he felt it would be great if I just took a few minutes to share on the missions fields that we support in Israel.

Um it's a missions field that I kind of oversee, it's very close to my heart.

And that's morphed into something a bit larger.

Um and I do want to share with you this morning uh about the three projects we support in Israel.

I was there visiting just a few weeks ago, and I can tell you that we are sowing into good soil.

It's very exciting to see the Spirit of God alive and at work in the projects that we we give to a KCC.

Uh but first I'm just going to I'm talking again with Rodi and I'm just going to take maybe 10 or 15 minutes to talk about why we support uh missions fields in Israel.

Now, um normally I uh you wouldn't feel you'd have to defend why do you give to Kenya or why do you give to Mexico?

It's a it's a no-brainer, it's an outpouring of the goodness of God, right?

I mean we've been doing a service called It's Too Good to Be True.

Well communion is a celebration of something that is too good to be true.

Seriously.

Admissions is an outworking of that, and we are called to go to Kenya, go to Mexico, go to these places and demonstrate the love of God.

That is an absolute mandate.

However, our media and our politicians, and sometimes even church leaders, would question the need to do that with Israel.

They're the uh they're oppressors, they're aggressors, and somehow they are beyond the deserving of grace and mercy and compassion.

And so I'm just gonna take a few minutes to explain from what the Bible says why we're absolutely mandated to support Israel, actually.

In fact, here's something else that's too good to be true.

If we align ourselves with what the word of God says about Israel, we can command a blessing, and more than that, we are aligning ourselves with what God wants to do in the future, as told in the Bible.

We're aligning ourselves with yet to be fulfilled biblical prophecy.

Now that is too good to be true, that is exciting, and so um that's what I'm going to do.

Now, this is um a 10-hour, four-week teaching course condensed into 10 to 15 minutes.

Um so it's gonna be fast and furious, okay?

Now here's the good thing.

Uh after the first service, there was a second service, so I have to stick to the timeline.

10 hours takes us to it won't be your bedtime, so what's the issue, right?

Um so it's gonna be fast.

Um I won't be reading out too many scriptures, although I'll be reading out the key ones, uh, but I've attempted to put the scripture references on the slides, okay, because I'm not making this up.

This is the anointed word of God.

Okay, do we have ears to hear what the Spirit of God is saying to us?

So, Father, I just pray for us this morning.

I pray that we would have uh ears to hear what the Spirit is saying.

I pray, Lord, that I would just be able to communicate your heart and your desire and your love and your compassion and your future destiny that you have written about concerning the Jewish people in Israel.

And I pray that as a church we would align ourselves to that in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Now, this church we we started to give to missions projects in Israel in 2015.

I think this is the sixth year, more or less.

And off the bat, thank you because you have given uh approximately$90,000 towards good works in Israel since 2015.

So that is a tremendous thing, and I want to thank you for that.

So we're gonna start uh right at the very beginning, as Julie Andrews sang.

Um it's a very good place to start.

And we're gonna look at the promises that God made to Abraham right at the get-go.

And so um, I'm gonna read from Genesis 12 and then Genesis 13.

And this is what God said in Genesis 12.

This is what God said to Abraham in Genesis 12.

The Lord said to Abram, Go from your country, your people, and your father's household to the land I will show you.

I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you.

I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse those who curse you, and all the peoples on the earth will be blessed through you.

And then in Genesis 13, the Lord said to Abram, Look around from where you are, to the north and to the south, to the east and to the west.

All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever, and a line forever.

I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted.

Go walk through the length and breadth of this land, for I am giving it to you.

So quickly, the promises to Abraham to make him a great nation, to give his descendants a specific land to live in forever, and I don't know if you're into eschatology or not, but the full extent of that land has never yet been fulfilled.

Right?

It talks about the Euphrates, it talks about the Nile, but that's another rabbit trail we won't go down, but God gives them a specific land to live in forever, to bless those who bless them, and to curse those who curse them, and to bless the whole world through them.

And obviously the prophetic fulfillment of that was Jesus, the Messiah.

Okay.

Um moving on quickly, more promises were made to Isaac and Jacob.

Um it was reinforced by God to Isaac as an everlasting covenant.

They would be numbered as the dust of the earth as a nation, and all nations of the earth should be blessed through them.

Again, this is a very specific reference to Jesus, our Messiah.

Uh obviously, God fulfilled the promise of giving them a land when, and you can read about it in the book of Joshua, um, they were led in to the land, they uh took Jericho and moved in.

That was when they entered the land after their um return from Egypt and their 40 years in the wilderness.

Um they became a nation, they became a nation in quotes as the dust of the earth, millions, okay?

And God fulfilled um the promise of being a blessing to the world through them when Jesus was born.

Okay?

Jesus.

Quick rabbit trail.

Who were the first Gentiles to worship Jesus?

Okay, they were the Magi, all right?

The wise men.

The wise men were from Persia.

They weren't Arab, they were Persians.

They were from what we know as today Iran.

Okay?

The first Gentile worshippers of Jesus were Iranian.

And Iran has future blessings to come from God that have not yet been fulfilled.

It's because back in the day, Cyrus, Darius, Artaxerxes, three of their kings, blessed and released the Jews and financed their return back to Jerusalem and financed the rebuilding of the temple.

God has never forgotten that.

God will not forget that.

And God has yet to fulfill the blessings on Iran in the last days.

It's easy to just see good guys, bad guys when we listen to our media.

And I'm not condoning anything, I'm just saying that God hasn't forgotten the good deeds that nation has done and will bless them in the future.

He's also Abraham demanded a blessing from God for this for Ishmael and his descendants.

God has commanded a blessing in the future for the Arab nations of the world, right?

So I say this quickly to say it isn't, it's so easy to think good, evil, good is, bad is, us, them.

There isn't.

There's just you're in Jesus, you're separated from Jesus.

Okay?

That's it.

Satan will use anything to separate you from Jesus.

It might be a spirit, a religious spirit.

It might be secular humanism that is taking out our generations in this country today.

He doesn't care what he uses, as long as he can separate us from Jesus.

Okay.

And if you look at the statistics, way more people in the world are killed each year through drug overdose than terrorism.

Okay?

So we have to be very careful how we discern what things and how they're going on in the world and what does God see?

He doesn't condone evil, but if we look at our society, our culture, what's going on in our culture to separate us from Jesus?

Quick rabbit trail.

That was free.

Because God loves everybody.

Okay?

And he has a destiny planned for all of his creation, not just the bits that we think.

Moving on.

That was a rabbit trail.

Let's move into the New Testament, Paul.

Oh well, Jesus was, yeah, Jesus was born, Jesus lived, Jesus was crucified, and the church was born.

So we're now into the New Testament.

And the early church was made up of Jews, and then Gentiles were added, obviously, through Paul and through others.

And it's important to note that in the book of Acts, Israel and the church are unique and distinct.

Israel is mentioned 20 times in the book of Acts, I think it is.

The church is mentioned 19 times.

It is a false theology to say that the church has replaced Israel in God's plans and purposes.

It is a false theology.

God has destiny for both in the future.

Okay?

And I'm gonna read these from um Romans 11 and Romans 15 quickly.

Romans 11 is my favorite book in the Bible, it's got everything in it, it's got grace, salvation, honor, humility, prophetic fulfillment.

It's all in Romans 11.

We need to do a study on Romans 11.

Okay, but anyway, here we go.

Romans 11.

This is Paul.

I ask then, did God reject his people?

No.

I'm an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham from the tribe of Benjamin.

God hasn't rejected his people, whom he foreknew.

So too, at the present time, there is a remnant of believing Jews chosen by grace.

Believing there's always been believing Jews chosen by grace.

Grace abounds to the Jewish people today as it abounds to the church.

Okay?

And if by grace, then it cannot be based on works.

If it were, grace would no longer be grace.

Because of their transgression, and they did transgress, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious.

But if their transgression means riches for the world and their loss means riches for the Gentiles, how much greater riches will their future full inclusion bring?

Future full inclusion.

I'm talking to you, Gentiles, and as much as I am the apostle, the apostle to the Gentiles, I take pride in my ministry in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people, the Jews, to envy and save some of them.

Do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches.

If you do, consider this you do not support the root, but the root supports you.

You will say then, branches are broken off so that I could be grafted in.

Yes, granted, but they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith.

Do not be arrogant, but tremble.

For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.

And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in again.

For if God is able to graft yes, God will graft them in again.

I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery.

So that you may not become conceited.

Israel has experienced a hardening in part until there's an until the full number of Gentiles has come in until God has worked out his prophetic destiny for us and the church, right?

And in this way, at that time, all Israel, not all well, yes, all Israel will be saved.

All of Israel, not a proportion, right?

All Israel will be saved.

Moving on to Romans 15.

Now, however, I'm on my way to Jerusalem in the service of the Lord's people there.

For Macedonia and Achaea were pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the Lord's people in Jerusalem, that is the believing Jewish people in Jerusalem.

They were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them.

For if the Gentiles have shared in the Jews' spiritual blessings, they owe it to the Jews to share with them their material blessings.

Okay?

So to summarize quickly, God has not rejected Israel.

There is a remnant of faith of Jewish believers, and there has been through the millennia, and grace abounds to them, just as grace abounds to us.

Who is grateful for grace?

Okay, the root supports us.

We do not support the root, and we are exhorted to not be arrogant about this.

Okay, they will receive full inclusion, and all Israel will be saved in the future.

We have an opportunity to align ourselves with prophetic destiny that has yet to come.

So cool.

And they have blessed us spiritually.

We owe it to them to bless them materially.

That's what Paul says.

Quickly, Israel's timeline.

Um they entered the promised land, there were periodic exiles, and in one of those, Iran or Persia choose to bless them.

Um and God hasn't forgotten that and will repay them with blessing.

Jesus was born, Jesus was crucified, and then in AD 70, because of their disobedience, Israel was scattered and the temple was destroyed because of disobedience.

Okay, for the next 1900 years, the Jewish people largely kept their identity, their culture, and their religious practices despite being dispersed among the nations of the world.

They suffered many attempts at genocide.

There were crusades, there were inquisitions, there were pogroms, there was Hitler's final solution.

And yet they survived, they kept their identity, they kept their belief in Yahweh, and miraculously in 1948, after nearly 2,000 years of dispersion, Israel was reformed as a nation.

It is probably the biggest single evidence of prophetic fulfillment in the world today.

God said he would regather them, and in 1948, he just went and danted it.

Right?

God's word is true.

So in the 72 years since this little country was formed, they've been attacked by Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Soviet Union, Algeria, Morocco, Cuba, North Korea, and Iran, as well as the Arab League Alliance, the PLO, Jamul Amal, Hezbollah, and Hamas?

What's going on?

And the world condemns them for robust self-defense.

What's going on?

Did you know that Israel is the most democratic country in the Middle East?

Did you know that 20% of the Israeli population are Arab?

They are the freest, wealthiest, healthiest, best educated Arab grouping in the whole of the Middle East.

Did you know that Arab representation in their parliament is pretty much identical to female representation in the Canadian parliament?

But you're not told that.

Did you know that 15% of the faculty at the University of Haifa are Arab?

You're told that they are Arab haters and aggressors and oppressors.

Why is the world picking on Israel?

I'll tell you why.

This is what I believe, this is what I believe the Bible says to me.

It's anti- Oh, excuse me, I bit my tongue.

Anti-Semitism.

It's a spirit.

There is a spirit abroad called anti-Semitism.

If Satan can disprove the word of God, he wins.

Agreed?

If Satan disproves the word of God, guess what?

What does that mean for us?

He can do it in three ways because the word of God says Jesus is coming back.

Who believes that?

He's coming back actually to a place called Bosra, but we won't get into this.

He's coming back to a Jewish Israel to save his people when they cry out to him.

So if Satan can kill the Messiah or the people or destroy the land, he wins and he invalidates the word of God.

Well, he tried to kill the Messiah twice.

First go was when Herod basically committed genocide and killed a whole generation of young babies trying to sweep Jesus up in that.

He then killed him at the cross, but guess what?

That didn't work because Jesus rose from the dead.

Yes?

So then he moved to the people.

Let's try and kill the people.

Like I said, there were pogroms, there were inquisitions, there were crusades, and there was the final solution that Hitler rolled out, and it failed.

And the people miraculously threw actually many, many Christians praying for and advocating for them to return to their land, right?

He failed in killing them.

What's left?

If he can destroy the land, Jesus can't come back and fulfill the promised word of God.

There is all hell has been let loose to destroy Israel and disprove the word of God.

Do not let anti-Semitism settle in your heart.

Do not let subtle doubts, please, just settle in your thinking or your heart.

I exhort you today to align yourself with what the word of God says.

Okay?

I forgot to.

Yes.

The church in Israel, um, they have separate but related destinies.

Okay?

Um, God hasn't, I'm not saying they're better than us or we're worse than them, or we're better.

Just separate and relate.

Separate but related.

God loves, we're all God's favorites.

That's probably the best way of putting it, right?

And we know that, you know, in terms of Gentile and the church, every tongue, every tribe has to hear.

We know in the old in the Ender times about the increase in signs and wonders.

There's we can go into it another time as part of the course.

There's things to happen, right, before the fulfillment of what God has promised for the Gentiles and the church, before Jesus returns.

There's also things that have got to happen for Israel.

Um, they have to confess their sin as a nation and plead for their Messiah to return and save them.

At that point, all Israel will be saved.

So that hasn't happened yet.

It has yet to happen, but it will happen.

So, what's our response to this?

Um, we're called to bless Israel, we're called to financially support Israel, we're called to honor our spiritual roots, and we're called to pray for Israel and look for the return of our Messiah.

Even so, come soon, Lord Jesus.

Okay, uh, the fullness of the Gentiles has to come in.

We don't know what that means, how many that is, but what we do know is all of Israel will be saved.

That's a that I could say if you say that's 100%.

That's exciting.

That's the teach on why, as a church, we position ourselves with Israel.

Okay, it's a positive action.

We choose to bless, and we will receive a blessing.

We choose to sew in, we choose to show compassion, and we choose to align ourselves with what's going to happen in the future.

Because that is too good to be true, that we can get to do that.

That is really cool.

Now, what I want to do is just talk to you about what we do in Israel, our missions fields.

So, next picture.

Ah, yeah, here we go.

So, this gives me an opportunity to teach you a Hebrew word.

Brody felt Brody saw my notes, he thought, well, that's good, but that's that's heavy, man.

He goes, break it up with some pictures at least.

So here's a picture, right?

So here's a Hebrew word.

In Hebrew, these are called minions.

Can you say, turn to your neighbor and say minions?

Right, okay.

So it was the minions, the Assyrians, and the Babylonians were were the ancient enemies of Israel, right?

Okay, ha ha, that's good.

So I was in Israel six weeks ago.

I had the pleasure of uh visiting the three projects that we support there, and we are sowing into great soil, honestly.

We really are.

We do three things we support an evangelist over there, we uh bless a church over there, and we sow into a compassionate work there.

Um so the compassionate work, we we support an organization called La Man Sion, who in turn uh work with a food bank in a city called Rishon Lut Sion.

It is a dormitory town close to Tel Aviv.

Um there's a lot of working poor in Rishon Lut Sion, and everybody that goes to this food bank is means tested, right?

There is genuine need when a lot when you move to Israel from a place in Eastern Europe, you don't tend to take your pension plan with you, okay?

It doesn't kind of work like that, so there's a lot of poverty, a lot of need.

Israel embraces anybody making alia, regardless.

Okay, uh, so this food bank is uh the the name of this food bank in Hebrew, it means open opener of the heart.

That's its name.

Okay, this is a a secular food bank, but that's the name of it.

Opener of the heart.

It's run by the guy on the far left of the picture, a guy called Motti, he's a trained CPA, a trained accountant who chose to give that up to run this food bank.

It gives out food parcels every Thursday.

Uh, each food parcel is enough to feed a family of four for a couple of days, and each Thursday they give out nine thousand food parcels.

That's enough to feed 36,000 people.

They do it on a Thursday to allow the recipients to celebrate Pesak, Sabbath, Shabbat, I should say, the Shabbat on the Friday night.

Okay.

Um, to do that takes close to 250 volunteers and um volunteers from all walks of life, the army, the police force, office workers, university students, everybody jumps in to help with this.

And um it's quite humbling, really.

The it takes place in the parking lot of a shopping mall.

So on the busiest shopping day of the week, the parking the shopping mall gives over 20% of their parking space for free to allow this to take place.

Um the volunteers do this.

A lot of the fresh produce, because they give out meat, fresh produce, dry goods, and candy for the kids.

Basically, the fresh produce is in quotes tithed by farmers.

Motti said to me, Do you know what tithing is?

I went, Well, yeah, I do actually.

He said, Because most of the fresh produce, the farmers in the locality give 10% of their produce to the food bank, right?

Um the day, the week before I was there, there was a lot of rockets coming in, and uh the volunteers weren't able to get to the food bank, and so um a local insurance company within walking distance of the food bank closed their offices for the day, and all the staff went to serve at the food bank to make it happen.

You know, it's humbling to see community in action, and um we're part of that.

We sow into that, they know our name and are grateful to us for helping them.

Uh, it's good soil that we are sowing into there.

Um, so yeah, the pictures there, you've got um, I can't see without my glasses on.

You've got Motti, and then I think we've got Gabriel Goldberg, who's spoken here before now, myself, and then David Goldberg, who's also spoken here before.

Um moving on to church.

We support a congregation called Bethel.

It is it meets in a city called Ashdod.

It's a port city to the south of Tel Aviv, and it's It is a wonderful, wonderful congregation.

Honestly, they are a light on a hill.

They love Jesus.

They particularly minister to young people and young adults.

They are great.

And that's their pastor, Israel Poptar.

You know, if there's one group of people that really hates Christians, it's the ultra-orthodox Jews.

And it's common for the ultra-orthodox to stand outside their church doors, to take pictures, to take videos of everybody who enters the church.

They will then post them online and say, do not give these people jobs, do not let these people rent a room from you.

They believe in Jesus.

They are beyond the pale, right?

They are persecuted.

About four years ago, this church had a small branch work in a city called Ashkelon.

It was firebombed, and they think it was by the ultra-orthodox, although nobody was ever caught.

So this is the reality of them doing church, right?

And so we choose to bless and stand with them.

And they again are very appreciative of that.

Next picture.

Okay, this was taken on a Wednesday by the pastor of the church from his apartment.

I was with him two days later for that church service.

That is an unexploded rocket that was fired out of Gaza.

Okay?

So this is just this is life.

This is doing church.

This is walking your faith out.

Let's stand with them, let's support them, let's pray for them, and let's bless them, right?

So the Bethel congregation, that is who we support in Ashdod.

Let's pray for them.

And lastly, we support an evangelist.

Her name is Raquel, Raquel Natanel.

I said this morning that she's like Pat Guerra, but this girl's on steroids compared to Pat, honestly.

That's her husband to the left of her.

This is in Raquel's garden, and the lady to the right of Raquel is Levia Strugnell.

Who knows Trent Strugnel?

That is Trent's sister.

And uh Levia, I love Levia, we get on, we have a great time.

She does a lot of translation work for Raquel because Raquel's English is not too good.

Okay, it's a lot better than my Hebrew, but it's it's not too good.

And so those are actually pomegranates hanging from a tree behind them.

Yeah, we had pomegranates off the tree for dessert.

It was quite cool.

So Raquel's mandate is to share who Jesus is through the Old Testament scriptures.

She'll work with I should say the food bank serves Jews and Arabs, no discrimination, okay?

Raquel will share Jesus with whoever wants to listen, right?

Um but her modus operandi is through hospitality over food, opening up who Jesus is through the Torah.

And she will probably five nights a week have people in her home sharing anything between from six to thirty people.

Can you imagine that?

The workload is boggling.

Often she'll have a hundred people in.

It's just crazy.

She has thousands of people a year through her home so she can tell them about who Jesus is and break bread with them.

And uh just one quick story.

I mean, she can talk about politicians and rabbis and all sorts of people who basically secretly believe in Jesus, but in quotes haven't come out.

Right?

Her great-grandfather was the chief rabbi of the whole of Israel.

So she she's got a lot of in with people.

Um her and her husband went down to the local, it was a liberal synagogue, right?

Not ultra orthodox, went to the local synagogue because they wanted to uh celebrate one of the feasts.

I can't remember which one it was.

Might have been Yom Kippur, I don't remember.

And the rabbi recognized her, knew what she stood for, and publicly kicked her out, right?

You're not welcome here, you believe in Jesus.

Get out.

So they had to leave.

And a few days later, there was a knock on the door of her home.

She she lives just a few hundred yards.

Um lives in a beautiful place called Enkerem, where tradition has it, John the Baptist uh was born.

It's tradition, um I don't know if it's true or not.

Um there was a knock on the door, and there was an army officer in uniform.

And he basically said to her, look, I was in the synagogue the other day, and I think the way that you were spoken to and treated was absolutely appalling.

Okay?

Now they do military service in Israel, so they have 12-week boot camps, so they're rotating new recruits all the time.

He said, My job is to take in these new recruits every 12 weeks.

And what I want to do from now on, every 12 weeks, is to bring my 30 recruits to your house so you can tell them about Jesus.

Right?

Just a great door opening.

Um so that's what she does.

That's just one of the many, many things that she does.

So we are sowing into three great projects, it's good soil.

Um what should our response be?

Well, I suggest that we bless Israel.

That is a posture of the heart, and it's a practical outworking.

We should financially support Israel, we should honor our spiritual roots, and we should pray, right?

We let's pray into prophetic destiny that we can be a part of it.

Um, if you want to give to these projects, just so you know, when you take missions on our giving envelopes, your money doesn't go to Israel.

It goes to other fantastic things that we do around the world as a church.

If you do want to sew into Israel, you do have to write Israel on the giving envelope each time.

Okay, that's me done.

Uh what we are gonna do is finish with a very short video from David and Gabriel.

These guys, he's gonna love them.

These guys are 110% in for God, for Jesus.

Okay.

So they might look different to us and sound a bit different to us, but these guys are gold, honestly.

So thank you.

Let's just finish with a quick message from Gabriel and David.

So happy to be able to greet you all and to say that, to say peace.

We're here in the city of peace, in the holy land, the truly holy land.

Never mind what the news media report.

This is the place where God has put his Holy Spirit, and we're able to speak to you today because God has given us this place.

The time is late, it's very late.

Be ready and think of Israel.

Don't forget Israel.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

Why does it say so in Psalm 122?

They will prosper.

Yes, they will be blessed.

That love you, that love you, Jerusalem.

God bless you.

Shalom, I'm Gabriel, and you just heard my brother David, and we've had a wonderful morning together with someone that you all know very well, Andrew.

And we just want to say our sincerest thanks to all of you at KCC for your support for Israel.

We appreciate it very much.

We thank you for your prayers.

We were today at one of the food pantries that you're supporting, and we saw how many people were being helped.

God bless you.

What you have done for Israel will come back to you many fold.

Thank you.

Inshallah.

Wow.

Can we just thank Andrew for that amazing message and reports of good things happening in Israel this morning?

I don't know about you, but I find it so encouraging to hear these stories of people that are serving Jesus through incredible obstacles.

Like it is not easy to serve Jesus where they are, and they're spreading that message of hope and life.

And what I mean, what an incredible thing to hear this morning.

So thank you.

Well, church, I'm gonna ask you to say something with me this morning.

You know, we had our team puddle this morning, and we talked about how God is bigger and stronger, and we got all hyped up for the service, so we're gonna get you hyped up too.

So can you say with me, God is good, God is bigger, and God is stronger.

Do you believe that this morning, church?

Amen.

We're gonna talk about our tithes and offering, and I'm gonna read you a verse that you've most likely heard before, and it's from Proverbs, Proverbs 3, 9 to 10.

And it says, Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the first fruits of all your produce, and then your barns, sorry, I can't read that far, your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine.

And I think what a fitting verse to go along with this message.

You know, when we practice tithing, to me, you know, what I saw in this vest, this verse when I read it today was it's not just about coming to church and, you know, you show up and you're like, okay, here's my tithe, these are the blessings I need, so I'll give you this much, and these are the blessings you're gonna give me, and then you do your business transaction and you go home, right?

Tithing is a heart issue, and tithing isn't just for you.

Tithing is a way that God gives us this amazing exchange where we get to give 10% of what our blessing, our prosperity, our money is.

We give it to him, and in exchange we get the peace of knowing that the burden's not all on us anymore.

He's got provision, he's got a way forward, he's got something in mind for you and for the person next to you.

It's not just for me, it's for you, and it's for the person beside you, and it's for your neighbor, actually.

Because, you know, sometimes in this world we can get so focused on, okay, these are the things I need, these are the things that I'm going through.

Okay, God, you hear me?

You see me?

This is what I'm ugh.

But when we give our tithe, he does something in our heart where it's like eyes off of me.

And I get to look up because I know that God's got me, he's got my back, he said it in his word, and I believe in his word, right?

And so that means that in exchange for all this anxiety and stress, I just give it to Jesus, and he just gives me peace.

And he's got that peace for all of us this morning, and that's something that, you know, it's not we're not obligated, you don't have to.

It's not like, oh, he wants my tithe again, right?

You know, God doesn't need your money, he's not broke, but he wants your heart, and he wants that peace for you this morning.

Do you believe that, church?

Can we give with that heart and just give as you give this morning, give that anxiety, give that worry, give that stress, give it to him.

He's got you, and he's gonna open the way so that whatever you give this morning is not just going to bless you, but you're giving to a place that's blessing and reaching out to the nations and to the broken, to people that really need this message of hope, and you get to be a part of that this morning.

Isn't that exciting?

That just gets me so excited.

So I'm gonna invite the ushers forward.

And before they pass the baskets, I just want to let you know there's a few ways you can give.

They're on the screen.

You can give through there's envelopes on the back of your chair or on the front of your chair that you can fill out, do your giving that way.

You can also text.

We have an app and we have a website.

All the information's up here.

Um, but before we give, I'm gonna pray for you.

We bow our heads.

Father God, we just thank you for your word that we've heard this morning.

We thank you, Father, for the things that you're doing in our hearts and in our lives and in our church, Father.

I thank you that we get to be part of a generous house that serves you and puts you first, Father God.

So I just pray for every single person that's stepping out in faith, that's giving up their anxious heart, that's giving it to you this morning, Lord, that's asking for your peace.

Lord, would you meet us here in this moment, God?

But that this would not just be a Sunday where we show up and we do our duties and we leave, but Lord, we would actually take a moment right now and see this as a step of faith where we're giving to you, and we know that we can walk out of here with your peace and your assurance that you're taking care of us and that you're using us to actually reach other people in ways we might not have even imagined, God.

So I thank you, Father, and I just thank you for your blessings in Jesus' name, amen.

All right.

Well, I just want to welcome you here.

If this is your first time, or maybe it's your second or third time, you're not so sure what we're about yet, but you keep showing up.

We just want to thank you for coming.

And we just believe that you know God brought you here for a reason, and you're just in such a good place.

This is home, this is family, and we would love the chance to get to know you.

So please don't leave today without letting us say hi to you.

And one of the ways that you can do that is you can fill out on that envelope, you can just say, hey, I'm new here, I need to know a little bit more.

You can drop that in the basket, or you can take it out the back doors to the connect table where they there's a team there that's super excited to greet you and get to know you.

But please let us say hi.

We really want to connect with you and answer any questions you might have.

All right, and on that note, we have our next steps uh program that we run here at KCC, and it's an awesome three-week, three-week program that Pastor Brian, he's gonna wave at you.

Pastor Brian runs.

It's starting next Sunday, and he just goes through kind of the heartbeat of our church, what we're about, how you can get connected, and just lets you know a little bit more about what we're all about here at KCC and how you can really take that next step in your journey of faith.

So next Sunday during the 11 o'clock service, Pastor Brian's gonna be running that, so don't miss out.

Awesome.

All right, well, as you know, Wednesdays we have prayer at 7 a.m.

here at KCC, and who knows that prayer is great.

Prayer is like our foundation, right?

It's how we talk to God, and we're two or more are gathered, right?

That's what the Bible says that there his presence is.

So we have prayer at 7 a.m.

Wednesday mornings.

We invite all of you to come, wake up, bring a coffee, maybe if you need it, to help you, you know, with your super spiritual prayers.

Uh but normally on the last Wednesday of every month, we join, we join in prayer together.

But this Wednesday, we're gonna be at Evangel at 6:30 p.m.

They're having citywide prayer, and we invite you to just come with us, come support that prayer night at Evangel because we're gonna join together as the churches in the city of Kelowna, and we're gonna pray for our city, we're gonna pray for our churches, and we're gonna believe that God has something incredible that He's gonna do in this next year.

Do you believe that for 2020?

That there is something incredible he has for our churches, and we want to get really in unity with what Evangel's doing on this Wednesday night.

So 6 30.

You can bring your kids, they have child care, so that just eliminates all your barriers, right?

Bring your kids, bring your prayers, and bring your coffee.

We'll be we'll be there with you.

Amen.

Alright, well, we want to talk about our connect groups.

If you haven't been part of a connect group, it's really an amazing way to join in with the church and find your place.

Because you know, it can be hard on a Sunday to get to know everybody.

When you go to a Kinect group, it's smaller, it's at somebody's home, and it's a great way to really find your people and find your connections.

So if you don't know about a Kinect group, if you're not part of one, you can again go to our desk.

They know everything back there.

They have all the answers, and they're just waiting for you to ask.

They're dying to have someone to talk to.

So don't leave them hanging, go and talk to them about our Kinect groups.

Um, yeah, I think that's all I have to say.

So I'm gonna invite Pastor Brody to come back up and close our service.

I just really felt that uh I want to thank Ezra again for sharing this morning.

I believe that uh when you bless Israel, you too will be blessed.

And how many of you want the blessing on your own lives and on your family?

This is a huge part of it.

Well, this is one of the blessings that uh the Jewish people will give to their families, to their children, to their communities, and so I'm gonna bless you before you go.

May the Lord bless you.

May you experience his abundant blessings flowing towards you.

May he keep you.

May you know that you are safe in his loving arms, hidden in the cleft of the rock.

May he cause his face to shine on you.

May you realize that you have his attention, you have his desire, and that he loves you.

May he be gracious to you.

May you enjoy his abundant grace and mercy every day, new, every morning.

May he lift his countenance over you.

May his character grow in you daily until you've run the race.

And may the Lord give you peace.

The shalom of God may minister to your body, to your soul, and to your spirit.

Amen.

God bless you.

Have a great Sunday afternoon.