It was 10:30pm in Jerusalem and I could not sleep. We had been traveling all over Israel up until this point and had just arrived that evening into the holy city. My mind was racing. God bless Kristine, who was my roomie all these days. I would set my alarm each morning to go off before the crack of dawn and would tip-toe out of the room as quietly as I could so that I could go spend time with our Lord. I love being up before the world gets up and sitting in the dark with Him. You’d be surprised how glorious those hours are! But not only did she have that early morning alarm going off each day, now it was evening, and I still couldn’t sleep, even though we were both exhausted! So, I left the room to head for the lobby area and find a lounge or quiet place to sit and reflect. To my surprise, the elevator door opened to a bustle of activity. You would have thought it was noon in New York City, but it was almost 11:00pm in a hotel lobby in the city of Jerusalem
Every lounge was packed, every couch and chair sprinkled throughout the hotel were occupied. I stood there and wondered what in the world was going on, but apparently, this was normal. I found a young man who worked for the hotel and asked him where a good place might be where I could go have some quiet time. He gave me a slight chuckle, smiled and kindly suggested the upstairs lounge as another option. I was relieved, finally I could sit and digest the day and journal my thoughts. However, no sooner do I reach the top step, I discover the upstairs lounge is equally as busy. What is wrong with these people, I ask myself? Doesn’t anyone sleep around here?
As I surveyed my surroundings, I could only come up with one word to sum up what I was witnessing - LIFE! Jerusalem, and Israel for that matter, is all about life. Observing the people in conversation, I noticed something…no one was looking down at their phones or other devices, they were actually engaged in spirited conversation. I saw people conducting business, families laughing out loud, friends drinking tea, Orthodox Jews gathered in deep discussions, and countless other scenarios. It was busy, and it was loud! The Hebrew language ran rampant – and it all made my heart sing.
Coming back to the states I realized that this is something many of us have lost…how to live, how to engage, how to laugh out loud again. Unlike Israel, we’re a young country. We’ve never been threatened with extinction, yet, and so we do not understand the value of what we have. We get caught up worrying about things that, at the end of the day, really don’t matter. In Israel they know how precious everything is, and how easily it can be taken away. Every inch of that land, the size of New Jersey, I might add, is used. Whether they are fine-tuning the water supply routes, setting up greenhouses across once desert plains, working agriculture on top of the Golan Heights, planting trees and vineyards, and quickly becoming the world leaders in technology, medicine, agriculture and the military. This once desert, dust bowl that even Mark Twain described as “mournful, dreary and lifeless” when he visited there in 1867, is now filled with life! And it’s not just the land, it’s the people – they live! They know what losing 1.5 million children from the Holocaust feels like, because they feel their absence, they lost a generation. Think about that for a minute. If my calculations are correct, they lost more than all the children under the age of eighteen in the state of Colorado alone.
So, let’s move out from old patterns into new ones. Maybe during this Christmas season, as we bounce from one social occasion to the other, we leave our gadgets behind and actually LIVE LIFE. When is the last time you had belly laughs, or played cards, or walked city sidewalks with your family, or engaged in spirited conversation, without being so easily offended? Maybe we look at our parents, grandparents, spouse, children, friends, and realize that in a moment all of that can be gone – forever. Like the elevator door opening up to LIFE in a hotel, maybe redefine how your home feels the next time someone walks through the front door, or the life you can bring to the next event.
Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life (John 14:6). If you are a follower of Jesus, then this is our season to celebrate Him – and He was all about people – He was all about life. What better way than to bring His LIFE to the world!
Love,
Jeremiahs Call Ministries
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