Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news, and messages by Steve Martin.
Like many American Jews, I was pleased to see President Trump’s recent declaration in conjunction with the rededication of the United States on May 17, to encourage that the preceding Shabbat, May 15-16, should be observed across America as well. Acknowledging Jewish Heritage Month, the final sentences of his proclamation were, “I call upon Americans to celebrate the heritage and contributions of Jewish Americans and to observe this month with appropriate programs, activities, and ceremonies. I further call on all Americans to celebrate their faith and freedom throughout this year, during this month, and especially on Shabbat to celebrate our 250th year.”
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Other than feeling good and seen, especially in light of the growing permissiveness of antisemitism throughout America, many Jews like me looked for additional meaning and significance in this proclamation, and what it means specifically this week.
April 14 is Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Memorial Day. In Israel, this will be observed with local memorial ceremonies and ones broadcast on national TV. Interviews, documentaries, and feature films related to the Holocaust will be aired across all TV and radio channels, with entertainment channels suspending broadcasting. An air raid siren (different from that which we have spent the last several weeks dreading and sending us to our bomb shelters) will be sounded, stopping traffic and bringing people across the nation to stand in silent prayer and reflection.
This year, there are an estimated 196,000 Holocaust survivors remaining. It’s a drop of 20-25% from five years ago (240,000-250,000), an even bigger decrease from approximately 300,000 just a decade ago. As many die and the remainder age, their medical and other needs increase. Since 2023, other challenges have also increased with many suffering poverty and, in Israel, living through the Hamas massacre of October 7, 2023, and the war that followed. Many are reliving the memories of traumas of their early lives in their final days.
Marie Nachmias blesses Israel. (YouTube/Chana Jenny Weisberg)
It's no secret that the Jewish people have preserved traditions going back thousands of years. But as a relatively new country celebrating just 71 years of independence, 71 years since the restoration of Jewish sovereignty to the land that God gave to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their descendants, it's incredible to be part of the unfolding traditions of the state of Israel as we observe our independence each year.
In seven short decades, Israel has thrived and prospered as God promised. Incredibly, Israel has created many new traditions that are as in stone as the ancient ones we celebrate as well. There are several pillars to Independence Day festivities each year including: back-to-back observance of Memorial Day immediately prior to Independence Day, the international Bible competition, local and national ceremonies, Israelis lighting up the barbecue and having festive meals together often in the same spot in a national park where entire extended families gather, and more.
One of the most incredible parts of these is the state celebration that is broadcast live on national TV. It is rehearsed for weeks and full of protocol that one would ascribe to a country many times older. The prime minister and many other leaders attend. Tickets are hard to come by. Like many such ceremonies, there's music, and it ends with fireworks. But the central pillar of the national ceremony is the lighting of 12 torches representing the 12 tribes of Israel. Lighting the torch is considered one of Israel's highest civilian honors.
This year, some of those who lit a torch included the team behind sending Israel's first spacecraft to the moon, the mothers of three boys kidnapped and murdered by Palestinian Arab terrorists in 2014, the leader of the Pittsburgh Jewish community that suffered an anti-Semitic massacre several months ago, a famous movie director who donated his son's organs after a horrible traffic accident and more. But the one who captured the heart of the nation was 92-year old great-great grandmother, Marie Nachmias, who went up on stage to light her torch—and prayed.
She began her words with the formula by which all torch lighters do, not by their title or what they've accomplished, but by their lineage, the way Jews do. "I am Marie Nachmias, the daughter of Shalom and Chana Sabach, of blessed memory."
Then the host interrupted the scripted remarks and interacted with her, live on national TV. Using the affectionate word that's a sign of respect for older women of her Tunisian origin, he said "Mamo, bless us, bless Israel."
And bless us is what she did. Marie raised her hands and eyes to heaven, and prayed from the heart, the heart of a woman whose life was never easy but always had something to give to others. While it's not common for Jews of North African decent, at 17, Marie fled Nazis hunting Jews in the streets during the German occupation of Tunisia.
As a young woman, she struggled through the early years of the state along with hundreds of thousands of others who sought refuge as Israel's population doubled in a decade. She's been privileged to live to see Israel prosper and exceed nine million residents.
"I bless the state of Israel, with all my heart, may God hear me ... may Israel continue rising and continue growing. And may no more soldiers fall in battle, oh please! With all my heart, the Jews, Arabs, Christians and Druze, so we will all be one nation, all ... created by God, may He give us peace, and next year—another 10 million Israelis!"
Then, as the host prompted her to the formal closing line that everyone says, she got flustered. Right there on national TV. It couldn't have been more real—or precious.
"And to the glory ... I am sorry, and I am nervous ... to the glory of the state of Israel!"
Interrupting her, the crowd, including the prime minister, rose and gave her a standing ovation. The spontaneous cheering increased when she blessed all of Israel, not just Jews but our Arab, Druze and Christian citizens as well. The prayer of an elderly Jewish great, great-grandmother inspired moment of national unity by breaking through traditional divisions in Israeli society.
But this was not scripted. It was genuine and embodied her life and why she was honored to light the torch to begin with.
Among the challenges she's seen included raising eight children, two of whom have died. In 1973, her son was wounded during the Yom Kippur War, which she attributes to her becoming a foster mother to dozens. "My son was in a combat unit and was wounded when he tried to rescue his commander. He was hospitalized for a long time. I took an oath and prayed that he get well, together with all the other soldiers. I vowed that if God gives me my son back, I'd be willing to do any mitzvah (commandment) or mission that is given to me," according to Ynet.
God heard her prayer, and her son recovered. He became a municipal social worker in their Galilee town. One day, he called her and said he had a little girl who needed a home. That's how it started.
The children she fostered were Jewish and Arab, with every kind of physical limitation and challenge. Eventually, she would foster children from around the country, and even from outside Israel's borders.
"They knew everywhere that she was willing to take in and raise any child. Her message was that every person was made in the image [of God], no matter their origin," her daughter Ricky told Ynet.
The committee that chose the torch-lighters singled her out as "a symbol of the immigrants who established Israeli society on a foundation of mutual solidarity and help to the needy, and of the thousands of foster families in Israel who opened their hearts to help children in crisis."
At the moment, "Mamo" was too excited to talk, her sincere prayer and the authenticity of the moment united Israelis across the nation. If it had been scripted, it couldn't have been better.
After a week with more than 1 million Israelis suffering nearly 700 rockets being fired at their communities from terrorists in Gaza, and the day before mourning nearly 28,000 Israelis whose lives were taken defending the state or in acts of terror, we all really needed a heavy dose of "Mamo" to bring us together with joy.
May God answer her prayers and bless us.
Jonathan Feldstein was born and educated in the U.S. and immigrated to Israel in 2004. He is married and the father of six. He is president of RunforZion.com. Throughout his life and career, he has been blessed by the calling to fellowship with Christian supporters of Israel and shares experiences of living as an Orthodox Jew in Israel. He writes a regular column for Standing With Israel at charismanews.com and other prominent web sites. He can be reached at firstpersonisrael@gmail.com.
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That's the message I woke up to Wednesday morning from a friend on the West coast. A few minutes later I learned that our mutual friend, Ossie Mills, had died suddenly at 58. We chatted about Ossie, how I got to know him through a unique project he was running to bring Christians to Israel, how it was in fact Ossie who introduced us. And we consoled one another.
Fifteen hours later, my day ended with sharing news and memories about the untimely death of another great man whose life's work was about connecting Christians to Israel. I spent the last hours of the day coordinating rides to his funeral which, according to Jewish tradition, would take place the next day.
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein died in Jerusalem, a place that was dear to his heart and where he moved after spending most of his life in the U.S. He was an Orthodox rabbi; a devoted husband, father and grandfather; and the visionary founder of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. Part of his being a visionary was who he was, an out-of-the-box thinker and passionate Jew and Zionist. And part of it was his being literally among the pioneers of building bridges among Christians from the Jewish side.
For nearly four decades, Rabbi Eckstein built a means for Christians to understand a biblical imperative to express their support for Israel. Over the years, the IFCJ, under his leadership raised more than $1.3 billion. The good that has been done through this, over nearly two generations, will last for generations. That's not just platitudes, it's fact.
Countless Israelis and Jews in distant countries have benefited from Rabbi Eckstein's vision and commitment. Many never knew, and never will know, that they were helped because of him and the international network of support, the fellowship, he created. No one had a greater heart for Israel than Rabbi Eckstein, but his heart suddenly stopped this week. Filling this void will be hard.
Like many out-of-the box visionaries, Rabbi Eckstein was not a stranger to controversy. From a Jewish perspective, especially when he started, reaching out and embracing Christians was bold. If not challenging Jewish traditions as an Orthodox rabbi, he challenged Jewish discomfort and attitudes about Christians. Just two generations after the Holocaust, it was nearly unheard of for any significant public expression of care or concern about Israel and the Jewish people coming from Christians. Most Jews remained untrusting of ulterior motives, and thousands of years of history and baggage that left Jews persecuted in the name of "the church."
Rabbi Eckstein broke many of those barriers down and sowed the soil that allowed many others—Jews and Christians—to embrace the importance of mutual fellowship and support.
I am privileged to be one of those he inspired. I consider him a mentor in many ways. When God called me to be a bridge between Jews and Christians in a small church in Cleveland, Tennessee, I had never heard of Rabbi Eckstein. In fact, I didn't know there were others who were doing what he was doing, and what I had just been called to do.
Before I moved to Israel, I wrote to Rabbi Eckstein seeking his counsel. We had the privilege to connect a number of times, in Israel and different parts of the U.S. Or, I should say, I had the privilege. It was important to me that, on multiple occasions, he affirmed my work was important. Once he asked me, "Why are you not working for us?"
While I never was his employee or immediate partner, we connected often enough that I'm sure he knew that I was in fact working "for us" in the broader Jewish-Christian bridge building sense. On one of the many trips we each made throughout the U.S., we ended up spending Shabbat in the same community together. I had the dual privilege of seeing him "on," masterfully speaking with no notes, to a crowd of Jews about why what he was doing was important. And on quieter moments that weekend, we engaged in personal banter about more important things such as our family, his recently deceased father and why we each did what we were doing.
Rabbi Eckstein's fingerprints are truly all over Israel. The national media tributes to him affirm that. His presence will be felt for some time, albeit without his soothing voice. And for some time, visitors will note his joyous face upon arrival and departure in IFCJ ads though the jet-bridges at Ben Gurion Airport. A bridge builder indeed.
Why I am doing what I am doing was underscored to me today, vividly.
Around a recent unremarkable mid-50th birthday, I pondered a serious life and death issue, for me at least. Neither my father, my grandfather nor my great- grandfather lived to see 60. Each died from something different, but hereditary all the same: cancer, heart disease and anti-Semitism. I know there are things I can do to prevent the possibility of some of these, but ultimately, I believe my destiny is in God's hands.
So, on the occasion of my unremarkable birthday I prayed about what my legacy would be, whether I made it out of my 50s or not. As I learned from Rabbi Eckstein that Shabbat we spent together, the first answer to that is my family. Being blessed with a grandson now, this part of my legacy took on a new dimension.
Professionally, I have done many wonderful and even outstanding things on behalf of some good and important organizations. I spend most of my waking days working. Yet, I realized that my professional legacy would "just" be the sum of a variety of jobs. That wasn't good enough. So I started my own organization, runforzion.com, to address building bridges between Jews and Christians from a new approach. Not to duplicate or compete, and certainly not to look at Christians as a faith-based ATM with some just trying to get money out. On one of my recent trips to the U.S., after hearing about what I am doing, someone commented, "Oh, you mean like Rabbi Eckstein."
Of course I could never do what he did and would never have the hubris to think I could. But as an inheritor of the Jewish tradition that he pioneered, I have joined a growing number of Jews who actively embrace working with Christians, not to appease a boss wants to raise more money, but for the value and importance of these relations. To fellowship.
Pondering the early death of a friend and mentor the same day, the reason for my doing what I am doing has never been more evident. I don't need a statue or a street named after me to have a meaningful legacy. I just want to do good, and do good in a way that will outlive me and continue beyond my time on earth. If God gives me 67 years to do His work as he gave to Rabbi Eckstein, I want to make the most out of it. If I get that long, not only will I have spent about as much time building bridges as he did, but I know I can achieve a meaningful legacy. As he did.
Many Jews don't understand the concept of fellowship as Christians do. I pray that this will inspire more good Christians to work with and embrace people like me, and for more Jews to do the same. To truly fellowship together. I don't pretend to be his successor, but our work building bridges is important. Whether this is your calling as it is mine and it was his, or not, please join me.
Jonathan Feldstein was born and educated in the U.S. and immigrated to Israel in 2004. He is married and the father of six. He is president of RunforZion.com. Throughout his life and career, he has been blessed by the calling to fellowship with Christian supporters of Israel and shares experiences of living as an Orthodox Jew in Israel. He writes a regular column for Standing With Israel at charismanews.com and other prominent web sites. He can be reached at firstpersonisrael@gmail.com.
Great Resources to help you excel in 2019! #1 John Eckhardt's "Prayers That..." 6-Book Bundle. Prayer helps you overcome anything life throws at you. Get a FREE Bonus with this bundle. #2 Learn to walk in the fullness of your purpose and destiny by living each day with Holy Spirit. Buy a set of Life in the Spirit, get a second set FREE.
