Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news and prophecy.
Donate to our 'Protectors of Jerusalem' - The Temple Mount Sifting Project - and we will give a 3-month Trial Subscription to a recipient of your choice.
In addition, we are offering you a selection of gifts when you sign up for an annual subscription of Israel Today Magazine!
And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you; and ye shall return every man unto his possession, and ye shall return every man unto his family.
We learn in today's verse of the significance of the jubilee (50th) year. Every seven cycles of seven years, God commanded that on the 50th year, the Land of Israel, the Jewish people and all the farming animals be allowed to rest from their work and take the time to rejoice over Hashem and the Torah. This year, we are celebrating a very special anniversary in the history of Jerusalem: 50 years since the reunification of Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria after the IDF reconquered the Land in 1967. To celebrate this momentous occasion, Israel365 and HaYovel invite you for a 2 week experience to celebrate the miraculous liberation of Israel’s heartland. This unique and very affordable educational journey will introduce you to the Land and the People of Israel on the once in a lifetime occasion of Jerusalem’s Jubilee.
Be inspired by the stories of men who have stood on the mountains of Israel, through the warm summer months and the harsh winters. Won't you join us in restoring the Land of Israel?
In the story of Purim, God selected Esther to be placed in the royal Palace to be able to play an integral role in saving the Jewish nation from the evil decree of Haman. All that Esther had endured in her life, was in order to bring her to the specific point in time in which she would fulfil her destiny of becoming a Jewish heroine. So too, Nations around the world are now beginning to pay attention to thier role in history and specifically to thier relationship with Israel. Now is the time to read the scroll of Esther and learn how you can make the most of such a time as this.
The staff and volunteers at HaYovel in Har Bracha (Mount of Blessings) just outside of Jerusalem spend endless hours toiling the soil of the Holy Land in order to restore the beauty of Israel and fulfill Biblical prophecy.
We apologize for the error in the translation for yesterday's verse. It should have read "And the chiefs of Yehudah shall say in their heart: ‘The inhabitants of Yerushalayim are my strength through Hashem of hosts their God.’"
If you enjoy your Israel365 daily email newsletter, please consider donating to one of our causes or buying products from our store and blessing the Land and the People of Israel.
Thank You to our latest Tree Donors
"Todah Rabbah" to Carolyn Wallace from Ohio; Deborah Tarrant from North Carolina; Virginia Billing from the UK; Cynthia Morrison from Georgia.
"Todah Rabbah" to Linda Borenstein from New York; Harold and Carole Wray from Ohio; Michael Schachter from the UK; Misty Lustila from Minnesota. Bring a Joyous Purim to Israel's Neediest »
Thank you to our Israel365 Store Customers
"Todah Rabbah" to Elenita Vargas from Ontario, Canada; Ken Allensworth from California; Tanna Clay from Texas; Susan Marie Reitsma from Ohio. Shop the Israel365 Store »
It’s great to hear from you and make new friends from all over the world. Please send me an email and let me know how you are enjoying Israel365 (don’t forget to say where you are from!).
My heart has always been in Israel but my mind has not caught up to my heart, dreamed of coming to the city of Jerusalem but have never been able to get there for financial reasons. I have had my eyes opened by the things I have learned from the Jewish perspective of the Word of God which man has turned upside down in the USA. Taking God out of everything only increases hate and envy,strife, killings, and the like. But my eyes are not on the things of this world but the glory of the New World to come. Thank you so much for your enlightenment of the precious word of God. Please keep sending me your opening of the Word up. May God Bless Israel. -Sincerely Gary Gamble Big Spring, Texas
In several locations throughout Judea and Samaria (the so-called “West Bank”), local Palestinians reportedly bought and distributed candies to commemorate the attack.
In Gaza, Hamas issued official statements glorifying the murderous action and sanctifying the attacker, a young Arab man from the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabal Mukaber.
Thousands gathered in the streets of Gaza in celebration.
“The message of our Islamic party Hamas is a message of encouragement and support for every jihadi who carries out an attack that puts an end to the acts of the Zionist enemy,” said Hamas leader Fathi Hamad.
The victims of the attack were mostly young female soldiers who were on an educational outing.
The terrorist, Fadi Ahmad Al-Qunbar, apparently decided spontaneously to carry out the attack.
His sister had nothing but praise for Al-Qunbar’s actions: “Praise be to Allah that he became a martyr. It’s the most beautiful martyrdom.”
The Al-Qunbar family on Monday attempted to erect a mourning tent for their fallen “martyr,” but were stopped by Israeli police.
Israeli government officials put the blame squarely on the Palestinian Authority, pointing to ongoing incitement, much of it religious in nature, in the Palestinian education system.
“We should have full control over the education system in the east Jerusalem neighborhoods,” demanded Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely (Likud).
PHOTO: Celebrating the terrorist murder of Israelis is a common practice in many Palestinian communities (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)
Want more news from Israel? Click Here to sign up for our FREE daily email updates
We should all celebrate these great women of faith.
March is Women's History Month, so for the next few weeks we will be hearing a lot about women inventors, humanitarians, entertainers and entrepreneurs who are changing today's world. We will probably also hear a lot about Hillary Clinton and her chances of shattering the glass ceiling in American politics—but I'm not convinced that all the great women heroes of the past would be cheering for her political views.
When I think about the empowered women of my generation I'm reminded that they stand on the shoulders of brave women pioneers who didn't have today's advantages. We should especially be grateful for the Christian women who defied religious and cultural traditions—and sometimes paid with their lives—to free African slaves, protect children from abuse, denounce injustice, preach the gospel in foreign nations, heal the sick and win women the right to vote.
This is certainly not an exhaustive list, but here are 12 women I'm celebrating this month:
1. Mary Magdalene – She was the pioneer of pioneers and the forerunner of all forerunners. As a passionate follower of Jesus, and the first person—male or female—to be commissioned to preach the gospel, she proved to a male-dominated, first century-world that God can and does use women to do His work.
2. Jarena Lee (1783-1855) – Authorized to preach in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, she traveled hundreds of miles on foot to share the gospel. When people questioned a woman's right to preach, she told them: "If the man may preach, because the Savior died for him, why not the woman, seeing he died for her also?" She was the first black woman in the United States to publish an autobiography.
3. Sojourner Truth (1797-1883) – Born a slave in New York—and later sold to a second owner for $100—she eventually became an abolitionist. In her most famous speech, "Ain't I a Woman?" delivered in Ohio in 1851, she demanded equal rights for both women and blacks. She became a Methodist in 1843 and felt God calling her to ministry. "The Spirit calls me, and I must go," she wrote. During one speech in Boston she admitted that she once hated white people, but that after she met Jesus she was filled with love for everyone.
4. Phoebe Palmer (1807-1874) – A Methodist revivalist, Palmer and her husband, Walter, helped fuel the holiness movement in the mid-1880s, which led to the Pentecostal revival. Although she and Walter were well-known preachers, she was the more popular speaker at a time when women preachers were an oddity. In one of her books, The Promise of the Father, she called for the acceptance of women in ministry. In 1850 she also founded a mission for alcoholics in a New York City slum.
5. Fanny Crosby (1820-1915) – Even though she was blind from birth, this "queen of gospel song writers" composed more than 8,000 hymns. Raised as a Baptist, her most famous songs include "Blessed Assurance," "Rescue the Perishing" and "Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior." She always prayed that her hymns would bring people to Christ, and she believed her songs were divinely inspired. Some theologians criticized her for "feminizing" church music.
6. Catherine Booth (1829-1890) – At a time when people threw eggs at women for speaking in public, this brave firebrand preached on the streets of London and ignited a gospel revival movement to help the poor. Not only did she establish the Salvation Army with her husband, William, she also carved out a path for women ministers by writing Female Ministry: Women's Right to Preach in 1859 and by mentoring hundreds of "Hallelujah Lassies," women who served as evangelists in the Salvationist movement.
7. Mary Slessor (1848-1915) – This short, red-headed girl from Scotland was inspired by a Presbyterian pastor to go to the mission field at a time when women were discouraged from such work. She ended up in a dangerous region of Calabar (modern Nigeria), and she established a mission station among tribal people by traveling to them in a canoe. Her work laid the foundations for the widespread growth of Christianity in Nigeria today. With her characteristic spunk, she opposed African traditions and successfully stopped the ritualistic killing of twins in Calabar.
8. Amy Carmichael (1867-1951) – This brave Irish Presbyterian sailed to India and founded the Dohhnavur Mission—which pulled hundreds, if not thousands, of children out of ritual prostitution. Known to the children as "Amma," which means "Mother," she dressed as an Indian and even dyed her skin with coffee to fit into the local culture. When a British woman asked Carmichael what missionary life was like, she simply wrote: "Missionary life is simply a chance to die."
9. Ida Robinson (1891-1946) – She was an early Pentecostal pioneer ordained in the United Holy Church of America and appointed to pastor a small church in Philadelphia in 1919. A few years later she felt God gave her an assignment to "loose the women" so more females could be ordained in ministry. Thus she founded the Mount Sinai Holy Church of America, which became a network of 84 churches by the time of her death in Florida.
10. Aimee Semple McPherson (1890-1944) – Born in Canada, she preached the gospel to her dolls as a child. But after she began preaching throughout the United States in the 1920s and 1930s—often under a large tent—she was more popular than evangelist Billy Sunday. People loved "Sister Aimee" because she used drama and theatrics to make the Bible come alive. When she built her church, Angelus Temple, in Los Angeles in 1923, people came from all over the nation to hear her—including Hollywood stars. She eventually founded the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel, which today has more than 8 million members worldwide.
11. Corrie ten Boom (1892-1983) – The daughter of a Dutch clockmaker, she led a rather boring life until Nazi forces invaded Holland. At that point, Corrie and her Christian family began hiding Jews in their home to protect them from German death camps. But their work was exposed, and she was sent to Ravensbruck, a women's labor camp in Germany. Her horrific experiences there prepared her for a worldwide ministry that took her to 60 countries. She preached about forgiveness and Christ's love well into her 80s.
12. Gladys Aylward (1902-1970) – This simple British woman wanted to go to China as a missionary, but she was told that women could only serve as teachers or nurses—and she was neither. So without official backing she used her life savings to buy a one-way ticket to Shanxi Province. Once she got to China, she became an official "foot inspector," helping Chinese officials enforce a new law against the cruel "foot-binding" of Chinese girls. This led to her work among orphans. Her brave attempt to protect children from the Japanese invasion of China was memorialized in the 1958 film The Inn of the Sixth Happiness—a film that Aylward hated because it glamorized her very simple life.
It was Catherine Booth who said: "If we are to better the future we must disturb the present." We need more women today who will disturb the status quo. I pray that this year's celebration of Women's History Month will inspire a new generation of women to rise up with holy courage.
J. Lee Gradyis the former editor of Charisma. You can follow him on Twitter at leegrady. He is the author of several books including 10 Lies the Church Tells Women, 10 Lies Men Believe, Fearless Daughters of the Bible and The Holy Spirit Is Not for Sale. You can learn more about his ministry, The Mordecai Project, atthemordecaiproject.org.
NEW from CHARISMA:Do you want to encounter the Holy Spirit and hear God speak to you? Increase your faith, discover freedom, and draw near to God! Click Here
Did you enjoy this blog? Click here to receive it by email.
