The Lord is Faithful

So I'm in Israel. I don't know a single person. It's my first day out of the school dorms. It's Sunday. That's the context.

On Saturday night, I prayed two things: 1) I know that there is an incongruity between the hope that I have in Christ and the way it affects my life, so I prayed that God would introduce me to people that would help me mature and better put in to practice the things that I say I believe. 2) I prayed that the Lord would provide me with someone in Jerusalem to live with.

There are so many things that I never thought to ask the Lord for. It has been fun to ask for things and watch him provide. Saturday night, I was walking down Hebron Rd. and saw a sign on a fence that said 24/7 (and a bunch of other stuff in Hebrew on a sign next to it). I knew that was a sign that some houses of prayer have used in the past, so I decided to check it out. Sure enough the Lord, in all of the huge city of Jerusalem, directed me to a house of prayer. While I was there, I worshiped with some American's, some Jews, a Swedish guy, and a Canadian. I have never been a part of seeing God's presence in all nations. It's incredible. Coming together with random people from all over the world and being united through his Spirit has given me a small picture of the unity there will be in heaven. One of the American's I met will introduce me to a man on the Mt. of Olives who rents rooms in his house to believers traveling through the land. I hope that Moshe will have a room for me.

Then on Sunday, through a weird and equally unplanned series of events I ended up at an Arab speaking church and enjoyed worship there. Afterword, I was desperately trying to introduce myself to people and make friends. That got me nowhere. Then this guy walks up behind me (the first guy to introduce himself to me) and said, "Hi I'm Paul. Are you doing anything? Oh. Do you want to walk around the city for awhile?" So we hung out and eventually made our way to his church in Bethlehem where I met some incredible believers who I can tell will be good friends. Paul also offered me a room in his house. I really want to live in Jersualem not Bethlehem, but I know that I have someone that I can live with any time I need a place. Praise God. In the States, it's so easy not to need anything. In another country, it's a little different.