The Friends of Israel in Action Jan/Feb 2024
Tikvah Team’s Global Footprint
If you’re interested in volunteering with The Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry (FOI), we now offer an outstanding program you can join that is making an impact around the world.
Last July, FOI launched the Tikvah Team. This global volunteer network consists of like-minded believers whom FOI trains to serve, support, and bless Jewish people with the love of the Messiah and to mobilize their own local churches to do the same.
Tikvah is the Hebrew word for “hope.” More than a wish, biblical hope is the eager expectation of good things to come. And we have many eager expectations for this new ministry.
To ensure the program’s success, we first formed the Tikvah Beta Team. Between February and June 2023, Christians from the United States, Canada, and Europe volunteered to help us develop a system to best organize, manage, and report the team’s efforts.
The Beta Team far exceeded our expectations. During those five months, 10 volunteers spent 300 hours ministering in their local Jewish communities and galvanizing their local churches.
A volunteer from Virginia traveled 50 miles each way to her local Jewish Community Center to assist the elderly, which helped her develop relationships with the Jewish ladies there. The Jewish community embraced her as a Christian; and each time she visited, she looked for opportunities to share the hope of Christ within her.
Another volunteer in Germany, a Bible college graduate, assisted an FOI Church Ministries representative with reading, studying, and reviewing books for presentations that teach German churches biblical truth about Israel.
Our volunteer from Minnesota partnered with her local Jewish community to deliver Passover gifts to Jewish families. She used these opportunities to instill in her family a love for Israel and God’s Chosen People by involving her children in her deliveries.
In Washington, a college student hosted a Bible study on campus. He taught the biblical significance of Israel and the Jewish people from the prophet Daniel, using FOI’s commentary on the book of Daniel, The Most High God by Dr. Renald Showers, as a resource. Through the Bible study, he seeks to inspire his church to serve the Jewish people.
Why must we train volunteers to love and support Israel and the Jewish people? Because FOI cannot do it alone. We need biblically minded Christians to stand alongside us in our mission. We aim to minister more effectively by training believers to become friends of Israel right where God has placed them.
Small acts from each volunteer add up to great hope for the Jewish people at a time when hope is sorely needed.
You can support the Tikvah Team and other FOI ministries like this around the world. Thank you for your prayers and financial support!
In Canada, please give here.
Reaching Poland With Living Bridges
For centuries, Poland represented the unofficial capital of Jewish life and culture in Europe. As a result of the great Jewish immigration in the region throughout the Middle Ages, millions of Jewish people settled in or near Poland, bringing their culture, religion, and distinct passions with them.
Following the Holocaust, Poland’s Jewish population sharply decreased and now numbers only a few thousand. Our team of workers in Poland recognizes how the Holocaust continues to afflict the country. FOI Poland stands against the cultural current of antisemitism shockingly prevalent in Eastern Europe, including in many Polish churches via Replacement Theology.
Our Polish team operates Living Bridges, an educational outreach to younger Poles to teach them about God’s love for and enduring promises to the Jewish people. Our workers take youth and school groups to the concentration camps in Poland, now serving as memorials to the staggering loss of Jewish lives during World War II.
Living Bridges also leads trips to Israel to teach college and seminary students why Christians should love and support Israel and the Jewish people. We use this opportunity to influence the next generation of Polish teachers and pastors and to instill in them a love for Jewish people that we hope will stem the tide of antisemitism and Replacement Theology in the church.
Through Living Bridges, our team enlists young Poles to help in our ministries. Throughout the country, many Jewish cemeteries have fallen into disrepair, due partly to the lack of Jewish people available to maintain them. Living Bridges brings together young volunteers to clean and repair these cemeteries. The Jewish community is deeply moved when Christians serve alongside them with genuine respect.
Our field representative Timothy Rabinek described the purpose of Living Bridges:
Understanding the unique connection of Jewish people to Eastern Europe, we want to make the most of the opportunities we have to share God’s love with Jewish people and change the perspectives of young people living in Poland. The first step is education, both historical and biblical. We can’t forget what has happened here. The Holocaust is part of our history; and in an age when the memory of this brutal crime is being forgotten or even denied, we must teach the truth.
We thank God for using Living Bridges to stir Polish hearts to love His Chosen People, and we pray He will continue to use our team’s efforts for His glory.
You can support our Polish team leading the ministry of Living Bridges and other FOI ministries like this around the world. Thank you for your prayers and financial support!
In Canada, please give here.
Photos: The Friends of Israel Archives
