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Fighting For Faith, Family & Freedom
Sunday, October 15, 2023
To: Friends & Supporters
From: Carol Bauer
As you know, my wife, Carol, prepares a monthly prayer alert. I hope you will share Carol's thoughts with your friends and fellow worshipers. Thank you for taking an interest in her monthly devotion. -- Gary
The last eight days have felt surreal, almost like an out of body experience. Living here in the “land of the free and the home of the brave,” it is difficult to imagine what it must feel like to live in Israel right now.
If you are like us, you know people who live in Israel, have relatives or friends there or have children serving in the U.S. military in the region. But for most of us, the atrocities being committed half a world away often make us close our eyes, turn away and think to ourselves, “This cannot be possible.”
The big problem is that this is real. It is happening. And it is happening in the Year of our Lord 2023.
As a civilization we may be blessed with Internet connections, Starlink, big hearts and deep pockets. But we are also seeing, almost in real time, widespread barbarism and savagery akin to a different era in world history. The juxtaposition of all our technological advances compared to the visceral hatred and a real 21st century killing machine could not be more stark.
When I was growing up, one of the books many of us read as teens was The Diary of a Young Girl. It was the story of the young Jewish girl, Anne Frank, whose family was hidden in the attic by a Christian family in Amsterdam for over two years before their arrest in 1944. She and her sister died in a German concentration camp months before the war in Europe was over.
As a teen like Anne, it was hard to read and nearly impossible to imagine the depravity she experienced. And, it did prompt the reader to wonder what they would have done in a similar situation. Would I have bravely harbored a whole family in my house knowing that if they were found I, too, would be killed?
It is a timeless question, one that tests our faith and courage. But the reader had the luxury of knowing that era was gone and civilized society was now pledging “Never Again.”
Our children, now all parents themselves, were similarly challenged by Elie Wiesel’s famous book, Night. His was an autobiographical novel about the time he and his father spent in Auschwitz and Buchenwald. It is a horrific description of his life coming of age in a concentration camp, while his father withered before his eyes.
I know our children, and perhaps yours, too, were deeply affected by the book, which is a description of man’s inhumanity to man. It was hard to get your arms around life as he described it.
But again, they had the luxury of an even greater distance in time from World War II, and could rest in what we all thought was a moral commitment that such atrocities would never happen again. Wars would not end, we knew. But weren’t there basic rules of war to which the world’s civilizations could ascribe?
This past weekend we learned again the hard and difficult truth that the simmering hatred toward the Jewish people was not isolated to individual terrorist incidents, but, in fact, was organized, precise, widespread, well-financed and seemed to represent much of the Arab world. Sadly, some of the financing has come from our tax money, as the Biden Administration made stupid decisions that provided funds to Islamic radicals.
There is no end to the vile and depraved inhumane acts committed against Israeli families, from little babies to the elderly and disabled. Hard as it is to comprehend in the year 2023, the world finds itself in the midst of another era in which God’s covenant people are being singled out for the vilest forms of torture and death imaginable not on a battlefield, but because they are Jews. And, because of social media, we all see the horror.
Now, we are seeing new evidence of Jew-hatred right here in the United States, including at some of the most “elite” universities in America. It’s not “Never Again.” It’s Again. May we as individuals and may the American church not be found wanting.
Pray for the people of Israel, who have lost loved ones, whose family and friends are being held hostage, or who have sons and daughters in the IDF who have been called up for duty. For all of them, their lives will be changed forever as their homeland goes on a war footing to fight for its right to exist as the only Jewish nation in the world. Grant them a sense of peace in the midst of chaos.
Pray for the leaders of Israel, President Biden and other leaders in the region that Hamas would be isolated, lose financing and become a pariah on the world stage. Lord, penetrate the minds of all our leaders with the images of the evil acts of Hamas so that they will be driven to respond accordingly.
Prompt each of us to reach out to our Jewish friends and neighbors to offer prayers, support, a shoulder to cry on, an understanding ear and an affirmation of solidarity with them in these days of shock and demoralization. Remind them that we share a religious heritage. Give us the courage to confront anti-Semitism here in the United States.
Consider financially supporting the Israeli people with a donation to any number of trusted relief organizations, including:
Christians United For Israel
International Fellowship of Christians and Jews
Samaritan’s Purse
Finally, I encourage you to talk with your family and close friends about the importance of this moment. We no longer have the luxury of looking back and boldly stating, “Never Again.” The Again is here . . . now. Where will we stand?
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