February 2005

Shalom Friends -

As we experience cold and snowy days here in Michigan, we hope that your love for the Lord is growing warmer through your study of his word.

Discovering a "Real" Shepherd's Rod and Staff

Over 70 of you were able to join us this past month at our Fellowship Dinner, to hear Bruce's story of God's faithfulness on his trip to Africa. He told powerful stories of how God saved them from attackers and was very present with them as they traveled the back roads of Africa, looking for places that need "Living Water", both physically and spiritually.

If you were there, you heard about how while working with the Masai tribesmen, Bruce accidentally broke a taboo and offended a tribe elder, but made up with him by giving him his Swiss army knife. In return, the extremely grateful man gave Bruce his walking stick and war club, two very personal items that no Masai man is ever without. We made an interesting discovery this month. In the book, A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23 by W. P. Keller, the author recounts his experience as a shepherd in eastern Africa. He discusses ancient shepherding practices that are still used in the Middle East and Africa, and said that the Masai war club and walking stick were used in shepherding, and are what Psalm 23 refers to in the line, "...thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me." (Ps. 23:4). So if you were with us, you got to see what David was describing in his psalm.

This is one of many examples of biblical insights we've learned from our African brothers and sisters, whose cultures mingled with that of Israel many years ago, and often still live as in Bible times. It is interesting how God brings together a fascination with understanding the Bible's culture with a desire to serve him in Africa, and blesses us in this way.

En-Gedi Speaks in Dayton, OH

This past weekend, En-Gedi had our first traveling teaching engagement when we taught at Church of the Messiah in Dayton, Ohio. The church focuses its teaching on the scriptures in their Hebraic context, and studies the weekly portion of the Torah that Jesus studied and Jews still study even today. The staff of the Center for Judaic-Christian Studies (James Whitman and Dwight Pryor and others) are elders there. They invited us to be the teachers at their monthly Hebraic Heritage service, and to lead the Torah study this week. We spoke on several subjects from our book, Listening to the Language of the Bible. Bruce talked about shepherding and shared his rod and staff with them, and Lois spoke about some rich Hebrew words and discussed what we can learn about lashon hara (gossip) and "do not judge" from a Jewish perspective.

In a few weeks we will be teaching about the Passover Seder at some churches and schools in the area. Call soon if your group is interested in having us come speak about that.

Hebrew for Kindergarteners and 9-15 year olds

                                                                                   En-Gedi is now involved in a project
                                                                                   to give kindergarteners at South Side
                                                                                  Christian Elementary school in
                                                                                 Holland, Michigan a taste of Hebrew.
                                                                                 Mary Okkema, one of our staff, is
                                                                                working together with Lisa Vredevoogd
                                                                                and Rachel Kamm to research how to
                                                                       give children beginning lessons at their their
                                       peak time of language acquisition skills. They have spoken with
                                    some teachers from synagogues in Grand Rapids about materials
                                    they use. Jewish children begin learning Hebrew from this age, and
                                     as adults have an ability to read their scriptures with a much
                                    greater comprehension than through a translation. Wouldn't it be
wonderful if Christian children had a chance to learn biblical languages to give them skills they can use in Bible study throughout their lives!

The women are leading 6 sessions with two classes of kindergartners. Lisa Vredevoogd is organizing and leading the sessions, and teaching them letters, colors, body parts and some songs, and playing games in the language. She is using the Total Physical Response method to teach them verbs by having the children act them out. Their first week was met with great enthusiasm by the five-year-olds!

And here is news about a neat Hebrew opportunity
for young people in Grand Rapids, MI.

Ahavas Israel Conservative Synagogue is sponsoring a Biblical Hebrew class for 9-15 year olds for 10 weeks from March 2 to May 11, 2005. The class will meet on Wednesday afternoons from 2:30 - 4 PM at the synagogue (2727 Michigan NE, Grand Rapids, MI 49506). Cost is $125 for the 10 session series, due by February 18, 2005, with 10% discount for additional children of same family. For more information, contact 616 949-2840. Here is a quote from the class leaders:

"We will begin with the Hebrew alphabet, and move quickly into forming syllables and words. Activities will be age appropriate, including flash cards, body parts, songs and games. We do intend to have fun while learning. In addition, while we will be using classroom materials, we anticipate showing the students the Hebrew Bible in printed form and the Torah (the first five books) in its parchment form."

En-Gedi is not involved in this class, so please forward your questions to them. We do hope that those who will be blessed by it will be able to be a part of it.

Listening to the Language of the Bible in Chinese

We are now working with East Gates International, headed by Ned and Christina Graham, to translate Listening to the Language of the Bible into Chinese for distribution in Asia. The vision of that ministry is to work legally with the church in China to equip Christians with the tools they need to grow in their relationship with God and to reach out to others with the Good News. They were instrumental in getting the Bible to be legally printed and sold in China, and they work to translate and distribute Christian books there. We are currently working on a traditional Chinese version of the book, hopefully to be available by the end of the year.

If you have Asian friends who are interested in reading some Hebraic insights in their own language, please let them know about our project. Also, please point them toward the website of Diakonia, a Hebraic ministry in Hong Kong who translates En-Gedi's devotional articles into Chinese and Phillipino. They have found that there is quite an interest in Hebraic studies in Asian countries, who also think more like biblical cultures than we in the West do.

Laptops Needed for Africa

Access to sound biblical educational resources is difficult for pastors and teachers in developing countries in Africa. Our ministry would like to be able to make our material available to them via the Internet, but very few pastors, particularly in Uganda and Kenya, have their own computers, so they have to spend the time and money to travel to Internet café’s for access. Imagine how often you would do this if you had a hungry family to feed on top of that? Right now we have specifically 3 pastors in this situation.

If you have been thinking about upgrading, and have a used laptop 2 years old or less in good running condition, or if you would like to donate a new one, we can give you a receipt for your gift-in-kind and you can claim the tax deduction. But more than that, your gift will make a huge difference on the African continent. The pastors there have such a zeal for the Lord that as we equip them with good educational resources, the gospel will spread like wildfire! We could share many personal emotional experiences of what such a gift means to them.  Can you imagine getting a gift of a computer that would cost the equivalent of a year’s worth of wages? We will be able to connect you with the person receiving your computer, and you can correspond with them by email if you wish. You will surely meet them one day, either in this world or in the world to come! The computers need to be good laptops so that they will last a long time without the need for service (availability of which is very limited). Please spread the word and be praying about this.

A Poem About the Tsunami

En-Gedi knows that we should love God with all of our mind - our creative and emotional side, as well as our analytical side. We therefore have both poetry and art on the En-Gedi website to express our feelings toward God. Please let us know if you would like to contribute.

We would like to thank our friend Jean Schreur for writing and sharing this moving poem for the victims of the tsunami that occured on December 26, 2004.

May the Lord Bless you -

Lois Tverberg & Bruce Okkema
Directors, En-Gedi Resource Center