Frieda's miracle

Frieda Roos van Hessen was born into a Jewish family in Amsterdam. They were not practising Jews: Frieda had been to synagogue only once, for her brother's wedding. But they knew they were Jews.

Frieda had a beautiful singing voice, and decided to become a singer. She trained at Amsterdam Conservatoire, and was soon performing to packed houses. She was chosen to sing the lead in the Dutch version of Disney's Snow White. She was a soloist in a performance of Verdi's Requiem for the Dutch royal family.

Then the Germans invaded Holland. As a Jew, Frieda was forbidden to perform for non-Jewish audiences.

One day a car pulled up at the house where they were staying. Her parents were arrested and taken away. They died in Auschwitz.

Frieda hid in the house and was not discovered. That night, she fled for her life. For the next four years, she hid in eight different locations. She escaped Nazi soldiers eight times. Once she was arrested, then set free again in miraculous circumstances. At one time she lived for months in one room.

Then came the news: the war was over. There was dancing in the streets.

After the war, she met a pastor, who sent a German woman to see her. The woman told her stories of Jesus. "I thought you were an intelligent person," said Frieda. "How can you believe all this nonsense?"

The woman asked her to read Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22. Alone, she read Isaiah 53 and understood not a word. She began to read Psalm 22 and came to the verse which says "they pierced my hands and my feet." She let out a yell. "That's Jesus!" she said. She went back to Isaiah 53. She understood every word. "How could I have lived all these years without this?" she said. "It was like coming out of a dark hole into the light."

She was converted instantly through reading the Old Testament.

Frieda, who lives today in the United States, is now 99 years old, and still active. Her aim: to show the power of the love of Jesus.

Next Tuesday is not only the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, but also Holocaust Remembrance Day. You can read about it here and here.

You can see Frieda's testimony, complete with photographs and recordings, here.
          

Establishing the kingdom (4)

The Bible says that Jesus will return to earth when the Jews are ready to receive Him, to deal with His enemies and set up His kingdom.

(If anyone tells you that God has washed His hands of the Jews, take no notice. It isn't true. Look at Rev 21:10 - 14, which tells how at the end of time the New Jerusalem comes down from heaven:

And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,

having the glory of God. And her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone, clear as crystal,

Also she had a great and high wall with twelve gates, and twelve angels at the gates, and names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel:

three gates on the east, three gates on the north, three gates on the south, and three gates on the west.

Now the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

The names of the 12 tribes of the children of Israel, and the names of the 12 apostles of the Lamb.

If people tell you that God has finished with the Jews, ask them what the names of the 12 tribes of Israel are doing on the gates of the New Jerusalem.)

The glories of Christ's kingdom are described in many places in the Old Testament, for instance Micah 4:1 - 3:

Now it shall come to pass in the latter days
  That the mountain of the Lord's house
 Shall be established on the top of the mountains,
  And shall be exalted above the hills;
And peoples shall flow to it.

Many nations shall come and say,
  "Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
To the house of the God of Jacob;
  He will teach us his ways,
And we shall walk in his paths."
  For out of Zion the law shall go forth,
And the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

He shall judge between many peoples,
  And rebuke strong nations afar off,
They shall beat their swords into ploughshares,
  And their spears into pruning-hooks;
Nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
  Neither shall they learn war any more.

We are told to pray that His kingdom will come (Matt 6:10). We are told that His is the kingdom, and the power and the glory (Matt 6:13).

The first five verses of Psalm 2 tell us how the kings and rulers of the earth will seek to shake off God and His anointed, but God will hold them in derision. Then comes verse 6, surely one of the most reassuring verses in Scripture:

"Yet I have set my King
On my holy hill of Zion."

Establishing the kingdom (3)

The Bible says that the Jews are going to become a believing nation. How is this going to happen?

The Bible says there is going to be what is known as the rapture:

For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.

Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.  1 Thess 4:16, 17.

After the rapture will come the tribulation, a time of terrible suffering for those who remain on the earth. The Old Testament calls it the time of Jacob's trouble (Jer 30:6 - 9; Matt 24:15 - 28; Rev 7:13 - 17).

There may be a number of reasons for the tribulation. But one reason certainly is to bring the Jews back to God. How will they come?

In that day a fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness  Zech 13:1. What fountain is this?

There is a fountain filled with blood,
 Drawn from Immanuel's veins;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
 Lose all their guilty stains.

They will wash as Gentile believers have washed, trusting for forgiveness in the shed blood of the Jewish Messiah. See Zech 12:10 - 14. Then Jesus will return. Jesus cannot come back to earth until the Jews are ready to receive Him. Which seems like a very good reason to pray for the Jewish people. (In speaking of His return, I do not speak of the rapture, which could occur at any time. He does not come to earth at the rapture, but appears in the clouds to take His people home.)


His return is recorded in Rev 19:11 - 16:

Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And he who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war.

His eyes were like a flame of fire, and on is head were many crowns. He had a name written that no man knew except himself.

He was clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and his name is called the Word of God.

And the armies in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, followed him on white horses.

Now out of his mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it he should strike the nations. And he himself will rule them with a rod of iron. He himself treads the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.

And he has on his robe and on his thigh a name written:

KING OF KINGS

AND LORD OF LORDS.

He will come back in power and great glory. All who have refused His forgiveness will find judgment. Those who went to be with Him at the rapture will return with Him. He will set up His kingdom on the earth.

What days!

Establishing the kingdom (2)

When the Jews rejected Jesus, what did Jesus do? Note what He said in Matt 23:37 - 39:

"O, Jerusalem, Jerusalem," - He was talking to the Jews - "the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!

"See! Your house is left to you desolate;

"for I say to you, you shall see me no more" - note He did not say you shall see Me no more forever - "you shall see me no more till" - there's an 'until'! - "till you say, 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!'"

Jesus was saying that the Jews would see Him no more until they were prepared to welcome Him.

After the Jews rejected Jesus, God opened the gates of salvation to the Gentiles (Rom 11:11). The good news is that after the fulness of the Gentiles is come to faith, then God will turn again to His Jewish people:

For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that hardening in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.

And so all Israel will be saved.  Rom 11:25, 26 (but read the rest of the chapter).

Israel is going to become a believing nation. When God turns again to the Jewish people, they will be ready to welcome Him. The Jews must come to faith, because of God's promises. God cannot forget His promises.

Establishing the kingdom (1)

Jesus didn't come to the Gentiles: He came to the Jews. "He came to his own, and his own did not receive him" (John 1:11).

When Jesus sent out the 12 disciples, He told them: "Do not go into the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter a city of the Samaritans. But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as you go, preach, saying, 'The kingdom of heaven is at hand'" (Matt 10: 5 - 7).

Mark tells how a Syro-Phoenician woman came to Jesus asking for healing for her daughter. Jesus told her: "Let the children be filled first, for it is not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the little dogs" (Mark 7:27). Why did He say that? Because she was a Gentile. (It's only fair to point out that she got what she asked, but Jesus made it clear His ministry was not to the Gentiles.) 

The Jews were God's chosen nation, through whom He wanted to reveal Himself to the world.

And when Jesus came to the Jews, what did He preach? He preached the kingdom of heaven. "Jesus began to preach and to say, 'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.'" (Matt 4: 17). "Now Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom" (v23).

Look at Matthew 13. "Another parable he put forth to them, saying: 'The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field'" (v24). "Another parable he put forth to them, saying: 'The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed'" (v31). "Another parable he spoke to them: 'The kingdom of heaven is like leaven'" (v33). "The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom" (v38). "The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all things that offend" (v41). "Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father" (v43)."Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field" (v44). "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking beautiful pearls" (v45). "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet that was cast into the sea" (v47). The kingdom is mentioned more than 50 times in Matthew's Gospel alone.

Jesus came to bring the kingdom. But the Jews couldn't have the kingdom, because they rejected the King.

The common people received Him gladly. Crowds followed Him. The Old Testament contained many prophecies of the Messiah. Jesus fulfilled all the ones that had to be fulfilled at that time. He did what He could to certify His Messiahship. He performed miracles they believed only the Messiah could perform. But the religious leaders of the Jews were another matter. They didn't like His message and they didn't want the man.

The Jews' final rejection came in Matthew 12:

Then one was brought to him who was demon-possessed, blind and mute; and he healed him, so that the blind and mute man both spoke and saw.

And all the multitudes were amazed and said, "Could this be the son of David?"

But when the Pharisees heard it they said, "This fellow does not cast out demons except by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons."  Matt 12:22 - 24. 

So when the Jews rejected Jesus, what did He do?

'Help me!' he cried - and then. . .

Mechanic Bruce Van Natta was lying underneath a massive truck when the jack gave way and the truck fell on his stomach with the loudest noise he had ever heard.

Blood shot into his throat. He coughed and spat out a large blob. He was bleeding internally from major arteries severed in five places.

"Lord, help me!" he shouted out, twice. He saw that the left hand side of his body was only one inch thick, thinner than the thickness of his spine. The right hand side of his body was two inches thick.

The driver of the truck looked at Bruce and went into shock. The driver managed to call the emergency services and replace the jack, but only in an unstable position under one of the truck's springs.

Bruce pulled as hard as he could on the truck's bumper to pull himself clear, but passed out. "My spirit left my body," he said, "and went up in the roof of the garage. My spirit was up there looking down, at perfect peace."

Then he saw, he said, a huge angel on either side of his body, dressed in white. Their arms were underneath the bumper.

An air ambulance arrived, but could not winch his body up because there was no ambulance equipment below.

A woman knelt next to him and began slapping his face. "Bruce Van Natta, open your eyes," she said. "Bruce Van Natta, open your eyes." His spirit shot back into his body and he felt excruciating pain. Every time he closed his eyes, his spirit left his body and began to travel down a tunnel. Then the woman slapped his face and his spirit returned.

"Do you want to live?" she said. "Do you have a wife and kids?" He remembered his wife and four children. I can't die, he thought. I've got to be here for my wife and family. He decided he had to keep his eyes open.

It was more than two hours before he was in hospital. Three doctors attending to him got into a disagreement. The CT scan showed he should be dead, but his heart was still beating. "We couldn't make sense of it," said one. "We didn't know what to make of it."

They repaired the major arteries but attempted nothing more, convinced he would die within hours. Twelve hours later, his heart was still beating.

Bruce had five operations in the next 12 months, then 18 months of rehab. But there was still a problem. The average adult has 20 feet of small intestine. All but three feet of Bruce's small intestine had been destroyed, and that three feet wasn't working properly. The doctors could feed him intravenously for only a year and then he would die.

A man named Bruce Carlson heard of the problem from a prayer chain and woke up two mornings in a row feeling he had to go to the hospital to pray for Bruce.

When he arrived, he laid his hand on Bruce's forehead and prayed for the small intestine to grow. Bruce said he felt an "electric shock" and heard a snap. He could feel his intestines rolling around.

X-rays and CT scans showed his small intestine had grown an additional seven feet in answer to prayer.

Bruce left his business and is now engaged in full-time Christian ministry.

You can read the full story here.

Does God answer prayer?

Have you ever prayed and felt like God didn't answer prayer any more? Bill Courtemanche was like that.

He had had a faith as a youngster, but had had a problem with alcohol, and had drifted away. One day a gun went off near his ear. He became completely deaf in one ear and lost 40 per cent of his hearing in the other. He learned to lip read, but still had problems.

He rededicated his life to Christ, and felt his faith had grown strong over the years since. But then there were problems in his local church. A 36-year-old mother died of cancer. Things continued to go wrong.

Bill knelt at the front of the church, pouring out his heart to God. "Lord, what is going on? Why do we have all this suffering? Do you even hear our prayers?" Suddenly he felt a terrible burning in his ears.

"I felt like my head was on fire, like it was about to explode," he said. He went home and slept for a while. When he woke up, the burning and nausea were gone. Then he noticed. After 17 years, he could hear with both ears.

He went to an audiologist, who told him there was nothing wrong with his ears.

You can read the full story here.

Later, Bill's mother was found dead in her bathroom. Paramedics worked on her and took her to hospital, where her heart stopped a second time. She was placed on life support.

Bill sat by her bed, praying for her, reading to her and "doing the things you do when you don't know what to do."

He explained his dilemma to a chaplain. His mother was technically brain dead. He did not want to say yes to removing her life support and let her die, but she was only alive because she was hooked up to machines.

The chaplain said life support machines were man-made and only God could terminate a life. If she was meant to go home she would die, and if she wasn't, she wouldn't.

They fixed Saturday to remove her life support. On Saturday, they told Bill to kiss her goodbye. When he did, she woke up. The doctor said it was a miracle.

It turned out that although she was supposed to be brain dead, she had still managed to hear.

She told Bill "You know the most annoying thing? You know how hard it is to sleep when someone sits there all night reading to you?"

God loves to answer prayer. Don't limit Him.