Carelinks Reports - Israel, February 2010

Very often we find God calls us to His service in caring for or preaching to someone, when the hand of Providence has been at work for years previously, preparing them for their meeting with us. So it was in the case of SAMUEL whom we baptized in Tel Aviv, Israel. Samuel is a refugee from civil war in Africa, and got to Egypt. From there he dedicated himself to God and Jesus and decided to try to get to Israel and devote himself there to the service of the Lord Jesus. We made a 10 minute movie of him explaining how he walked 18 days across the desert from Egypt to Israel; 26 asylum seekers started the journey and eight of them died in the wilderness. Even as human interest, it’s an amazing story and we commend the movie to you- at www.aletheiacollege.net/video/samuel.html . They ate some bread once each day and drank water from wells used to water camels, on one occasion chasing the camels away to get to the water. They too were chased by the Egyptian military. They then had to climb the border fence and somehow somersault the barbed wire at the top. On arriving in Israel, Samuel made it his business to dedicate himself to God and find the Biblical purpose of life. God led him to Bible Basics, and he became convinced of the need for baptism. At his baptism we read from Romans 6 and from 1 Corinthians 10- Israel were baptized in the cloud and in the Red Sea. Water both sides of them, the cloud [also water] above them- they were as it were immersed in water. And so the familiar yet powerful parallel develops. Life after baptism is as Samuel’s journey through the Sinai scrub; he has been there physically, and can see how all that happened to him was a living parable of redemption in Christ.

Brother Samuel with his much marked Bible, and Bible Basics.

Samuel is very prayerful, and has written out his prayer requests to keep him focused upon them in prayer. Number seven was for God to teach him of His word and revive him spiritually- and Samuel feels this has been answered now in his learning the Gospel and being baptized. However, it’s very difficult working in Israel, as he has been refused leave to remain and along with many black people is continually hassled by the Immigration Police, as he comments in his other prayer requests. So please pray for our brother and others like him there.