Issue 1/2015 - Operation Exodus USA

Issue 1/2015
in this issue
What God Can Do pg.2
Through Our Obedience
Momentum is Growing pg.3
in the USA
Past Accomplishments, pg.4
Future Goals
Trusting in the pg.6
Faithfulness of Our God
A Love Story pg.7
Find us
in the
App Stores!
Know that the LORD your
God is God, the trusted
God who faithfully keeps
his covenant...
- Deuteronomy 7:9 ISV
A Christian ministry helping the Jewish people return to Israel
1
What God Can Do
Through Our Obedience
Debra Minotti
President
Operation Exodus USA
According to Holman’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary, a succinct definition of
biblical obedience is “to hear God’s Word and act accordingly.”
In Jerusalem during the first Gulf War in 1991, Gustav Scheller received
a call from God to bring the Jewish people home. “This is what the
Sovereign Lord says: “See, I will beckon to the nations, I will lift up my
banner to the peoples; they will bring your sons in their arms and carry
your daughters on their hips.” Isaiah 49:22 NIV
He said “Yes” to the commission. Why? Gustav’s motive was obedience
to His God, and subsequently Operation Exodus was birthed. As the
Lord continues to lift His banner, others in the Church from many different
denominations came alongside. As a result, during the last twenty-three
years our ministry, together with Operation Exodus International, has
brought by plane and by ship over 142,000 people to the land of Israel—
what an honor and a privilege.
Our primary motivation must always be to walk in sustained obedience to
God’s call and purposes for this ministry. We position ourselves through
intercession to hear His voice and follow His Word.
Our Purpose
We are called to
encourage and help
Jewish people return to
Israel and to proclaim
God’s purposes for
their return.
I believe that in the not-too-distant future, long-awaited biblical promises
will be fulfilled! Despite many challenges, including social, economic and
political pressures surrounding Israel and the Jewish people, God will
return the Jewish people to the Land in fulfillment of His Word. This will
happen through our obedience, prayers and unshakable commitment to
God. We will not conform, adapt or water down our primary call. We
must stay true and walk with the integrity of our purpose in love!
As we walk like Ruth, assisting Naomi back to Israel, there will be a
blessing for both Jew and Gentile, Israel will be strengthened, and we will
bless the heart of God.
Come join us; God is lifting His banner to you. We need your prayers and
financial support. Believe me—you will be blessed.
2
Momentum is Growing
in the USA
Pete Scheller
Director, Planning and Development
Operation Exodus USA
As one year turns to the next, many of us will have taken time to reflect
and look forward. We have been doing just that at Operation Exodus
USA.
Records, Milestones and Foundations
Momentum is growing in the USA—we set a new record, assisting over
400 immigrants in their return to Israel in 2014. In doing so, we passed
a significant milestone: 1,000 Jewish people helped from the USA since
our inception. Through your generosity we were also able to play an
important part in assisting the thousands of immigrants who fled Ukraine
following the Russian invasions.
We moved into a new office and updated our website, laying the
foundations for future growth. We reached out more than ever before by
attending conferences, speaking in churches, and connecting with many
of you for the first time. We extend a special “Thank You” to all our faithful
partners and to those who responded by becoming supporters, donors
and prayer partners this past year.
All Things Are Possible
Enlarge the place
of your tent, and
let the curtains of
your habitations
be stretched
out; do not hold
back; lengthen
your cords and
strengthen your
stakes.
- Isaiah 54:2 (ESV)
Through the record snowfall that came as we gathered to plan in Buffalo,
New York, last November, the Lord brought a timely reminder: “. . . apart
from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5 ESV). It was very literal—we
couldn’t even get from our homes or hotels to the office! However, as we
prayed, talked over the phone and waited out the storm, we also heard
the corresponding truth from the Lord’s lips:
“. . . with God all things are possible.” Matthew 19:26 ESV
So we enter this year expectant—not of what we can do, but of what He
will do as together we offer Him our time, our finances and our prayers.
“Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask
or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the
church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever.
Amen.” Ephesians 3:20-21 ESV
Join our mailing list
or refer a friend.
See back cover for
details.
3
Past Accomplishments
Future Goals
Kathy Ardino
Aliyah Director
Operation Exodus USA
The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is glorified before the eyes of the world
each time a Jewish person answers His call to return home. Israel is the only
piece of property in the world referred to by God as “My land.”
“You will come up against My people Israel like a cloud, to cover the
land. It will be in the latter days that I will bring you against My land,
so that the nations may know Me, when I am hallowed in you, O God,
before their eyes.” Ezekiel 38:16 NKJV
Make a Donation
Help a Jewish person
return to Israel.
See back cover for details.
Another year has come and gone! The increase in those we have assisted
back to Israel in 2014 compared to 2013 was about 38%, bringing the total in
2014 to over 400, which includes 333 individuals and an additional 70 – 75 via
organizational grants. We were able to say “yes” to every person who asked
for assistance. The number of people requesting assistance was lower than
we projected in Hope to Home 2016, our 3-year plan. This was due, in part,
to a reshuffling of personnel in certain key positions within the Jewish Agency,
as well as a lower cash flow than we had expected; however, we were able
to strengthen the groundwork for the expected increase in requests and the
infrastructure that will support their return.
Most of the assistance we gave came in the way of individual grant gifts, as well
as other assistance through the programs listed below. Here are some of the
immigrants’ “Thank You” notes.
Avi writes: “You were not just part of my dream. You are
why it happened. A happy healthy new year. For what
you have done, there is no repayment.”
A Christian
ministry helping
the Jewish
people return to
Israel
4
Michael writes: “As the first 24 hours in Israel come to a close, I sit
here with a much clearer realization of the scope of what living in this
country entails. I realize the blessings that it will add to my life, and I
realize the struggles that I will need to go through. Yet, with the extra
financial assistance offered to me by Operation Exodus and the support
that it has given, I feel more secure in my decision, more content in my
journey, more comfortable in my new home. So, from the bottom of my
heart I must thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
The photo to the left
shows some of those
we assisted in 2014.
Team USA, just arriving in Tel Aviv on September 1, 2014
OE USA gifted grants to the following aliyah (immigration to Israel) education
programs in 2014:
Friends of Israel Scouts: Friends of Israel Scouts (FOIS), Inc. FOIS
encompasses programs that develop and maintain a connection between the
Israel Scouts movement in Israel and North American Jewry. The particular
FOIS program we support has a 70 per cent aliyah rate. Of that 70 per cent, 30
per cent of their families follow soon after to make aliyah.
Habonim Dror of North America (A Labor Zionist youth movement). The goal
of Habonim Dror is to build up the State of Israel as 1) a progressive, egalitarian,
cooperative society, at peace with its neighbors; 2) a nation actively involved in
a Peace Process with the Palestinian people with the common goal of a just and
lasting peace; and 3) as the physical and spiritual center of the Jewish people.
To this end, Habonim Dror calls first and foremost for aliyah to communal and
collective frameworks that actively work to achieve the aforementioned goals.
Naale Elite Academy: The Naale Elite Academy is a pluralistic program that
brings Jewish teens to Israel to complete their high school studies. Eighty-five
per cent of the students make aliyah and stay in Israel. Of that 85 per cent, 60
per cent of the families follow their children and make aliyah as well.
Looking Forward
Following our 3-year plan, in 2015 we will be going into key areas of the country
to meet with Jewish communities, and express our support for them and their
desire to return to Israel. Also on our calendar will be several trips into New
York City to establish a work in the midst of the largest Jewish community
in North America. At this point, we intend to continue with the grant gifts to
individuals, couples, families, and aliyah-supporting Jewish organizations,
hoping to assist 700 – 1,000. We also plan to continue offering Hebrew lessons
at an Ulpan school and online. However, we believe the Lord will give us more
creative ways as well. Absorption is another way we hope to help; aliyah is only
successful if the new immigrants have a successful absorption within the Land
of Israel.
How exciting—your prayers and support are what propel this ministry. As you
can imagine, this is a big undertaking. God does it, and He does it through you!
In closing, we would like to thank you for your faithful support in prayer, giving
and volunteering. You have touched the lives of so many to the Glory of God.
May the Lord bless and keep you in the New Year.
A Christian
ministry helping
the Jewish
people return to
Israel
5
Trusting in the
Faithfulness of our God
Wendy Beckett
USA Prayer Coordinator
Operation Exodus USA
“Know therefore that the LORD your God is God; he is the faithful God,
keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who
love him and keep his commandments.” Deuteronomy 7:9 NIV
The Word is full of proclamations of the faithfulness of our God through all
generations. In this first bulletin of 2015 we look back to give thanks for His
faithfulness in 2014 and to trust Him as we look forward to a momentous year
ahead.
Become a
Prayer Partner
See back cover
for details.
We see the Lord keeping His covenant of love with His Jewish people as
the number of returning immigrants keeps rising. Almost weekly we hear of
miracles of protection on those living in the Land. Christian Friends of Israel
has documented 8 to 10 amazing incidents where the Lord stepped in and
saved lives in the recent Gaza conflict. You may have seen the comment of a
terrorist: “Their God changes the path of our rockets in mid-air.” Thus Israel
was protected.
In Operation Exodus, when we declare, “Thus far the LORD has helped us”
(I Samuel 7:12 NIV), we are expressing our praise for His faithfulness. He
sends us prayer partners, staff members with just the needed skills, and trusty
volunteers. He shelters us, strengthens us and heals us!
In the days ahead we will need an even deeper trust in His faithfulness. Those
who truly “rest in the Faithful One” (quote from Hudson Taylor) can expect more
miracles for His Name’s sake. He will hear our persistent prayers! He will show
Himself strong! He will work mightily on behalf of His Jewish people and those
of us who are helping them! “The One calling you is faithful and He will do
it” I Thessalonians 5:24 CJB.
As we give thanks, let us pray for:
· All His purposes for aliyah (immigration to Israel) to be fulfilled in 2015!
· Sufficient expansion of our network to sustain the coming growth in aliyah
· His guidance as to how, when and where to return to the New York City
area
· Continued protection for those helping and those returning — and their A Christian
ministry helping
the Jewish
people return to
Israel
6
families
· His hand on preparations for the leadership from the U.S., Canada and
Latin America gathering in Manhattan in mid-May to call out to the Lord
for a mighty aliyah
A Love Story
Dear Friends at Operation Exodus USA,
I want to tell you a love story.
In the autobiography by Primo Levi, a great author and Holocaust survivor, he tells of a man whom he met during
his years in Auschwitz. The man was not a Jew and not an inmate; he was an Italian civilian who had been
commandeered by the Germans to perform repair work around the camp. Lorenzo was his name.
Lorenzo was a bricklayer by trade. Primo Levi, who had been a chemist in his previous life, was forced to carry
heavy buckets of poured concrete every day in the concentration camp. He was not very good at it, he says, partly
because, like all the other Jews in the concentration camp, he was weak from near starvation.
One day, without any explanation, Lorenzo brought Primo Levi a tin of soup. The danger in doing this was obvious.
Lorenzo and Levi belonged to different castes in Auschwitz—one was a civilian repairman; the other was an inmate.
One had some rights; the other had none at all. Contact between them was strictly forbidden by the authorities. To
help a Jew was to put your own life at risk.
But this did not stop Lorenzo. Every day for six months he delivered soup to the Jewish bucket-carrier. Levi noticed
that the soup was never the same. Lorenzo would make the rounds of the workers’ dormitories, collecting scraps
from their bowls for the starving Jew who carried the buckets.
Levi writes that he was amazed by Lorenzo. “In that violent and degraded environment,” he writes, “a man was
helping another man, and doing so out of pure altruism, pure goodness. This was simply incomprehensible to me.
He was like a savior who had come down from heaven.”
Primo Levi survived Auschwitz, thanks in no small part to the food he got from Lorenzo. And now comes the
surprising and sad part of the story. After the war, Levi went back to Italy and there he found out that Lorenzo also
lived in Italy. He decided to go see him in order to thank him for what he had done, for risking his life in order to save
a stranger’s.
But much to Levi’s surprise, when he arrived at Lorenzo’s home he did not find the same man. Lorenzo, who had
been so vigorous, so resourceful and so heroic at Auschwitz, was now weary, depressed, withdrawn and indifferent
to life. With no family and no one to depend on him, he seemed to have lost his reason to live. In Auschwitz, writes
Levi, Lorenzo was a man with a purpose, a man on whom others depended. But now it was over. Now there was
no one left to save, no one left to protect, no one left who depended on him. Therefore, Lorenzo had no more reason
to live.
What is the point of this story that Primo Levi tells? It is that life is empty without love.
We know that love, both in the sense of the ability to love and in the sense of being loved, is the gift of God.
These days, in spite of Israel’s greatness and incredible contributions to the entire world, she finds herself in a terrible
neighborhood surrounded by hatred and violence. But it is so comforting to Jews in Israel and throughout the world
to know that the kind of boundless love extended to Primo Levi by a Righteous Gentile, Lorenzo, is being perpetuated
by you, the readers and supporters of Operation Exodus. You are the Righteous Gentiles of this generation. May
God’s blessings always be upon you and your families.
Rabbi Jon Haddon
Danbury, Connecticut
Note: Operation Exodus USA deeply appreciates Rabbi Haddon’s graciousness in regarding us and our supporters
as “Righteous Gentiles.” We know that a special group of very courageous people received this title because they
risked their lives to protect Jewish people during the Holocaust. May we continue to stand by God’s chosen people
in times of increasing anti-Semitism here in the U.S. and around the world.
Definition of a Righteous Gentile:
Non-Jewish people who, during the Holocaust, risked their lives to save Jewish
people from Nazi persecution.
7
Our Purpose
We are called to encourage and help Jewish people return to Israel and to proclaim God’s purposes for
their return.
Our Vision
We believe God is drawing the Jewish people back to the Land of Israel from the USA and other
nations in fulfillment of biblical prophecy (Isaiah 43:5-6), and that the Gentiles are called to assist in
their return (Isaiah 49:22). So we will assist immigrants with the immigration process through prayer,
encouragement and financial support.
Our Values
Godly character, partnership, honor, courageous service
Our History
Operation Exodus USA is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit charity. We are affiliated with Ebenezer Emergency
Fund International, a ministry started in the United Kingdom in 1991 by Gustav Scheller. There are
representatives in over 50 countries around the world. Together, we have helped over 142,000
immigrants return to Israel.
Get Involved!
Name: ______________________________________________________________________________
Address: ____________________________________________________________________________
ECFA
Phone: _________________________________ Email: ______________________________________
Add me to your mailing list
Send me information about becoming a prayer partner
Here is my donation in the amount of __ $25 __ $50 __ $100 __ Other
Payment Options: Monthly Auto-deduction One-time Gift
For monthly auto-deduction – checking/savings account (ACH), please call (716) 681-6300.
You can also call in your gift on your Credit/Debit Card or give online: operationexodususa.org
Send information to my friend
Friend’s Name: _______________________________________________________________________
Address: ____________________________________________________________________________
A higher standard.
A higher purpose.
Phone: _________________________________ Email: ______________________________________
Send me __ 5 __ 10 __ 25 extra copies of this bulletin
For more information about Operation Exodus USA:
Phone: (716) 681-6300
Address: PO Box 568, Lancaster, NY 14086
8Email: [email protected]
Website: OperationExodusUSA.org
Find us
in the
App Stores!