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Personal Bio

David Soakell is the North East Area Representative and 'Church Liaison Officer' for Christian Friends of Israel UK.

To subscribe to his weekly prayer and news updates please email info@cfi.org.uk

Here is David's story in his own words...

Isn't God amazing? A couple of years ago, I spent two weeks with my son Matty (aged 12 at the time) working with Christian Friends of Israel (CFI) at the Soul Survivor event in Shepton Mallet, which was entitled, "Into His Likeness". What an awesome title! Beholding is becoming. As we lead lives of worship, gazing at our Creator, living with Him in view, we are changed. In His presence we are transformed, and our lives will reflect His glory. You know... seeing 12,000 kids worship the Lord is amazing! But why was I there... and why CFI?

Well, let me share a little on my background: Although my parents were "godly people", I grew up in a secular household. My parents were semi-professional cyclists, and my father used to build his own light-weight racing bikes ~ that was our "religion"! Every week, we would cycle anything between 60 and 100 miles most Sunday's. Come the racing season, it would be "head down... bottom up" and battling time trials... never seeing anything of the countryside... just the lines on the tarmac in front of us, as we pushed the pedals are hard as possible. Even on Christmas Day once, I remember riding a short 10 mile time trial. How the lungs used to burn in the cold!!!!

With my connection with Israel now, it's strange looking back... as my dad used to always tell us stories when we were kids of "how our name was changed when our family came to the UK." Many other stories were shared... but with the family only being small, tracing relatives was always difficult. A few years ago, I looked up the names Morris (Mother's maiden name) and Sokel (from which our name derives) at the Yad Vashem (Holocaust Memorial Museum) in Jerusalem. To my shock, I discovered dozens of people. Where these lost relatives? Well... that's another story, for another time.

However, I became a Believer in Yeshua (Jesus) in 1984. As soon as "the veil had been removed from my eyes", I felt the Lord lay Israel upon my heart. However. Israel was the last thing I wanted to know about, and even though I subscribed to CFI's mailing list in 1985/86, I did little with it... apart from learn quite a lot. Instead, I got involved in working with the former Soviet Union 'Underground' Churches in the mid to late 80's ~ smuggling Bibles into what was then the Soviet Union. In 1990, my wife and I spent over three years with Romanian Children's Aid ~ helping children with AIDS in a purpose built Romanian Hospice. However, God's calling on my life to work and help the people of Israel grew ever louder. and I found I could run no longer. Indeed, a recognised local prophet knocked on my door and told me to "repent" over this issue. I had not told this man anything about the call of God!

And so. I guess had I run away from God any longer, I might have found myself smelling of fish. and being spat out of a whale or something as big on the shores of Whitby!!! And so, I took on the role, in a voluntary level, of Area Representative in the North East of England for Christian Friends Of Israel in 1995. What an awesome time we've had since!

In 2001, my wife and I felt called to live by faith and move into this ministry full time, which we believe God had prepared us for in the many years before (as already mentioned, we've been part of CFI almost since its birthing). In the time that has passed, the Lord has mightily increased the workload of this ministry and the fruit we have yielded has been very encouraging, both here and internationally.

The main focus of time is to teach the Church on her Biblical roots, in many forms, but over the past eight years, the Lord has been using me in writing the weekly CFI News Report & Prayer Update, which goes out via the Internet (including a monthly general postal service). Writing these reports for CFI is not the easiest job I've had to do, but one which appears to be producing much fruit ~ and appears to be needed. The Reports now go throughout the world to most countries within Europe, Australia, Israel, Brazil, USA, South America, Canada, India & Singapore. Recently, I learnt that over one thousand Believers in Hong Kong receive this News Report. So we certainly can praise God for all He is doing. Without His guidance and blessing though, this simply wouldn't happen.

The second focus for the CFI ministry is to bless the people living in the land of Israel (including Jews, Arabs & Christians) and this is an area which we have also been able to encourage the North Eastern Churches over many years. We have a large humanitarian work in Israel ministering to Terror Attack Victims, Holocaust Survivors (200,000 still live in Israel alone), through to helping the Household of faith ~ Jewish & Arab believers in Christ, and helping Palestinian Arab children with heart problems. to name but a few of our projects.

Our aim now is to strengthen ourselves in the work the Lord has called us to. We feel that the Lord has brought about a greater hunger in the churches for sound biblical teaching, and that it is vital that churches have a full understanding of their roots in the Hebraic heritage. The vehicle of CFI has been serving this need and we are keen to continue in serving the Lord in this way. We also feel we have been able to establish a respected reputation for uncompromising delivery of the connection between Jew and Gentile and the debt we, as the Church, owe the Jewish People and the Land of Israel. We desire to be a blessing to the Church & Israel, and to bring glory to God's Holy name.

Years ago, God had laid on my heart Genesis 12:1-3. This scripture had burned away in my head and heart. Being familiar with this passage will provide good insight into the book of Romans chapters 9 to 11. It has to do with the origin of the Jewish nation, the disposition of the land called the State of Israel, and the spiritual blessings we can enjoy in the Messiah (Christ) today by being a blessing to the Jewish people.

Surely, we have been called for such a time as this (Esther 4:4).

Shalom and every blessing in Yeshua

David Soakell (Church Liaison Officer (UK) CFI Area Representative (U.K. North East) & Writer & Producer of the CFI News Report & Prayer Update)

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