Destruction and Peace

Today: November 20, 2008

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Destruction and Peace

Posted: Fri 15th August 2008 12.57 PM | Author: Christian Friends of Israel

Last Sunday was Tisha b’Av or the ninth of Av – the day on which the Jewish people remember the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem.

It is said that one Tisha B'Av as Napoleon was walking through the streets of Paris he heard bitter wailing coming form inside a building. When he walked in he saw a group of Jews sitting on the floor weeping. He asked them, "Why are you crying." They answered: "Jerusalem is overrun and the Temple destroyed." Napoleon thought for a minute and then told the Jews, "Don’t worry: it’s just a rumour. I know for a fact that all is quiet in the Middle East."

The group then explained to him that they are mourning an event that took place 1600 years earlier. An astounded Napolean replied, "If you are still crying 16 centuries later I have no doubt that one day your temple will be rebuilt."

Today, Jerusalem is rebuilt and all that remains of the Temple – the Western Wall is again in Jewish hands. But the age-old prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem continues. It is a biblical command. In Psalm 122 verse 6: “Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem.” This is a commandment not just a suggestion. So how should we pray? Thousands of churches around the world will pause on the first Sunday in October to unite in prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem. The challenge is: Will your church be part of this worldwide movement?

Last Monday, the day after the ninth of Av, Christians from Derby, Suffolk, London and Sussex gathered at the Commonwealth Church in Mayfair, London to pray and consider how we could respond. Can we together encourage pastors in churches and fellowships across Britain to make prayer for the peace of Jerusalem a focus in services on October 5th? Can we make earthly Jerusalem real in their prayers in a way that resonates with Jerusalem’s biblical heritage and glorious future?

Our Father and Our God,
Today we remember and obey your command
To pray for the peace of Jerusalem.

We pray for its people – Jews and Arabs –
For its narrow streets bustling with commerce,
Its street-markets and shopping malls,
Its doctors, lawyers and hairdressers,
Its bus-drivers and taxis, builders, plumbers and carpenters,
For its churches and synagogues.

We remember that it is the city in which you declared, even when your covenant people were in exile in Egypt, that your name would be there;

We thank you that in the place where David’s enemies taunted him, saying that even the blind and the lame could protect its strongholds, David ruled as King and later Jesus came, a descendant of David, to make the blind to see and the lame to walk.

We thank you for the Temple built in Jerusalem by David’s son Solomon, and we praise you for the prayers of your people in this place over many generations.

We thank you that Jesus came to the Temple in Jerusalem as a baby to be offered back to you, that he came here to celebrate the feasts, and that here in Jerusalem he offered himself willingly as a sacrifice for our sin and the sins of the world.
We thank you that in Jerusalem he rose from the tomb, he was seen by many witnesses, and from Jerusalem’s hill he ascended into heaven. We look for his return to the city of the Great King as our Lord and Messiah of Israel.

Until that day keep us faithful, so that Your Name be honoured among all nations, tribes and tongues, in Jerusalem and around the world, to the glory of the Father,
Amen

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