This community of believers have been sending us a yearly offering faithfully for over 20 years. When the offering arrived with the letter attached (it took a few weeks) it reminded me of the joy of long term committed relationships. In our world of instant updates and fast-paced living, we don't often enjoy or sometimes even appreciate the value of long-termed committed relationships. My Samoan friends remind me of a time gone by when ....

My grandparents would not dare mention the word "divorce." They somehow felt that if they said it, it might, God forbid, happen. It was like the word "cancer," it was just too scary to even mention, let alone contemplate.

I remember how committed they were to their family and their jobs. They were hard-working people who ran a small children's clothing shop in an East Boston neighborhood. The Italian food in that neighborhood was legendary. Day and night, including Shabbat, for over forty years they kept the shop open. I remember them saying, "We just want to give our children a better life."

I wonder if we value long term commitments like they did. Just the other day I was trying to help a young adult understand the value of commitment and mentioned the blessings I'd received being a part of the Beit Immanuel Congregation for over 30 years. I was thinking to myself  "This was a good example for him. Maybe it will help him understand the value of staying with something for a long time." So he says, "What! You stayed in the same place for 30 years! That's crazy!"

Is it? Sometimes I wonder. But even more importantly, I wonder how I can help my children and other young people understand that committment is important. Can I help them appreciate the rich heritage a committment to loving and trusting family relationships will bring? Do I demonstrate these values?

Perhaps I need to take a closer look at myself. Perhaps we need to recognize that in a lot of ways my generation (Baby Boomers born 1940's - 1960) have failed. Divorce rates continue to rise, even in the Messianic community. There are too many  inexcusable moral failings in government, business as well as amongst many husbands and wives, parents, teachers and community leaders. Can I expect young adults to willingly commit to congregation, community or even family when they have been on the tail end of so much brokenness?

What kind of a message does brokenness, divorce and alienation in society give our children? Is it any wonder that they question and doubt the integrity of the institutions we hold so dear? I fear not.

What can we do? We must be willing to take the first steps, and those in humility. I am reminded of the closing passage of the book of Malachi 4:6. It is written, "and he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to the fathers."

The work begins with the fathers, and it begins in the heart. This is not a quick-fix, self-help manual to keep the status quo. This is about those of us in places of authority and leadership, parents teachers and pastors acknowledging our failings and turning our hearts back towards our children, the kids of this generation. It is a call to us to change our attitudes first, not theirs. Anyone can criticize, complain and get angry about young people today. Believe me, in this I have plenty of experience.

When I opened that simple envelope from an island somewhere in the Pacific Ocean most would never find on a map, I was reminded of the need to change my own attitude first before I can comment on anyone else's, and with that thought a sweet peace surrounded me like the rolling ocean waves over the sandy Samoan beaches.

Important Congregation Update (relax I'm not going to ask for another offering!)

Some of you have been following our news for over 25 years. Back then we sent just a handful of mailings and I still have copies of the old Beit Immanuel Newsletters we used to send out when we first began writing in 1986. Your faithfulness through the years continues to be a source of great encouragement to us. You also are a demonstration of the kind of committed relationships that are vital to ouir lives, our love and our happiness. Thank you for understanding that!

Others have joined recently and we welcome you! Our newsletters now reach thousands of people, but we are very much aware of the need to keep our relationships personal and sincere.

With this in mind, I want to give you an update on some organizational changes in our community.  Most of you know that our Congregation has had a leasing agreement with the Church's Ministry to the Jewish People (CMJ) since 1990. CMJ is an Anglican Society and they are owners of the Beit Immanuel property. Under this contract with CMJ the Beit Immanuel Congregation were given the opportunity to manage the entire facility including the 20-room Guest House. This has been a wonderful provision from the Lord and all of us have experienced the innumerable blessings and grace of this special place. I cannot even begin to recall the hundreds and even thousands of friends that have stayed with us, prayed and served with us and contributed much to making us who we are. Or what about the numerous drug addicts, alcoholics, broken and desperate people who found a home and hope at Beit Immanuel through these past 10 years? Though I would love to relive with you much that has happened here over the years, I will leave that for another day.  Although it only goes back to 2008 you can access an archive of our newsletters here. 

For now it is important that you all know that CMJ have decided to terminate the contract with the Congregation as of January 1, 2012. That is a little more than 10 months away. The Tel-Aviv municipality are requiring a major historical renovation of the façade of the building and CMJ have decided to take on this project and in addition renovate the entire facility upgrading it to a quality hotel. They have also promised to provide a lovely space in the basement of the renovated facility for the Congregation to continue meeting.

There are some implications of this development that I want you to be aware of:

1. As soon as the renovations begin, the Congregation will need to find a temporary meeting place. The renovations could take up to 3 years. This will be a challenging time for the Congregation. As an encouragement, the Congregation Adonai Roi a Messianic Congregation in the Tel-Aviv area that we relate closely with now have their Shabbat meetings on Saturday morning at 10:30 here at Beit Immanuel. We have discussed the future with Pastor Avi Mizrachi and we are considering looking into a temporary meeting place for the two congregations during renovations.

2. Until now all of the income of the Guest House combined with the income of the Congregation were used to support the many ministries and outreaches of Beit Immanuel. Some of you send donations by check made out to "Beit Immanuel" and that was fine because it all went to the work of the congregation which included providing facilities and services to the many groups and individuals that visited us, for Yad b'Yad the German and Jewish youth reconciliation program, for children's work, single parent families as well as many other needs in our community.  Now that CMJ will be taking over management of the facility, it is necessary to establish clear lines of financial separation between the Guest House and the Congregation.  

Practically, what this means is that if you would like to support the Congregation by check please make it payable to Beit Avinu which is the non-profit organization that we have set up for this purpose. This can be sent to our regular address at P.O. Box 2773, Tel-Aviv, Israel, 61027.  The other means of sending support are through the internet site www.beitimmanuel, or by direct bank transfers to Beit Avinu. These remain the same. For more information or questions please e-mail me.

3. We are very much in prayer as to the future ministry of the Congregation. Clearly we are here to serve the people of this city and nation and we will continue all of the vital ministries we now oversee. It has been an incredible blessing doing this job here for so many years, but it is also an incredible amount of work. Our sense is that as we are released from the Guest House management we will be able to expand into other areas of ministry. We already have some ideas that we will share with you as things develop.

Shalom,

David Lazarus