Blessing
Bulgaria
Bulgaria is situated in the southeast of
Europe. It is a
beautiful country, rich in natural resources, where the dominant
religion is
Eastern Orthodoxy. The first Jewish settlements were established in
Bulgaria
after the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70 and since then there has
always
been a Jewish community in our land.
During the Second World
War,
the Bulgarian people resisted Hitler's attempts to deport the Jewish
community.
Not one Jew who lived under the jurisdiction of the Bulgarian
state was
deported to any of the Nazi concentration camps. Indeed, during the war
the
Jewish population of Bulgaria actually increased in number by more than
a
thousand.
In 1948, when the world
recognised the establishment of the new State of Israel, many Bulgarian
Jews
wanted to settle there and to give of their best for the building up of
the
nation. So between 1949 and 1951, 45-48,000 Bulgarian Jews made Aliyah*,
leaving only 4-5,000 in Bulgaria. Then, after the fall of Communism in
1989,
many younger Jews left Bulgaria. Now the average age of the 3,000 who
remain in
the country is eighty and reaching these elderly Bulgarian Jews with
the gospel
is not an easy task.
Open my eyes Lord
When I ask Jewish
people
if they ever read the Bible, they often say something like, "I am very
old
and cannot see well". To overcome this problem, I now offer to read the
Bible to my friends when I visit them. Initially, when I started
reading to the
Mashiah family, Mr Elijah Mashiah was very suspicious. However,
after a few
weeks, he would ask me to read the Bible as soon as I arrived and then
we would
speak about other things. Eventually Mr Mashiah insisted on coming to
church
with me and then in July, he told
me that he would like to ask Jesus to forgive his sins. We prayed
together and
I am convinced that Mr Mashiah is now born again and believes in Jesus
as his
Lord and Saviour.
Due to the influence of
the Orthodox Church, Bulgarian society has many traditions that are
deeply
rooted and that have found their way into Jewish minds. On one occasion
Mathilda called to ask if I would visit her and her husband. When I
arrived,
she told me that many bad things were happening to her family and asked
me to
consecrate the house because she believed that some evil spirits were
probably
in control of the family. Consecrating a house is an Orthodox tradition
but I
decided to use the occasion to share the gospel with Mathilda and her
husband.
I said I would bless the house but not in the same way as an Orthodox
priest.
Instead, I read Psalm 91 and told the couple that if they would like to
have
peace in their home, they must first have peace with God. They asked me
how and
I explained that the only way this could happen was through Jesus the
Messiah.
I then asked Mathilda the question, "What do you think of Jesus? In
your
opinion who is He?" She gave me the answer I least expected: "He is
the Son of God." When I asked if she really believed what she had told
me,
Mathilda replied, "Yes!" Then we prayed and she and her husband
received the Lord into their hearts. It all started with a simple
tradition!
When I first discovered
that Jesus was a Jew, it amazed me! The discovery turned my world
upside down.
I realised that Jesus had lived in history and was like many other
Jewish
people in the first century world. But, being the Lord, He was so
devoted to
God and knew His will so well that He was able to explain God’s story
in such a
way that it reached the hearts of many people.
We are called to do the
same; to live in this world but never to forget that we belong to
another
Kingdom and that we are commanded to tell the story of Jesus "to the
Jew
first".
* Made Aliyah: emmigrated
to Israel (back)
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