Corporate Worship

'Worship' maybe one of the most contentious and divisive aspects of Christianity. From the Greek Orthodox worship which has low participation from the worshipers through a structured 'hymn-sandwich' through a 'said service' with no music at all to the jamboree of music from the Charismatics.

So let's start with a definition...

Definition of worship from the Oxford English Dictionary:

noun

• 1 [mass noun] the feeling or expression of reverence and adoration for a deity:worship of the Mother Goddessancestor worship
• religious rites or ceremonies, constituting a formal expression of reverence for a deity:the church was opened for public worship
• great admiration or devotion shown towards a person or principle:the worship of celebrity and wealth
• archaic honour given to someone in recognition of their merit.

• 2 [as title] (His/Your Worship) chiefly British used in addressing or referring to an important or high-ranking person, especially a magistrate or mayor:we were soon joined by His Worship the Mayor

verb worships, worshipping, worshipped; US also worships, worshiping, worshiped) [with object]

show reverence and adoration for (a deity):

the Maya built jungle pyramids to worship their gods

[no object] take part in a religious ceremony:the family worshipped at Trinity Church

feel great admiration or devotion for:she adores her sons and they worship her

Personal and Corporate Worship

Demonstrably there are two uses of the word, firstly in some sort of corporate or collective sense and secondly in an individual or private sense. Whereas many aspects of our lives, indeed possibly all of our lives, can be defined as worship in the sense of expressing great admiration or devotion towards God, it is the sense of a formal expression of reverence towards a deity that often causes the wide differences of practice.

Music styles

Frequently at the core to this difference is music, and especially corporate singing. Indeed for many from the Evangelical tradition the word 'worship' has become a synonym  for singing. This is all well and good if you either enjoy singing or find that singing helps you to express reverence and adoration for God. If not, then you will struggle.

Music itself is something that can divide: From classical to techno-beat the gulf is as wide as the ocean. Take Mussorgsky's 'Pictures at an Exhibition'; as a piano duet it left me cold, as an orchestral piece I was totally turned off, but when the progressive rock band Emerson, Lake and Palmer turned it into album I found it captivating, though the other rock version by Tangerine Dream less so. So when someone suggests that maybe I would 'happily sit and listen to a rendition of Handel's Messiah', I'm afraid nothing could be further from the truth.

Having said that, years ago as a sound editor for the BBC I spent the morning editing the Easter Day service for Radio Four and the afternoon a classical recital for Radio Three. The music for the Easter Day service was very poor, and had it not been a programme for the Religious Programmes Department it would have been rejected. I found myself cringing and feeling embarrassed to admit to being a Christian throughout the morning. Conversely, although I am not a fan of classical music, and can admit to falling asleep in an Ashkenazy recital I was recording; something in the music of the afternoon allowed me to worship our Father.

Worship and Creativity

For me, worship, creativity and excellence are inextricably linked: A piece of art, be it music, painting or cinematography that is not striving for excellence is making a statement to God that He doesn't matter. When God created the world, He stood back and looked at His handiwork and said 'It's good'. The Radio Four service was not good, the Radio Three recital was. One helped me to worship, the other hindered.

But right now I am thinking particularly about corporate or collective worship. And here I have a problem. I struggle in so many gatherings of followers of Jesus that singing takes an undue place in the meeting. There is only one reference in Scripture to Jesus singing... though of course Scripture doesn't record every activity of our Lord but it does record singing and music taking a lot of time in both the Old and New Testaments.

Music certainly was a way that some people used to convey praise to God. I'm sure that God enjoys some of it, yet other parts I am not so sure. As Adrian Plass put it humorously, some of the songs that people claim to have 'received from the Lord' he feels maybe He was glad to get rid of them! We don't go into the congregation and grab random people to play the piano or organ or whatever, yet everyone is expected to sing even if they cannot.

Worship and Scripture

But the question is, in the recorded times of singing and music in Scripture, were all singing or playing musical instruments, or were many just being there, more like Orthodox worship? We cannot tell. Much of Scripture is descriptive and some of the prescriptive are difficult. Take 1 Corinthians 14: 26-40, a passage that is prescriptive about a gathering of believers.

²⁶ What then shall we say, brothers and sisters? When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up. ²⁷ If anyone speaks in a tongue, two—or at the most three—should speak, one at a time, and someone must interpret. ²⁸ If there is no interpreter, the speaker should keep quiet in the church and speak to himself and to God.

²⁹ Two or three prophets should speak, and the others should weigh carefully what is said. ³⁰ And if a revelation comes to someone who is sitting down, the first speaker should stop. ³¹ For you can all prophesy in turn so that everyone may be instructed and encouraged. ³² The spirits of prophets are subject to the control of prophets. ³³ For God is not a God of disorder but of peace—as in all the congregations of the Lord’s people. 

³⁴ Women^[f] should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. ³⁵ If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.<sup>[g] 

36</sup> Or did the word of God originate with you? Or are you the only people it has reached? ³⁷ If anyone thinks they are a prophet or otherwise gifted by the Spirit, let them acknowledge that what I am writing to you is the Lord’s command. ³⁸ But if anyone ignores this, they will themselves be ignored.<sup>[h] 

39</sup> Therefore, my brothers and sisters, be eager to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues.⁴⁰ But everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way.

Everybody brings something to the gathering, music, instruction, revelations, tongues, prophecies... indeed it says we can all prophesy in turn if we like. I can just imagine how long a church service for 3,000 members would take if each person prophesied! Mostly the early churches met in houses and were small gatherings. Reading Scripture I see again and again that the context is a meal together. Often, it seems to me, we have dropped the meal and kept the liturgy. Of course, liturgy can be uplifting and worshipful as can be singing. But not necessarily for everyone.

God is 'other' or Man in the image of God?

What it seems to me is that the there are two different ways of looking at gatherings: One is where we are so 'other' than God the Almighty and perfect that we exist to merely glorify and 'worship' Him. This fits closely with the definition of corporate worship being 'religious rites or ceremonies, constituting a formal expression of reverence for a deity'.

And some people really love singing to God. Years ago I was on the leadership team of the CYFA Arts Workshop and we did a lot of teaching on the meaning and place of worship in the arts. Worship = expressing the worth-ship of God we taught. One year a group of the young people came and said they were enjoying themselves, but they wanted to worship... we found out they meant they wanted to sing. For some people singing is a critical component of corporate worship. And I do not deny that this is a sizable percentage of the body of Christ. But not all.

The other way of looking at the gathering is that we are created in His image, we are of His DNA if you like, so creativity is part of our core being and like our Father we use our creativity to enjoy Him. In the second case, being unique, our creativity will overlap with others, but by necessity our worship will be also very different. I have a friend who draws or paints during the Sunday service. When I was expressing difficulty with singing in worship my sister-in-law put it this way:

Just because there's singing going on in worship doesn't mean you have to sing too. I often sit down and pray silently whilst listening to the music going on around me, as do others in our church. Some people there are also beginning to explore art (as in painting etc) in worship too.

Certainly there have been times when I would concur with her, there are times when I have been lifted up to the Lord when people are singing. But this is not technically worship. Equally often I have got alienated by the singing, not merely because I cannot sing, but because the words are trite or more often than not because the sound is unpleasant, like the Easter Day service I mentioned.

Excellence in Worship

So where does this lead us? I heartily endorse people using music and singing to worship the Lord. A small part of it I might even find uplifting myself... though I have never been to a worship service in the style of Emerson, Lake and Palmer.

Bob Kauflin and CJ Mahaney were running down excellence as something to be almost despised at the Worship God 09 conference. They were contrasting performance with worship. But in doing so I think they are confusing two attitudes where are not mutually exclusive. I believe they were totally wrong in how they were expressing it and have completely missed the understanding that we are created in the image of God... who is a creative God and who does things well. We need to encourage all forms of creativity in worship. We need to follow the imparted DNA from our Father and strive for excellence. I'm afraid I cannot see any Scriptural evidence for sloppy worship.

Some questions

When I was discussing this on Facebook, a friend of mine asked:

However...although we get to experience the joy of creativity WITH God, in whose image we are made, we are NOT God and are incapable of doing ANYTHING perfectly, and even what we consider our best may not actually even be the best we are capable of. So how does one draw the line? How good at something does someone have to be in order for what they are doing to be acceptable? To God and to other believers? Is someone whose best is really pretty bad to be denied the joy of creatively worshiping together with others?

These are really good questions. I don't have all the answers. Indeed these are the questions that stress me. At one church we attended there was a tambourine player who insisted on sitting in one of the front few pews. She played her tambourine vigorously and... out of time. This was so disturbing to the pianist he couldn't play in time when she was hitting it and then the whole congregation were out of time. Someone whose best is really pretty bad can totally inhibit worship for others. What is the answer? I don't know.

Some people answer this by saying God as our Heavenly Father looks on us like we look on our children. At 3 years old, when they do a painting or perform a song we might be thrilled that they had reached that level rather than critisising them for not being Michael Angelo or Luciano Pavarotti. Partly I think it is related to discernment, almost like the way Paul talks at the beginning of the third chapter of 1 Corinthians.

3 Brothers and sisters, I could not address you as people who live by the Spirit but as people who are still worldly—mere infants in Christ.  2 I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready.

As followers of the Messiah, we need to grow up and learn to use the gifts He has given us. That means knowing our gifts and knowing our lack of gifts. We can still enjoy attributes and even use those attributes we are not gifted in to worship God, as in a hobby. But we shouldn't mandate others have to use them; not everyone can sing!

And what about the Fresh Expressions of church that don't have 'corporate worship' at all? They meet and fellowship together, share their lives together, study the Scriptures together... but don't sing. Indeed our small community of believers here in Cyprus feels close to a 'fresh expression' of the body of Christ.

And what about the 'boiler rooms' - 24 hour places of prayer where one, two or small groups pray throughout the day and are linked together in a network relationship rather than corporate? I long for and wish there were one of these in Larnaca.

Where I am on my journey

For me, lying on the deck of a yacht in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea after dark and looking up in wonder at the stars leads me to worship. The inky blackness displaying the constellations and galaxies. I feel that here even the rocks and stones light years away from us are crying out in praise and worship of the Lord. What an amazing creative God we have who made us and all the heavens... and He longs for a relationship with each and every one of us.

A few years ago I was TV director for a cantata on the life of Esther which is now broadcast almost every year in Cyprus as part of their Religious Programming for Easter. If I remember correctly it took about 3 weeks editing the pictures and another three weeks doing the audio. This was expressing the worth-ship of our God. Making films that express the love of our Father for us is definitely another way I find to worship.

However, progressively over the years I have found congregational 'worship' to be alienating. I love small gatherings of believers. I enjoy fellowship with many followers of Jesus in many different places. Over the past few years I feel I have been learning more and more about the Lord and seeking Him in through the Scriptures more than in the past. I must admit to being drawn to the 'fresh expressions' and to the 'boiler rooms' as expressions of church. But they are not corporate expressions of worship. And that is where I struggle.

I am me or we are us

There is a key question to which we need to address ourselves. In our 'worldview' do we think of ourselves more in terms of 'I am me' or more in terms of 'we are us'. This core difference affects everything we look at. I believe we see a definite east/west split on this. Starting with the USA, which is 'I am me' and heading eastwards there is an observable shift towards 'we are us'. Easterners are more community or tribal or corporate orientated, whereas westerners are more individualistic.

The USA has a highly developed 'every person for themselves' culture, which they love and cherish. Illustrative of the change moving eastwards is the involvement in the shop floor of the directors of Ikea. As we move to Europe, societies tend to believe they have a responsibility towards their communities for health care and so community health care (which Americans tend to call 'socialized medicine') is common. Further eastwards to the Middle East and we begin to see tribal values come to a head. Even in urban Jordan, most Jordanians will know to which tribe they belong and proudly tell you about it. Traveling right out eastwards to Japan, the corporate rules almost exclusively, with companies taking the place of communities. Japanese live and die attached to the company.

Globalization has shrunk the world so we see on our computer or TV screens what is happening in other parts of the world in real time. However, it has not removed the cultural differences between the 'I am me' and the 'we are us'. Understanding what we see is still coloured by our worldview.

There is a Chinese curse 'may you live in interesting times'. My lifetime has certainly been interesting. The latest interesting phenomena being what is called the 'Arab Spring'. In a CNN article an American Arab writes how Arab Spring nations don't yet grasp freedom of dissent. In that article the author states:

It is hard for younger Arabs not born into freedom to understand how individual liberty works in real life.

Note the author is talking about individual liberty, whereas for many Arabs the Arab Spring was about corporate freedom. Hence the preceding paragraph:

Little wonder, then, that Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy has called for the prosecution by the U.S government of the filmmakers, and Egypt's top cleric, Mufti Ali Goma, has called on the United Nations to forbid denigration of faiths. Morsy studied in the United States and Ali Goma regularly visits the West on the interfaith circuit, yet both men don't yet grasp that religious freedom and the freedom of expression are inextricably linked in America.

The Egyptians are thinking in terms of 'we' and the author, although himself of Middle Eastern origin, thinks in terms of 'I'. Mostly westerners and many Europeans don't get the we/us. Our models of corporate bodies are very non-Eastern and often illustrate individualism rather than community. 

I was the only non-union member of the Audio Unit for the BBC at one stage. It's kind of interesting to be the only member of a unit working when all the rest are on strike! Was I acting 'I' and them 'we'? No, I don't think so, theirs was not a concern for the corporate we, but a concern for the multiple I. When we think 'we', we are still not understanding true community.

As followers of Jesus, part of the corporate body of Christ, how does this work for us? The early believers 'held everything in common'. For many brought up in the 20th and 21st century this smacks of communism and for some even turns the stomach. Yet it was taken seriously in the early church.

There is the story in Scripture of the couple that tried to hide the truth about the sale price of a piece of land from the apostles and were struck dead for it. I've not heard that happening in too many churches recently!

Middle Easterners can have a lot to teach us, from the West, about 'we'. They also have a lot to learn about freedom and responsibility. Many in the western church are totally coloured in their thinking by their experiences of corporate bodies like the unions. At the beginning the unions were struggling for freedom. In the UK the unions were started by followers of Jesus wanting to stand up for righteousness and justice. Because of the drift towards individualism it appears they have lost the community side of their identity and become beacons of self interest. 

Freedom, whether individual or corporate, bears responsibility. The two Egyptians quoted were calling for that corporate responsibility. In giving us freedom, our Father, looks for responsibility. We often abuse it. We turn freedom into liberty. In a search for freedom from the person they saw as the oppressive dictator King of England, the US enshrined liberty as a core value in the Declaration of Independence. It has lived with that since. 

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

It might be interesting to note that the crafters of the Declaration of Independence did not cite Scripture, nor Christian values for these 'unalienable Rights' but that it was 'self-evident'. In other words, the argument put forward by the Founding Fathers was that it was logical to believe these are human rights and illogical to believe otherwise. It was not born out of a exegetical Bible study as Evangelicals might expect today. Thomas Jefferson, in fact, was somewhat anti-Christian, but pro-Jesus. For instance in a letter to Benjamin Rush he wrote:

To the corruptions of Christianity I am indeed opposed; but not to the genuine precepts of Jesus himself. I am a Christian, in the only sense he wished any one to be; sincerely attached to his doctrines, in preference to all others; ascribing to himself every human excellence; & believing he never claimed any other.

When we confuse doctrines and teachings for the person Himself we confuse the very core of what being a follower of Jesus is about. He said 'By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another'. Loving one another is not something you can do independently or alone. It requires community. 

Be devoted to one another in love. Honour one another above yourselves. That is something we, who are followers of Jesus, can demonstrate to the world. Honouring one another above yourselves doesn't mean making films vilifying others, nor does it mean rallying against the films when they are made and killing people.

I don't believe in independence, but in inter-dependence. I don't believe in liberty but freedom. That, I believe, is the Way of the Master.

The short and long of it

"Jesus was short on sermons, long on conversations; short on answers, long on questions; short on abstractions and propositions, long on stories and parables; short on telling you what to think, long on challenging you to think for yourself; short on condemning the irreligious, long on confronting the religious." - McLaren, _More Ready than you Realise_ 15

The truth is out there... or is it?

During the ‘Arab Spring’ I got emails from some Christian friends in Egypt purporting to describe a huge pro-Mubarak protest that the western media were hushing up. Because I knew the location they were describing and having been involved in large scale events management I knew the number of people described couldn’t fit into the location described. I asked for photographs of the event in question. I never got answers to my emails. I’m sceptical the events were as described in the rather strongly worded emails I was receiving.

More recently I had emails about a news report claiming Egyptian Christians were being crucified...

‘Middle East news media have reported that the Muslim Brotherhood has “crucified those opposing Egyptian President Muhammad Morsi naked on trees in front of the presidential palace while abusing others.” Those opposing the new radical Islamic regime include Christians, and experts have suggested that “extra brutality is reserved for Christians.”’  

This was widely reported including the summary above. There are loads of references to this but this is a good example:

http://aclj.org/radical-islam/egypts-christians-grave-danger-muslim-brotherhood-crucifies-opponents


I admit I was instantly skeptical. I used to work in TV news for the BBC and I was struggling to believe there was no photographic evidence for huge numbers of Christians being crucified in front of the Presidential Palace in Cairo. I researched further and found that all the articles...

‘...base their claims on reports from Sky News Arabic — a recently formed joint venture between BSkyB and Abu Dhabi Media Investment Corp.’

Jonathan Kay, a professional investigative journalist traced the source:

‘Sky is supposedly the original source on the story, everyone agrees. Yet neither algemeiner nor WND nor any of the other sources supply the original Sky reporting that purportedly outlines the facts. 

That’s because there is no Sky report on the subject.’

This is his report:

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/08/22/jonathan-kay-how-egypts-crucifixion-hoax-became-a-classic-internet-urban-legend/

I would have let it drop but for three other stories that are significant. Last week I was encouraged to sign a petition by a couple of intelligent friends of mine to ask Facebook to block a page entitled 'Soldiers deserve to die'. I'm staunchly pacifist but I don't believe soldiers deserve to die!

It seemed bizarre to me so I researched further, only to find ‘Soldiers deserve to die’  is a rather silly advertising campaign from the Lung Cancer Alliance, where they suggest all sorts of groups including cat lovers deserve to die. It's not anti-military at all. It's a US campaign, not related to Europe. There is no page on Facebook with this campaign. Signing the campaign just shows that the person concerned has not done the necessary research to check it out. Here’s the source to the debunking of this story.

http://www.abc4.com/content/news/state/story/Controversial-ad-campaign-says-you-deserve-to-die/wtD747okcUynBc-CP57aNA.cspx

Now I’m currently reading a book by Jeremy Scahill called ‘Blackwater’ about mercenary armies and their operation around the world. Every assertion shows careful research and citation. It’s a fascinating book. Well worth reading because if it's true the world as we know it is changing more that we might think. Countries have lost their power to corporations.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Blackwater-Rise-Worlds-Powerful-Mercenary/dp/184668652

But there has been another issue going the rounds in the last few months and came to a head in discussions over the last few weeks. That is the issue of ‘Heaven and Hell’ or more specifically those believing in ‘eternal conscious torment’ and those believing in ‘annihilation of the soul’. There’s a well researched and well cited book debunking the annihilation theory. Or so it seems. The book cites writings by the pro-annihilation lobby and shows them to be in error. Except... the writings don’t exist and the citations are fictitious. How often do you check citations? I usually do if they feel suspicious as I showed above, but how many creep through unnoticed because the citation agrees with my deeply held belief?

So where is my citation for this? No, that is your task to check it out. It exists I promise you, and as they say... Google is your friend.

‘The Truth is out there’ was the catchphrase of the X-Files, a science-fiction conspiracy theory TV series about a hush up on UFOs. Good TV series. Well made drama. 

I really enjoy the CS Lewis science-fiction trilogy and would love to dramatise that contextualised for the Arabic audience. But that is an aside. In one scene Lewis reports how Ransom, the central character in th books, is discussing with an eldil, or angel. In this scene he describes how the angel appears to be at a strange angle to the room... and then the observer realises that the angel is upright and that the whole room is at an angle. The truth is out there, our perception of truth however is filtered through semi-opaque glasses... ‘Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.’

Response to a video made by Israel's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Danny Ayalon

Original on Tuesday, 20 September 2011, updated 9 March 2012

This is a response to a video made by Israel's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Danny Ayalon which purports to explain 'the historical facts relating to the Israeli Palestinian conflict'.

Like most subtle propaganda it is not what is said in the video that is significant, but what is omitted. In the video Danny Aylon says he will not go back to Biblical mandate, but I believe that in order to see the current conflict in context that is exactly what you must do. I have tried to summarise, and although I may have left something out myself, the intention is show that neither side are actually striving for peace, but both using and abusing systems of power in an effort to control the opposition. Danny Ayalon's point that we should not refer to 'occupied territories' but 'disputed territories' is at variance with the language actually used in UN resolutions related to Palestine.

BC 2100: God promises land to 'descendants of Abraham'. The description of that land includes what we currently know as parts of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and the whole of Israel/Palestine. Abraham had two children and from those two siblings are both the Jews and the peoples who currently inhabit Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the whole of Israel. Thus the creation of the two semitic peoples: The Jews and the Arabs.

The promise to Abraham was displaying our Father's heart. It was not merely a promise to bless, but showed His heart for the world: I will bless you so that you can bless the nations. It is not blessing for it's own sake, but blessing to communicate the love of our Father to the whole earth.

BC 1900: Joseph expresses this promise to the Egyptian people. As he is blessed so he blesses those he is in contact with. The twelve brothers eventually learn this 'blessing others' and become the fathers of the tribes who make up that side of the family.

BC 1446 to BC 300: The family feud continues with the twelve tribes battling with those from Abraham's other son over which part of land belongs to which side of the family. What is noticeable during this time is that for most of these 1100 years neither side of the family remember the clause to 'be a blessing' but are very happy to be on the receiving end of blessings.

BC 1150: Earliest record of Palestinians by name (Peleset People) in Egyptian writing during twentieth dynasty of Egypt. As a people they were sufficiently large to invade Egypt during Ramses III’s reign. We can assume therefore they have been around for hundreds of years to have grown to a number sufficient to invade Egypt. This is obviously at variance to Israel’s claim that Palestinians are a recent people group in the area and some misguided people assuming Palestinians were the Philistines mentioned in the Bible. Nor is the invasion a blessing to the Egyptians!

BC 300 to AD 0: The silent years. Our Father is brooding over the planet preparing for a major change.

AD 0 to AD 33: Our Father sends His son to reiterate that those who are to receive His blessing are those who should bless. He demonstrates that His way is not the way of power and might and that those who follow the way of power and might are against our Father. The twelve tribes are hoping for something rather different and so disinherit the promise by rejecting our Father. No longer is the promise for the physical children of Abraham but for the spiritual offspring: Those who chose the path of peace and who share our Father's blessing with the world. These are called the followers of the Way.

BC 64 - AD 324: The Roman's use power and might to subjugate the whole Mediterranean basin including Palestine.

AD 313: The Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity, while at the same time maintaining the Empire by power and might and not promoting blessing of others. Whether this was the intention of our Father is open to debate.

AD 324 to AD 636: Byzantine rule of Palestine, where Eastern Orthodox control was maintained by power and might. Very few Jews lived in Palestine (10%-15% of the population). This diaspora, which continued till the 20th Century, should have allowed the Jews to demonstrate being blessed in order to be a blessing around the world. Sadly they failed to do so.

AD 636 to AD 1096: Rule by power and might changed control of Palestine, demonstrating again the way of those opposed to the Way of our Father. This time it was those claiming a revelation of strict adherence to law that used the sword to crush the people living in the area.

AD 1099 to AD 1260: We see the Way of peace trampled by those claiming to be Christians. Battling with swords and horses they sought to liberate land rather than hearts and thus entirely missed our Father's commendation to be a blessing.

AD 1260 to AD 1517: Power and might succeed in ejecting the 'Christians' and rule of Palestine is by an Egyptian Sultan. During this time the Jews, having failed to demonstrate our Father's call to be a blessing are significantly persecuted by those who claimed to replace them in the promise and have now, themselves, forgotten the call to peace and to be a blessing to others. It is a bloody awful mess.

AD 1516 to AD 1917: Palestine was conquered by power and might by the Turkish Sultan Selim II and was a conquered state being a province of Syria till Britain, the new world power demonstrated it's might.

AD 1897: The 'Zionist Organisation' was founded with a specific aim to 'to establish a home for the Jewish people in Palestine secured under public law.' One of the slogans used was 'A land without a people for a people without a land'. This totally ignored the large non-Jewish Palestinian population living there. However, Christian 'Restorationists' decided, somewhat arbitrarily, that despite their numbers, these Palestinians were not sufficiently coherent to be considered a 'people'. This was definitely at variance to our Father's call to be a blessing to the nations and showed how they had become corrupted by power.

AD 1916: Three great powers connived together to control the area. This came out in what is known as the Sykes-Picot Agreement. It was, at the time, a secret agreement between the governments of the UK and France with the assent of Russia. The aim was to define their influence in what we call the Middle East. Hence the French influence in Lebanon, Syria and Turkey and the British influence in Palestine, Jordan and Iraq. They were planning how they would carve up the Middle East and control it pending the downfall of Ottoman control in the region.

AD 1914 to AD 1918: TE Lawrence (a British Army Officer) honed and developed urban guerilla warfare techniques throughout the region, working with the Arabs. He is hailed as a hero, but had the victor been the other side, he would have been known as a terrorist. These techniques were embedded into the psyche of the people of the region.

AD 1917: The British foreign minister sent a letter to Lord Rothchild. That letter became known as 'the Balfour Declaration'. It included two significant phrases, that the British Government viewed with favour 'the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people' and that it was 'clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine'. It could be construed that this demonstrates a desire to be a blessing, both to the Jews and to the Arabs in the area.

AD 1922 to AD 1948: Britain wished to establish it's power and might and so after the First World War, the League of Nations was established in Europe. Unsurprisingly the 'British Mandate' which gave them control of the region called Palestine was confirmed by the League of Nations, which included the Balfour Declaration. The USA, staying clear of the League of Nations, endorsed this mandate. During the whole interwar period, the British, keeping in mind power and might, rejected the principle of majority rule or any other measure that would give the Arab majority control over the government of Palestine.

AD 1919 to AD 1923: Many thousands of Jews migrated to Palestine. This created stress between Jews and Palestinians. The family feud started some 4000 years earlier has still not been resolved.

AD 1920 to AD 1921: Jewish immigration and the way the British implemented the Balfour Declaration/British Mandate led to Arab riots. The British then started a system of immigration quotas. Attacks on Jewish settlements, which the British failed to protect, led to establishment of a Jewish militia to attempt to defend those settlements.

23 and 24 August 1929: Sixty-seven Jews were killed in a massacre in Hebron by Palestinians. This was the tipping point to violence for the Jews who formed the group called the 'Irgun Tzvai Leumi', which itself carried out many terrorist activities, as a result.

AD 1939 to AD 1945: The second world war, which became known as 'the war to end all wars' raged throughout the world. Sadly, it was not the war to end all wars and some people claim there has only actually been 26 days of peace since that war. During the war Hitler raged against both the Jews and the Christians killing them in roughly equal numbers in camps like Auschwitz. The Jews appropriated this to themselves, calling it the 'Holocaust', a strange name for it since they were killed not by fire but by gas. Rather than being a blessing to others they saw themselves in the role of victim.

AD 1945 to AD 1947: The British Empire was severely weakened by the second world war and the power base moved from the League of Nations, which it somewhat controlled, to the United Nations, somewhat controlled by the USA. Power and might had moved its centre from Geneva to New York. In Palestine, Jews were secretly smuggled into the country (about 110,000 of them) and a terrorist group similar to al Qaeda called  'Haganah' waged war on the British.

July 1946:  92 British people were killed in the King David Hotel when it was bombed by Irgun Tzvai Leumi. The result was that Tel Aviv was placed under curfew and over 120,000 Jews were questioned by the police. Since power had moved to North America, when the USA criticized British handling of the situation and delayed loans which were vital to British post-war recovery it forced the British Government to refer the Palestine problem to the United Nations. Terrorism by Irgun Tzvai Leumi continued using techniques similar to those developed by TE Lawrence in the First World War.

29 November 1947: UN General Assembly ratified a plan to create two states: Israel and Palestine, partitioning the land between the descendants of the two brothers who had the squabble some 4000 years earlier. Jerusalem would be under direct UN control since it was such a sensitive issue. The West Bank and the Gaza Strip plus some land in both the north and the south of Palestine was to be the Palestinian homeland. This was significantly more than is currently under dispute as being 'occupied territories'.

AD 1947 - AD 1948: The partition never happened because the struggle for power between the Brits and the Americans (through the UN) meant the Brits failed to withdraw in time. Though ratified, it was thus never implemented. Three way hostilities continued for two years between the British, the Jews and the Palestinians. Eventually enough was enough and the Brits withdrew. None of the three protagonists seemed to recognize a desire for peace or to be a blessing to others.

14 May 1948: David Ben-Gurion, declared the establishment of the State of Israel, in accordance with the 1947 UN Partition Plan. Ben-Gurion became Prime Minister of the new state. Both superpower leaders, U.S. President Harry S. Truman and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, immediately recognized Israel. At this time the Jewish population of Palestine was approximately 650,000, the Arab population around 1.2 million. Hence, had it been a single state the Arabs would have outvoted the Jews 2:1. The Palestinian state was not formed at that stage.

AD 1948 to AD 1967: Two significant, but short conflicts between the Arabs and Palestinians on one side and the Israelis on the other. The Israelis did better than the Arabs. In part this was because they were significantly better trained, but also because they were better navigators. There is also the reason that they were supplied with extra armaments in direct violation of a UN Security Council Resolution. The 1947 partition line became confused and it was clear that both sides wanted 100% of the land. The Israelis ended up in control and the United Nations passed resolution 242 which required Israel to withdraw 'armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict'. This is the context of what we now call the 'occupied territories'.

AD 1948: During the conflict many Palestinians in areas occupied by the Israelis were forced from their homes and fled to other countries like Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. In every other situation people fleeing for their lives are referred to as 'refugees'. However, Palestinians are not treated like this and are not dealt with by UNHCR but by UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency). There are now three or four generations of Palestinians who cannot return to their homeland, who have no passport and for whom it is illegal to work with aid provided for education and health care by UNRWA.

AD 1982: United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) defined piracy as 'any illegal acts of violence or detention, or any act of depredation, committed for private ends by the crew or the passengers of a private ship… on the high seas… or against persons or property on board such ship… against a ship, aircraft, persons or property in a place outside the jurisdiction of any State'. The aim was to protect individuals sailing in 'International waters'.

AD 1987-1993: The First Intifada. The ‘shake off’ began in the Jabalia refugee camp and quickly spread throughout Gaza, West Bank and East Jerusalem. Palestinian actions primarily included nonviolent civil disobedience and resistance, and it was the first time that Palestinians acted together and as a nation. There were general strikes, boycotts on Israeli products, refusal to pay taxes, graffiti, and barricades, but the Palestinian demonstrations that included stone-throwing by youths against the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) defined the violence for many. However, intra-Palestinian violence was a prominent feature of the Intifada, with widespread executions of alleged Israeli collaborators. While Israeli forces killed an estimated 1,100 Palestinians and Palestinians killed 164 Israelis, Palestinians killed an estimated 1,000 other Palestinians as alleged collaborators, although fewer than half had any proven contact with the Israeli authorities.

15 November 1988: The Palestinian Declaration of Independence, written by Mahmoud Darwish and declared by Yasser Arafat which broadly similar to the 14 May 1948 statement by David Ben-Gurion. It does not of itself recognise the state of Israel, but an accompanying document citing UN resolution 242 was considered enough to invite Arafat to address the United Nations General Assembly. A UNGA resolution was adopted ‘acknowledging the proclamation of the State of Palestine by the Palestine National Council on 15 November 1988’ 104 states voted for this resolution, 44 abstained, and 2 – the United States and Israel – voted against. By mid-December, 75 states had recognized Palestine as a country, rising to 89 states by February 1989.

September 2000 - today: Second Intifada or ‘shake off’. Palestinian terrorists launch attacks against Israel and Israel launched attacks against Palestinian territories. Like two teenagers squabbling… but with much more serious effects. Wikipedia lists the casualties as 719 Israeli civilians were killed and 334 Israeli security force personnel were killed, 2,204 Palestinian civilians were killed and 1,671 fighters were killed, a further 870 Palestinians were killed and it is unclear if they were civilians or fighters.

Somewhere between 2005 and 2008: It is possible that it changed to what is known as the Third Intifada, but this definition, along with claims it is a battle of words not of violence is disputed. During that time Israel has blockaded parts of Palestine refusing to allow sufficient food and medical aid into Gaza. Followers of the Way, including at least one highly qualified doctor who I personally know, tried to take medical supplies in by sea and were chased out by Israeli gunboats.

31 May 2010: Israeli Defense Forces attack a flotilla of ships carrying aid supplies heading towards Egypt in International Waters. International waters starts where territorial waters cease, which is approximately 14 miles from the coast. At that stage they had not turned towards Gaza which was their announced destination. The ban on entry to Gaza by sea was made by the Israeli military after the flotilla were already en route. Initial contact was 120 miles northwest of Gaza and 80 miles west of the southern border of Lebanon. Under the 1982 definition this is International Piracy, however, the power base in the United Nations refused to condemn the action as such, though a UNHRC fact-finding mission described six of the nine passengers' deaths as "summary execution" by the Israeli commandos.

AD 2011: Palestinian Authority declared it wished to have full membership of the UN. At that stage it was reported that 126 (65.4%) of the 193 member states of the United Nations had recognised the State of Palestine. A successful application for membership in the UN would require approval from the UN Security Council and a two-thirds majority in the UN General Assembly (128 states). On the prospect of this being successful, the USA alluded to possible withdrawal of UN funding, which would destabilize the whole UN. This is power and control without blessing. However, when addressing the UNGA directly President Obama proposed a more conciliatory approach,  ‘Each side has legitimate aspirations -- and that's part of what makes peace so hard. And the deadlock will only be broken when each side learns to stand in the other's shoes; each side can see the world through the other's eyes. That's what we should be encouraging. That's what we should be promoting’. That is the Way of truth and reconciliation.

18 July 2011: Syria announced that it had formally recognised the State of Palestine. Events in 2011 and 2012 suggest that other nations may no longer recognize the Syrian administration who made this declaration.

23 September 2011: Mahmoud Abbas delivered to the UN Secretary-General the official application for recognition of a Palestinian state by the UN and a membership of the UN. The UN Security Council began deliberations on the matter on 26 September. 


31 October 2011: The General Council of UNESCO voted in favour of admitting Palestine as a member state. 

4 November 2011: Israeli Defense Forces attack a flotilla of ships heading to Gaza carrying aid supplies. Initial contact was made 48 nautical miles from the coast, well into International waters. The crew of the boats didn't help themselves by failing to observe correct maritime radio protocol. They were boarded soon after. Under the 1982 definition this is International Piracy. Blockading Gaza and stopping delivery of medical supplies is also in direct violation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1860.

15 December 2011: Iceland recognized Palestine as an independent and sovereign state. For two thirds majority of UNGA Palestine needs 128 states to recognise them. In theory, they now have that number, however there is some dispute about the list of countries.

TODAY: Some areas of the 1947 partition are under Israeli control and others under Palestinian control. Millions of Palestinians, possibly in the order of six million, live outside of Palestine, not only with no hope of return to their homeland, but many of them as stateless persons, without passport, without right to work and totally reliant on UN aid for education and health care. More than three million Palestinians live inside Palestinian controlled areas and are struggling for education and health care blocked by Israel. As many as eight million Jews live outside of Israel, with the right to return to Israel and with legal passports both from their host country and from Israel.

My comments: What we observe is a spin on stories from both sides of the dispute, often playing clever word games on whether 'occupied territories' are 'disputed territories'. We see power play between super powers, minor powers and micro powers. We don't see either side seeking blessing for other nations. Thus both sides have forgotten or are ignoring our Father's blessing and his call to be a blessing to others.

But that is not the whole story. Behind the scenes there is a small group of followers of the Way who call themselves 'Musalaha' which is the Arabic word for reconciliation. It is a group who take protagonists from both sides out to the Negev desert, not to play with words, not to argue who is right and wrong, but to try to bless. Individual followers of the Way in other countries like Lebanon have also tried to bring about musalaha/reconclliation and have been persecuted and in some cases forced to become refugees as a result. There are also individual followers of the Way trying to be a blessing. I have a British friend who is a surgeon in Gaza and tried to take in needed medical supplies to her hospital by sea on a 36 foot catamaran. She was turned away by the Israeli Defense Force.

As followers of the Way ourselves, our brothers and sisters working for Musalaha and others, like my doctor friend who are bringing blessing are the people in need are those we should specifically bless and pray for. Also, despite everything, we should seek to show our Father's blessing to protagonists on both sides. However, Propaganda is propaganda, spun to gain power and control. That is not the way of our Father.