Something happens when you spend an entire day together. Somewhere along the road, the small talk begins to fade. Stories come out. Questions get asked. You laugh together, share what you’re carrying, and before long, people who were strangers not so long ago begin to feel a little more like friends.
That is what happened this past Saturday as six families joined us for their first Jerusalem Outreach day.
Some had arrived in Israel only weeks ago. Others came carrying very different stories—including grief, uncertainty, and the challenges of beginning again. We thought we were taking them for a meaningful day in Jerusalem. What God gave us was something far more personal: time to listen, time to love, time to talk about faith, and moments of prayer and hope that none of us could have planned.
The hours we spent together gave conversations time to deepen naturally. At one point, Sergey, a member of our ministry team, found himself in a long conversation with a father whose family had arrived in Israel only a month earlier. They began talking about God’s promises to gather the Jewish people from the nations and bring them back to their land. Imagine packing up your life, arriving in Israel, and then hearing promises like these from Isaiah. For this father, Scripture suddenly connected with something he and his family were actually living.
Elsewhere, Olga was listening closely as Chaim, another member of our team, shared his own testimony—what God had done in his life and his faith in Yeshua. He opened the Word of God and later invited anyone who wanted to pray with him. Some prayed aloud; others joined in quietly. It wasn’t a moment we were trying to manufacture. It grew naturally out of the time we had spent together. As the day ended, Olga told us how much the warmth she had experienced meant to her.
She wanted to stay connected.
Another woman had nearly missed the day altogether. After an accident left her with ongoing problems in her leg, she genuinely didn’t know whether she could manage so much walking. She decided to come anyway, and we watched her stay with us step after step, all the way through Jerusalem and to the end of the day. When it was finally time to say goodbye, she hugged our team with tears in her eyes. Being able to walk the entire day, she told us, felt like a miracle. Then she shared something else: she wanted to come to the congregation with her family.
Mira and her husband almost stayed home too. Their family was grieving the recent loss of their father, and the thought of walking around Jerusalem under the blazing August sun had made them hesitate. But they came. And right in the middle of that August day, the Jerusalem sky opened. For nearly an hour, rain poured down. Our plans had to shift, but Mira and her husband didn’t seem concerned at all. They were smiling. “This is God’s mercy!” they kept saying. “Glory to God!”
We will remember that moment for a long time. Here was a couple who had arrived carrying real grief, standing in an unexpected summer rain and receiving it with joy. Throughout the day we prayed together, walked together, talked, and laughed. Later, they told us the day had felt like a time of healing. By evening, something simple but beautiful had happened: they were smiling again.
Of course, Jerusalem itself was extraordinary.
We stood at the Western Wall, walked through the Old City, looked across Jerusalem from the rooftop of the Austrian Hospice, and ended our evening at Armon HaNatziv. For some who had only recently arrived in Israel, experiencing these places was especially meaningful. But when we think back on Saturday, the places aren’t what we remember first. The people are. We remember Olga listening. We remember a father hearing promises written thousands of years ago that suddenly sounded remarkably close to his own story. We remember an emotional embrace from a woman who wasn’t sure she could walk. And we remember Mira and her husband standing in the rain and calling it mercy.
This is why days like these matter to us. They give us something we cannot manufacture or rush: time to know people, listen to their stories, and allow friendship to grow. And when questions about God and faith arise, we can share naturally and openly about God’s love, what He has done in our own lives, and the hope we have found in Yeshua.
Six families came with us to Jerusalem for the first time on Saturday. By the time we said goodbye, we knew one another differently than we had that morning. Would you pray for them with us? Pray for those who are only beginning their lives in Israel, for Mira and her husband as they continue walking through grief, for Olga and her family, and that every conversation and friendship that began or deepened that day will continue to be surrounded by God’s love and guided by His hand.
We thank God for every conversation, every prayer, and every new friendship that grew from this day.
Our prayer now is simply that He will continue to lead these families, draw them closer to Himself, and give us many more opportunities to walk alongside them.
