A Time to Celebrate

"So you shall rejoice in every good thing which the Lord your God has given to you and your house, you and the Levite and the stranger who is among you." (Deuteronomy 26:11) A Time to Celebrate

Dear brothers & sisters… This past week we were invited to a very special celebration. For this past school year (September to July), we have been helping Ethiopian immigrants with a specially developed program. The children we so happy Hebrew language courses were offered to new immigrants in the mornings, but parents were unable to attend because they needed to stay home with their children. So, a new program was started which we were asked to help with. Would we consider providing a meal for forty children? For the last ten months, or so, the Ethiopian immigrants have now been able to take their classes at night, and in the same building, their kids are taking classes to learn and do art projects. When they take a break, we provide the children’s meals twice a week. So with your support, we were able to provide almost 3500 meals this year. Certificates gladly received by Jewish Ethiopian immigrants We were invited to the graduation class of about 25. The Director of the school spoke and assured the adult students that their learning Hebrew was a very important part of their new life to open doors and that they need to continue to learn the language to improve their lives. We enjoyed seeing each one receive their certificates of completion. They had displays to show all projects which the children had worked on over the year. In the end, a magician showed up to entertain us all. One of the immigrants we sponsor, told us her children love to go to school to be able to eat our food. We bring them fresh and healthy food, and it is food they love. In addition to the food distributed each week, we also bring toys and school supplies as we them on hand. They showed slides from a time earlier this year when our clown volunteer visited with these children - that was a big hit. This evening, we received a lot of "todah rabah's" (Hebrew for "thank you, very much"). It was wonderful to celebrate together and realize how wonderful God is and see His mighty hand at work. "And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love to one another and to all, just as we do to you…." (I Thessalonians 3:12)