Archive

Shalom Dear Friends,

RUSSIAN LANGUAGE PROJECT

We are very happy to report that our Russian language project continues to move ahead at a good pace. Since we reported last month, our first 58 pages have been translated by Olga and returned to us. Chiara is working at getting them in place for publication on HaDavar’s Internet site. This aspect of the project has been a real challenge considering the fact that she does not know a lick of Russian or the Cyrillic alphabet. She has learned quickly and we will have the pages checked before we publish them on the Internet.

Shalom Dear Friends,

SPONSOR A LANGUAGE PAGE

We are very happy to report that our Russian language project is moving ahead nicely. Since we reported last month, our test pages have been translated and our technical abilities and procedures have checked out. As a result, we have sent our translator the first 58 pages of our website to be translated into Russian.

We are working with Peter Shirokov, a missionary with Chosen People Ministries, stationed in New York city. He has recommended a translator, Olga, who lives in Krasnoyarsk, an industrial city of one million people located in south central Siberia. Olga estimates that she will have the translation done in approximately one month.

Shalom Dear Friends,

LANGUAGE UPDATE

One of our deeply desired goals is to present HaDavar’s ministry on a worldwide basis through languages other than English. The four most prominent languages used by the worldwide Jewish community today are English, Hebrew, Spanish, and Russian. As a result, Hebrew, Spanish, and Russian comprise our target languages. We would be thrilled to have our web site presented in additional languages (we already have a good selection of pages in German), but those languages represent our primary goals.

Shalom Dear Friends,

OUR TRIBUTE

This month we want to praise and glorify God and thank Him for the gift of one of His choice saints. This newsletter is HaDavar's tribute to our friend Morey Lokken.

Morey

One of the ways Morey served the Lord was to staff our Bible book table on the campus of the University of California, Irvine almost every Friday these past 19 months.

Unfortunately (from our human perspective), at the end of January Morey was riding his bicycle, as was his daily practice. The rain had produced a muddy spot on the bike trail that Morey did not see. The ensuing crash left him with a serious brain injury in spite of the fact that he was wearing a helmet. He was rushed to a local hospital where the doctors predicted that he would not live.

Shalom Dear Friends,

NEW WEBSITE!

I am very pleased to announce the roll-out of a brand new and upgraded HaDavar website (you are viewing the new website now). Many of you may have realized this already when you received and read the January newsletter on the new website. If you have not gone to the new site, the address is the same (www.hadavar.org). However, if you have bookmarked the site previously, do not use your old bookmark to go there. Your old bookmark will take you to the old site. Instead, type our address in the address box at the top of your browser window and hit enter. If the old site still shows up then push your refresh button a couple of times to put the new site into the cache. If you see the word “drupal” in the address, not to worry. Drupal is the name of the program Chiara used to create the new website.

Shalom Dear Friends,

FLU EPIDEMIC AT HADAVAR HEADQUARTERS

We are facing a medical crises of significant proportions here in the HaDavar office — CHIARA HAS CONTRACTED A SEVERE CASE OF ISRAEL FLU VIRUS! What is the Israel flu virus? No, it is not the H1N1 swine flu (definitely not kosher). Israel Flu is a insatiable desire to return to the Land of Israel.

What are the symptoms of the Israel Flu? The symptoms are an uncontrollable, glassy-eyed urge to stop work and pitifully moan, "I want to go back!" The Israel flu is also accompanied by a desire to consume falafels, Israeli coffee and mutter what simple Hebrew phrases the victim knows like "boker tov” (good morning).

Shalom Dear Friends,

We are writing this newsletter at the end of October because we will be in Israel for the first two weeks of November. When we return, we will face a mountain of backlog (and jet lag) to work our way through. That means we will have very little time to write an entire newsletter, produce it, and distribute it in November. We thought it would be wise to get as much of ahead start as possible. Please pray that we will efficiently tackle the mountain of backlog we are working through as you read this newsletter!

UCI BOOK TABLE

Shalom Dear Friends,

ISRAEL 2009

As you read this newsletter 14 students and 2 HaDavar staff are thrilled to be walking in the “Footsteps of the Messiah.” Most of the group have never been to Israel before. This means that their Bible study is suddenly turning from “black and white, analog definition, small screen” to “full color, high definition, wide screen” on an hourly basis as they walk where Jesus walked. Please pray for our study tour. Pray that these two weeks will be a life-changing experience, for safety, and for opportunities to witness to the Israelis we come in contact with.

Shalom Dear Friends,

OVERWHELMED!!

We are experiencing a wonderful trial and problem at HaDavar’s School of Biblical and Jewish studies. We are being overwhelmed by the student response to our new classes. 147 students have enrolled in the Book of Daniel. Almost every seat in the morning class is filled, and we are in the overflow area during the evening class. We guessed that it would be a big class, but we had no idea how big! Chiara and Paul and Bob have been really hopping to get the class material ready for everyone. This is the largest class we have ever had. This is a great problem to cope with!