Prayer Request

Our favorite time of night has just passed. Our window in the living faces northwest more or less. I like it because, as I remind Mandy, I know when we look out our window we're facing Fenway Park. (Yeah ok and all of our loved ones too :-) We get these amazing sunset scenes. The sky doesn't quite rival the ones we saw this past summer over lake Michigan but it is pretty unique. Beit Jala (like every other town here) is a series of hills. As the sun drops behind Beit Jala it sets our town aglow. We look up at the hill and as the town begins to dim and the stars begin to pop out we here the Muslim call to prayer. This ain't Uxbridge. (My Nana Phyllis would remind me at this point that ain't isn't a word, but I hope she'd forgive me for the sake of expression.)
Muslims pray 5 times a day. The call goes out from loudspeakers at the top of every Minuret and if you're not careful it quickly becomes background noise around here. I say "careful" because I don't like to let it become background noise. Mandy and I have started something new: whenever we hear the call to pray, we pray. Novel isn't it. But really, Islam is on the rise over the world (in case you've been living in a cave and haven't seen the news for the past 5 years.) But honestly I don't stop to pray about it that often. I want Muslims to know Jesus Christ. I really need to start praying that more Christians would answer the call to go and minister in Muslim lands. I just plain need to start praying more. So when we hear the call to prayer, we don't just let it fade into the background noise of beeping car horns, yelling street merchants, and the children playing in the court down below. We pray for Muslims.
As we sit and look out our window at sunset another odd part of the picture is Gilo. Gilo is the Jewish settlement up on the hill. There's a wall and checkpoint between here and there but you can't really see those. All you notice is the contrast in structure. Gilo is well organized and the building are all well layed out, gleaming new blocks of human ingenuity. We got some tough news earlier this week. Miss Grace, who is the Elementary Principle here, has a sister who just found out she has a brain tumor. She is Palestinian. She was able to get to Gilo to the good hospital to get help - exactly how I'm not sure- perhaps a doctor's note gets you across the checkpoint. I'm still unclear on that. As if the news that your sister is in the hospital with a brain tumor isn't enough, Miss Grace can't go see her. Miss Grace can't cross the checkpoint without permission either. She has applied for permission but who knows how long that will take. So we'd like to ask you all to pray. Pray for Miss Nuhan (Miss Grace's sister) that the Lord would heal her. That she would be able to get (and pay for) the treatment she needs. And pray for Miss Grace, because no matter what your politics are or you're opinion of the situation over here this really just stinks for her. She's a believer, she didn't cause this problem but she's certainly a victim of it. So consider this a 'call to prayer.' We need your help!