The J-Phone

Key West

It’s been way too long since I posted to my own blog, mostly because I have been busy as the official blogger on the Jews for Jesus blog.

My wife Kathleen and I were down in Key West recently. I was speaking in a church on behalf of Jews for Jesus. The church I was speaking at put us up at the La Concha, which is Key West’s oldest hotel. The La Concha is used as a hurricane shelter of last resort, and you may have seen it if you’ve ever watched coverage of hurricanes in South Florida, because all the media people stay there.

We wanted to do some fun stuff which was just purely tourist, so we walked a couple of miles from the hotel to the southernmost spot in the continental United States — only 90 miles to Cuba from here! Behind me you can see a heavy wrought-iron fence. This separates the spot we are standing from a Navy base, and barely out of camera range are some massive radar and satellite dishes. It was kind of sobering to realize that our proximity to Cuba actually made that a spot considered strategic by the military!

Another curiousity which was just at the other end of the street where we are standing in the photo is the southernmost house in the continental U.S. — not to mention the southernmost hotel, the southernmost guest house, etc. I picked up fairly quickly that there is some competition for the title of “southernmost!” In fact even though this house to the right bills itself as the southernmost house, there is a plaque attached to the wall of the next house over which proclaims it to be “the southernmost southernmost house.”

All my life, I have heard people proclaim the beauty of sunsets in Key West. So, shortly before sunset Kathleen and I walked to Mallory Square, where each evening they have a Sunset Celebration, complete with street performers, hot dog vendors, and all the other ways possible to separate tourists from their money. Hundreds of us gathered along the shoreline, where I quickly detected a problem in our viewing of the sunset — there was an ISLAND in the way! As we were soon to find out, unless you are on a boat out on the water or on the roof of someplace like the La Concha, you can’t see the sun hit the water. It was a big disappointment to both of us, and I remarked jokingly that I felt like an entire island had swindled me. I did manage to get this shot of a sailboat and the setting sun, which proves something I remember my photojournalist father once telling me: “great pictures are all about timing!

A Modern Day Haman

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made international news recently, during his “World Without Zionism” conference in Tehran. Ahmadinejad made wiping out my Jewish people national policy for his country when he called for the destruction of Israel, saying, “bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad” (more literally translated from Persian, “vanish from the page of time.”)

Ahmadinejad is not the first to call for the destruction of the Jewish people — just the most recent. In a couple of weeks, Jewish people will celebrate the Festival of Purim, which commemorates a failed attempt to wipe out the Jewish people. Purim celebrates the events of the biblical book of Esther, in which it is recounted how a Persian counselor to the king, Haman, made plans to destroy the Jews of Persia.

There is a certain people scattered and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of your kingdom; their laws are different from all other people’s, and they do not keep the king’s laws. Therefore it is not fitting for the king to let them remain. If it pleases the king, let a decree be written that they be destroyed” (Esther 3:8-9a).

Haman met a bad end by the close of the story: swinging from the gallows he had intended for one of the Jewish protagonists of the story. The book of Esther has always fascinated me, as it is the only book of the Bible that make no mention whatsoever of God.

But just because God isn’t mentioned in the story does not mean He is not present behind the scenes. In the miraculous way in which the young, Jewish Queen Esther finds herself in a position to preserve her people, I see the fingerprints of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This is the God who called Israel his segulah, his treasured possession. Among the promises that God made to the Jewish people was that He would preserve them, no matter what madman might try to wipe them out.

The apostle Paul echoes this promise in the book of Romans, asking,

“God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be!” (Romans 11:1 NASB)

Paul answers his own question, stating,

“God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew.” (Romans 11:2)

Like many Jewish people, in a couple of weeks I will celebrate Purim in some traditional ways: I will listen to the reading of the megillah (the scroll of Esther), I’ll shout “BOO!” when Haman’s name is pronounced, I’ll enjoy the costumes of children dressed up their favorite characters in the Purim story, and I’ll eat as many delicious hamantaschen as my wife will let me get away with.

I’ll also keep in mind that I worship a God who keeps His promises. Though the madman may be named Ahmadinejad instead of Haman, I can trust that the Lord will continue to ensure the survival of all His people — Jew or Gentile — because He is a God who gave up that most precious to Himself: his own Son, Jesus.