For 15 years the Rabbi of the Messianic congregation in Paris has been praying for a Torah scroll. This past January I heard that Tzahi Shapira and his organization had secured a Torah for another congregation so I approached him with a request for a Torah for Paris. I knew that such a gift would have a great impact on the people, the congregation and the Messianic movement in Paris and Europe. Well, the fulfillment of those pryers and my request came this past Shabbat as you will see in the attached video at  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g62Eh3Jvpmg&lch=email&lc=xJ3hTYQ1KWA9r6WuTmkOJl4M0tifOwqz73_qz_99qK4&feature=em-comment_received

    Be blessed as you watch this touching moment at an IAMCS leadership conference in Paris with about 150 attending from May 10-12, 2013. Shalom. David Schneier
 

The best everything store in Paris

   This is the best everything store in Paris and it's one block from our apartment. It has been in business for over 100 years and the current proprietor has been there almost 40 years. If he doesn't have it, it doesn't exist. No Walmart here. Only one thing - French is required. Try explaining you need fishing line to restring a necklace when your not fluent in the language. Shalom from France. David Schneier

Our Spring Schedule

Dear All,

   Here is our schedule so far for this Spring and Summer:

1. David in Crimea and Odessa, Ukraine: April 18-31.

2. Paris IAMCS leadership conference: May 10-12

3. Paul Wilbur and Chuck Pierce worship conference and concert: May 24-26

4. MJAA Messiah conference: June 30-July 7

5. Beth Simcha, Wilmington, NC: July 20

6. Zagreb, Croatia: Sept 26-30

    We have the weekends open on July 13 and September 7th, possible June 22, and possibilities for David to travel in August if anyone is interested for us to come. Shalom, David & Leslye

Images from Europe, Israel and the US

Sharing God's love with an Orthodox Jew in Paris

Street art in Paris

Outdoor seating in Jerusalem made of concrete

Paris is a dieter's nightmare

Beware of camels and artillery fire in Israel

An indescribable musical instrument in Paris

Demonstrations in Paris on our corner

New York movers. What else?

Opera house in Odessa, Ukraine

Notre Dame service to honor and remember 7 million Ukrainian farmers starved or worked to death in Siberia by the Soviets who wanted to collectivize all farming in Ukraine. The world watched and did nothing.

A moment during the service

Street Klezemer music in Paris in the Jewish quarter

Dear Friends of the Schneiers

   It's always good to be where the Lord wants you to be, doing what He wants you to do. For the writer of the book "Visioneering" that is the definition of success.  This spring we are expecting Him to "show Himself strong" in Europe so that many Jewish people will come to know him and that the Messianic Jewish movement here will continue to grow. The usual challenges of entrenched anti-Semitism, anti-Israel voices, the view of our Jewish people that Yeshua is not for them and false Messianic theologies are everywhere. However, the biggest challenge right now is fighting off the divisive attacks of the enemy and we ask you to pray for a hedge of protection for the leaders of the movement in Europe and their congregations and ministries.

   Here's what's been happening and what's ahead:

1. We participated in or led three seders during Passover. What a joy to be at a Jews for Jesus seder, followed by one led by Leslye for a bible study she attends and finally one in our home for our Jewish neighbor and his children. The kids asked so many questions that it was more like the 10 questions than the usual four. Please pray for this Jewish family who are our only neighbors on our floor and who are hungry to learn of their Jewish identity and of Yeshua. Here are some glimpses of each of these joyful gatherings:

Ladies' Seder

Seder in our home in Paris

J4J Seder

 2. In mid-April, David will spend two weeks in Ukraine. Part of the time will lead an IAMCS leadership conference in Yevpatoria, Crimea. There will be folks coming from Canada, US, Russia and Ukraine and we are expecting the same or greater level of worship, practical teaching and deep fellowship as we have had over the past 5-6 years of such gatherings. Please pray for Pastor Barry Boucher and I, as well as local leaders, as we take up the key issues facing the Messianic Jewish movement in Europe. Please also pray for the three key leaders in Ukraine (Yura, Viktor and Sasha) who live to serve God and their neighbors.

Yura, Viktor and Sasha

3. We will be gathering Messianic leaders in Western Europe, Ukraine and hopefully Croatia for a leadership conference in Paris from May 10-12. Anyone who wants to come can get in touch with me ASAP. Messianic Rabbis David Chernoff and Jeff Forman are coming from the US to team up with the Schneiers in Paris. The situation in Western Europe is quite different than in Ukraine, but biblical principles of leadership are constant. We are expecting leaders to come from England, Czech Republic, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Ukraine, Croatia, Switzerland and Spain to attend. Please pray for a greater sense of personal unity and common vision.

4. Finally, Paul Wilbur and Chuck Pierce will be leading a conference and concert in Paris during the last weekend in May.We will be joining Paul and Chuck during this citywide gathering. The hall for the concert seats 3,500 people and needs to be filled to cover the expenses. Please pray for everyone who is supposed to come to be there, for unity of the pastors in Paris to promote this conference and for a strong spirit of worship and praise to fill the various halls where the conference will held. This is an awesome opportunity for breakthrough in Paris and France for believers to understand their relationship with the Jewish people in the nation and identification with Israel.

   Please also pray for the possibility of a Torah being donated to the Paris congregation by Jewish believers in the US. We need to raise funds for the costs of one leader to bring the Torah to Paris (airfare and hotel, about $1,500-$2,000) so please pray about helping in that endeavor. The funds need to be sent in right away (if possible by April 12th) so we will receive them this month. You cannot imagine what joy the presence of a Torah brings to a Messianic Jewish congregation.

Rejoicing with the Torah

Sasha reading from the Torah in Odessa

Rabbi Eric Walker passing on the Torah

      Also please be praying for us as we celebrate Jewish feasts in Zagreb, Croatia at the end of September. This is the first time we will be traveling to Croatia. Even in this hotbed of anti-Semitism, there are those who love the Jewish people and Iarael. We will also have an IAMCS leadership retreat in Nikolaiv, Ukraine in late October. Rabbi Eric Walker, his wife Lora and a team from Birmingham, AL will be joining us in the retreat and ministering to Holocaust survivors and orphans. Let us know if you want to join in on the blessings abundant in Ukraine.

 If you like to help support our work in Europe reaching the Jewish people with the good news of Messiah and helping to plant Messianic congregations and to encourage existing ones and their leaders to be faithful to the examples of powerful and loving Messianic communities in the 1st century, you can do so as follows:

Please send your check, made payable to Glory of Zion Int’l Ministries, to:

The Schneiers
c/o Glory of Zion Int’l Ministries
PO Box 1601
Denton, TX 76202-1601
(Please include a note with your check that it is “For the Schneiers.” (Your gifts are tax deductible).

    If you would like to make a credit card donation, go to www.glory-of-zion.org, click on "Donate" on the left side of the home page, fill in your credit card info on the "Send a Donation" page, in the "Put Toward" section click on "Designated Gift" and in the "Enter Recipient" section fill in "The Schneiers." This last step will insure that  your gift goes to our ministry. You can indicate in the comment section if your gift is one-time or to be charged monthly on the date you provide.



   Blessings, Love and Shalom,

    David & Leslye

 

Update from David & Leslye

 
     While most of America is waiting for the lights to go on in New Orleans, just wanted to give you an update on our schedule:

1. February 7-11: Bristol, TN at Congregation Ari Yehudah

2. February 14-18: Brooklyn, NY

2. February 22-25: Birmingham, AL at Congregation Beth Hallel

3. April 16-27: Odessa and Nikolaiv, Ukraine for IAMCS leadership conference

4. May 10-11: Paris for IAMCS leadership conference

5. May 26: Chuck Pierce and Paul Wilbur conference/concert in Paris

6. June 30-July 7: Messiah 2013, Messiah College, Grantham, PA

    Be blessed. Love and Shalom. David & Leslye Schneier

End of the year update from the Schneiers

Dear Friends of the Schneiers,

    A month after our trip to Israel, Leslye and I journeyed to Odessa, Ukraine. (See Israel report at http://closeupsfromfaraway.blogspot.fr/2012/11/finally-back-in-israel.html). The Odessa congregation, Gates of Zion, which we helped found in 1995 and are the senior leaders of today, hosted an IAMCS congregational leadership conference. Congregations were represented from twenty-two cities in Ukraine as well as Russia,  Belarus, Czech Republic, England and the US and friends from Israel. The joining of the first Russian congregational member to our IAMCS fellowship opens up a whole new, vast area of ministry for us in the former Soviet Union.  Approximately 190 people registered for the conference and perhaps 30 more attended from Odessa. If your church or congregation is interested in attending one of these semi-annual leadership conferences and serving the Messianic movement in Europe please contact David at schneiers@aol.com. You will never be the same!

    The conference included ten hours of sharing over three days led by David, Messianic Rabbi Eric Walker of Birmingham, Alabama, Pastor Barry Boucher of The Life Centre in Ottawa, Canada, Bishop Anatoly Gavriluk from Kiev, Ukraine and three key Messianic leaders from Ukraine, Sasha Popazov (Odessa), Yura Korshun (Nikolaiv) and Victor Vilensky (Yevapatoria). They will be at the IAMCS Rabbis conference in Orlando in January. There were powerful times of worship and praise, reading from the torah, afternoons for fellowship, plenty of meals, visiting the Holocaust Survivors' Association museum and hosting a banquet for the association's members, ministry at two of the six orphanages we serve and celebrating at our shabbat service. Many thanks to Messianic Rabbis Alan Levine and Joel Liberman for gifts to make the survivors banquet possible. Rabbi Eric also brought about 80 tallts which were distributed by his team to a meeting of the main congregational leaders present at the conference. ("Behold how good and pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity." Ps 133:1)

Brothers dancing together

One congregational leader interpreting for another leader

Breaking bread together

Celebrating God's word together

Worship leaders from 6 cities praising together

Inflatible torahs from Israel (Totally Kosher)

Reading from the Torah together

Birmingham tea blessing the leaders with tallits

    

                                                       

   You can see by the photos that our time together was joyful and blessed.  It reminds me of what Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote about the imperative for the believer of "life together" with other followers of Yeshua. We were created for such loving relationships with God and with man. I have rarely seen the fulfillment of Bonhoeffer's call as I do in the revival of Messianic Judaism in Ukraine. It is intentional, voluntary and not programmatic in any way. You can see it when 6 congregational worship leaders get together without rehearsal to lead worship and praise, each not wanting to outshine the others and where 3three key leaders of different Ukrainian Messianic congregations work together without competition to provide the servant/leadership model (which Yeshua spoke about in Matthew 22:25-28) for a whole country and continent to see.  

     

    We want to focus on the ministry to the survivors of the Holocaust in this update because of the shortness of time left to share the good news of Yeshua with these precious people. At this point many of the survivors openly profess their relationship with the God of Israel through Messiah Yeshua. As much as were are excited about the survivors coming to faith, we know there are hundreds more who need to know the power of Yeshua's resurrection. This process from "Holocaust to Heaven," as Rabbi Eric so aptly described it, has taken seventeen years of service by the Odessa congregation to the survivors. They know God loves them and preserved them for such a time as this by the active love shown them and their families. Their faith is not shaken by traditional religious opposition because they can see that the Messianic Jewish believers come not with words only but with deeds on a consistent basis.

Romanian soldiers entering Odessa

A march of death of Jewish prisoners

One example is Mihail. He was a young teenager when twenty thousand Jews including Mihail and his family were rounded up in Odessa and marched to wooden barracks. Once the Jews were locked inside the barracks, the Nazis and Romanians tried to murder them all by shooting them through windows. That plan failed because those who died first created a wall of lifeless bodies which protected those who were still alive. Finally, the captors set the barracks on fire and 19,999 of the Jews were engulfed in the flames. The smoke and smell from the fire and burning bodies and the screams of those who were perishing through this horrendous act of mass murder went out into the city. No one nearby could claim that they did not know what was happening that day. Only one person survived this event and that was Mihail. He managed to get through the roof of the barracks he was in and eventually escape the compound which was surrounded by guards waiting to shoot anyone who broke out of the barracks.

Diorama of barracks burned by the Nazis & Romanians

...... and a banquet for survivors

Mihail with Leslye at the banquet

  

Mihail at our congregational service

   Mihail was present at the banquet we had for the survivors after our conference and at our shabbat service. He knows God saved him and Yeshua  redeemed him. He was the only one of 20,000 to survive and you can imagine the power of his testimony. There are many others who still have not experienced the saving grace of Yeshua's sacrifice in Odessa, Ukraine and the former Soviet Union. The success of the ministry to the survivors must continue and it must grow because most of the survivors have less and less time to hear the gospel as each month passes. You can be a direct part of this ministry by your prayers and a special end of the year and regular monthly gifts. There is information below that will help you with your support.

   Another ministry of the Odessa congregation that we closely supervise is our work with six orphanages. The Birmingham team visited two orphanages, one for the deaf and one for disabled children. At the orphanage for deaf, we were treated to many presentations by the children including songs, short plays, readings and piano and accordion solos. The team had a chance to bless the kids with some treats and prayers. We then toured the facility and were shown concretely where our support has made a difference including kitchen and computer equipment, new windows to keep out the cold and new furniture and carpets for a new section for very young children. Our thanks to Rabbi Walter Lieber and his family foundation for their generous gifts over many years now. To maintain and expand our ministry to other orphanages in Odessa is possible through your support in 2013.

Short skit by the orphans

Accordionist and pianist from the orphanage

88 year old US team member passing out treats

New beds and carpets

   In all of this we are more than conquerors. Yet, we are facing a serious financial crunch in 2013. You may know that a foundation that has substantially supported us for years has ceased its operations in 2012. Because of the death of another key donor and the effects of retirement of other donors and the recession on giving, we need raise approximately $40,000 just to stay even with the annual levels of support we have reached in these past 17 years.. But time is running out for the Holocaust survivors, many of the Odessa orphans will remain in the orphanages until they are seventeen and the Lord is opening doors for us to plant congregations in Israel and gather many unaffiliated congregations spread all over Russia. These congregations need fellowship and encouragement to continue their local works and we have the experience and leadership to help them. Being centrally located in Europe enables us to travel easily from England to Ukraine and now Israel and Russia. And our connections with individual Jewish people in France continue to grow. France has the third largest Jewish population in the world but only two Messianic congregations. So much has to be done to raise up new leaders to expand the Messianic Jewish witness in Europe and it cannot be done without you.

   We need to see through a significant increase in end of the year gifts and new monthly donors because  you see what the Lord is doing in Europe and are motivated to be part of it. In 7 days we need to sign our lease for our apartment in Paris for September 2013 through June 2014. We need your help to do that because the funds we used to rely on to make such a decision are no longer available. Our home is our base for all of our work in Europe. Please consider this appeal when you receive this e-mail and let us know by return e-mail that you have sent or will send in a special gift before the end of the year towards covering the goal of raising $40,000 for ministry expenses. Knowing that you are behind us and want to invest in reaching our Jewish people in an ever increasing atmosphere of European anti-Semitism will be a much needed encouragement for the year ahead.

   If you would like to financially partner with us you can do so as follows below.

Please send your check, made payable to Glory of Zion Int’l Ministries, to:

The Schneiers

c/o Glory of Zion Int’l Ministries

PO Box 1601

Denton, TX 76202-1601 

(Please include a note with your check that it is “For the Schneiers.” (Your gifts are tax deductible).

    If you would like to make a credit card donation, go to www.glory-of-zion.org, click on "Donate" on the left side of the home page, fill in your credit card info on the "Send a Donation" page, in the "Put Toward" section click on "Designated Gift" and in the "Enter Recipient" section fill in "The Schneiers." This last step will insure that  your gift goes to our ministry. You can indicate in the comment section if your gift is one-time or to be charged monthly on the date you provide.

   Blessings, Love and Shalom,

       David & Leslye

                                  Some gifts from the Odessa congregation

                                  for Leslye's birthday in October