Our second day in Israel ended with a story that needs to be told rather than read. It’s the last thing our friend Adi (see previous post) shared with us before we parted ways. I’ve retold it on the video below. I hope it’s worth 2 minutes of your time.

What does 15 seconds look like? from Matt Elsberry on Vimeo.

[caption id="attachment_811" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="--Mother protecting kids from missile attack--"][/caption]

“You have 15 seconds to find shelter or face potential death”

As we entered Sderot, Israel, we were given this stern warning. We were also to keep the car window’s down partway to listen for the sirens and the haunting call of “Tseva Adom”, Hebrew for “Code Red”. If the peace in the city was broken, we would immediately stop the car and sprint to the nearest shelter. This created a palpable tension in the air that was in direct contrast to this small, well-manicured city on a beautiful day.

Over the last 8-9 years over 10,000 missiles have been fired from Gaza into this small Southern Israel town. That’s an average of well over 3 per day. Once a launch is detected, it is immediately announced and residents have 15 rapidly descending seconds to find a bomb shelter. To get a feel for what life is like in Sderot, watch this powerful video here.

One of the …

[caption id="attachment_764" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="----Masada from above----"][/caption]

My friend Gunnar is a tribe leader in the area of Stewardship. He is the Executive Stewardship Pastor for Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas. We’ve been friends for several years now.

Gateway is looking at taking the message of stewardship to their partners globally. They wanted to start in Israel and was curious to see if I wanted to come along and help them…ummm…yes?

So it was with the purpose of exploring Israel and it’s stewardship needs that Gunnar, myself, and seven other amazing other guys  embarked. All seven of the guys were incredible strategic thinkers and 5 of them are successful business owners/leaders. Would there be a way to use our gifts and experiences to serve the Messianic followers there?

-Day 1-

I had just presented at our Crown ignite! Training in Kansas City (more on this later), so I showed up a day later than all of them. While I missed their tour of Jerusalem, I was able to catch up with them on the second day. The excitement was about to begin.

After driving down in two vans to the Dead Sea and Masada (…

To describe everything that happened in my recent trip to Israel…at least not in one post.

[caption id="attachment_730" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="-----The Dead Sea from Masada-----"][/caption]
So, to do them justice I will spread out the tale in a few posts.

As a quick glimpse we ministered to victims of terrorist attacks; were within sniper distance of the Gaza Strip; traveled with the leaders of a volunteer emergency response team; met the persecuted church in Ashdod; got a private tour of an Israeli Army base; took a boat out on the Sea of Galilee; worshiped with Jewish, Russian Jewish, Arabs and Sudanese believers on top of Mt. Carmel…I could go on.

I’m out of breath just thinking about all of it.

Today I find myself nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains, just a couple hours north of Atlanta. We have Crown staff, board members, and volunteers who have traveled here from all over the world and we are all desperately trying to serve them well.

I will post the first of the Israel stories soon. For now, it’s back to work!

[caption id="attachment_714" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="The Oregon sunset from my inadequate camera phone"][/caption]

For the last few days I’ve been off the grid.

Almost literally. I’ve been on one of the Westernmost parts of the US, on the Oregon coast a little bit West of Portland. My great aunt has a house right on the beach. It’s one of those sentinel houses that stands guard over redundant path the sun frequents as it dips itself into the pacific.

It’s been good for the soul. I’ve been out here with my dad, trying to get to know myself better by learning to know him better.

Not to mention God.

I’m guessing there’s just some infinite truths we don’t get to know about our heavenly Father until we explore some of the finite truths about our earthly fathers. The enemy whispers that the failings of our human fathers are also the failing of an imperfect God that calls Himself perfect.

I’m certainly no expert in this stuff. I’m just a guy trying to understand his father better.

And his Father.