In 1952 Paul and Marjorie Rowden and their two young daughters traveled from their home in Atlanta, Georgia to Israel to work in the Baptist Convention in Israel. They lived in both Arab and Jewish communities.
They administered and taught classes at the Nazareth Baptist School in Nazareth, worshipped at the Nazareth and Jerusalem Baptist Churches, took Hebrew language classes in West Jerusalem and traveled occasionally across the border to visit East Jerusalem, located at that time in Jordan. The book contains the publication of their informal letters written to family and friends in America during the years 1952-1957 and describes the dynamics of their relationship with other Baptist mission members, with immigrants, diplomats and natives-both Arabs and Jews. It portrays their observations of the culture, the land and its people, their struggle to learn Arabic and Hebrew and their desire to express their faith in an ancient land sacred to many world religions. The book also contains historical information regarding how Baptists came to be in Palestine/Israel beginning in 1911 due to the efforts of Shukri Musa, a Palestinian Arab, and how the land and its people, subjected to ever changing political and religious storms shaped the lives of American Protestant Christians living in Palestine/Israel during the first sixty years of the twentieth century.
The letters are supplemented with information containing historical context and include footnotes and an index. The chapters are organized by stations where Baptists lived and worshipped; including Nazareth, Cana, Jerusalem, Haifa, Tel Aviv and Petah Tikva.
Baptist programs in Jordan, Lebanon and Gaza are occasionally referenced. Other Protestant Christian denominations, faiths and programs, the U.S. State Department in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and the Israeli Ministry of Religious Affairs are addressed to the extent that their staff interacted with members of the Baptist Convention in Israel.
To order the book online – http://amzn.to/dsj6bL