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Author
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Topic: Cedars of Lebanon
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Robby
Advanced Member
Member # 448
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posted
UPDATE: Minister Bruce Balfour of the Cedars for Lebanon project was arrested by Lebonese authorites and imprisoned 3 weeks for the crime of visiting Israel.
israelinsider
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Minister held 3 weeks in Lebanese prison for crime of visiting Israel
By israelinsider staff July 31, 2003
Bruce Balfour, 52, was arrested on July 10 at Beirut airport.
Lebanese authorities arrested a Canadian minister earlier this month on charges of collaborating with Israel, Lebanese Prosecutor General Adnan Addoum acknowledged Wednesday.
Addoum said Bruce Balfour, 52, was arrested on July 10 at Beirut airport on a military court order issued in absentia, which accused him of the crime of visiting Israel and "collaborating with the enemy."
Lebanese authorities received information that Balfour had traveled between Lebanon and Israel in a "suspicious" manner, and issued a warrant in April for his arrest.
Addoum said Balfour is now being held at the suburban Roumieh prison northeast of Beirut. Canadian newspapers have reported that Balfour is a native of western Canada who was in the Middle East directing an evangelical project, Cedars of Lebanon, to help replant the biblical cedar forests in northern Lebanon.
News of his arrest only become known after Balfour managed to get a message out his cell to the Canadian Ambassador in Lebanon. In the message he wrote, "After 11 days of hell in Lebanese prisons, I am finally allowed to make contact with you. I have tried more than 100 times to make contact but nothing worked."
He described the circumstances of his detention. "When I arrived at the Beirut Airport on Thursday, July 10th, at about 9:30 PM on British Airways flight 6703, I was arrested because a computer entry said that I have been in Israel at one time, which is true. But please tell me where the crime in this is. My freedom has been taken away and I have been treated horribly. This is against all international law and moral code of every civilized country in the world.
"I need to get out of here now. Every hour multiples the possibility of me being moved to another location and disappearing forever."
In a second message, Balfour said that he was in Roumieh Prison. "on the top floor with South Lebanese prisoners." He appealed for help from people around the world. "I desperately need your help," he said. "I pray that you will not forsake me!" He is reportedly fasting.
A friend, Fred van Vliet, said Balfour was not even aware his letters were getting through. "He hasn't had any contact with anyone, and he doesn't know if anyone knows where he is. His hand lettering deteriorates through the letter. It starts off pretty good, but at the end of the letter it's very scrawly," said Vliet.
The Canadian government has reportedly demanded that the Lebanese government explained why it was not informed earlier of his arrest.
Balfour's mission is explained on his website: "Since the original Cedar of Lebanon forest began to be cut-down and used for wealth-building more than 4,000 years ago by the Phoenicians, Egyptians, Assyrians, etc., up to the British in the 20th century, few have planted new seedlings on he mountains of Lebanon," he said. "We are working toward planting forests of seedling back on the original slopes where they were first harvested by armies of people over the Millennia including Israelites; for King David's, the temple in Jerusalem, Solomon's house as, "The House of the Forest of Cedars of Lebanon," which took 13 years to build, and many other structures in the Bible lands.
Before his arrest, Balfour made no secret of his plans to go back to Lebanese soil. "I will be returning to Lebanon on July 9th from here in Southern California to film and produce a documentary on Lebanon, its Biblical importance of the Cedars of Lebanon and our project. This documentary should be available for showing by the end of August 2003."
Posts: 364 | Registered: Sep 2002
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barrykind
Advanced Member
Member # 35
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posted
A Canadian 'planting of the Lord' in Lebanon
By Dan Wooding
ASSIST News Service
A CANADIAN Christian, who has previously worked in Lebanon, has launched a new project to plant 10,000 Cedar of Lebanon trees in this Middle Eastern country.
Bruce Balfour, who lives in Clearwater, British Columbia, declared in a message from Lebanon: "I have been praying for years about returning to minister amongst the downtrodden Lebanese, especially the persecuted Christians . . . The people that I met were very fearful and hopeless and did not know which way to turn. I had the opportunity to show many which way to turn, and tried to give them all hope for better days ahead -- in the Messiah's return."
Because of the situation in Lebanon, he stated, "a long-term return would be difficult. Then an idea that I had been thinking of during the war years returned to me. I was moved by the barren peaks, ridges, and slopes, which at one time were covered with the Cedars of Lebanon. Maybe, I thought, some day I could replace those which were taken to build the first and second temple, and both the houses of David and Solomon in Jerusalem. During the war years it was not possible -- but maybe now it was.
"As I started to talk about it, the people were very interested; so I followed through with some meetings, including with some officials. The results were an invitation to come and start a Cedars of Lebanon planting project."
Balfour continued, "Now I could be 'a planting of the Lord' on the mountains of Lebanon. In Psalm 92:12-13, it says that 'the righteous who are planted in the house of the Lord, shall flourish and grow like a Cedar in Lebanon.'"
In addition to the cedars, he said, "we will also have a planting of truth -- the Word -- which will also be firmly rooted. I Corinthians 3:6-8 says that 'now, the deaf could hear the words of the Book, and the eyes of the blind shall see out of obscurity and darkness, and Lebanon shall become a fruitful field and mature like a forest' (Isaiah 29:17-18). In the Jewish culture the people are considered as a forest, each one to be nurtured and cared for."
For more information, contact: 403-283-2263 or lucasjw@telusplanet.net.
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The HEART of the issue is truly the issue of the HEART!
John 3:3;Mark 8:34-38;James 1:27
Posts: 3529 | From: Orange, Texas | Registered: Jun 2002
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