Russian Jew Rabbi Joseph Rabbinowitsch fled from the pogrom there in 1881 to Palestine, intending to found a colony. One of his relatives had given him a New Testament because he recommended it as “one of the best guides to the Holy Land.” One day as he climbed Olivet and looked over the Kidron Valley at Jerusalem, questions flooded mind: “Why has the City of David been desolate all these centuries…? Why have my people lived so long in their dispersal? Why do we go through these persecutions again and again?” His gaze shifted north to Calvary and Isaiah’s words sprang to his mind: “Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted” (53:4). At that moment it dawned on him that the rejected Jesus was the Messiah who had suffered and died for his sins. His life was transformed. He returned to Russia to tirelessly preach the gospel of God’s Sin-bearing Lamb. — Risto Santala, p. 210