How a near-death experience prepared a SA pastor to represent Israel

A vision during a near-death experience during heart surgery in 2004 impacted the course of a Port Elizabeth church leader’s ministry on two significant fronts.

Doctors lost him on three occasions during a quadruple heart bypass operation and in that time he experienced entering another realm where Jesus spoke to him of him being the Messiah, and he saw a man preaching on faith, the anointing and the glory, said Apostle Neville Goldman leader of Ebenezer International.

In 2012 he saw influential US-based church leader Apostle Guillermo Maldonado preaching and realised he was the man from his near-death vision. Maldonado became his “father in the supernatural” and Ebenezer joined Maldonado’s New Wine apostolic network.

In May this year Goldman was invited on a mystery trip to Israel — together with another 11 leaders from different nations. The 12 men, most of whom have links with Maldonado, were appointed as ambassadors of the Mount Hebron Foundation, tasked with promoting a positive image of Israel in their nations — especially among Christians.

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Goldman said that before his Messiah vision in hospital in 2004 he had visited Israel but he had not been deeply impacted on a spiritual level.

But after the vision he was led to visit Israel again on a quest to research the life of Jesus as a Jew. It was a perspective-shifting time in which he studied the Hebrew alphabet, engaged with rabbis, studied scripture through new eyes, and went on to write three books inspired by revelation from God during the journey.

Fast-forward to 2015 in Catania, on the Italian island of Sicily where Goldman was ministering at a conference in Catania Italy. During this time he engaged in conversations with a man he later learned was the personal assistant to Enzo Saladino, an Italian businessman and “ambassador” for Judea and Samaria.

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After declining an invitation from Saladino to visit the biblically-important city of Hebron in Judea and Samaria last year, he accepted an invitation to visit in May this year, not quite understanding what he was getting himself into.

To his surprise, he and the handpicked representatives of 11 other nations were met on the runway by leaders including the director of the international desk of Judea and Samaria, Israel Levinson, Saladino and Rabbi Aaron Egel-Tal.

He said another surprise arose out of a conversation with Rabbi Egel-Tal in which he was probing the real reason for their invitation. At a certain point the rabbi, asked Goldman if he believed — as the rabbis did — that Christ, who they called Messiah, was returning.

When Goldman responded affirmatively the rabbi shocked him by saying: “If you are expecting the Messiah to return, and we are expecting the Messiah to return, why can’t we work together to accelerate the return of the Messiah?”

Questioned further, the rabbi confirmed that the 12 new ambassadors for the Mount Hebron Foundation could preach Christ freely in the execution of their mandate to bring Christians to Israel and to Hebron to discover the truth for themselves rather than rely on anti-Israel misinformation spread by media.

During their visit to Israel special forces searching for the bodies of three Jewish boys murdered by Hamas discovered the Mount Hebron site where the three angels led Abraham when he prayed for Sodom.

And on April 29 next year the 12 newly-appointed ambassadors to the Mount Hebron Foundation together with Judea and Samaria leaders, will participate in an inaugural prayer event involving Christians and Jews at this important biblical place of prayer.

Through their official status the ambassadors will be able to arrange tours of Christian groups in which travelers will have special access to whatever they want to see. The plan was also to appoint more ambassadors from other nations.

Maldonado himself is leading an encounter in Jerusalem in December and will be able to benefit from the new opportunity that God opened up through the Mount Hebron Foundation this year, said Goldman

A Sons of Abraham meeting in Hebron is also planned for April next year.

“So what it will mean is that the Christians from across the globe will start to come, will start coming together to pray for the world’s greatest evangelistic approach coming in,” he said.

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“Now there’s a significance to it, in the sense that Mount Hebron doesn’t speak about Calvary as much as it speaks about the Kingdom to come. So therefore all the barriers between churches are going to be broken down very soon in a very real manner, as As we pray to God for the world and the state in which it is in.”

The 12 ambassadors, with the backing of the foundation, will also be able to facilitate trade, technology and agricultural opportunities around the world. They are also collaborating in a project to build a massive trauma hospital in Hebron to cater for all trauma victims in the region.