Houses of Beauty
Vision
Our founder, Wendy Cohen, is a Jewish believer in Messiah Yeshua, Jesus Christ. After the LORD called her to South Carolina, He led her to what He called “God’s Mountain,” and asked her to create a goshen.
He told her she had been given former Cherokee Land, and was to honor both the Cherokee and her own Hebraic roots,
Establishing a nature-based eco-system, utilizing the resources of the environment for healthy living,
Focusing on the arts, healing, restoration, redemption and harmonious living in Christ,
Basing life upon His Word and His Presence.
The Reality
As people have come and joined our community, discovering their place within this narrative, the LORD has created a rich and beautiful tapestry amongst and through us. We share much love and joy. Creativity flourishes. God’s Word and Presence hold us up. But we fall on our faces a lot. Multicultural issues bring challenges. Different ways of understanding life do not easily congeal. Then God helps us. He lifts us up and prepares us for the journey ahead. Even the mistakes, redeemed in His Hands, add much beauty to our tapestry.
We celebrate God’s calendar, His Feasts and His Holy days with others who come to join us. The first buildings are complete, and we are preparing to work the land. We are honored to be part of God’s Kingdom here on earth. We are honored to be party of His Story.
The Backstory
Can we walk together for a few minutes as I, Wendy, explain the genesis of Houses of Beauty? Will you take a short journey with me into my life?
When I first responded to an altar call and gave my life to Messiah Yeshua I asked the Lord to conform all my thoughts, feelings, actions and words to His Will and His Heart. I wanted to experience the fulfillment of John 5:19 and John 17:21-23, to feel Yeshua fully in me and myself fully in Him, to share Him with others freely, to live the most joy-filled, exuberant, full-of-love life possible. Over time I learned to relax into Him. He did the work and I received His glory. It was all about Him.
Raised by atheist Jews, I knew very little about Torah and God’s commandments until Yeshua, Himself, introduced me to the Ancient Path of the Israelites and asked me to conform my life to Torah. Then He took me to the most charismatic, healing churches in the United States and asked me to stay there, learning about His Spirit, consciously living within Him. From Old Testament to New Testament, heaven penetrated my life, a taste of “on earth as it is in heaven.” Then God asked me to lead a Messianic cultural/arts organization in California, introducing many Christians to the Hebraic roots of their faith, and introducing many Jews to Yeshua and His Spirit.
My heart yearned to live in Israel, and eventually the LORD brought me there to establish a residential creative retreat center on top of Mt. Carmel. I finally felt like I had found my home on earth, living in Israel within a community that was mostly Druze and Arab. I moved most of my most treasured possessions to Israel and thought I would live there till the end of my life.
I was surprised when the LORD asked me to move to South Carolina to start a “goshen” there. Leave Israel? My home? Really?
But yes, absolutely. And discovering the connections between the Native people who lived here for centuries and my own Hebraic roots is inspiring. Many of the Cherokee believe they have Hebrew roots and their DNA confirms that possibility. Their ancestors lived in the Levant, which includes Israel and its surrounding countries. They are people of “the land,” whose worship practices were tied to the land. We are people of the land whose religious festivals were connected to our agricultural cycles. Spiritual and physical food merge in our ways. God is calling upon us to dive deep into those paths together.
During Sukkot, the Hebraic Feast of Tabernacles, 2022, our first public gathering, more Cherokee were present than anybody else. More Cherokee showed up to celebrate an ancient Hebraic feast than anybody else. God is calling His people, the people of this land, home to Him here. We are in the midst of a mystery. We celebrate Shabbat weekly and we celebrate the feasts. We are preparing to steward the land according to ancient Hebraic and Cherokee ways. We don’t know how yet. But God knows. Please contact us if you are interested in walking with us on this journey. We would be so blessed to include you!
A little “ditty” about our journey
We get where we’re going by leaps and jumps,
slides and glides.
We fall on our rumps,
God cuts us down to our stumps.
But we get back up and continue the ride.
It’s only our pride.
Smile.
Have a beautiful life!
Houses of Beauty? Tiferet? What?
"Houses of Beauty," in Hebrew, is "Beit Tiferet."
Tiferet is the balance between Love and Structure.
Love is the expansive quality of life, the expansive generating principle of existence. Structure is the ordering principle. Gravity. Math. Physics. God’s Law.
All of God’s creativity utilizes both.
The beauty of a wedding crown is Tiferet.
The Tabernacle is Tiferet.
All of our creations, in the LORD’s Name, are Tiferet.
A butterfly. Our selves.