Rocks, talks, flips, and floats

Yesterday we went down South.

The day before that it rained like crazy over here, the Old City was near empty, we enjoyed walking around without crowds. It's like Milton-Freewater compared to Disneyland when it rains.

Anyway, back to yesterday. - Confused yet? I'll just try to skip around days a little more if you want.- So we went down to the Dead Sea. It was not a scorching day, which I liked very much, but it was a little bit colder than one wishes if one is to swim in a large body of water.

The Dead Sea is amazing. It's very pretty from far away and very weird when you're in it. But at least I can float in it! Not like freshwater pools, those I sink in even when I hold my breath, something about density and low body-fat percentages I hear. In honor of my last visit to such places I orchestrated the 2nd annual amateur American synchronized swim-team practice. Here's to you Drs. Anderson and Trull!

Then we cleaned ourselves from the "refreshing" waters of the Sea and headed toward another famous place, En Gedi. We hiked in from the back side, stopping at a spring on the hill and then at some cool natural rock spires, where we IBEXers climbed around like a bunch of Ibex (or look at this website or this one.) As we looked out over the Dead Sea and the plains of Moab and Edom over in Jordan, Abner talked to us about Sodom and Gomorrah. The Dead Sea was pretty likely not dead before those days, now it stands as evidence of God's wrath and judgment. A big freshwater lake gets hit with the aftermath of God's fire and brimstone target practice and it stays fresh no more, for like 3 or 4,000 years no more... It was an unexpected and interesting thing to consider. What a great testament to the power, justice, and wrath of our mighty God. I think it would be good to not take Him quite so lightly folks, He is far more than we really think about. Far, far more.

We got to the aforementioned spring shortly thereafter, where we looked at a couple of Psalms. When one reads something like this "O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water" (Ps. 63:1) in such a place as that it means more. Let me share a little: So you stand there, at a spring that essentially is the only freshwater for miles and miles and miles and miles, you are looking down at a beautiful body of water - beautiful, but oh-so-deadly and worthless to you - there are rocks as far as you can see in most directions. Chances are its been a while since you had any fresh water of any kind, you're running from someone who wants you dead (for 17 years... how much that would stink) and yet when everything in your body cries out for one sip of fresh water you say something that shows just how much you have your priorities in order. David thirsted for God when literally he was thirsty out of his mind, I don't think I know very many people like that - and I am certainly not one who can claim that in the least. Let's try something new and make the Lord the thing that we long for most.

Let me tell you another little story that relates to that. It's about me, in case that isn't clear in the first 7 words or so. Being in Israel there is a lot I can miss. I miss such mundane things as clothes dryers that dry your clothes in one cycle (though I'm too stingy to use the one here anyway :), I miss having classes in more than just one classroom. I miss chapel three times a week. I miss eating real portions of meat. I miss playing soccer in grassy fields. I miss my family. I miss wearing more than 6 different shirts. I miss my friends that will too soon be graduating. I miss lemonade and root beer (not together, just in general) I miss little kids. I miss sliding down the handrail in front of Davidson. I miss honey bunches of oats on the occasional saturday morning. I miss sunday school. I miss one Person in particular. In short, there are many things that I miss. Not that I would trade this part of my life, oh no, not at all! I love being here.

But the point of the list, though maybe having the appearance of complaint (which again, it's not :), is to explain something. Those things are things that I long for, be they every day or just occasionally. Nevertheless, those are things that I think about, desire, look forward to, etc. And those things are probably, no, definitely, on my mind far too often. Most likely far more than the Lord is on my list of desires. Not only that, I would venture to say that even when He is I don't often give him priority. I don't think like David. I don't write like him or rely on the Lord like him. It would be nice to for sure, but I don't. It's a challenging thought. What is on the priority list in my life? You could ask me a few to-the-point questions and have a pretty good idea.

But I'll tell you what I'd like to have. I'd like to have a one-item list of desires. A one-item list that is so obvious in my life that you folks when presented with the "give one word to explain Elijah R Conlee" it would be the only thing that came to mind, not just the first, but the only. I'm far from this I can tell you, but I think that if one truly makes EVERY effort to live this way than by His grace and strength it is possible.

You want to know what that list would look like?
Here's how I picture it, more or less: When I'm an old man, or dead and gone, someone will reach for my old worn Bible. They will thumb through the pages that are filled with notes and underlining and highlighting and dates and a piece of paper will fall. It would be old and yellowed, the edges wrinkled and torn, like it had been held and considered a hundred times a hundred times. Because it had. It probably has a few words in black pen, my name maybe, but the word that stands at the center is just one: God. -- and not God like we so loosely say it, but "God" written down with reverence. "God" written with respect and honor and love. "God" written with Fear. Who knows, maybe it will have another name for the Lord, or maybe on the back it will be written in Hebrew or something. Regardless of what form it comes in, it's going to fall on the floor, whoever sees it will pick it up and read it (which won't take long :) and have no doubts about that being the way my life was lived. If they didn't know me then the one with them will get to explain how my life was just canvas, God used it for something far greater.

I had more I was going to say, but this tangent has got me thinking too much. I can't go on when such things are going on inside. It's a challenge, sure, but what greater challenge have we than to honor the LORD as such.

In class this morning someone said my name in Hebrew, causing Abner to question, and that sparked a short conversation about what it means. I can look at it in Hebrew and know what it means, which is cool (and a story for another time), but more importantly it is a reminder of how I should live.

Elijah: My God is Yahweh.

I think it is about time that I go and make that a true statement.