Closing out Galilee and a glimpse ahead

So it's been a few days since last post, a few days since we got back from Galilee, a few days that have been fuller than full.

Here's a little tidbit about IBEX: All you do is learn. It is amazing. Not just little facts, but things that matter. Things about the Word, about the LORD, about yourself, about things that you can't even make sense of at the time. Who knows, it may be years before it all makes sense...

All that to say, I am in the middle of the beginning of the end. In case that is confusing, I'm almost done here. Sure three and a half weeks is a long time. But it is no time and I have a ton to do (like about 20 pages of papers not to mention some killer finals) and a ton to see and do and some great people to get as much time with as I can. It's not time folks, no time at all.

So I will briefly sum up Galilee and then give you the rough sketch of the next few weeks. Regrettably, I will not be blogging as much, I just have too many other ventures that are - in blunt honesty :) - much more important for me right now.

So... Galilee. We left off on day four (which had the Capernaum, Tabgha, Bethsaida, and rafting if I remember right). Which means we are on Day five, April 1st, Wednesday... We went to the last of the 3 Woe cities, Korazim and then headed north. We headed up the upper Jordan River to the Hulah Valley and the site of the largest tel in Israel: Hazor. It's mostly covered by farmer's wheat fields, but it has a lot of neat stuff archaeologically speaking. Then we went to the north side of the valley to the site of Dan. Lots of trees, a few springs, a pagan high place, a huge gate system, looking over at Jordan, and one last cool thing. To my Corban Israel 08 friends, we got to walk over to the Canaanite gate that they found on the southeast side. It was pretty impressive. Then we went to Banias, the big awesome waterfall close to Caesarea Philippi, where we went next. Somewhere in the area is where Peter said "Hey Jesus, You are the Christ, the Son of God."

Then we went up the huge crusader fortress, Nimrud, and got to hike around that for almost an hour, the thing is ginormous, 45 minutes is not even enough time to get to the upper section and back. Then we headed out into the Golan Heights area to the overlook of Syria. Hooray us, we saw three countries in a day :)

That night Bill went home because his wife was about to have a baby, which she had on Saturday :) So the next day (Thursday) Abner took us around a little bit for a Life of Christ perspective on the Sea of Galilee area. We went up to Shalom Point and reflected on Jesus' Galilean ministry as the entire sea stretched out before us. Then we went down to the decapolis city of Hippus (aka Susita) and checked out those ruins. The afternoon brought a boat ride on the Sea (which sadly did not involve Israeli folk music, you know those TMC MacArthurites and their anti-dancing rules...;) Then we got to relax and enjoy the beach.

Friday was a free day, so we went and hiked the Nahal Yehudia. There was one stop along the way for some cliff jumping of sorts. I have done such a thing three times in my life. All of them here in Israel :) The first was at En Gedi (10-12 foot jump), then on the Jordan River float (16-18 feet at least) and then in the big pool on this hike. We guessed it to be about 25 feet, maybe 30. I don't know if I was shaking because the water was so stinking cold or if I just had a lot of adrenaline. There is one place on the hike where you have to climb down a 30+ ft ladder into the water and swim about 20 yards, it was an amazing hike. Then we had the afternoon to hang out on the beach again.

Saturday was our last day, we slept in :) And then went to the Yardenit (baptismal site on lower Jordan) for a tiny bit and then headed down the Rift Valley to Bet-She'an. Which is a super-well preserved Roman city compared to everything else we have seen. Good times.

And that concludes the Great Galilean Adventure. It was amazing, challenging, and just plain great. Plus I am really tan, it's like having two summers or something!

Now for the run-down of life:
This week = busy as can be part I : big quiz yesterday (I missed one again, it was one that I changed my answer on again! arrgh...), paper due today (summary of Jesus' Great Galilean Ministry - 3.5 pages single spaced), Tomorrow is class and then a Seder dinner because it's passover. Then Day of Prayer / Land of the Bible big nasty final "quiz" (Bill doesn't use the word test apparently). That afternoon we head up to Samaria (Mt. Gerizim) to watch the remaining Samaritans offer their passover sacrifices. It will be a challenging and eye-opening experience. Then Friday morning we leave at 5 am for Egypt. I'll be in Egypt for about 5 days, spend a day or two chilling on the beach at Elat (chilling? I mean roasting I guess) and about a day in Jordan seeing Petra and such. During which I will be reading like a fiend because I have about 1.27393 thousand pages to read before the end of the semester. Then I get back, now we hit busy as a beaver part 1,000,000. It's our last week of class. I have something like 2 little papers, a quiz, and my huge project/paper for Abner's classes. And just like that it is finals week and I will be done with Israel-ish.

Following the IBEX closing ceremonies, I will fly to England, see a friend and travel with big bro Caleb for a couple of weeks. Then I get to come back to Israel for a couple days and then I am home. Changed forever and dog-tired. There you go, you know as much about my life as I do now :)


Really cool story before I close: So this week is Passover. Two days ago was Palm Sunday, thus this coming Sunday is Easter. Does anything click yet? No? It's ok, we're slow too, Bill and Abner had to explain it to most of us about 3 times. The timing of this week matches Passion week, about 1,979 years ago Jesus finished His ministry, was crucified and resurrected. How amazing to be in the land when the weeks match like this... But more important, let's think about the cross. Talk about the culmination of ministry. Talk about pain. Talk about overcoming something huge. Jesus did that for us... How much more than blessed are we? ... I don't think we consider that enough.

'til next time...