Shephelah ha ha ha

Recently we took a trip down in elevation from the Judean Hill Country of where we are staying to explore the "Shephelah" or lowlands of Israel.  We arrived first at Beth-Chemesh and the Sorek Valley, which is where Samson lived most of his life.  We got to take some fun pictures with us fighting one of the guys in our group who had a donkey's jaw bone and was fending us off with it.  

Next, we made a stop atop of a hill in Azekah that was overlooking the Elah Valley.  This was a significant site primarily because this was where David fought Goliath.  We got to read the story from 1 Samuel 17, take a few pictures and then continue our way south.  Later in the day, we would come back to the Elah Valley and reenact the battle of David and Goliath with our own students and ancient Israelite sling.

We then climbed around in some tiny caves that the Jews had dug in the time of the Great Revolt around 130 AD.  It was fun to crawl back into these secret rooms that the Jews had created to hide from the Romans.  After messing around in these secret passages, we ate lunch at an old Roman Colosseum just down the road.  

After lunch, we made our last stop at the site of Lachish.  This was one of the last fortresses standing in the nation of Judah.  Although it was overrun by the Assyrians under Hezekiah, it was later built up only to be ran through again, but this time for good, by the Babylonians.  We got to walk around the ruins of Lachish and then make our way back to the Moshav.  

All in all, it was a beautiful trip with plenty of scenery and biblical insights that I am afraid that I do not have the time to get into (even though that is probably the most important part about being over here!).  Anyhow, I miss all you guys and love you all!  Hope you are enjoying the Lord and striving to be a good steward of His Gospel!

Herro Herodium!

This past Wednesday we had our field trip to Bethlehem and various other sites south and east of Jerusalem.  To begin our day, we went up to Bethany where Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from the dead, resided and visited the Mount of Olives.  This location was quite significant in the Life of Christ containing some prominent events such as: the Olivet Discourse, the Triumphal Entry and His Ascension up into heaven.  It is so close to Jerusalem and has a great view overlooking the Old City from the east.  

After this, we ventured to some tombs outside Jerusalem that were known for containing the oldest piece of the Bible that we know.  In these tombs, a silver amulet dating back to 600 BC was discovered with the Hebrew etching of Numbers 6:24-26, which is the priestly benediction, "The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace."  Once again, it is awesome to see verification of our faith and God's Word.

Next, we progressed south to the city of Bethlehem.  This city was not anything like I expected it to be, which was small, quiet, and peaceful; rather, the modern city of Bethlehem was crowded, hostile, and frankly uncomfortable.  Nonetheless, we observed the fulfillment of the prophecy in Micah 5:2 as seen in the birth of our Messiah in Luke 2.  We then were left to wander the city and check out the Church of the Nativity for a little while.   From here, we moved on to climb atop of the Herodian, which is a monumental fortress erected by Herod the Great in the time of Christ.  This was a very sophisticated and genius fortress not only because of its strategically defensive location but also because of its advanced water cisterns that were able to hold up to 400,000 gallons of water.

On our way back to the Moshav we made two final stops.  First, we pulled off on the side of the road and went into a local field outside of Tekoa, the hometown of Amos the prophet.  We read from Amos 5:6 which says, "Seek the Lord and live..."  This was the message that this shepherd from Judah had to take to Israel in the North.  So simple but so true and I cannot begin to even imagine of taking a message of destruction to a nation that is like your older bigger brother.

After this, we did some hiking in the Rephaim Valley.  This was a nice green valley with hills that we ran up and rolled some rocks down.  Nonetheless, this was the probably the valley that David chased the Philistines down and out of Judah three times.  So, this was a fun final stop and relaxing way to end our day.  Sorry for the delay in the posts... as you can tell, things are getting busier.  I encourage you to check out facebook for some more pictures if you have time. 

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Love you guys!

The Curious Trip of Benjamin

Yesterday we had our first trip to somewhere other than Jerusalem and we ended up going basically everywhere, but we just called it the Benjamin Trip.  First, we went west heading toward the Mediterranean and passed Emmaus also known as Nicopolis.  Though this is most likely not the same Emmaus that is mentioned Luke 24, where Jesus is with two disciples on the road to Emmaus, we still read the story.  We saw the Coastal Plains and Tel Aviv where we flew in almost three weeks ago.  Then, we turned around to head east and stopped up in the mountains to get a good view.  To get to this location, we traveled on the Beth Horon Ridge Route, which is seen several places in the Old Testament.  So atop the mountain we were on, we read Joshua 10, which speaks of Joshua driving the Amorites away from Gibeon down this same route we had traveled on.  It is such a great story because the victory is won for the Israelites but only through the Lord, since He caused the sun to stand still and was picking off Amorites with "large hailstones" throughout the battle.  In verse 11 of chapter 10 it says, "the Lord hurled large hailstones down on them from the sky, and more of them died from the hailstones that were killed by the swords of the Israelites."  Israel was not a powerhouse nation so the thought of them conquering Canaan and taking the promised land in the time of Joshua was only accomplished through several divine acts of God, just like this one.  It is so cool to see and read of how God's omnipotent and sovereign hand reached down in order to make the impossible, possible for His chosen people.  

After this, we visited some sites in the Central Benjamin Plateau.  Here, we saw Gibeon, Geba, Gibea of Saul, Ramah, Michmash and several other important locations in Old Testament times.  A couple highlights were Gibeon and the Geba-Michmash Pass.  At Gibeon we got to read 1 Kings 3, where Solomon, recently crowned King of Israel, asks God for wisdom.  It was awesome because after this we got to pray as a group and ask God to give us wisdom in the midst of lives allowing us to apply immediately what we had read.  Then at the Geba-Michmash Pass we got to see where Israel was encamped at Geba under Saul and Jonathan to fight against the Philistines who were encamped just a mile away at Michmash in 1 Samuel 13-14.  At this time, the Israelites seemed against the odds having only three thousand men in comparison to the Philistines who had, "soldiers as numerous as the sand on the seashore."  And what's more, but the fact that all the Philistines had weapons while verse 22 of chapter 13 shows Israel's slight disadvantage in arms, "So on the day of battle not a soldier with Saul and Jonathan had a sword or spear in his hand; only Saul and his son Jonathan had them."  Even so, in chapter 14 Jonathan crosses the path and crawls up to Michmash with his armor-bearer and puts to death 20 Philistines causing a complete disarray in the Philistine camp.  From here, Israel goes on to rout the Philistines, but it is imperative to not forget God's hand in this event in 14:23, "So the Lord rescued Israel that day, and the battle moved on beyond Beth-Aven."  Reading this account created a great mental image as we stood on a hill overlooking Michmash to our left and Geba to our right and pictured where Jonathan might have crawled up to start the panic in the Philistine camp.  Once again, it was only through the written Word of God that any of this was special because other than thinking on God's intervention for His people at this location, there was nothing special to see. 

 

Finally, we made our way more east and got to see Jericho and the Wilderness.  This was pretty awesome since we were able to walk around on the ruins of Jericho and collect any potsherds that we might have found.  It was surprising how small Jericho actually was, measuring 300x150 yards!  This made it easier to see the whole place and actually identify where some of the wall crumbled from the earthquake God created.  It was interesting because before this trip we read an article debating the existence of Jericho.  Some archaeologists claim that it was not a city in the time of the Israelite Conquest, but there is much evidence that actually proves quite contrary.  For example, some archaeologists claim that the Egyptians overtook this city way before Israel was in the promised land.  However, in the remains of Jericho, several pots were found still full of grain and other simple items that anyone would expect to be plundered and taken when a city is destroyed by a foreign nation, like Egypt.  Also, if Egypt in fact conquered Jericho in their traditional manner, they would have taken months to do so, and if this were the case, you would not expect the people of Jericho to let months go storing up pots full of grain while they're being overtaken by the Egyptians.  As a result, this evidence seems to favor a swift destruction like the seven day period recorded in Joshua 6.  Also, Joshua records the Israelites attacking in the spring right after harvest so this would explain the pots still full of grain at the time of destruction.  All this to say that it was once again comforting to see God's history through the Israelites proven through more than enough evidence.  I know that you can give people all the evidence in the world and they still will refuse to believe in God, but yesterday definitely helped me to see what an honor it is to serve a True and Living God.  

This basically wrapped up our day and the next big thing we have is a nice little hike on Sunday!  Love you all and hope you are experiencing the reality of God and His love through His Word!