Israel Touring Day 2

What a beautiful morning!  This was the view from our room.  What a gorgeous sunrise over the Sea of Galilee.

 After breakfast, we drove to the Mount of Beatitudes.  We went to a reserved pavilion, and this was our view looking out over the Sea.

 Bryant simply read Matthew 5-7 as Jesus would have delivered it.  It took about 16 minutes.  He reminded us that Jesus did not slacken the Jewish laws, but this shows us how short we fall of the standard.  Thankfully, God shows us great grace.  We were reminded of that as, after Bryant's reading, we sang Holy, Holy, Holy and We Are Standing (on Holy Ground).  This was the most wonderful way to start this day.

 The Catholic church built on the Mount of Beatitudes.

 So many beautiful flowers here!

 We continued driving around the Sea to Capernaum.  This is the city that Jesus chose as His home as He got older.  He called Matthew the tax collector to be a disciple here.  He spent time with Matthew and other sinners (Mark 2:13-17).  The Bible documents many miracles that were performed here such as exorcism and healings (Mark 1:21-34).  We see in Mark 2:1-12 the paralytic man who was brought by his friends to Jesus, and Jesus healed him.  John 6 recounts many stories that happened in and around Capernaum as well, such as Jesus feeding the 5,000, walking on water, and declaring Himself to be the bread of life.  In Matthew 11:20-24, Jesus condemns Capernaum. 

One of the places to see in Capernaum today are the ruins of the synagogue.  These columns are from a synagogue built upon the ruins of the synagogue from when Jesus would have taught there.

 In the background, you can see a (gaudy, crazy spaceship-looking) Catholic church that was built over what is believed to be Peter's house.  It is believed that Jesus would have stayed at Peter's house while in Capernaum.

 Statue of Peter in his hometown.

As we left Capernaum, we stopped in Magdala which was discovered and started excavations only a few years ago.  It is believed Mary Magdalene was from here.  It is also possible (though not a certainty) that the two fish the young boy was carrying that helped feed 5,000 came from Magdala as they have discovered a man-made path from the sea to an area where fish would have been cleaned, dried, and sold.

 We went into a small chapel here, and Bryant taught from Mark 5:25-34.  This beautiful painting on the wall depicts the scene, of a woman reaching through the throng of people around Jesus just to touch the hem of His garment, believing that would be enough to heal her.  Jesus "perceives power had gone out from him" and He confronts the woman then rewards her faith and heals her.  Oh to have faith like her!  

 We went back to our hotel where we were treated to a "Saint Peter's lunch."  This is a whole tilapia as that's the most common fish in that area.  Green beans and rice were on the side but I think that's a modern day side.  It was really quite delicious, but watch out for the little bones!

After lunch we went the Yardenit area of the Jordan River.  Bryant read of Jesus being baptized by John in the Jordan River.  It's believed that He was baptized further south, closer to the Dead Sea.

 After hearing of Jesus' baptismal, we each had the opportunity to be baptized if we wanted to.  Ryan and I (along with most of the group) took this opportunity to be baptized by Bryant.  Even though this was not a baptism after a first profession of faith for either of us, it was a wonderful experience that we will both treasure.  What an amazing way to celebrate and recommit our faith and trust in Jesus as Savior.

We finished the day with a sunset boat trip on the Sea of Galilee.  Though it was a beautiful day for us, we read Matthew 14:22-36.  We could imagine the fear the disciples may have felt when a storm rose up on this sea.  It's actually so much bigger than I realized!  I imagine they were in a much smaller boat than we were too.  During this storm, Jesus walked out on water to them, commanded Peter to walk out on the water to Him, and then calmed the storm.  Jesus shows incredible power over nature at that time.

As the sun set, we could see the light of little towns and villages popping up all around the sea.  It made it easy to understand what the disciples saw when Jesus told them "a city on a hill cannot be hidden" (Matthew 5:14).

It was another day where we were in awe of what we were seeing.  We couldn't believe that we were actually walking in the same places that we know with absolute certainty Jesus walked and taught.  We saw scenery that looked the same as it would have 2,000 years ago.  What an incredible day.

Israel Touring Day 1

On Tuesday morning, we were ready to get the touring adventure started!  We ate breakfast at the hotel where we started meeting lots of new people.  We really didn't know many people at all as we started out on this, but we grew to adore lots of them!  After breakfast, we loaded up on the buses and starting driving north from Netanya until we ended up at Caesaria-by-the-Sea.  This was an important port city for the Romans, so our Jewish guide, Moshe, filled us in on how the city was laid out and how it fits into the Roman design.  This city was built up by Herod the Great and Pilate (yes, that Pilate) would have lived here.  Pilate would only have gone to Jerusalem for major events as a political move.

From there, we walked over and took our seats in the amphitheater, and Bryant delivered his first sermon to the group.  He taught on Acts 10 and Acts 23, both of which pertain to this city.  In Acts 10, we see the Holy Spirit moving in two places at once.  First, he's moving in Cornelius, a Roman soldier stationed at Caesaria-by-the Sea, to go and get Peter.  The Spirit is also moving in Peter, letting him know to go with the men sent by Cornelius, after giving a vision teaching Peter about clean and unclean animals and showing him that God loves the Jew and the Gentile.  This led to Peter coming to Caesaria-by-the-Sea to speak with Cornelius; Cornelius then became the first Gentile convert.  We, as non-Jews, are blessed from this.  Later in Acts 23, Paul is brought to Caesaria-by-the-Sea as a prisoner, and he presents his testimony to King Agrippa and the governors.  It is quite possible that he would have given this testimony as a speech in the amphitheater where we sat.

 After the sermon, we walked around a bit.  I always love Roman architecture.

 The ruins of Herod's personal palace, sitting right on the sea.

 From the palace ruins, looking over to the hippodrome ruins.  The hippodrome is where they would have run chariot races.

 This sign was excavated at Caesaria-by-the-Sea, and it states that Pontius Pilate built this road in honor of Emperor Tiberius.  The cool part about this is it gives historical evidence of Pilate, who otherwise is only mentioned in the Bible.  With this timing, it corroborates the timing of the Bible.

 We were so glad to be on this trip with Brian and Katherine!

 When we left Caesaria-by-the-Sea, we drove a little bit up the road where we saw up close the beautiful Roman aqueduct that carried water from the Mount Carmel mountain range to the city which helped them make their port area.

 We continued our drive, and soon stopped for lunch.  We were invited to eat with Bryant and Anne at that meal.  Each person would be invited to sit with them, the Foxes, and the Taylors for a meal during the trip.  This was a great time to talk with the Wrights more to hear their perspective on how things have changed over their many trips and ask any questions we had about the trip or our Bible study leading up to the trip.

After lunch, we drove to the top of Mount Carmel overlooking the Kishon Valley.  Here, Bryant taught from 1 Kings 18:17-46 which is where the prophet Elijah challenges the prophets of Baal, and God demonstrates his majesty.  From this passage, we see several things taking place.  First, Elijah spoke truth to King Ahab even though that would have been extremely difficult.  Second, even the false prophets of Baal recognized the need for a blood sacrifice to be made.  Third, after God reigns over Baal, the Baal prophets are killed in the Kishon Valley which is a foreshadowing of the final battle of good and evil that will happen there.  Lastly, Elijah calls on the Jewish people to choose who the will serve.  We too must make that choice.

  It was a smoggy day, but this is from the top of Mount Carmel looking over the valley.

As we continued our drive, Bryant taught on our bus about the prophecy of the ingathering of the Jewish people leading up to the second coming of Jesus.  He quoted much Scripture including Psalm 106:47, Isaiah 11:12, Jeremiah 23:2 and 29:10-14 (10 being the first ingathering, 14 being prophecy).  He noted how until 1948, there seemed no way for this to happen, but then the Jewish state was reformed.  He then went on to quote Jeremiah 30:2-9 and 31:8-12, and many verses in Ezekiel...36:8-12, 36:21-28, 39:25-28, 11:16-20, 28:25-26 and chapter 37.  I don't have any pictures as we were simply driving along, but I want note these verses so when I look back on this post in future years, I will have these verses together to remember what we studied.

Soon, we stopped at a view overlooking the Bahai Gardens in Haifa.  This is one of the most holy sites for those who follow the Bahai faith.  To be honest, I know very little about this faith, but it's a beautiful place to stop and look around.  From this area, you can also look to the distance and see Lebanon.

 As we left the Gardens, we drove through Nazareth which is what Moshe called "Jesus' playground" because it's where He grew up.  Here, we went to the top of Mount Precipice.  We read Luke 4:14-30 where a mob tried to throw Jesus from this mountain top after he spoke in the synagogue here.  Brian pointed out that the people weren't mad at this point that Jesus claimed to be the son of God.  Instead, they were mad when He talked about going to tell the Syrians and Phoenicians (currently, the Lebanese).  They were okay with their "holy huddle" but didn't want to share with those from another culture that they despised.  I guess some things never change.

 As we left Mount Precipice and Nazareth, we drove through Cana where Jesus performed His first miracle of turning water into wine at a wedding.  We didn't stop here, but we kept driving until we reached Tiberius which sits on the Sea of Galilee.  We checked in to the Scot's Hotel, ate a delicious dinner, and then turned in for the night.  What a great first day of touring!

Israel Trip

Ryan and I were very fortunate to have a trip of a lifetime experience recently.  We joined 90 other people on a trip with our senior pastor, Bryant Wright, to Israel.  We have never done a group tour before, but we were willing to try it for this.  This trip was nothing short of amazing!  I have made an entry for each one of our days.  I'm going to try and put in as much detail as possible, so I'll have this to look back on in future years.  So, here we go...

We left late on Sunday evening.  We flew Turkish Air with 3 other couples; everyone else flew on Delta.  Ryan and I were actually able to fly first class on these trips which was awesome.  When we walked on to the plane, we were given wireless headphones and wonderful freshly-made fruit drinks; they were delicious.

Not long after leaving Atlanta, our chef came by to introduce himself and show us the menu.  We were kind of blown away.

  The food was quite tasty and was freshly made.  The olive oil for the caprese salad made me so excited to get to the Middle East and enjoy lots of great food!  

When we flew in to Istanbul, we could see some great views of the city.  I wish we'd had more time to actually get out and explore!  However, we pretty much walked over to our next gate and boarded for Tel Aviv.  When we landed, it was already late and the sun had set.  Unfortunately, one of the couples traveling with us had a bag that didn't make it, so we all waited together to get that search process settled; they received it two days later, thank goodness.  We left the airport and drove about an hour or so north to Netanya.  It was really too late to see anything.  Imagine our surprise when we woke up the next morning and saw this view of the Mediterranean Sea was our room view!

 Our hotel was so cool looking too!  We had no idea from the night before.

From here, we boarded Bus #2 and settled in to seats that we'd claim for the rest of the trip.  We went to the second to last row.  We were right behind the back exit stairs so we were able to make quick entries and exits each time.  Across the aisle from us was Paul Trotti, Sr and behind us was Mike Anderson.  We are friends with both of their sons, so we already knew we would enjoy having them there.  We then got to know others who sat around us too.  We loved our "back of the bus gang!"  We were ready to get this adventure on the road!

October Fun

A few other miscellaneous October happenings that I actually have pictures of...

Our family went to see the Milk Carton Kids concert at Variety Playhouse at the beginning of the month.  This concert was much more the girls' speed than the Grace Vanderwaal concert earlier this year.  We could sit down, relax, and enjoy music that wasn't overly loud.  It was a great concert!

 I had the pleasure of chaperoning Mia's recent class field trip to the Atlanta History Center.  It was a fascinating day learning more about the Civil War and Atlanta's history.  I always love time with the girls' classes; it's such a fun way to see them interact with their (awesomely amazing) teachers and their classmates.

 On the same day I went with Mia's class, Lily's class had a field trip to the Holy Spirit Monastery.  It was a beautiful day, and they enjoyed learning more about the monastic life and history of this monastery which is only about an hour away from us.  I wish I could have been in two places at once so I could enjoy this with them!

The middle school Pathfinders went hiking at Amicalola Falls one day; Lily had a great time.

 Sweet Mia got braces!

 The girls helped Brandy and Aberle with their "trunk or treat" at their church.  Mia was excited to wear her Ironman costume while Lily went more casual with jeans and her skeleton shirt.  How cute is Aberle as a hot dog?!

 A peasant and fair maident ready for school on Reformation Day.  Mia's great friend, Sophie, had a beautiful dress too!

 Lily with a few of her friends at school.

 Lily went home with Avery after school to spend the night, and they had fun dressing up as Hogwart's Prefects while trick or treating around Avery's neighborhood.  Mia had a great time trick or treating as Ironman around our neighborhood with lots of friends.

 Lily loved her first D-Now weekend at JFBC!  Here she is with her small group as they got ready to perform their "fruits of the spirit" skit where they told fruit jokes and puns.

 I don't have pictures of playdates with friends, Ryan's time in FL with David, Hollis, and Debbie, or the time I had to spend working to get to the October 15th deadline!  It was a beautiful, fun month!

Happy 12th Birthday to Lily!

I can't believe I'm about to say this, but Lily just turned 12 years old.  That's right.  12. Years. Old.  Where in the world has time gone?  

We love this girl to pieces, so we were quite excited to celebrate her!  Her birthday was over Fall Break, so she enjoyed having the day off from school.  I took the day off from work, so we could have a great family day together.  We were really glad that Grandpops had flown in from Chicago the night before.  On Thursday, we had a small lunch and then went over to Parkway Point.  Grandpops surprised the girls and got them arcade tickets for Main Event, so they had lots of fun playing there for a little while.  After that, we headed upstairs to see the movie Small Foot which was pretty cute.  We enjoyed hanging out together that afternoon, and then finally we met up with Granna and Papa at Golden Corral for dinner.  Lily loves "GC" as she calls it.  We had a fun time.  Afterwards everyone came back to the house to open presents and take a few pictures.

 Lily was very excited about all of the presents she received, but she couldn't believe it when she opened this gift from Ryan and me.  It's a Hogwarts castle with over 6,000 Lego pieces!  She immediately dumped all 39 bags out on the floor and start working to put it together.

 On Friday, we had breakfast together at J. Christopher's, and then Ryan and David headed out towards Gainesville.  They drove down to go to the UF/LSU game with Hollis and Debbie.  They had a great time!  The girls and I stayed home, and Lily made herself a birthday cake.  It didn't turn out exactly as she'd hoped, but it was still delicious and had a pretty icing on it.  Finally, around 3:30, her best friend Emory arrived after a day at her new school.  It didn't take long before we were singing Happy Birthday and digging in to the cake!

 About an hour later, the girls got ready, and we headed on out.  We went to Figo for dinner which is always tasty, and then we drove on down to Symphony Hall at the Woodruff Arts Center.  They were playing the second Harry Potter movie with the ASO again which is just such a cool experience.  This was the perfect way to celebrate Lily's birthday!

We had great seats and enjoyed watching the movie.  We snuck out when the credits started because it was already after 11:00; we were tired!  We made it back home, and Lily loved having Emory spend the night at our house.  They stayed up for a bit later, but then drifted off to sleep.  On Saturday morning, the four of us girls went over to Studio Movie Grill to have brunch and watch The House with a Clock in Its Walls.  A little creepy in parts, but overall entertaining.  Unfortunately we had to take Emory home after that, but this was a wonderful way to celebrate our girl!

I always like to ask the girls for some favorites on their birthday.  Here are Lily's current favs:

Color - Purple

Movie - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2

TV Show - Kids Baking Championship

Book - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Drink - Dr. Pepper

Memory from prior year - Our surprise trip to Universal Studios in Orlando

Best Friend - Emory McKeeby

Bible Verse - 1 Peter 3:3-4

School Subject - Latin

Food - Dad's mac and cheese

Activity - Playing with friends

Place to Go - Anywhere with Emory

Game to Play - Scattegories

Restaurant - Figo

Animal - Otter

Most Thankful For - Friends and Family

Goal this year - Learn how to do a split

We are so in love with Lily, and we are so proud to call her our daughter.  She has many great qualities.  She's incredibly witty, responsible, insightful, intuitive, loyal, honest, trustworthy, motivated, creative, and beautiful (inside and out).  She's fun to hang out with.  She's a good cook and baker.  She's going to be a great wife and mom someday.  I can't wait to see the path she walks as she continues to grow and mature; I know it will unfold quickly before us.  Lily Hooks, you are adored and loved more than you know.  Happy birthday!