11 July: Day 4: lots of old places

Wow, I am definitely not over the jet lag yet! After a sleepy breakfast we visited Capernaum where the ruins of several buildings from the time of Jesus still stand. The base of the synagogue is believed to be the remains of the one built by the Roman centurion and that Jesus frequented. The main part of the synagogue was rebuilt about 350 years later, but the foundation remains and is still visible.

The black part is from the time of Jesus.

It took a while to convince Papa to take this picture through a door.

Underneath a small Catholic church are the remains of a house that may have been where Peter’s in-laws lived. Capernaum was a beautiful little spot with lovely views of the Sea of Galilee.

As you might imagine, one of the highlights of this trip is connecting the Biblical stories we know so well (and some we don’t know so well) to their physical locations. This happened to some extent today with the Sermon on the Mount. The Bible tells us that this took place somewhere in the vicinity of the Sea of Galilee on a mountain (obvi) but doesn’t give us GPS coordinate, so there are a number of hills that it might have been. A hundred years ago the Italian Church picked one of these possibilities and built a church to commemorate the Mount of Beattitudes. Our guide Mickey did not seem to like this church so much, because they surrounded it with Italian style gardens and “we do not have gardens of this type in Israel! Very pretty in Italy, not in Israel!” Needless to say, we didn’t stay here long.

Full disclosure: Papa and I had a very difficult type separating the next few sites in our memories, so some of the information may be misplaced.

Bethsaida was the site where Jesus fed the 5,000. We learned about some cool parallels between the two stories where Jesus feeds a lot of people; In one he feeds Jews and has 12 baskets of food leftover for the 12 tribes of Israel. In the other he feeds Gentiles and has 7 baskets leftover for the 7 peoples that the Jews drove out to conquer the Land of Canaan. We also got to touch a  3,000 year old gate.

Caesarea Philippi is the second Caesarea that we saw. Today all you can see is the remains some pagan places of worship devoted to Pan. Some people on the tour refused to take pictures in front of anything pagan, but I made Papa do it because the people were a part of the cult of the dancing goats and that’s hilarious.

Dancing goats in matching outfits!

In between some other sites we went to both the borders of Lebanon and Syria. We were less than a mile away from Lebanon today and didn’t learn until later that a rocket was fired into Israel from Lebanon within just a few hours of our visit. CNN says it’s unlikely Lebanon wants to engage in another conflict but it’s still something to think about. We didn’t get as close to the border of Syria, but we could still see it.

That's Lebanon in the background.

Probably the most extensive site we saw today was Dan. It’s now a nature reserve and we got to walk along the Jordan River to the site were Jereboam erected the altar for the golden calf. I was unfamiliar with this golden calf - my mind immediately went to Moses - so I learned a ton here, and Papa has been teaching me even more tonight. We have a very lively church group on our tour from Georgia/Jamaica. They’re all a part of the same church but some say they’re from Georgia and some say Jamaica  so I’m not really sure what’s going on there. Anyway, they are a very talkative/participatory/vocal group and were singing the whole time we walked along the Jordan, so that was really neat and highlighted just how many psalms and songs were inspired by this river.

Politically, things are not getting any calmer here. Rockets continue to be fired and it’s estimated that Hamas has nearly 10,000 more at their disposal. Israel’s Iron Dome system (which is super interesting to read about) has been put to the test and is working well. I know that I struggle with letting go of worries and this trip has been no exception. We continue to see tanks and soldiers making their way towards Gaza and I am struggling to feel at ease, even though I know that worrying does nothing. We appreciate your prayers for safety and are so thankful for the safety we have experienced so far, as well as the safety we take for granted at home. I’m also super thankful for competent airlines, because I learned today that one man still doesn’t have his luggage! I like to think I would have his positive attitude if I were the one in that situation, but I have a sneaking suspicion I wouldn’t.

Tonight was the start of our first Sabbath in Israel and we learned all about Sabbath elevators. You can still use elevators on the Sabbath, but you just can’t push the buttons. That is one of my favorite tidbits I’ve picked up.