Day 6 - June 14

Tuesday, June 14

Wow, these days are going by so quickly! Well my memory, Beka, is downstairs right now calling her mom so I'll start with what happened at the end of the day today and work my way up until this morning. Well first of all I must document our shower situation. We have one big bathroom with a normal bathtub/shower on one side and on the other there is just a big shower head on the wall with a drain underneath and that is right next to our toilet. We figured we got the handicap room. So last night Beka couldn't figure out the regular shower so we both used the one by the toilet. Tonight while I was taking a shower, Beka tried the other one once more and got it working! So to make a long story short, we took showers together, seperately tonight, that was fun. So moving on backward to the reason we showered. After our delicious dinner tonight we got our suits on and headed down to the Sea of Galilee. Our hotel is right on the shore and it was beautiful! The water wasn't that deep in our little cove thing and wasn't nearly as cold as Lake Michigan! The water wasn't salty either! I was expecting salt water. That was so refreshing. Once it started getting darker out we could see all the lights from near by cities come on, on the hillsides. [Can't forget! Beka and I decided we needed to make one of our famous pee spots the Sea of Galilee so we did just that tonight!] We could also see the mountain we had just returned from hiking, which I will tell about now - Mt Arbal. Jews lived here, honestly I don't know much else but when the Romans were capturing all these cities, Mt Arbal was one of them. this took place about 80 years?? before Masada. the reason that is important is because of what the Jews did when the Romans came up and attacked. Just like in Masada, these people would rather have killed themselves than by the hands of Roman soldiers. There are stories of the men pushing their family members off the edge of the cliff (built into the side of the mountain) and then jumping off to their own death. the mountain was about 12,000 ft above sea level and we climbed to the top. The top was the most fun because we started cheering on the people who were coming up yet. We had a big cheering tunnel going and everything. Before that we came from Bet Saida (vfishing city). About 5 of Jesus' deciples were from this town, right by the Sea of Galilee. Jesus probably spent quite a bit of time here. Previous to that we were in Capernaham. They had made like a huge amusment park type-feel out of it which kinda stunk but it was a big/important city and people now a days love anything to do with making money! Thise city was so big/central/important because it was a part of the Religious Jews tringle and more importantly along the Via Maris. Jesus called his disciple, Matthew, from here. It is one of the three cities where Jesus performed "most of His miracles." (Matt 11:20) Because of the volcanic activity in this area there was a great amount of balsalmic rock. The people of this town used this rock to make flour/wheat grinders and shipped them out. Here, we talked about how Jesus in Luke 17:2 condems those who might cause a child to stumble or sear their questioning minds. Parenting is a freaky job! We didn't stay here too long but also discussed the fact that carpenters in that day probably worked more with stone than they did with wood. Before that was Korazin. this city was also made primarily out of balsalmic stone. they had an example of a "narrow gate" that we all (well most) walked though. It was definitly easier to go around it rather than through! they also had a manger made of stone. Here we discussed Jewish education. This city had a school. Before the kids reached the age of 5, their parents were primarily responsible for thier teaching. They would start school at the age of 5 (half day) and learn about the Torah. A saying from them was that they wanted to "stuff them with the Torah like an ox." The goal for every young child by the age of 10 was to have the Torah completely memorized. They were so devoted to that text!! Between the ages of 10-15, they would begin to learn more books, begin to study under a Rabbi, become decisiples, have Bar Mitspha (age 13 for boys) and Bat Mitspha (age 12 for girls), they would also likely marry. A couple interesting things...when Jesus parent's took Him to Jerusalem and forgot him there, he was discussing with the leaders in the temple. they were blown away! He probably had the Torah memorized by this time. Another thing to do with age is that all Jesus desciples were probably about 12-20 years old. that is so different from what we have heard our whole lives! This morning we went to the Mt of Beatitudes (supposed site). Pastor Ed had the sermon on the Mount (Matt 5-7) memorized so he quoted that for us while we looked down over the Sea of Galilee. Jesus was such a hunple man. It is so hard for me to be humble. I would think that the way to "get my same out there" if I were Jesus would be to go to the big cities, heal huge groups of people at once. Jesus focuses on individual people. That is just so amazing to me. Think how many people (still today) know the name of Jesus rather than those people all around the world who work to make their names known and try for huge successes.