Israel Day 4 and 5

Two day's worth of pictures here because of sketchy internet service in the desert. 

Wednesday

We began the morning with Evan baptizing (those who wanted) in the Jordan River. ALL of our students wanted to do this and two of those students had never been baptized before. Each night we spend some time debriefing the day, and in those times we've shared a brief testimony of how we came to know Christ as Savior. This experience was very meaningful to the students. 

After seeing the Jordan River, we visited Beit Sh'an. This is an (active) archaeological dig site that would've been part of the Decapolis in the 1st century, then taken over by the Romans in the 4th century. We climbed the tel (the taller area in the back), which was the quarters of an Egyptian governor and also where Saul's body was put on display (1 Samuel 31).

In the pictures, the gray stone would be 1st century, the white would be 4th century.

Public latrine! :)

 After a stop at McDonald's for lunch, we made our way into the desert.

We visited the caves of Qumran, where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. 

The last stop yesterday was at the Dead Sea, where we stayed the night. The Dead Sea is probably one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. That sounds crazy--I always thought of it as dark and dreary because it's in the middle of the desert, but the water is crystal clear. As we were driving to the hotel, the sun's reflection made the most colorful picture. 

Floating in the Dead Sea is so strange, too! It's like being in a pool without an air mattress. We weren't supposed to take our cameras down to the water, so no floating pictures, but it was pretty neat and a little bit cold! 

 View from our hotel window.

Thursday

Today was a strenuous day! First thing this morning, we climbed Masada. This was one of Herod's palaces, but later used as a fortress for the Jews in the 1st century, then was one of the final events in the first Roman-Jewish war. A group of Jews camped out here as the Romans surrounded them to surrender, but the Jews ended up all killing themselves the night before the Romans attacked. 

As I looked out at the desert today while climbing Masada, I now have a very vivid picture of what "roaming in the wilderness for 40 years" looked like. 

We also climbed to see the waterfall at En Gedi today (main reference here is 1 Samuel 23-4, although there are many more) but I left my camera on the bus! Ooops! 

The students had fun feeding these birds for a few minutes! 

After Masada, we ate a wonderful falafel lunch, then went to see the site of the Jericho Road. There is  a monastery there now. The most well known biblical reference is the story of the Good Samaritan, found in Luke 10:25-37. 

This was an interesting site because it was HOT, with an extremely steep road, and Bedouins following us. We saw a little boy that was probably barely Arden's age, riding a donkey down the path. We couldn't help but crack up at the contrast of our kids riding their bikes in our driveway to these kids riding donkeys on cliffs! 

While we saw all these wonderful sites today and my mind is full with information! We have made it to Jerusalem and have two more full days ahead of us.