Well it's been two or three weeks since I posted.
Last Saturday 4th August Pam and I returned with 30+ others from a 10 day trip to Israel, and what a trip it was. I've known and heard people talk of the difference such a trip made to them but never really imagined it would have that impact - it really does!
It was a tremendous privilege to walk the land of the Bible, to observe and feel its dimensions, to observe and feel the history - the reality.
It was a tremendous privilege to walk where Jesus - God in the flesh - lived, walked, talked, healed, delivered, saved, died and rose again!
There was just sooo much! It was action packed all the way! When people have asked what was your favourite, rather like our team leader Steve, I find I have lots of favourites - in fact I started to write a list and I found it would be too long for a post! So many things brought the Bible, it's stories and teachings to life in a new way - it's like it added a third dimension.
Probably the saddest things was to see and feel something of the division and tension in Jerusalem and Bethlehem, and to see those for who Messiah came, still looking and longing for him.
The weirdest, laying on the Dead Sea and then putting your legs down in order to stand up and finding they just bounced up!
The most moving was to hear the testimonies of a Palestinian believer - how he came to Christ in prison, the trials he faces day by day, his vision for the gospel, and that of a converted Jew in Nazareth, how he had come to a saving knowledge of Messiah and how he was now seeking to make him known.
Another important aspect was the group we went with from various parts of the UK and the world, mostly unknown to one another but like a family by the end - sharing food, fellowship and fun truly helped to make it - and the collective memory at the airport as we waited for our flight certainly helped to fill the gaps in our memories and diaries!
HiStory is His story, the Bible tells us God is behind and in the story of planet earth, his great love for those he made in his image, and how he has a plan to redeem a people from every tribe, tongue and nation unto himself - a story of God's amazing grace to people who just don't deserve it!
The unfolding of that story took place in a very small corner of the earth, today it takes place on an international scale as Jesus continues to build his church as His Spirit moves across the nations of the earth and gets behind every barrier that man can raise whether of the mind and heart - or a very physical wall, to bring men and women to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ!
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