Visiting Galilee

We hit the ground at full speed yesterday. By 7:30 AM we were on our tour bus with Yosse, our guide, headed for the ruins of the Roman city of Caesarea. This is one of my top five sites to visit in Israel, simply because of the multiple connections it has with the ministries of Philip, Peter, Paul, and Luke. See this month’s National Geographic for some great photos and drawings. We visited the Roman theater, the hippodrome, the ruins of Herod’s palace, and got back on the bus.

Continuing north on the ancient Via Maris, a road travelled over the centuries by traders and warriors from Egypt and Mesopotamia, we came to the excavations at Megiddo. This city was built and destroyed twenty-four times before being abandoned. We walked among the stables built by Solomon a thousand years before Jesus’ birth. From the top of Megiddo we took in the panorama of the mountains of Samaria, Mt, Gilboa, Mt. Tabor, the city of Nazareth, the valley of Jezreel, and Mt. Carmel.

Our next stop was for lunch in a Druse village. A traditional vegetarian meal of Mediterranean dishes was spread like a buffet on our tables. The waitress just kept bringing out more and more things.

After lunch we drove to the top of Mt. Carmel, where Elijah once faced off with the prophets of Baal. Then we pointed our bus toward Nazareth. There is not much to be seen there from the days of Jesus. We visited the Baptist church and school in Nazareth. We were routed around Cana because of a political protest taking place there. Eventually we arrived at our hotel in Tiberius.

I spent a miserable night with some kind of food poisoning. I’ll spare the details. But I was beat when we began this day, and it was a packed one.

Leaving the hotel at 7:45, we stopped at the Mt. of Beatitudes, the traditional site of Jesus’ teaching the Sermon on the Mount. We talked about the life Jesus calls us to, sang some hymns and prayed.

Our next stop was far to the north at Caesarea Philippi. Along the way our guide provided an overview of modern Israeli history. Again at Caesarea Philippi we had the opportunity to open the Bible and think about the meaning of discipleship at the spot where Jesus first began teaching us about the kind of cross-bearing disciples he was looking for.

We then retraced our steps all they way back to the Sea of Galilee and began circling it clockwise. We pulled over to read the story of Jesus’ casting the demons out of the Gadarene demoniac. Eventually we made our way to a kibbutz that provides means of St. Peter’s fish and a boat ride on the lake itself.

We visited Tabgha, the traditional site where Jesus fed the multitudes.
We continued our way around the lake, stopping to see a baptismal site used by Christians from all over the world who wish to be immersed in the Jordan River. Then on around to Capernaum, the city of Peter and Andrew, and the one Jesus adopted as his home. We read from John 6 the words Jesus once spoke there about the bread of life.

Finally, we stopped at a museum that displays a boat dating back to the time of Jesus. There I ran into a friend who teaches at Mary Hardin Baylor and Hannah, one of our guides from our trip back in 2005.

This is how the day is spent on a typical Matt Marsh led trip. You keep moving and cover a lot of ground. Now I’m back in my hotel room. It is almost 7 and time for dinner. I should have no difficulty sleeping tonight.

Perhaps I can think clearly enough tomorrow to offer a more reflective piece. Perhaps not.