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Israel Study Tour - The Church At Rocky Peak
May 5-16, 2014
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Crawling Through a Cave
There was an unbelievable amount of “AWESOME” packed into our first full day!
Starting off with a hike in Gezer, we followed the footsteps of Joshua to a set of large “remembrance stones” erected in the Old Testament. We stopped there as Mike read passages from Joshua’s life and encouraged us with the thought that each generation has to experience God in a fresh way and as individuals we need to build our own memorials to Him in our lives.
Gezer
Situated near the International Coastal Highway and guarding the primary route into the Israelite hill country, Gezer was one of the most strategic cities in the Canaanite and Israelite periods. Gezer is a prominent 33-acre site that overlooked the Aijalon Valley and the road leading through it to Jerusalem. The tel was identified as biblical Gezer in 1871 by C. Clermont-Ganneau who two years later found the first of many boundary stones inscribed with the city’s name.
From there we re-live the life of Samson as we overlooked Zorah. Again, we experienced where Scripture took place as we read his tale out of Judges. Samson is a lesson in how compromising our God given calling is not only destructive to us but to countless others as well. We took time to look out towards many of the areas where his Samson’s life took him and we took a few moments to pray and affirm out individual God-given callings. Our time there ended with a climb down into an ancient cistern where Mike reaffirmed us through the words of Jeremiah that the Lord is our “living water.”
Lastly, we experienced key events in the life of David. We hiked up to where the Philistine’s camp was in 1 Samuel 17 and we overlooked the Valley of Elah, where David and Goliath faced off. We even got to head down to the stream where David has selected his 5 smooth stones for battle and picked up a stone or two of our own. You never know when we’ll run into another vicious giant, right?
Tel Azekah and Elah Valley
The Brook Elah is famous for the five stones it contributed to the young slinger, David. Some surmise that David chose five stones instead of the one needed in case he needed to face Goliath’s four brothers.
From there, it was off to Adullam to explore the caves David used to hide from Saul murderous jealousy. This was the highlight of my day because we were given the opportunity to literally crawl on our hands and knees through an incredibly narrow cave that David had taken refuge in. It was tough for the 30 minutes it took to get through, so it’s mind blowing to think that David and his men would at one point call those caves “home” for an extended period.
We ended our day by heading to the Dead Sea and that’s where we’ll pick up our adventure tomorrow. See you then!
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