Who Are You and What Are You Doing Here?

Today our last full day here in Israel has come to a close. To start out our day, we met down by the Sea of Galilee for our morning devotional. We discussed the two different words for love in the Greek language, and the exchange of the word from Simon Peter and Jesus in John 21. The two forms of the word love are Agape and Phileo. Agape means selfless love and Phileo means brotherly love. At first Peter addressed God as Agape, but changed to the word Phileo because he wanted to show a more affectionate kind of love. After our devotional, we boarded the bus to head to Mt. Carmel. This is where we discussed the story of Elijah in 1 Kings 16. Stacie helped us understand that the passion Elijah showed and being all in for Jesus made people mistake him for Jesus. Both of these people had courage and a love for God above all else, which made Stacie pose the question: who are you and what are you doing here? {referring to us and why did we feel the need to travel to Israel}

Lastly, we traveled to Caesarea Strato’s Tower located on the Mediterranean Sea. This place was a gift to Herod from Caesar Augustus. It took 12 years to construct and contained one of Herod’s many palaces. Herod constantly tried to compete with God by building extravagant cities and palaces, constantly trying to please his people. Something that stood out to me was when we were overlooking the ruins of Herod’s palace and Ben reminded us that Herod had no chance of competing with the one true God. Here, Paul also preached the word of the Lord throughout the land and was later arrested. We discussed this while sitting in the jail cell Paul most likely sat in for 2 years. Paul preached without hindrance and feared nothing, and this is where Acts ends (Acts 27:31). Even though the story of Paul ends here in Acts, we have the ability to continue the story, our stories. What will our next chapters look like?

Today, the story of Paul’s journey by showing no restrain in proclaiming God’s grace really stood out to me. He had the goal of spreading God’s love to the ends of the earth, and we as Christians need to keep cheering each other on to finish this race (our earthly life) strong. In Acts 20:24 it says, “However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.” This was our motto to finish our our days here in the Holy Land.

-Briana Plaisier