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Israel In Depth - Legacy Path Experience
December 1-12, 2019
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We ALL Need Living Water
We began this day in Ein Gedi. The National Park is filled with Tamarisk trees and ibexes.
The area between Wadi David & Wadi Argot is where David was chased by Saul. When Saul stopped in a cave, David was waiting inside and cut off the corner of Saul’s robe instead of killing him. The corner was symbolic of the Word of God, the 2 stone tablets, YHWH, and the Torah.
We talked about our need for Living Water here. God is Living Water in the desert. There are 3 kinds of deserts. 1- desert one can survive in. 2- desert one can survive in with help. 3- desert one cannot survive in. These are symbolic of trials in our lives. Psalm 63:1 says O God, my soul thirsts for You as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. Jeremiah 2:13 God is called the fountain of living waters. We NEED Jesus, THE Living Water so we will never thirst again.
Ein Gedi
En Gedi is the largest oasis along the western shore of the Dead Sea. The springs here have allowed nearly continuous inhabitation of the site since the Chalcolithic period. The area was allotted to the tribe of Judah, and was famous in the time of Solomon (Josh 15:62). Today the Israeli kibbutz of En Gedi sits along the southern bank of the Nahal Arugot.
Our 2nd stop was Qumran. Here we learned about the Essenes. They were separatists wanting to remain pure, but worried they’d become unclean. They also were scribes. The Essence scribes painstakingly wrote the scrolls. Pastor Brian explained that 1 scribe would write a word or 2, then it would be checked/verified by 2 scribe assistants. If an error was made, it couldn’t be corrected. The scribe would roll up the entire scroll, place in a piece of pottery, and place the pot in a cave. Jesus quotes from Psalms, Isaiah, & Deuteronomy more than any other books. Those 3 original scrolls have been found and are fully together.
We climbed to Mid-Mountain in Qumran to see the caves where some of the Dead Sea scrolls have been found. While there, we had a time of personal reflection and prayer.
Qumran
10 miles south of Jericho, Qumran was on a “dead-end street” and provided a perfect location for the isolationist sect of the Essenes to live.
The site was excavated by Catholic priest Roland deVaux from 1953-56. More recent excavations of the site have taken place under the direction of Hanan Eshel.
Jericho was our last stop. Pastor Brian took us thru Joshua 1-7 and helped us understand that once Joshua followed the instructions of the Lord and crossed the Jordan River that it was Jesus who was waiting on the other side. The take away from this story was that we need to listen for what the Lord tells us and act upon it in obedience. He will be there for us.
We got about 20 minutes to shop in Jericho and see a few sights before returning to the bus and heading for our kabbutz in Ein-Gev. Today was physical and emotional. We are 44.
Jericho
The “City of Palms” spreads out on the west side of the Jordan River at 825 feet below sea level. In Jesus’ day a new center had been constructed on the wadi banks in the foreground by the Hasmonean rulers and Herod the Great.
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