We have arrived!

Leaving Grand Rapids at 3:00 p.m. on Thursday afternoon, we all waved good-bye to our loved ones. Jonathan and Jennifer Greer, our professors and guides, greeted and prepped us for what the next hours would look like. 37 of us are on this trip and right away, we found our “group buddies.” From Grand Rapids, we headed to Chicago where we flew out at 9:30 p.m.for a 10-hour flight to Istanbul, Turkey. We landed in Istanbul at about 4:00 p.m. and we fly out to Amman, Jordan where we’ll land at about 11:00 p.m. From there we will start the process of getting through customs and boarding the bus to our hotel for the night… only to have breakfast at 5:00 a.m. the following day so that we can get on the bus and take a 2.5 hour drive to Petra where we’ll spend our first day in Israel.

Sleep looks grim in our near future, but we’re all reassured in that anyone who has ever taken this trip has never once come back to say it wasn’t worth it. John spoke to us for a moment about this type of “classroom” that our group will experience over the next 10 days. This type of classroom is about to be like none other as we not only learn with our minds, but will have the privilege to learn with our eyes, our feet, and our hearts. Many of us are anxious to learn about the culture, the food, and maybe even some cultural misconceptions we may have. But overall we’re most anxious to walk where Jesus walked and to learn where he, himself, taught. John told us about how the Bible is about to come alive for us. Though we’ve read many of these stories so many times, we have had to use our imaginations to picture what the lay of the land looked like. Now we’re about to find out just how different the reality is from our imagined cultural patterns, people groups, and customs from the ancient days.

One thing is certain – the way any of the 37 of us read the Bible will never again be the same. The stories of the Israelites, and the disciples, and JESUS, are all about to come alive as we walk where they themselves have walked.

For those of you joining us on this trip through our writing, we thank you. Thank you for your support as we release many things back home in order to have this experience of a lifetime. We hope that we can help these stories come alive for you, as well. Please continue praying with us for traveling safety, and for endurance! Lastly, please pray for our guides, Jonathan and Jennifer, as it is they that have the responsibility to take 37 of us under their wing over the course of these next 10 days!

Stay tuned!