Walking with Faith: Wander in the desert for 40 years and die...

First off, I have to explain the title. A few years ago, Pastor Steve preached a sermon about fulfilling our God-given role in life. One of his lines was that for some of the Israelites, their lot in life was to wander in the desert for forty years and die. It's a line at has just stuck with Jeff and me. In the context of the sermon, it wasn't as negative of a statement as it sounds now.

Today we got a taste of what the wandering may have been like. Keep in mind that if you drew a triangle from Kalamazoo, to Grand Rapids, to Holland, it would equal about the same amount of area in which the Israelites wandered for forty years. God was trying to teach them dependence on Him. However, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Our first stop today was at Tel Arad. This is currently a National Park where excavations are underway. We first stopped at an Israelite fortress used during the eighth and ninth century BC.

Our fearless leader would often take off, letting us follow.

"No Passage" only means a more "authentic" walk.

Looking out, we could see Bedouin camps. They are those groups do dwellings you see off in the distance. Each group of dwellings is a family group. The Bedouins are wandering shepherds, and they live much like Abraham, Isaac, and Jakob would have 3,000 years ago. This is the land God promised to Abraham.

Here's a picture of the fortress.

The coolest part of the fortress was the temple located inside. In an effort to centralize worship in Jerusalem, King Hezekiah ordered that all high places be destroyed. This included the places dedicated to the one true God. The people of Arad defied the king's orders and buried their temple instead of destroying it. Hence, it is left for us today. The temple in Arad is a replica of the temple in Jerusalem. The alter in Arad's temple is the same size of the one in the Jerusalem's.

I apologize for the sideways pictures. I'll have to turn them around on my computer once we get home.

This was the Holy of Holies. Notice the two stone tablets? One is an original and one a replica, but it seems that the Jews using this temple had things in the Holy of Holies to represent what was in the Ark of the Covenant in Jerusalem. Faith, can you remember everything that was kept in the Ark?

While here, we had a lesson on the parts of the temple and the sacrificial system. In Genesis 15, God makes a covenant with Abraham. The covenant is sealed with a blood sacrifice. A blood sacrifice would end in the death of either party if they did not hold up their end of the agreement. There is no way that Abraham can keep his half of the covenant - to live a sinless life - so when it's Abraham's turn to walk through the blood sacrifice, a blazing touch appears and God takes Abraham's place in the covenant. By doing so, God promises that if Abraham breaks the covenant by sinning, God himself will die in Abraham's place.

Out of this comes the Old Testament sacrificial traditions. In the temple in Jersualem, every day at 9am and 3pm, a priest would offer a sacrifice to remind God of this promise. Fast forward to Jesus' time. The sacrifices were still being made twice a day, at 9 and at 3. It's no coincidence that Christ cried the words "It is finished!" from the cross at 3:00. He was the final sacrifice that fulfilled His covenant with Abraham and us.

Take away from Arad: On the Day of Atonement the priest would leave a red cord on the alter that would eventually get bleached white, symbolizing their sins were gone with the scape goat. Jewish literature says that after Christ's crucification until the temple was destroyed, the cords never bleached out again. Never again would sacrifice be needed.

On our way out of the Tel, we walked through excavations of a Cannanite city.

Our next stop of the day was En Avedat National Park in the wilderness of Zin.

Remember my earlier comment about why the Israelites had to wander for forty years? They needed to learn dependence on Him. There's really no other way to survive in this wilderness. I got a taste of this lesson myself today, but I hope I'm a faster learner than the Israelites.

We hiked through a beautiful canyon.

Notice the small spec in the sky? It's really an eagle. It reminded me of the passage in Isaiah about soaring on wings like eagles.

Sources of water are hidden all over the desert. Walking up into the valley, I never would have guessed we'd see this.

Once you're in a valley, you have to get out. What's the only way out? Up. Yup, up that.

Now, I'm not a fan of heights. It's really not so much the height as the fear of falling from the height. Or slipping. Or tripping over a rock. You get the picture. If you look really closely, you can see a vertical crack in the rock on the far left side of the picture. That's where we climbed up. I did a lot of praying and watching Jeff's feet, but we all made it up.

Take away: There's always a way out of a valley, but the only way you'll get there is by looking Up.

Our lunch stop today was at McDonald's. We ordered Happy Meals to take home the boxes for the kids. The cost of living is really high in Israel. One Happy Meal costs about $10.

Other than carrot sticks instead of apple slices, it tasted the same as it does back home!

Our final stop the day was Avdat. This was a Roman fortress. Although it has not Biblical connection, we were able to see what a Roman praetorium would have looked like. This would have been similar to the place where Pilate would have tried Jesus. I did not realize before that since it was Passover, the priests would not have been able to come inside the Roman fortress to talk to Pilate. He would have had to come out to them or they would have had to shout. Half of us went outside to yell "crucify him" so the other half could hear what it would sound like. The sounds just echo off the walls. It was haunting. To think that by my sin, I was right there with them yelling for Jesus to be crucified. It makes me cry with shame and thankfulness.