End of a Month

The sun is setting on my time here in Israel.  It's been a fantastic month!  I've learned so many new things and gotten my first taste of international travel.  I couldn't hope for a better guide throughout this time than Dr. Schuler.  He's been incredible, not just for me but for the whole group, when it has come to making sure everything has gone smoothly so that our experience would be a good one.

I think that being in Israel for a month means that I can say that I not only visited Israel, but I actually lived here for a short time.  I've gained new a perspective on life back in the United States and I feel incredibly blessed to have grown up in the country I have.  I'll miss the feeling of being surrounded by history on all sides and that is not to say that we don't have history back in the United States but the history of the Holy Land is so much deeper than what we have back in the US. 

One of the biggest changes for me will be in how I read my Bible.  I can put a memory of a place with a name now and that makes so much difference!  The narratives come to life now, gone is the abstractness I used to feel when reading the Bible...it's not just some place I've read about.  I've been here, walked and worked in the heat, seen the historical sites and experienced the Middle Eastern culture.  I've helped peel back layers of history and put a lot of thought into how those people before me lived. 

I'll miss the people I worked with on a daily basis.  D team, yall are incredible people and I'm so glad that I got to spend as much time as I did with you....even if we were slightly hot and miserable for a portion of that time.  :-)