A very full day, I think.
We were up early, leaving the Tel Aviv/Yafo (= Jaffa or Joppa) area behind. En route to Caesarea Maritima, I spoke about Peter’s vision of the clean and unclean beasts in Joppa and the centurion Cornelius in Caesarea and his acceptance of the gospel. Then we poked around Caesarea itself — at Herod’s palace, where, decades later, Paul was given a hearing by Agrippa and Festus and appealed to Caesar; at the theater; at the beautiful hippodrome; and at the medieval (Crusader) city.
From there, we drove to the traditional site of Elijah’s contest with the priests of Baal atop Mount Carmel, with its magnificent view of the Jezreel Valley (Armageddon) and much of the rest of that region of Israel.
We then proceeded to Sepphoris, where (although it’s not mentioned in the New Testament) I suspect that Jesus and his adoptive father, Joseph, worked as stone masons and contractors. A wonderful site, on which I have a column forthcoming in the Deseret News.
From there to Nazareth, where we visited the Church of the Annunciation and the so-called “synagogue church” and “Mount Precipice” and enjoyed some exceptionally good baklava, burma, and kunafeh.
Driving through Cana of Galilee, we descended to our hotel in Tiberias.
I think that’s everything.
I would expand on this some more, but I’m deathly tired. And I couldn’t do it justice anyway.
Posted from Tiberias, Israel
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