Israel Day 5 - Going to Jordan, Jerash, and Mt. Nebo

Day 5 started off in a great way. We woke up a little early to have our morning devotions and we noticed a beautiful sunrise. Here are some great pictures of a sunrise on the Galilee. Enjoy....

After an another great breakfast, we drove over to the border crossing with Jordan. That was an experience in and of itself. Riding across the "No-Man's Land" in the shuttle, seeing lots of armed guards, and then standing outside for an hour or two marked our border crossing experience. We had to leave Steve, our tour guide and Avner, our bus driver, back in Israel. Jordan wants tourists to use their services so we picked up a new guide, driver, and an armed guard... yup, you heard me right.

The guards took all of our passports at once and then called us in five at a time to question us and pass us through. On the way through the line to get our baggage checked, it became apparent that there are not many 6'10" men in Jordan. All the managers of the crossing came out of their smoke filled office to say hi and shake my hand. Everyone in our trip kept saying it was like I was in the NBA. Pretty funny :o)

Not 10 miles into Jordan, we had a little bit of an anxious moment. We pulled up to a checkpoint with 4 or 5 Jordanian soldiers, a tank, and a heavy caliber machine gun behind some sand bags. In Israel, we were used to taking pictures of soldiers with no problems. Jordan is a different story though. Our friend Jim snapped a picture and immediately, the guards ran up to the bus and started yelling for us to give them the picture. What many people didn't realize is that they had turned the heavy caliber machine gun so it was facing the middle of our bus. Needless to say, we deleted the picture. After a few harsh words between our bus driver and the soldiers, we moved on..... whew!

Once into Jordan, we noticed that there was a lot of poverty in the region. There are still Bedouin nomads everywhere and once we got farther into the country, tons of olive groves. Beautiful country though.

We drove down the west border of Jordan on "The Kings Road" and came to the city of Jerash. This was one of the 10 Roman Decapolis cities. Jerash was one of the most beautiful cities in the Middle East at the time. The reason we went there was that it shows us the Roman influences that were very likely a part of the scenery in Jerusalem at the time of Christ.

We had the opportunity to sing in the middle of the stadium in the last picture above. The stadiums were designed in such a way that sound waves would bounce off the seats and then off the wall behind the stage so it was an amazing sound. The ruins were amazing and as you can see, we had a lot of fun climbing all around the city.

We had to get a "Family Picture" with our friend Sarah. She hangs out at our house and helps out a ton with the kids that come to our Home Group.

We spent a couple of hours going through the city. So many cool things. It's amazing the things you find that have their roots in the Roman and Greek world. The main street in the city is called the Cardo Maximus, which is where we get our English word cardiac.

Well, after learning a ton and trying to keep the women in our group safe from all the men offering to make them Bedouin Princesses by buying them with camels, we decided to grab some lunch. There was a man there making bread. Kelly gave him a couple of dollars to take his picture and he made her a special piece of bread shaped like a heart. I was slightly jealous :o)

We went from Jerash on a long, scary, 2 and a half hour drive through Jordan. Our Jordanian bus driver was crazy. He had this nasty habit passing cars on blind curves on the side of a mountain. All of us were a little sick but we made it just in time to the monastery on Mt. Nebo before it closed. Mt. Nebo is where God brought Moses to see the land he had been promised in Deuteronomy 32. If you remember the story, this is the place where Moses saw the promised land but could not enter because he misrepresented God by striking the rock twice. This ruined the perfect picture of Christ (1 Corinthians 10) as our rock who was struck once for our iniquities and brought forth living water.

It was absolutely amazing to look out over the land and hear that story as Brett taught us. Once again, it brought new life to the Bible stories we had heard so often but also felt the unending grace of God. While he may have told Moses he couldn't go into the promised land then, God snuck him in by the glory of Christ (Matthew 17:3).

The picture on the left is looking northwest toward Dan, Galilee, and Samaria. The middle picture is looking straight out toward the north-most part of the Dead Sea, Jericho, and the middle portion of Israel. With the coastal mountains in the distance, you can see how the country is not wide across at all. The picture on the right is the statue at the top of Mt. Nebo. I think it is meant to symbolize the stories found in Numbers 21 of the fiery serpents and when Christ said in John 3 "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life."

We got back on the road and spent another 2 hours driving south. This was a bizarre drive because every quarter to half a mile, you could see the eerie green lights glowing from the minarets of the mosques that seemed to be everywhere. We finally ended our day in the town right out side of the Valley of Petra. We spent the night in a cool little hotel that was a 500 to 1000 year old village that was converted into a hotel. One of the coolest places I have ever stayed in.