The Jordan River, Galilee – Israel Day 7!

In case you hadn’t figured it out, I’m back from Israel and completing the last few blogs from home. Time, links and neuron shortage made finishing the task while on the road impossible, but I am still just as thrilled as I was while still in Israel, and I’m itching to get back – with you along!

We headed out to the Jordan on the morning of day 7, and I found the bus a little slow, so I switched my method of transportation to a “ship of the desert.”

 

 

This was really fun, and it is very high up! Here’s a close up of this beauty.

 

When we reached the Jordan we had a big surprise in store. Normally it is an oversized stream, and in many places you can wade across it with the water below your waist, or even below your knees. This has been especially true in recent years with the extended drought Israel has had. But this year the rains and the snow reversed the drought, the Sea of Galilee is high, and the Jordan – fed by the Sea – is VERY high, nearly at flood stage. Here you can see that it is up at its boundaries, where even the stubby palm trees are underwater
up to their leaves.

 

 

 Several years ago, when the Galilee was very low, some local fishermen came across the ruins of an ancient fishing boat buried in the mud at the edge of the Sea. The Israeli Antiquities Authority, with a complex and careful process, was able to salvage it intact, and it is now on display at the edge of the Sea. This is typical of the kind of boat used in Jesus’ day. It could even be the one from which he commanded the Sea to be still (Mark 4:35), or from which the disciples caught 153 fish after his resurrection (see John 21).

 

 

 

Fishermen in those days typically used a large, weighted net to capture their fish. It was a large circle, with weights on the edge, and a rope tied to the center. They tossed it as a big circle on top of the water, and as the weights sank, they gathered the net closed. Here a modern version of this net is tossed from the boat we rode out on to the Sea. This is a wonderful and beautiful journey.

 

Karl Clauson, the radio host on WYLL 1160 AM, weekdays 4-6 PM, and our co-host on this trip, used to be a commercial fisherman in Alaska, so this ride was especially gratifying for him as a believer. He struck up an immediate friendship with the folks who owned the boat we were on, and by the end of the journey he was the pilot!  The sun was setting so the light is a bit low on this shot.

 

Before we went in at the end of the day, I snapped this wonderful sunset with a bird soaring above us. You just simply have to come to the Sea of Galilee and experience this beauty!

 

 

-Pastor George