HAPPY NEW YEAR

January 1, 2008
Can you believe that it is a new year already! Jean, Rosemary, Bill, Charisa, Cheritt, and I welcomed in the New Year on the Dead Sea. Can You believe that the others in the group slept through it? We did get some sleep and then had breakfast before going down to the beach at the Dead Sea. We did get in the water! It was cold, but not as cold as the Jordan River (which I became quite pale in). This was slightly better. The neat thing is, you float! Even on your stomach! You just can't sink. It is very, very salty. You can see the salt on the rocks. It is suppose to be very healing. Once in the water, it was fine. We even took pictures of us floating and reading a magazine! The dead sea is at the earths lowest point at 1300 ft below sea level! The water feels a bit oily and this is because there is magnesium in it! Imagine that, a metal in the water! They are now mining magnesium out of the water because it is a stronger metal and car companies are using it! This is truly a blessed land. We read Psalms 120-132 Song for the ascent into Jerusalem. We went to Masada. This has very special meaning at this site. Masada was built by King Herod (the king we love to hate). He had a palace built here, although he was not here. We read from Ezekiel 23 (?). There was a Jewish community here. They wanted to be free. The Romans have been outside of this fort for quite some time trying to figure out a way to take it over. They ended up building a ramp, and eventually were breaking through the reinforcements that were made. The people inside agreed that that would not leave they wanted to be free. So the families gathering in their homes and the fathers killed their children, the wife/mother laid over her children and the father killed them. The men went to the lottery room and drew numbers and they each went back and laid over their wife and were killed, the last person killed himself. When the Romans came in they saw what had happened. They wanted to win but not like this. There were three women found alive hiding and they shared the story. I can only hope that the Romans showed them mercy and did not do horrible things to them. Therefore when the Israeli armed forces swears in its military it is here and they state the "Masada will never fall again". It is a a touching story. Then we went to the Falls of En Gedi, this is where David hid from Saul. There are beautiful water falls off in the distance. We saw more Ibex (antelope) and acacia trees (these were used to make the ark). The rocks here are dolomite. We traveled on to Qumran National Park - this is the spot where the Dead Sea scrolls where found. They were stored in clay jars with lids and in different areas in the mountains. This is the whole Old Testament except for Ester and one other I can't think of at the moment. They still haven't figured out who wrote them. They are word for word as in the old testament. I have pictures of Jericho in the distance where there is a wall. Jesus stayed here 40 days and 40 nights. We entered into Jerusalem, it is of course, very different from when Jesus was here. We stopped just after we got in the City and our guide had us do what Jewish Tradition was in old times when entering the city - you would get off your donkey (in our case our motor coach) and look around the city (we are high up and lights are all around). Then he did a traditional Hebrew Blessing with wine and crackers (similar to communion) welcoming us into the city saying that is was "our" city to because we felt that it was important enough to come to see it! It was very touching, I don't think any of us had a dry eye.