A Little Catch Up...

Where do we start when so much is going on?

It has been a most eventful several days.  Hope you haven't given up and quit checking our progress.  We are now in Israel.   All is well and never boring.  Our God is surprising us every step of the way.  Thank you for your continued prayers.

Today we are in Jaffa on the most blue Mediterranean Sea.  As I sit here typing I heard a horse clomping through the street probably pulling a cart.  We have gotten comfortable here and there is always old mixed with the new.  

Our time ended in Cairo all too soon.   To bring you up to speed a bit, Friday we attended church (Egypt's Friday is our Sunday) and it was youth Friday (man, that really sounds weird), so it was a lively service and most enjoyable.  After lunch with our host we went to a beautiful villa and met a lovely widow from the church.  To be in her presence was a treat, I throughly enjoyed her exquisite gardens but praying with her was a true gift from God.  We all sensed we had been in the presence of royalty but trusted God used us to encourage her along her journey. 

Much encouragement is needed for even seasoned believers in this land.  It is a difficult place to labor.  It seems so many are growing tired but there is refreshment and renewal with fellowship of brothers and sisters.  We were able to have prayer with both young and old, but the needs seemed quite similar.  All along the way God has arranged  many opportunities for us to give ourselves in prayer but we have received so much as well.

After our appointment, we hit some shops and scooped up some amazing treasures.  

On Saturday we walked through Islamic Cairo and found ourselves experiencing sensory overload.  The sights, smells, sounds, and all of it packed so tightly together was far beyond anything I could have expected.  We have so much to show and to tell when we return.  

Then, on Sunday we all packed into a van and began the long trip to The Land of Goshen.  No one seemed to know exactly where that might be.  After consulting maps and calculating the course we headed toward some ancient ruins in the Delta Region NE of Cairo.  We moved out of the city across some desert and then it was as if we did the proverbial step back in time.  We shared the road mile after mile with teams of oxen, donkey carts, horses, mules, bicycles.  All heavy loaded with the harvest.  The farming is probably much the same as it was 3000 years ago.  We were able to put our feet on the land and scoop up treasure in the form of pictures and memories.  God let us see  the real people, families, pains, joys, hopes.  We did our best to capture God's heart for this land and will bring home much treasure from that adventure.