Israel • Jordan River Baptism (behind the scenes)

This is a tongue in cheek post.  I have to say that up front because I am laying my pride aside and showing you what really happened when I got baptized in the Jordan River.

Alan and I look so pastoral and contemplative in the first two images…

Then there was the dunk.  Right about now my brain is receiving the signal that this is, in fact, runoff from a snow covered Mount Hermon.  My system was about to go into shock…

I come up and try to find a way to take a breath.  I uttered something like “whhhhooooooo!”  Not graceful or contemplative at all.

But, in my usual style, it turned to a giggle and I was able to breath.

Just keeping it real, people.

I LOVED being baptized in the Jordan River!

What Would Your “Ruins” Say About You?

I look forward to sharing more about Masada in a future post.  It really is an amazing location and story.  For now, I’d like to share a single image which looks like a mere pile of monotone rocks.  Turns out this is the armory.  The reason the archaeologists know that this is the armory is because they found thousands of arrowheads in this area.  At every location on our tour we were told about the people based on their structures and artifacts.

As our tour guide was telling us this portion of the story, my mind wandered a bit and I wondered…If someone came to my house 1,000 years from now and, for some reason, there were still discernible artifacts among the rubble, what would people find?  And maybe more important, what would they think of me because of what they found?  Admittedly, I don’t have a bunch of amazing things in my home, but it really is the more day to day “stuff” that tells people how you lived.  Books, music, family photos, computers, kitchen tools…what would my “stuff” say about me?  What would they think was important to me?

It’s a question worth pondering even for a few minutes…what would people from the future know about you because of what you own?