Fun and Games?

Right now it is Sukkot. In English this would be called the Feast of Tabernacles. This feast is to remember God's faithfulness to Israel as they wandered in the wilderness and how He provides for them still to this day. Sukkot is also celebration of the harvest. Many types of fruit are harvested at this time of year. So in your sukka, you are to sleep and eat your meals for 8 days. This picture shows the walls of our sukka, the fruit laid out to eat, and the students fellowshipping in it. You can also see the palm branches that make up the roof. At night you can still see the stars through them, reminding you that this is a temporary shelter.

Theo and Matt are very excited to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles. Here they pose in front of the fruit: Mangos, figs, pommagranites, bananas, apples, plums, guavas, grapes, peaches, and nectarines are some of the fruits we enjoyed. Abner, one of the professors, shared a devotional from the Old Testament relating to Sukkot (Haggai 2:1-3; Zechariah 14:16-19), while Bill, another professor, shared from the New Testament (John 7). The culmination of Sukkot ends with the people praying for rain. At this point every year, Israel has not seen rain for nearly 5 months. They will need rain for the crops to grow...so they pray diligently for rain. Every year, the rains begin again after Sukkot...imagine being in Jerusalem celebrating the feast and have Jesus claims to be the source of living water. Water that brings life to both the fields and people. What a powerful picture that must have been. I can even see now how much this land needs rain.

Sukkot is a very joyous holiday to celebrate. In fact, it is known as the most joyous time of the year to the Jewish people. We have seen that evidenced by those we are around as well as having fun ourselves. Wednesday evening Sukkot began. While we were on our field trip, we started the fun by filling Bill's backpack (that he was wearing) with rocks while he was teaching. The best part was that the students were so careful that he didn't even notice. It wasn't until he was putting his materials away that he found the 10 rocks.

We continued the fun last night after chapel. All of the girls went to the miklat to hang out and get to know one another better. We had walked to the village earlier and bought fresh bread from the bakery and treats from the store. We also had iced coffee! We spent an hour or so playing a question and answer game that helped us learn fun facts about each other. We had a great time. When we went to leave the miklat (it doubles as a bomb shelter), we found that the guys had locked us in. They shut the huge door and tied the handles so we couldn't open it...we eventually got out because their knots weren't very good, but when we got back to the dorms we found the following missing: shower heads, shower curtains, soap dispensers, toilet paper and holders, toilet seats and all of the doors! Try getting boys to put those back at 11:00pm. All in all, I thought it was funny, but not every girl agreed with me. Lucky me, it was my job to make the guys put everything back. It was a little tough to fall asleep after that!

This afternoon we are going camping in the wilderness. First we get to go to the Dead Sea to float (I would say swim, but you don't really. You float.). We will then camp near there. Tomorrow we are hiking up the Ascent of Ziz and back down Nahal David and the springs of En Gedi. It will be a neat time to reflect on the life of David as we hike and stay in the same place that he hid from Saul.