We’re Feeling Younger All the Time




You know it’s one thing to be 50+ living in a country that boasts being 200+ years old. But it’s quite another when you are 50+ and looking at the remains of a great harbor, summer palace and aqueduct all 2,000 years old. In fact, it makes you feel younger!

Today we visited Herod the Greats’ summer palace in Caesarea on the shore of the Mediterranean. There we saw the ruins of an outdoor stone theater… think of a semi-circle of limestone seats 14 rows high and a stage with the sea as its backdrop. The remains of numerous pillars, capitals, sarcophagus, and a hippodrome… think Ben Hur. Down the road a bit we touched and took pictures of what’s left of the aqueduct which carried fresh water to this elaborate seaside resort. Amazing.

We also visited Mount Carmel, where Elijah and his God outwitted the prophets of Baal. See I Kings 18-19. We travelled the Jezreel Valley, stopped at a Druze establishment for a falafel pita with fresh veggie garnish for lunch. At Tel Megiddo we saw the remains of the stables of King Solomon where he housed 400 horses and we walked down 186 steps to see how King Ahab got water to this very strategic Tel from a spring outside the city. It only took 80 steps to climb out at the site of the ancient spring.

We’ve been blessed with beautiful weather, food that will put our home cooking to shame and the good company of one another. What comes to mind is the Scripture that says: “How good and pleasant it is when brothers and sisters live together in peace.” In a place that has know war since the times of the patriarchs, we’ve been blessed with a peaceful time together.

Bob Nichols said to me this morning, “I’ve read these stories for 70 years and now I’m trying to get my mind around seeing them.” I think many of us echo that. Yes, we are blessed. PEACE AND JOY, THE CELTIC MONK

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