The Miracle of God's Knitting

Stuffing!

Today for Lunch

We had fun with our spaghetti alfredo at lunch today before mom got home :-)

Suddenly Winter

A one day transformation, buddy has a while new world to explore.

The Display Photo

Just an extra photo.

Cheesecakes on Parade (pt.2)

Rachel and Emily with their treasure-trove of goodies. The chocolate torte and white chocolate raspberry were decimated, the pumpkin melted but the apple crisp came to the rescue just before closing. And tomorrow is a new day! (Round 2)

Cheesecakes on Parade

For the past two weeks Benaiah and I have had to stare at these sumptuous looking treats in the fridge hoping that maybe, just maybe, all the pieces won't sell. Ha! Not likely - more pics from the craft show to come later. Rachel and Emily just left for the festival.

Getting Ready for Winter

Today we had snow forecast but none precipitated. But lightning McQueen is ready for the flakes to fall. Meanwhile mommy and daddy are busy writing sermons and baking cheesecakes. One guess whose doing what.

Little Man, Big Playground

Seeing the Sights

Back in Session

This past week was the official beginning to our new semester here at Bethlehem Seminary. After all the pizza parties, retreats, and minutia of preparation we found ourselves in chapel, bowing before the Lord and asking for his help as studies resume.

Dr. Tomlinson, our school president, gave us a faithful charge from 2 Peter. His encouragement was that we not just learn while we're here, but that we grow into those who love like Christ. Pray that for all the men here in the Seminary and all the college students.

Here's my course load for the next 4 months: Hebrew Exegesis, Soul Care, Preaching, and Church History 2. Pray for the professors of each of those courses as they prepare to lead us through the material. Pray for learning and transformation.

Pigeons, Parks, and The Pleasures of God

Whew! What a race it's been readjusting to life in the mini-Apple. Benaiah's been to the park everyday, except when it rains, and it turning it into his home turf. Today was the first day though that he noticed his park has pigeons and squirrels. What a realization that was! He would get all excited and run after the little animals who were not too disturbed by this tiny person. We have no idea what we're going to do when winter hits :-)

Rachel's summer work schedule is almost over, then we'll start to get into a groove for the fall. It's been good for us to just enjoy a few weeks together as a family after the summer apart. Sharing memories of our experiences together. Dreaming for the fall and beyond together. Playing with all our super-cool toys together. And just generally being together.

We're grateful to God for these simple blessings. Thank you for your prayers as we prepare to transition into the fall.

We're Home!!

Just a brief bulletin, we made it. More reflections to come. Thanks for journeying with us.

Where's Daddy?

I'm getting closer buddy, only lake Michigan is between us now. Tomorrow I will be getting up at 4:00 to jump the pond and be reunited with my family. More reflections will be posted here...when I make the time to reflect :-)

Summer Hebrew 29

Not much today, just wanted to splash this picture before your eyes. Awww. Reminds me of reading Jonah from a few weeks ago :-)

Tomorrow is the final exam and then I begin the long journey home. Thanks for keeping us in your prayers.

Shalom.

Summer Hebrew 28

Hazy sunrise as the clouds linger just above the hills. My time here is quickly drawing to a close. But it feels more like a sunrise as I think back over this experience of language learning. Only God knows what the day that has dawned holds for us.

This I do know, "The sum of your word is truth and every one of your righteous rules endures forever." (Psalm 119:160) So, we'll hold on to that and let His word lead us down this newly lit path.

Shalom

Summer Hebrew 26

You never know what you might stumble upon. Walking back the Yafo Gate in Jerusalem, we wound our way through the Jewish quarter. Lo, and behold, we came upon this site which to you may just look like a pile of rocks. It is actually the foundation layer of the great Broad Wall of Jerusalem from the time of Hezekiah. This wall wound it's way around the large western portion of the city and used to be over 21 feet tall until the Babylonians destroyed it.

This whole summer has been full of ordinary days and stunning surprises. I came expecting to get into the groove of rather mundane language study. But I have been so surprised at how much fun we have. Yes, it is fun to read the bible in Hebrew. And on top of that our teachers make the class time very enjoyable. Today we sang a few songs taken from Psalms and Isaiah. After that we recited one of our memory verses together and began acting out the vocabulary to Genesis 2.

The winding path of this summer course has only 4 more days to roll and in 10 days I'll be back with my family. And after that the language learning journey has only just begun!

Summer Hebrew - Reflection

I read an interesting quote this evening that feels very real at the moment: "A simple but elegant fact about humankind is that if we avoid risk, we do not learn."

This summer was certainly a risk in the best sense of that word. There were a lot of unknown factors about this summer and about what could be accomplished in just 6-weeks of language learning immersion. But, surprise, surprise, this risk has resulted in a harvest of learning - linguistic, pedagogical, cultural, ... and Hebrew!

As I approach my last week of classes here I am struggling to put into words what has been going on inside of me. Today I visited an archaeology park in Jerusalem and took this picture from inside a ritual bath that all worshipers must pass through. They came down the stairs on one side - unclean. After washing they would mount the other side - clean.

At this point, that's the best I can do for analogy, I feel different in my approach to the Hebrew text - but there is a lot more work to do!

As we've been studying this week, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...and God said, "let there be light." And there was light." But on day two, God didn't content himself with light, he moved on to more creative acts. And so I feel like this summer has been a summer of light...and it's just the beginning of an exciting process.

Thank you to all who have been praying and encouraging. One more week to go.

Shalom.

Summer Hebrew 25: When you feel like a mountain goat!

After 5 weeks of language learning by immersion, when you finally get a pause in the action, the question comes to mind, "How in the world did I get up here?"

It's actually been a fantastic climb thus far and we're feeling more and more comfortable in listening to the language, speaking in full sentences, reading pages of text in our homework, and just beginning to write short sentences. These are the 4 basic skills of language learning: listening, speaking, reading, writing. They are usually listed in that order because it's often best to begin mastering them in that order. That's been my experience here thus far and it is paying off!

Tomorrow is Shabbat (Sabbath) and I'll be enjoying a restful day of reading my hebrew texts, reading other things (in English :-), and going for another countryside run. Sunday I'll be heading to Jerusalem for the last time - I hope to visit the Israeli Bible Society, an excavation of the 1st century steps to the temple, and the archaeological dig in the City of David (the original Jerusalem).

More pictures then! Shalom.

P.S.- these goats are called ya'el (יעל) which is also the name of a famous heroine in the book of Judges - I'll let you figure out who :-)

Summer Hebrew 24

Only at the Biblical Zoo will you find signs like this posted (Bereshiyt bara' elohiym 'et hashamayim ve'et ha'arets...) "in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth..."

It's also only at a Zoo like this where you'll find exhibits of donkeys, goats, and chickens :-)

We've just finished the Genesis 1:1-2:3 account of creation. It's absolutely marvelous to read it in Hebrew and feel the poetic nature of the text. It's been a refreshing contrast to our readings in Jonah. In conjunction with the creation readings, we're also reading the Exodus and Deuteronomy records of the 10 Words (Commandments) and Psalm 8 - "O YHWH, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth..." What a great mix of texts!

Last night for homework we received a sheet of questions in Hebrew, like we've received before, but this time there were no multiple choice answers...just a blank line. I was amazed in class today as I listened to my classmates read their answers. Sure, we used up some of our 30,000 mistakes on that exercise - but we were composing basic answers to questions all in Hebrew. Wow!

This morning I was meditating on the text from Psalm 119:125 (only five words in Hebrew) "I am your servant; give me understanding, that I may know your testimonies." That is our prayer here everyday - "we are your servants here learning Hebrew, we need your help to understand the text, to understand the language, because we want to know more of you through this your precious Word."

With one week left, we appreciate you offering that prayer for us too.

Shalom.