{"id":5602,"date":"2014-07-03T14:22:44","date_gmt":"2014-07-03T18:22:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/?p=5602"},"modified":"2014-07-21T10:04:27","modified_gmt":"2014-07-21T14:04:27","slug":"the-land-of-the-messiah-1-introduction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/the-land-of-the-messiah-1-introduction\/","title":{"rendered":"The Land of the Messiah #1\u2014Introduction"},"content":{"rendered":"
Why go to Israel? Simply put, do you want to have a greater appreciation for and understanding of God\u2019s redemptive plan revealed in His Word? God\u2019s redemptive plan took place in the historical past. And, that past has a location\u2014the land of Israel. Just like sharing the same language is the key to understanding each other\u2019s communication, understanding the geography of historical events illuminates those events in the Bible. Geography shapes history<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Why that<\/i> Place?<\/h2>\n
Why was the real-estate of Canaan the \u201cpromised land\u201d setting for God\u2019s redemptive plan?\u00a0 Would not Hawaii or the Bahamas have been a better choice? Why was Caesarea Philippi Jesus\u2019 choice for Peter\u2019s famous confession (Matt 16)?\u00a0 Why is Megiddo (aka: Armageddon) the location of the final battle between good and evil? Why did Jesus launch His earthly ministry in the Galilean region as opposed to Jerusalem? Understanding geography opens up new insights to why God\u2019s plan happened the way that it did.<\/p>\n
The Land\u2014the Crossroads of the World<\/h2>\n
The small piece of real-estate known as either Israel, Palestine, Canaan, or the \u201cpromised land\u201d forms a land bridge between three continents\u2014Africa, Europe, and Asia. This land was at the intersection of the world during the ancient times. World travel dictated that the travelers go through Israel.<\/p>\n
It was to this \u201ccrossroads of the world,\u201d that God called Abraham to live out his faith in Him. God placed Israel at the center of the known world so that the world may know about the one and only Creator and Redeemer God.<\/p>\n
The Land\u2014the Testing Ground of Faith<\/h2>\n
God did not establish His people in an isolated and beautiful land of ease and relaxation like Hawaii or the Bahamas. He brought His people to a place of testing. Because of its strategic position, maintaining an independent centralized government was always politically challenging. Only three times in history has the land been under its own centralized rule\u2014the time of David and Solomon\u2019s empire, the Maccabean times (1-2nd<\/sup> century BC), and today.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, the land is challenging in many other ways. The terrain of the land is rugged and not given toward ease of travel. Travel is constricted to certain common trade routes which empires fought to control. The climate of the land is volatile and can easily lead the land into drought conditions\u2014as so often seen in Bible times. The agriculture of the land is complex\u2014varying from fertile valleys in the north, difficult terraced farming in the hilly central region, and very little agriculture in the south. Religiously, well, let\u2019s say it is complicated\u2014just as it was in Abraham\u2019s day and throughout the history of Israel including today.<\/p>\n
To this testing ground of faith God called His people to live out their belief in the one true God who could and would provide for them in this extremely complicated and challenging location.<\/p>\n
Pilgrims to the Land<\/h2>\n
To this land a group of forty-six folks, mostly from Faith traveled to gain a better understanding of God\u2019s redemptive plan. Just as Israel was called to be at the crossroads of the world, every believer today is called to be the light in his sphere of influence while facing his testing ground with the faith of Abraham in order that the world may know about the one true God.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Land of the Messiah\u201d blogs will be a series detailing the lessons from the locations we visited in the order that we visited them.<\/p>\n
Before leaving, the Faith Israel group met at the Opperman’s for a time of food and fellowship:<\/em><\/p>\n
![\"IsraelinWorld\"](\"https:\/\/faith-blog-assets.s3.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/20170523133509\/IsraelinWorld-300x220.jpg\")
Why was the real-estate of Canaan the \u201cpromised land\u201d setting for God\u2019s redemptive plan?\u00a0 Would not Hawaii or the Bahamas have been a better choice? Why was Caesarea Philippi Jesus\u2019 choice for Peter\u2019s famous confession (Matt 16)?\u00a0 Why is Megiddo (aka: Armageddon) the location of the final battle between good and evil? Why did Jesus launch His earthly ministry in the Galilean region as opposed to Jerusalem? Understanding geography opens up new insights to why God\u2019s plan happened the way that it did.<\/p>\n