Day 19 - May 29 - Sunday

My Journal Entry:

Today started with free time from 10:00-1:30, so Lizzy, Heather, and I went to the beach, soon to be joined by Lindsey, Amanda, Emilie, Caleb, and Priscilla. SO much fun! Hurrah for the fishies swimming in the water with us! Including one poor little dying fish that I was able to catch and play with for a little bit because he was slowing down. He was a speckled brown color on top, but his belly was silver and shined rainbow colors in the sunlight! When we were playing in the swells in the water, I got this sudden visual of the way that some dads toss their little kids in the air and then catch them, and I realized that the ocean waves are God's way of doing that with us. :) After lunch we walked to Jaffa (a.k.a. Joppa,the port where Jonah left for Tarshish), found an AWESOME playground that was for big kids too and played there for a while on the way, arrived and went inside St. Peter's church (which is built in memory of Peter's vision of the sheet with the animals on it coming down from heaven, since Joppa is where that took place), found the only shop we've seen in Israel so far that had Dr. Pepper, walked back to the hotel, ate dinner, then went to the beach for our last scheduled performances. After our last performance Mr. Wilson gave a speech and we prayed together and then had a huge hugfest afterward with lotsa love and joy and tears and general affection goin' round. Then we met back up at the hotel and Mike shared his testimony, and there was more snifflin' and hugging. Overall, it was a very magnificently emotional day. :) Tomorrow we go to Capernaum! Which, ironically, was Cornelius' hometown, so Peter took the same journey (roughly) that we will tomorrow!

Mr. Wilson's Details:

We took a 5-mile round trip hike down the coast to old Joppa. This is where Jonah sailed from to run away from God, as well as the location where Peter saw the vision that led to his ministry expanding to the Gentiles. Then in the evening we went back out to the beachfront.