My brother-out-law, Andrew, has just finished his masters degree in Ancient Near East History at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem where he has been studying the last few years. Andrew was an excellent guide for me and his parents as he showed us around Israel. We were able to benefit from Andrew’s knowledge of the area, the history and archeology (and his ability to speak Hebrew) as he guided us around the country for 9 days.

And we did see a lot of the country! The blue lines on this Google Earth map show the routes we took, many of which are off the beaten path and deep into the West Bank to see locations most people don’t get to.

From walking on the Temple Mount, to standing on the shores of the Dead Sea, from modern battlefields to ancient fortifications and cities many thousands of years old, to visiting the first cave where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found (photo below), we got a glimpse of the rich history of these Bible lands.

This trip also took us to Germany to visit our newest staff members. I am on the Board for our newly minted GoodSeed Germany office, so it was good to spend more time with the people who will be the boots on the ground as this ministry gets started in Europe. While in Germany we had some meetings but also did some video work about one of our new staff couples who came to know the Gospel when they were given the German edition of “The Stranger on the Road to Emmaus”. We want to tell their story on video and so captured some of the background “b-roll” footage in Germany and will finish the narration of the story in our studio in Alberta in the coming months.

In the coming weeks I’ll start publishing some of the photos and some videos from the trip on our blog (http://www.troyandnaomi.com) and our Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/gstroynaomi). Stay tuned!

Troy & Naomi

P.S.  Today is our eldest daughter’s ninth birthday! How have 9 years passed so quickly with her growing so big.