Summer Plans

In less than a month, I'll be leaving for the Middle East, along with about 40 other seminary students from Southern, Emory, Duke, Vanderbilt, and several other semniaries/divinity schools. The trip is a 3-week long travel seminar, where we will be doing some archeological work, scaling Mount Sinai (partly by foot, partly by camel), exploring some old Crusader fortresses, visiting some of the ancient cities of the Bible (such as Damascus, Galilee, and Jerusalem), and much, much more. The whole group will be divided into two smaller groups - one led by Max Miller of Fernbank Museum of Natural History, and the other led by Dr. Steven McKenzie Professor of Hebrew Bible and Old Testament at Rhodes College. I am in Steve's group, and our itinarary looks like this:

May14-16 Orientaion in Altanta
WEEK ONE
May 17 Arrive Damascus (Damascus)
May 18 Explore Damascus (Damascus)
May 19 Damascus Museum, Baalbek (Homs-Crak vicinity)
May 20 Crak, Apamea (Hama)
May 21 Palmyra (Palmyra)
WEEK TWO
May 22 Busra (Busra)
May 23 Jerash (Amman)
May 24 Nebo, Madaba (Petra)
May 25 Petra (Petra)
May 26 Aqaba, Sinai (St. Catherine)
May 27 Mt. Sinai, St. Catherine (Taba)
May 28 Arad (Arad)
Week Three
May 29 Masada, Jericho, Beth Shean (Galilee)
May 30 Sea of Galilee and Golan (Galilee)
May 31 Nazareth, Megiddo, Caesarea (Jerusalem)
June 1 Jerusalem-Old City (Jerusalem)
June 2 Jerusalem-Israeli Museum and Bethlehem (Jerusalem)
June 3 Flight to Athens, on to Delphi (Delphi)
June 4 Delphi, Corinth (Athens)
June 5 Athens (Athens)
June 6 Return flight to the U.S.

As you can imagine, I am feeling a million different things about this trip. I am nervous because I am traveling with a group of people who are completely unknown to me. Also, we are traveling in very dangerous locations. I am nervous also because I am traveling with a group that is theologically very different from me. I have a very conservative approach to theology, whereas many of the participants will approach theology from a liberal perspective. On the other hand, I am excited that I am traveling with such a diverse group. My prayer is that in spite of our differences, we will have a unique sense of community and will develop wonderful relationships over the three weeks that we will be traveling together. I am also excited because this is an amazing trip and is certainly an opportunity of a life time. I am looking forward to learning and experiencing so many new things. The very worse part about the trip is the fact that I will be away from Alex for over three weeks, possibly even out of contact for much of that time. But I know that in this case, distance will only make the heart grow founder.