We visited Mt Carmel, where Elijah challenged 450 prophets of Baal and 400 prophets of Asherah to prove that Israel’s God was the true God. He called down fire out of heaven to consume his sacrifice, the stone altar, the wood, and even the water in the trench around the altar. Then Elijah killed all of the prophets of Baal with the sword. We visited the general area, but no one knows the exact spot where the confrontation took place.

It’s an amazing story. Even if you already know it, it’s worth going back and reading again. It’s in I Kings 18:17-40. This statue of Elijah slaying a prophet of Baal commemorates Elijah’s victory. This is a great Old Testament example of God doing “exceedingly abundantly beyond” all we ask or think (Ephesians 3:20).

This statue commemorates the event showing Elijah slaying one of Baal’s prophets.

Israel is tiny. The whole country would fit inside Lake Michigan. It is younger than I am. Yes, I was seven years old when Israel became a nation. Yet this tiny country is the continual focus of world affairs.

The history of the land and the Jewish people goes back four thousand years. I have been reading about it in the Bible since I was a small child, and hearing about it in the news for almost as long. Although I always found the land fascinating, I never expected to set foot on it personally until my niece Nancy Knox Long invited me to join a group she was going with from Orlando, Florida, led by scientist Grady McMurtry.

As we visited various sites, we learned about their significance from a topographical, geological, archaeological, historical, and Biblical perspective. In future posts I will share some of what I learned. At times we walked where Jesus once walked, and saw places where He visited. We saw the tomb where He was buried and from which he arose.

One of the most significant comments we heard, which summarized our entire experience, was spoken by our tour guide at the tomb. “This is a very important place. A very important event took place here. But this is only rock. We are not here to worship and glorify rock. We worship and glorify Jesus Christ.”