“We’ve got to go to Israel,” my friend Robbie kept saying. Susan and I had tried to go during the winter, but things did not work out. I replied, “It is great to see the Holy Land, but Susan and I mainly go to see our friends. Let me get in touch with them and we’ll see. Meanwhile, pray.”
Before I knew it, Robbie, his wife Kristen, Susan, and I were on our way to Israel via Toronto on Canada Air. Harry and Dagmar Tees have lived in the Old City of Jerusalem thirty years as ambassadors for Jesus. Harry is originally from Holland and Dagmar is from Germany. Susan and I met them during the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta and we regularly stay in touch. Dagmar welcomed us in the Tel Aviv airport, gave us a cell phone, and wished us safe journeys. We then walked to rent a car, planning to stay with the Tees our last three nights of the trip.
After spending the first night at Masada by the Dead Sea, we drove up the coast of the Mediterranean to visit the Tals, our Jewish friends. I met Steve in 2004 as a result of sitting next to his seven-year-old son, Roy, on a flight from Paris to Atlanta. In 2010, Steve invited us to Roy’s Bar Mitzvah and we were able to attend. Roy is now in graduate school at a prestigious university in London. Steve and his wife Anat live in the town of Binyamina with their three younger children.
After visiting a while in their home, we took two cars to a charming nearby town where we had a wonderful meal. Before it was time for dinner, Steve, our proud host, took us on a walking tour of the area. We would stroll a while, sit and visit, then hop up when our leader said: “Come… we walk.” “Come… we walk!” became the mantra of our trip.
Walking was the primary mode of transportation in Jesus’ day and there is something refreshing about it. Shortly after His baptism and return from being tempted in the wilderness, two disciples of John the Baptist asked Jesus where He was staying. “Come and see,” Jesus replied. They walked with the Messiah and were never again the same.
“Come to Me if you’re weary.” “Come, I’ll make you a fisher of men.” “Come, I am the Bread of Life.” “Come, I’ll give you Living Water.” “Come… walk with Me and you will know My Father in Heaven.” These are the invitations of the Son of God who came to seek and save the lost. He Is our Savior and Lord and Teacher and Friend. I just want to walk with Him forever.
“Then Jesus declared, ‘I am the Bread of Life. Whoever comes to Me will never go hungry and whoever believes in Me will never be thirsty. But as I told you, you have seen Me and still you do not believe. All those the Father gives Me will come to Me, and whoever comes to Me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do My will but to do the will of Him who sent Me. And this is the will of Him who sent Me: that I shall lose none of all those He has given Me, but raise them up at the last day. For My Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.’” John 6:35-40