This has been an amazing couple of months for me. I have traveled over 25,000 miles and have been in 5 different countries.
I’ve hiked, toured, preached, taught, built, led, and followed…and all the while I’ve tried to keep my awareness centered on the overwhelming gratitude I feel to be fortunate doing what I’m doing.
During the past couple of months, I’ve been able to travel to Israel and walk in the footsteps of where Christ walked. Hiking through Israel brought the Bible to life for me. Being able to spend day after day in the quiet countryside walking from town to town was almost like walking quietly with Jesus himself.
Then spending a little bit of time in Paris was eye-opening as well. Beautiful churches and cathedrals of massive scale but in a country where 63 percent of the youth claim to have “no religion.” I read in a recent poll by the Christian Missionary Alliance that less than 0.5 percent of France’s population claims to be Evangelistic Christians. What was once the world’s center of Christian faith is now quickly becoming a Christian graveyard.
Then moving into Africa where the exact opposite is true. Christianity is growing at a significant rate and Africa will be the world’s center of Christianity by the year 2050. People in Africa have nothing but their faith…and that in itself makes them rich in God’s eyes.
Finally in Guatemala, I got to observe Oscar and Amy Garcia. A husband and wife team living out their faith…not by what they say…but by what they do. They care for an entire village by providing the spiritual, physical, and emotional needs of anyone that they come in contact with. Much of what they do gets no “air time” and many times they provide for others out of their own finances. But in doing so, the community gets to see something they may not understand… they get to see a glimpse of Christ moving through the hearts and resources of Oscar and Amy and into their own hearts.
During this period of intense travel, I wanted to always be mindful that “God was with me.” Either as a protector, a guide, a doctor, or my father and Creator, I never wanted to get so caught up in what I was doing that I overlooked my need for God. So during my travels, I decided I would seek Him out. I would take a photograph of anything that existed in nature that looked like a cross or reminded me of Him.
Here are some of the photos of what I saw…
Carpet in our hotel room in Israel.
Window in Paris
Light pole support in Israel
Tow truck on the freeway.
Utility cover in Guatemala.
Telephone pole in Africa
Guatemala home
Widow’s home in Guatemala.
Marking on the wall of an old cathedral in Antigua, Guatemala.
Side of a home in Guatemala.
Marking on a stone in Zippori National Park in Israel.
These are just a few of the photos…but you get the idea… God is all around us… and is available to us at all times…we just sometimes forget to look.
Christ’s Burial Tomb
I really enjoyed doing this…and like the Bible says…seek and you shall find. My prayer for all of us…especially during Easter…is that we take the time to look. If you do…He promises…you’ll find Him.
Happy Easter!
~ Bob
