Day 2: The Galilee Sea-Way

Day 2 The Sea of Galilee  

Some roads are paved with tar. Some with stone. Today’s road is made of water. For the next few days, we’ll make our home around the sea, walk its shore, cross over its breadth. We’re experiencing the road that led home for Jesus. He loved this area—even claiming Capernaum on its north shore as His adult home.

Jesus taught most His sermons, performed almost all His miracles, and called all His men (except Judas) from around these shores. He traveled its waves, literally as a road from one shore across to the next, sometimes as a short-cut, sometimes as an escape route. The Sea itself, one of the world’s only fresh-water lakes below sea-level, fills the cup of an extinct volcano. In Jesus’ day, Herod was just building Tiberius and ten Gentile cities, called the Decapolis, lining the north-east shore near modern-day Golan Heights.

In many ways, Galilee’s sea-road symbolizes a faith road, then and now. The disciples lived by faith in what they encountered here. The high hills surrounding the shore brewed sudden storms. Fish eluded their nets one day and swarmed the next. Though experienced seamen, the disciples always found the sea a dark mystery.

Interestingly, Jesus chose the sea-road for some of His most important instructions on “walking.” Lessons on faith and obedience followed in His ministry like one wave after another. And on one very stormy night Jesus taught His fishermen-turned-followers a huge lesson about faith, giving new meaning to the phrase “getting your sea-legs.”

As we travel this Galilee Sea-Way today, ponder the sea-worthiness of your faith. Faith is an reasonable issue in the calm, but the supreme test in the storms. Let your guard down out here. Nobody’s watching you, nobody expects you to lead them or teach them. Today in the quiet hours we’ll spend on the water—it’s just you and the Lord. Listen to the lapping waves on the boat and renew your commitment to Jesus’ words, “Trust Me.” From the various storms you face in your ministry to the ones that sweep unexpectedly across your heart, the Lord will never let you sink. Just ask Peter.

Today’s Memory Maker:

At En Gev, enjoy an authentic fish lunch typical of those Jesus shared routinely with family, friends, and disciples. Read John 21—what a memory that breakfast must have been for His friends—the ones to whom He entrusted and called to ministry.

Read all about it: Mark 5:16, Matthew 8  

Map: label the Decapolis (Golan Heights), Capernaum, Tiberias, and modern En Gev