The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Recharging Your Batteries in the Holy Land

Episode Date: January 17, 2020

Jeff is in the Holy Land! He shares his experience of seeing the Gospels come alive through this pilgrimage. From the Sea of Galilee to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jeff describes what it’s like to walk in the footsteps of Jesus. Snippet from the Show Jesus said, “As the father has sent, even so I send you.” [John 20:21] God sent his son with the power of baptism and the Holy Spirit, and that is the way we are sent as well. Get Jeff’s shownotes by texting “jeffcavins” to 33-777 or email us at: [e-mail]

You're listening to the Jeff Kavens show, Episode 149, Recharging Your Batteries in the Holy Land. Hey, I'm Jeff Kavins. How do you simplify your life? How do you study the Bible? All the way from motorcycle trips to raising kids, we're going to talk about the faith and life in general. It's the Jeff Kaven show. And welcome to the show, or I should say, good news. morning, Bokerto from the Holy Land, from Israel. It's good to come to you from the Holy Land, and I wanted to give you an update as to what's happening on this magnificent pilgrimage that we are on. We're at day eight right now on our pilgrimage and just having a fantastic time.

It's actually very early in the morning right now, I mean very early. And my wife, Emily, has taken off with a group of people to take a daily walk down to the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. It's one of the traditions that we do every time we come to the Holy Land as we get up when we're in Jerusalem, we get up early, and we walk through the quiet streets of the old city of Jerusalem to the Holy Sepulcher, where you have two major events that took place. You have the crucifixion of Jesus, and you have his resurrection, all contained in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It is magnificent. We do it every morning. I just did it yesterday, but I told, I told Emily, I said, I need to stay behind today. I want to spend some time with

all of my friends on the podcast and tell them what we are doing. We're basically having our batteries recharge over here on this pilgrimage, and I want to tell you just a few of the highlights so far, and the spiritual truths that come out that do recharge you when you go on a pilgrimage, such as this. And it is a pilgrimage, and the people that we're with, traveling with, will all tell you that every day is different, weather's different, challenges are different, blessings are different, insights, and it's all different, and it's different for everybody. That's the beauty of going on a pilgrimage.

I think sometimes we get into a rut, you know, in our lives. And I have mentioned this earlier, an earlier podcast, that sometimes we get get into a rut and we actually fool ourselves into thinking that we are walking as disciples of the Lord simply because we're studying, you know, or we're going to conferences, we're watching television, we're listening to Catholic radio, whatever it might be. And that kind of replaces the actual walking as a disciple and doing the work as a disciple. And when you go on a pilgrimage such as to the Holy Land, like the one we're on right now, you are reminded very quickly, that being a disciple of the Lord goes way beyond conferences and books and things.

In its real life, it's real encounters with real problems and situations. And that's what we are reminded of as we walk around the Sea of Galilee, and we walk around the Mediterranean, I should say, and make our way into Jerusalem. My voice sounds a little bit different today because I caught just a little bit of a cold, but even a cold when you're in the Holy Land is not a bad thing and not something to get you to get you down. Hey, I want to, before I get into some of the things that we have encountered on this pilgrimage that has been recharging our batteries,

I want to remind you that coming up in June of 2020, Father Mike Schmitz and I are leading another pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and we have incredible friends joining us with, Andrew and Sarah Swofford. Many of you know the Swaffords out of Benedictine College in Atchus in Kansas. We have great singers who are going to be joining us and doing concerts along the Sea of Galilee and Jerusalem for all of us. There's going to be an awful lot of young adults on this trip. So this is a good pilgrimage coming up in June for young adults, but Ali Aaliyah will be there. Taylor Tripodi, brother Isaiah will be there. And we have six or seven other really

good priests that are going to be joining us. So if you want information on that, that door is going to be closing pretty soon. So you might want to go to my website, jeffcavens.com, and get all of the information. Franciscan University is co-sponsoring this and Ascension Press. It looks like is going to be there as well joining us. So it's going to be a great trip. Don't let this one pass you by. And it really doesn't matter what age you are, but we want you on that trip in June.

It's going to be a beautiful, beautiful pilgrimage. Well, you know, a pilgrimage does recharge your batteries, your spiritual batteries. So often I hear from people that when we get over here, like the second or third day, they'll say, man, I needed this. You know, I needed some time. I just needed some time to focus on the Lord, to walk with the Lord. And that's what we do over here. We don't just sit down and study.

You know, we don't just sit down and open up our Bibles and go through lessons. We walk together on these pilgrimages. We talk together. We pray. We have mass at all of the really, really critical places, you know. Like so far, we have had mass in Cessaria. We've had mass in Magdalene where Mary Magdalene was from. We've had mass in Bethlehem.

We're having mass in the Holy Sepulchre. Just amazing places. and we're entering the stories, and we're bringing the cares and the problems and the hurdles and the questions that we're facing in life right now. We're bringing them to the pilgrimage. And John Paul II tells us that when you go on a pilgrimage such as this, you are going back to your roots, but you're not walking alone. You're walking with the Lord.

The Lord is going with you on that pilgrimage, and you have the added assistance. assistance of the Blessed Mother and the saints to accompany you in accomplishing what God wants to accomplish in your life. And of course, there's pilgrimages all over the world in different countries, but there is always something different about the Holy Land, about Israel. And many people will say to me, I've been to Rome and I've been to Israel. They're totally different. But they typically will say that when they come to the Holy Land, they'll say, I have come home. I have come home, and it is our home. As Christians, Jerusalem is our home.

It's our home because it's where our story culminates. It's where the meaning of our life, the suffering of Christ and the resurrection, the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. This was in Jerusalem, and this is the culmination of our story. And without that, our story doesn't make sense anymore. So I would ask you to pray about someday, coming to the Holy Land. And I would love to bring you over here and walk with you.

And let me tell you just a couple of things that are different about our pilgrimages. And this is my 56th pilgrimage to the Holy Land. So we kind of worked out the details. I think what makes these pilgrimages different than other pilgrimages is that Emily and I are with you. We walk with you. We eat with you. spend time with you and pray with you, we are available, accessible. And that's why we come over

is because it gives us a rare opportunity to be with people that we've perhaps encountered at a conference, or people have heard one of my teachings through Ascension Press. But now we get to spend some time together. We get to go to Mass together in Bethlehem and so forth. I think another thing that's very different here is that we not only celebrate mass at the key locations, but we pray the mysteries of the rosary every day on location where they happen. And it's the people in the pilgrimage that are the ones who are praying. They're the ones who are leading in this area. And that's exciting. Another thing that I think is really different is we have incredible guides that are so well, so well trained. But the beauty is, is that I work with

those guides in a way where I do the Bible on location, and they do the cultural teaching and archaeological teaching. And there's a real bond between us and a real synergy in the way, in the way that we work. We also have, I would say, some of the most outstanding priests come with us on every single pilgrimage, and they are available for confessions. We have confessions right on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, and we just did that two nights ago. Incredible, just incredible, to go down to the Sea of Galilee and to see two big bonfires, and to see all of our people sitting around the bonfire with priests right along the shore in chairs waiting to hear the confessions of God's people.

That was mind-blowing when I walked down there and our wonderful canter, which is another thing. We have the best canters in the world. Jackie Francois Angel and Bobby Angel are with us right now. Some of you know Jackie Francois Angel is one of the best speakers in the country and a fantastic singer, and she led us in praise and worship right there

at the Sea of Galilee. evening as people were going to confession. You put all of this together, along with the fact that I teach 30 times, over 30 times on the pilgrimage, on location. We're not just going here and walking through these places. We're teaching, we're encountering, we're praying. These are incredible pilgrimages. And if you have ever thought about going to Israel, I really encourage you to mark off next January 2021, because we're coming back. And save your pennies, it is a life changer. I cannot say that enough.

You know, after 56 times, I remember after maybe the fifth or sixth time, I was telling people that this is not just a trip, it's an investment in your life. That's really what it is, is an investment in your life, because you never forget it. And once you come to the Holy Land and you read scripture on location, like, for example, two days ago, we were on the Mount of Beatitudes in Galilee. And people were reading Matthew 5 through 7, the sermon on the mount. I promise you, for the rest of your life, when you hear the sermon on the mount in mass, it's 3D in your mind and heart. You're seeing the Sea of Galilee. You're up on that mount. And that does something. It really

does something to solidify this walk with Christ, that it's real. It's not ethereal. It's not just theology. But he walked the shores of the Sea of Galilee. You're walking them. You're encounter. the word, and that is a spiritual investment that I think pays dividends for eternity, to be honest with you. So you put all this together. Our pilgrimages are just A-plus. Great coaches, great hotels, great food, great fellowship. It is an experience of a lifetime. Well, enough about that. But I've just always wanted to tell you that because I'm over here now. my batteries are being recharged spiritually, and I love it. We came on the first day, and we started off our pilgrimage at Cesarea Maritina.

We flew into Tel Aviv, and by the way, the whole world was saying, wow, you're going to Israel. Now, this is on the heels of the U.S. taking out a terrorist from Iran, and networks talking about how dangerous things are going to be. I think if you were to talk to our people right now, you would hear them say, I have never felt more peaceful in my life. It's beautiful, peaceful, and there's nothing on the news. And it's, you know, the news outside of here is quite a bit different than actually being over here. And Israel has become such a great host for all of our, all of our people. Well, we landed in Tel Aviv and spent the night there. And of course, people have a little bit of jet lag coming over

from the United States and Canada and some of the other countries, Australia, New Zealand. And then we started off our first day at Cesarea Maritima, right there on the Mediterranean, and we had an opening talk at a theater overlooking the Mediterranean, and we started to look at what our pilgrimage was going to look like. And we did some comparisons between King Herod and Paul, each one honoring a king. King Herod was honoring Caesar, and Paul was honoring Jesus Christ. And for the rest of the pilgrimage. We were going to see the evidence of Herod, which is just simply old buildings now, and we were going to see the evidence of Jesus Christ, which is a living, vibrant, and thriving church. After that, we went up to Mount Carmel, where Elijah dealt with the prophets of Bail,

and we had a great lunch with the Drews community up there, but we were able to go to Mount Carmel. Now, the first two days, we had some rain. And, and, uh, people were prepared for that, but hey, that's part of life, and that's part of a part of the pilgrimage. After we left Mount Carmel, we had just a beautiful mass as we made our way to the Sea of Galilee. And you see, the second night is going to be, second, third, fourth, fifth nights are going to be around the Sea of Galilee. And we had Mass at the ancient city of Magdala, right there on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. Now, that's where Mary Magdalene is from. And Mary Magdalene is a key player in the life of Christ. She was the person who was present

at the two most important points in Jesus' story. Well, there's a lot of important points, but she was there at the crucifixion, and she was there at the resurrection, which both of those are within the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where my wife is right now with a group of people early in the morning now. So we had Mass at Magdala, where Mary Magdalene is from, and it is a beautiful church. It is the most unusual church because it has the most unusual altar. The altar, as you're looking towards the altar, on the other side of that, that's my wake-up call, that's how early it is, as you look at the altar, right on the other side of the altar is the Sea of Galilee. And the altar is shaped like a great big boat.

And so it's really beautiful. You know what? I'll put a picture in the show notes of the priest saying mass there. And that was a beautiful thing to encounter Christ. And they, by the way, have found it at Magdala an ancient synagogue now that is uncovered, and it is an archaeological site that people go to. And it's really something to, no doubt Jesus was at that. synagogue because it's right there up along the northern shore by Copernum, which was his

headquarters. We did go to Copernum. Copernum is one of my favorite places in all the Holy Land. It's right there on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. You could say it was Jesus headquarters. It's his office. And 70% of the drama in Jesus' life takes place right along this northern shore of the Sea of Galilee with Copernum being at the center. And we had mass there in this church that is built right over St. Peter's house. And that's so much happened there. That's where the man, the paralytic, was let down through the roof. That's where Jesus healed Peter's mother-in-law.

Some people say that's why Peter denied the Lord three times. Joke. But Fulton Sheen talks about that. And so we spent quite a bit of time at Copernum. And then we went out on a boat on the Sea of Galilee, cut the engines for an hour, and I taught, I taught everybody right there on the water, on the sea of Galilee, about the call to discipleship. And this is where it really hit us. I believe, I know it hit me, that a pilgrimage takes you beyond a conference. It takes you beyond a television

show. It takes you beyond a book or a CD or whatever it might be. And it brings you to the location. It's like years ago, I love listening to the music of Phantom of the Opera, or maybe you like cats or Les Mis. But when you go and see the Broadway show, it really comes alive and you're not going to forget it, are you? I mean, you know what I mean. And that's what happens here, is that you've heard the stories, you've heard the stories, but suddenly now you're on stage where it happened, and you're thinking, wow, I mean, this did

happened. It happened right here. So I gave a call to discipleship out on the boat in the middle of the Sea of Galilee, and it was very, very powerful, where I challenged people to go beyond simply studying and accumulating knowledge into following Jesus and becoming like Jesus. And I guess all I could say is you had to have been there. There's something about teaching on the Sea of Galilee that was really, really incredible. Hey, I'm going to take a break. And when I come back, I want to tell you about a few other things

that we have done so far on the pilgrimage. And I also want to end the show today by praying for you from the Holy Land and the needs, the concerns that you're facing in your life and to know that I'm thinking of you. And by the way, we do have your petitions. Many of you have sent your petitions in your prayer petitions.

We have them in big. manila envelopes and they are at the foot of the altar everywhere we have mass in the Holy Land. So we're bringing you with us. I know a lot of you have sent those to us and I appreciate that. When I come back, I'm going to tell you a little bit about our experience at the Jordan River and it's the bat feast of the baptism of Jesus and we were there one of the only groups in the entire world on Sunday, we were there during that feast. I'll tell you about that. You're listening to The Jeff Kaven Show. When we pray the stations of the cross, we do so from the perspective of someone watching these events happen.

We're in the crowd witnessing what Christ is enduring. But what if it was possible to draw closer to our Lord, to walk right next to him, to hear the whispered prayers from his own lips. My name is Father Mark Toops, author of The Way of the Cross, praying the Psalms with Jesus. Jesus, as an observant Jewish man, would have gone through his days with the Psalms constantly on his lips. And in these new reflections on this ancient tradition, what to invite you to come even closer to our Lord, to meditate on his heart and to pray as he would have prayed in the moments of his passion. It will fundamentally change the way you experience the stations of the cross.

I'll just pray about Jesus, pray with him on the journey to Calvary. To order the way of the cross praying the Psalms with Jesus, visit ascensionpress.com. Welcome back. Just kind of going over our pilgrimage, I am in the Holy Land right now. Emily, early in the morning, has taken a group down to the Holy Sepulchre because it opens up really early in the morning before the crowds come, and we did this yesterday. We go down there and we sit for a holy hour right there at Calvary, where you can touch the stone of Calvary, and in just a few feet away, you have the burial tomb of Jesus. And so we go there early in the morning and

spend a holy hour, and most, you know, a lot of people do it every morning because they say, I'm over here. I'm going to wake up and go to the Holy Sepulchre. Not too bad. We're talking about pilgrimage and recharging our spiritual batteries. Well, we ended up moving on. We went to the day before yesterday to the baptismal site of Jesus. Now, what was so beautiful about this is that we started the morning by having mass in Galilee at a place called Curse. That's where the Gatorine Demaniac. went over the cliff into the sea. And then we took off from there and we made our way down the Jordan Rift along the Jordan River all the way past Jericho to the lowest place on earth, the baptismal site of Jesus.

And guess what? We renewed our promises, our baptismal promises right there. But here's the kicker. Then this happens. This happens in January when we go. That's happened six or seven times to us where we are at the site, celebrating Mass or renewing baptismal promises on the feast day around the world. And so when we went down to the Jordan River to renew our baptismal promises,

it was the official feast of the baptism of Jesus around the world. Talk about cool. And so we went down there, and I taught about that place. And everything that happened in Matthew 3 and 4 with the baptism of Jesus. then people renewed their baptismal promises. And it was Father Cheney from NDSU up in North Dakota at the Newman Center there. He's the one that presided over that service. And it was beautiful where we all renewed our baptismal promises.

And you know the story in Matthew chapter 3, right? You know 3 and 4 where Jesus went down into the water, came out of the water, went up into the wilderness for 40 days and encountered the enemy three times and was victorious. by quoting the Word of God from Deuteronomy 6 and 8. Well, we renewed our promises, and we suddenly realized that Jesus went through the waters of baptism, came up, and the Holy Spirit came down upon him, and we hear the words of the Father, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased, listen to him. And the only other time we hear that voice is in Matthew 17 with the Transfiguration.

those are the two times and so we experienced that and we're reminded of what jesus said when he said as the father has sent me so i send you and he sent his son in the power of baptism and the holy spirit and that's the way we are sent as well well then after that we made our ascent to jerusalem it isn't that long of a ride but it's straight up and jerusalem is up in the hills of judea up on the top you take a bus trip from Jericho and the baptism of Jesus down at the Jordan all the way up. It's called the Ascent. In fact, Psalms 124 to 134 are called the Psalms of Ascent, and they are the Psalms that you read when you ascent to Jerusalem. And we read many of those Psalms as we made that ascent, and then we were there in Jerusalem.

and we stopped and got off the bus and overlooked the city of Jerusalem and we prayed and it was electrifying. The next day, which was yesterday, we went to Bethlehem and we celebrated Mass at St. Catharines. And that happens to be, by the way, where universally the mass is broadcast from Bethlehem

and we had a great, great experience in Bethlehem. We went out to Shepherds Field and I taught about the Blessed Virgin Mary, as a source of mercy, as she gave birth to the source of mercy, Jesus Christ. And so we had a great time there, and an amazing dinner, or lunch, I should say, in Bethlehem. And so today we're going to be just in about an hour and a half as we get ready and we have breakfast and we go out to our chariots, our buses. We're going to be going to the upper room this morning and praying.

We're going to go to the upper room. and then a real highlight. We're going to be on the Mount of Olives. We're going to make our descent. We're going to stop halfway down at Dominus Flavit, where Jesus wept over Jerusalem in Matthew 23. Remember that, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that city that stone the prophets. How often I would have gathered you together as a mother hen gathers her chicks, but you would not. Behold, your house is empty and desolate, and it's there that I'm going to speak about the meaning of suffering, the meaning of suffering. And then we're going to move on from there. So that's so far, it's just been, it's just been incredible. Are my batteries charged? Yes, they are. Do I have a new

perspective on walking with Jesus instead of studying about Jesus? Yes, I do. Now, we should be doing this at home. Don't get me wrong. We're always on a pilgrimage. But, you know, a pilgrimage is really to refocus and to recharge those batteries. And that, That's what's happening. Everybody's doing well, by the way. If you have loved ones on the pilgrimage right now, everybody is doing well. We don't have any major sickness, no major injuries, or anything like that. So I want to pray with you and know that we're praying for you. I have mentioned you on the pilgrimage many times that how much I love doing the podcast and spending time with you. And I know that you could come on this particular trip, but I do hope you can come on another one. Save your pennies. Next January, we're going to have another trip that's going to be fantastic, and you just have to make a point of it, you know, and save the pennies and start to prepare and join us. It's just nothing like it. I'm familiar with all kinds of pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and I think we have

it right. I think we've got it right. And we, oh, last night, let me just throw this in before I go, last night when we went to Bethlehem, you know, we try to minister to everybody. We involve everybody on these pilgrimages. Our guides are Jewish. We go to the Holy Land. We shop at a store that helps the Christian community. We went to an orphanage last night in Bethlehem and brought all kinds of goods with us to these children who are are developmentally really challenged. And the sisters from Argentina have spent their life ministering to these children. And we went there and we gave, we played with the children.

It was amazing. And then we divided up after that. And our people, we divided it up into like groups of seven. And we had dinner with Palestinian families. Talk about interesting. We had dinner with Palestinian families. And they came back to the buses last night, just talking and talking away about what it was like and oh really really really powerful so that that took place just last night

and we stay half our time at an at an arab hotel just a wonderful wonderful hospitality so we're working with everybody over here absolutely everybody and and that's the nature i think of catholicism isn't it well i got to get going because i'm got to get ready and get some breakfast and we're going to be making our way to the upper room this morning, and then we're going to go over to the Mount of Olives. The weather should be good today, and so we've got a big walking day today, and we're going to walk with Jesus.

We're going to walk with the Blessed Mother and Peter and Paul, and just go deeper and ask the Lord to deal with us in our hearts in the areas that he wants to deal with us. So pray for us, will you? And we'll continue to pray for you. Again, big trip coming up in June of 2020 for young adults, but everybody is welcome. We've got a lot of age groups that are now joining the trip, so you are certainly welcome as well.

You can get that information on my website, jeffcavens.com. By the way, keep your eyes open for this new series. Check it out at ascensionpress.com. Marcholino di Ambrosio and I have a brand new series on Jesus as part of the Ascension Press teaching program. I should say menu. And if you didn't know it, all of our series now are available on streaming. You just have to get the workbooks.

We've got all of video streaming. And you can actually in your parish have 6, 7, 8, 10, 10, 15 studies going on all at the same time during the week. Because in this technological age, it's just possible. And so that's all available if you didn't know that. And also check out the study on Romans. Andrew Swofford, Dr. Andrew Swofford and I did a study on Romans that is available at Ascensionpress.com as well. We also have great partners who are available at ascensionpress.com.

We'll put the number in the show notes. And if you call, they'll help you start your church up with some fantastic Bible studies. Let me pray for you, okay? In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Lord, I pray here, from Jerusalem. I pray for my brother and my sister, that I pray, Lord, that you would move in their heart in such a way, that you would draw them close to you, and that they would be aware of this intimate relationship that you desire with them, this intimacy of the Eucharist, the intimacy of your word, the intimacy of walking by the power of the Holy Spirit. I pray, Lord, that whatever is

happening in their life right now, that you would be their shepherd, you would be their healer, you would be the son of God to them in their life in so many ways. Lord, I lift them up to you and ask you to bless them. May your grace flow into their life and may there be true healing and wholeness in Jesus' name. Amen. I'll say to you, I teach you a Hebrew word, Shalom, peace. We hear it every day. Shalom, shalom. And good morning. Bokertov from Jerusalem. Look forward to seeing you over here, but talking to you next week. I love you. God bless.