For the third year, ABR Associate Dr. Scott Stripling led a team of diggers to Israel to excavate the Byzantine monastery at Khirbet el-Maqatir. Joining Scott and his team was Dee Alberty from Baton Rouge, LA. Dee shares her experiences in Part 3 of this diary.

For the third year, ABR Associate Dr. Scott Stripling led a team of diggers to Israel to excavate the Byzantine monastery at Khirbet el-Maqatir. Joining Scott and his team was Dee Alberty from Baton Rouge, LA. Dee shares her experiences in Part 2 of this diary.

A beautiful and moving video clip from ABR Associate, Joel Kramer.

For the third year, ABR Associate Dr. Scott Stripling led a team of diggers to Israel to excavate the Byzantine monastery at Khirbet el-Maqatir. Joining Scott and his team was Dee Alberty from Baton Rouge, LA. Dee shares her experiences in this diary.

For me the physical start of what I am calling the Maqatir Expedition began on 20 May with a departure from Norfolk International Airport in Virginia; first to Philadelphia to catch an international flight to Tel Avi, Israel, then spending two weeks excavating, and finally flying home on 4 June. In reality, the expedition started a few months earlier when I began to consider participating in the Associates for Biblical Research (ABR) sponsored excavation at Khirbet el-Maqatir.

In June 2008, the Lord graciously reopened the doors for The Associates for Biblical Research to once again begin excavating at Khirbet el-Maqatir, Israel. This site has credible archaeological and geographical evidence to be correlated with the city of Ai, found in the momentous, redemptive-historical events of Joshua 7-8. A team of ABR staff and volunteers has traveled to Israel in 2009 through 2012 to perform further excavations at our site.

A special Christmas season message from ABR Executive Director Scott Lanser.

As a pastor in Frederick, Maryland for almost two decades, I visited thousands of homes in the community. In order to earn the right to share my message with those in each house, I soon learned the importance of being able to make a connection with them. One of the ways I learned to do that was to pay attention to the things that were visibIe in their home and attempt to find common ground about it. Redskins gear was an easy connection for me, Dallas Cowboy stuff was not!