I know that my Redeemer lives

This will be brief (compared to my usual style) but I feel like I need to share it. We're leaving in just a few short hours for Egypt and I won't be able to write for a week and a half, and I don't want to forget this feeling while it's still so fresh inside of me. Today was one of the most powerful experiences I've had since I've been here.

Today we went to the Garden Tomb.

It's been so incredible to see every site we've been to and I have already been awe-struck so many times, but there was something different about the Garden Tomb. I can't even put it into words really. But there was a whole different feel there. It just felt so.....sacred. Even with hundreds of people around, I might as well have been there alone, in peaceful solitude. Every place we go to speaks differently to each person. For some reason, this place spoke to me, and it's not even necessarily a fact that this is the right place, but just being there where it could have happened, feeling the spirit, and thinking about what my brother went through for me both before and after His crucifixion was a very humbling thing . The feelings I had were so powerful, they actually took me by surprise. We had the opportunity to sit there in the Garden, where many believe that Jesus Christ our Savior may have been laid and resurrected, and ponder the significance of what that means. I don't tend to be much of a tear-shedder, so you can imagine my surprise when we began singing "I Know That My Redeemer Lives," just feet away from that sacred place, and by the end of the first verse, I felt tears streaming down my face. The words that I've sung hundreds of times were filled with so much more meaning and feeling than they ever had been before. I wasn't expecting it, but I couldn't stop. I wish there was a way to truly convey how I felt sitting there without sounding cliche, but there really isn't a way to adequately describe it. It really was one of the most powerful experiences I've ever had.

Our tour guide there, a Baptist preacher from the south, left us with a really interesting thought. He said when you enter the tomb, "it's not important what you see there , but what you don't see that matters."

He really is risen. He really did overcome death, and because of Him, I can too. He went through every imaginable thing for me, and I am so grateful that through the power of His resurrection, one day, I will have the chance to fall at His feet and thank Him for the precious gift of His sacrifice.

He lives and grants me daily breath. He lives, and I shall conquer death. He lives my mansion to prepare.

He lives to bring me safely there.