Completion of a 7 year project

A little over 7 years ago I started an ambitious project. It was an idea that had been planted by Dan Stolebarger, whom I met as one of the tour leaders on a trip to Israel in 2006. He had taken the challenge upon himself as written in Deuteronomy 17:18:
"When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the priests, who are Levites. It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees and not consider himself better than his brothers and turn from the law to the right or to the left. Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel."
In context, the passage refers to the kings of Israel who would be appointed as leaders over the nation, hundreds of years in the future from when Moses wrote this. By copying the Scriptures for themselves, it was an act of humility and one that would safeguard them against pride (as well as the practical aspect that there were no printing press facilities at the time). Dan shared that as a leader in his family and in ministry, humility and safeguards were worthy things for him to pursue.

Copying the entire Bible by hand - are you mad? It would take a long time... should I get special books for it? Which version should I choose? In the end I decided to give it a go and stocked up on regular hardback school exercise books and used my favourite version (for what it's worth, the NIV - yes, I know it has its flaws).

After I passed the MAF flight test in January, I had just begun the New Testament. At the time, things were looking promising for starting with MAF in September. Some simple maths showed that, if I was diligent about it, it would be theoretically possible to finish by then. I didn't want to be lugging hardback exercise books with me overseas. As it turns out, September is no longer on the cards, but I still managed to finish ahead of this self-imposed deadline.

So this project, which began on 27 June 2011, is now complete - 7 years, 1 month, and 24 days later!

(I'm not sharing this to boast or make anyone think I'm super-spiritual - I'm not. It's just to celebrate an achievement of something that's taken a long time.)

My Bible looking a little worse for wear (hey, I've had it since I was 13) and the stack of notebooks

An excerpt from Psalm 139 that gives me comfort as I plan to move overseas