Day 8, The Temple Mount, Lazarus, Mt of Olives, and NO PHOTO

Day 8. 

Okay, this blog may be a bit off. I'm writing it 2 days later and my original draft is gone. Not sure what happened. So if my memory is fuzzy, well, you'll know, cause I'll say. 

So the morning begins with a bus ride through the city of Jerusalem. I sit near the back. Why? Because it's the fun area of the bus. Of course it's all fun, but really fun back there! We arrive at the Temple Mount to prepare to head to the top.

This is the side we entered, on the left wall (by the Western Wall). Now some brief history so you understand what you'll look at (I've been around Deeb our guide a lot so I talk like him). The first temple was built by Solomon WAY back. It was built on Mt Moriah, the place where Abraham bound Isaac for sacrifice until God was sure he was faithful. It stood till 597 BC when the Babylonians defeated Israel and destroyed the temple. This is when the Ark of the Covenant was lost until the 1930s when Indiana Jones rescued it from the Nazis, har de har har. Anyway, it was later rebuilt by Herod the Great. That maniac? Why? Because he was trying to make nice to the Hebrews who hated him so. Of course he taxed the wazoo out of them to fund it, but there you go. Now the Mount is like a giant platform, way above the city, rebuilt over the ruins of Solomon's temple. There the temple itself was built on top of it. Here what it looked like in the 1st century, thanks to a beautiful giant model at the museum.

Well the Jews rebelled against their Roman rulers (as Herod served as a puppet leader) in 66 AD, lost horribly, and in revenge the Romans destroyed the temple in 70 AD. The giant landing area, the Mount, is what remains. That's where we went.

1st you wait in line, a long LONG line to climb to the top.

Boring! It's all about security here. Israel is very sensitive about the religious sites, not wanting anyone to get riled up over it. So no religious icons or stuff up there. Keep your WWJD shirts at home kids. Now one more history note; remember the Muslims took Jerusalem later on. They hold Jerusalem as their 3rd holiest site, as this is where Muhammad ascended into heaven according to their tradition (and they also follow the Old Testament if you're confused, so the Abraham connection is meaningful to them too). So when they were present here except for the Crusader invasion they built a large mosque and the Dome of the Rock (where Muhammad ascended). As we climb the ramp to the top we see this;

This thing has even survived an earthquake, built in 637 AD. Behind us were Muslim women sitting together reading and studying the Koran. I love their devotion.

Now if you want to enter the Dome for worship you have to take a ritual bath, which is here;

Only Muslim worshipers can enter the Dome now, thanks to Ariel Sharon's ill-timed visit 10 years ago. But here it is up close;

It's absolutely beautiful. So we can't go in anymore. NO PHOTO. I did catch some worshipers going in and snapped a very discrete picture.

And then we saw some idiots behind us roll out a giant We Love Jesus banner (for a photo I think). Security whisked them away FAST. Number one rule while in the Holy Land; Don't be an idiot.

After this Rev James Howell took off, so we naturally chase him because he's basically a walking Wikipedia of the Holy Land. On the northwest side of the Mount are stairs headed down to a lower section of the Mount. At the bottom step is a curious step, slightly out of line and different material.

Evidence suggests based on this and dating, this is likely belonging to SOLOMON'S TEMPLE! Guys, NOTHING has been found of the 1st temple, zero! This is beyond awesome, almost 3000 years old of the temple to Yahweh! So stepping on it was truly an humbling experience (and those are my feet).

After that we left the Mount via the Lion's Gate, also the traditional spot where St Stephen was stoned to death. See the lions?

We left the Temple Mount afterward and rode up to Bethany. This is the hometown of the beloved Mary & Martha and Lazarus. It's here we find Lazarus' Tomb, way up the hill to the city. Climbing hills again. Mountain top experiences are common here by design. The tomb is next to a Franciscan church built on the ruins of a Byzantine one, which had direct access to the tomb.

Well a mosque cut it off, so a side entrance has been made.

Burial in those days went like this; the body would be prepared with spices and dressings and laid in the tomb for 2 years. After that the bones would be collected in a small box called an ossuary. So here's the tomb;

And here I come out, like Lazarus would have, though he may have been confused and not smiling; 

After visiting the church we rode up to the Mount of Olives. This is where you find Gethsemenie, where Jesus prayed as he steeled himself for the Passion to come. It's still here, filled with olive trees, some over a thousand years old (but they have no rings so we can't date them).

Beside it is the church of Dominus Flevit; translated Jesus Wept. It's new and beautiful inside.

At the altar is the Stone of Agony, the traditional stone where Jesus prayed.

After a time of reflection and prayer we left the church to walk up the hill (up and down the city goes, all the time) to the corner of the Temple Mount. There is was time for lunch. I had a giant sesame bread with Zatar (which I affectionately call the "green stuff"). Cheapest lunch, and with a Coke it's bloody good.

Oh by the way, it was freaking cold and rainy all day with a strong wind. That sucked. So we then took to a small museum nearby to show us how Jews back in the day would prepare themselves to worship at the 2nd Temple (Herod's building). After that we went to the front steps of the Temple Mount!

Here a Jew would come to the temple first by cleaning;

And then enter through the Golden Gate which was bricked over by the Muslims way back when.

In Jesus's time he would come and teach on these steps when he came to Jerusalem, just like we are sitting while James and Deeb teach us. See the city behind them? The temple looked out over everything. 

  

We spent some time there and then returned to the Western Wall (a return for a few of us like me). Now this is where the Jews were allowed to come and pray after the destruction of the 2nd Temple. It's holy and sacred and so sad. The prayers here are beautifully lifted. Now to come men and women are separated, and men must cover their heads (my hat worked fine). No pictures here guys, sorry. 

After that, free time in the Old City! Lots of crap from China at always 50% off. And it's still cold and wet. So my small group find a Turkish coffee shop and run into Rev James Howell and his crew who had the same idea! A hot drink on a day like this is grace indeed.

After that we walked and shopped for 3 hours. It's a great workout! Here's a couple of images;

One street vs another, and later in the day I must add. We then return to the hotel, exhausted, but I have one more thing to enjoy after supper, the Israeli museum! So 13 of us board a bus and I have a lovely ticket that reminds me of a church raffle.

This is my ticket to the museum? Really? Uy. So we drive off with a total of 57 (other groups come) and we're stuck in traffic. Uy! It's police checkpoints, definitely more police and miltary out lately, nerves over the peace talks with John Kerry. So we get there to see the Dead Sea Scrolls!!! And then the museum lady says, no photography. NO PHOTO. UY!!!! 

We were allowed to photograph the giant model of 1st century Jerusalem, which I took many for context. 

So I saw the Dead Sea Scrolls; so amazing. I saw a large piece of Isaiah, written in the 1st century BC. Before these were found in the 1940s, the next oldest Hebrew text was from the 10th century AD. That's a 1000 years folks! I get why they hold them with such reverence, as do I. I should add the no photo staff lady told us about the no photo crap just before we went into the Dead Sea Scroll display, so I got this.

Take what you can get people....the Dead Sea Scrolls are at the end of this hall.

We return to the hotel, and something hits me, perhaps hits most of us. This is our last night in the Holy Land (we board the plane tomorrow). So most of us stay up and go out on the town to celebrate till late. I made new friends this night, and I had the chance to reacquainte with old ones. It's rare for pastors to spend any time together like this, in the Holy Land or anywhere, so that was a wonderful gift. 

(This made the blog late, and then my phone deleted my work, FYI). One more day tomorrow, and writing this now (with that day already done) I can't wait to share it with you! Till then take care and God Bless!

Day 7; Cana, Nazareth, and Jacob's Well. Wow!

Today we left the Sea of Galilee. I got to see a good sunrise this time, huzzah!

The day it started out funny. No one was about to stay up to watch the Super Bowl as we all planned (it came on at 1:30am) except James Howell, and we were shocked over the score. For 30 minutes it's all we would talk about. That conversation ended, we boarded the bus and headed to Cana.

Cue the wine jokes! No one could resist. In all seriousness, this is where Jesus performed his 1st miracle, turning the water to wine. The town is actually called Kafr Kanna. 

See the wine shop in the last picture. See, the jokes have marketing relevance! Well we make it the Francisican Church that honors the Wedding of Cana at the traditional site. 

We happened to get there when they were holding Mass, and heard the hymns from underground in the ruins below. I'll upload it to Facebook later (I can't do that on the blogger app, so that's why). There were some old ruins underneath the church though containing ancient jars so that was cool.

We continued our journey this time to Nazareth. Now in Jesus' day it was probably barely 100 people. See if this looks like 100:

81,000 people today, and maybe 3% Christian. There is one cool spot here in Nazareth worth seeing, it's a replica living 1st Century Nazareth town located in the city. Now we feared it would be touristy, but it was amazing and felt quite real.

On the left is our guide Tali, who spoke perfect English and kept apologizing for it. Seriously she was awesome! This living town has volunteers who adopt the traditional dress and run the town, like a few places we have in the states. Here on the right is Simon, a shepherd who is wearing 1st century style clothing (guys have stripes like him, women adorn colors). His herd is made of sheep, goats, and one bossy rooster.

She explained that the goats are daring and love to lead and boss the sheep, which is common in herds this size. A good shepherd is needed. Sound familiar? I got to pet one. Pet the goats like at Carl Sandberg's!

Now when they bought the site, they found something interesting (this happens a lot here). On the limestone hill there was a pool looking thing and a flat area. What is it?

It's a wine press! The square area on the left would be filled with grapes and squashed with stomping of feet (feet are soft and perfect. If you used sticks or stones you would crush the seeds and make horrible wine), the juice would flow into the pool (see the channel?) be collected, ferment, and 40 days later da daa! The stomping of the grapes would be a time of celebration in Nazareth. Very cool!

We next met a carpenter. Now the Greek describing carpentry in the New Testament isn't about making furniture; they made tools, built houses, or were stone masons. Hard work. This one was making tools, and showed us how to work an ancient drill. It's like using a bow for spinning a stick with a drill bit you are pressing down (it's on the table). It's hard work living in Nazareth.

Next we met this lovely woman spinning sheared wool into yarn. Hard work again. What blew my mind was how to make the colors. When your ball is made you boil it to make colors. Easy materials make common colors, say orange peel for yellows to orange. What about blue or purple. Get this, they're from Mediterranean snails (okay, not just lying around), but they have to be kept alive for transport and dropped into the boiling water with the yarn to get the blues and purples. Yeah, poor snails, but doesn't it sound expensive? Thus blue and purple were for royalty or the extremely rich. 

Finally we reached a synagogue, much like the one that Jesus taught in and nearly got killed for it.

He read from the book of Isaiah (the scroll seen here), and it would freak out and confuse the people who knew him as a carpenter (1st century style). This would also serve as a meeting hall. Use this image in your mind if you like as you read Luke 4. 

Our pilgrimage continued through the West Bank as we entered Samaria. We entered the city of Jenin that has religious significance to scripture. In Luke 17 Jesus traveled to a border town between Galilee and Samaria and came across 10 lepers whom he healed (with the Samaritan who is the most thankful). Well here it is, Jenin!

We passed through to the outskirts to a steep mountain to a large mom & pop restaurant for lunch. As we start climbing we are passing all these Roman columns. Uh, okay. We get to the top, and there is the restaurant;

and this to the right;

What is this place?! Hang on they say, food is calling. Okay....and it's delicious. The owner also went to the University of Alabama and he shows it happily;

Okay, time for a short hike around this place. We find out this was first a big palace for the corrupt Israeli king Ahab and his wife Jezebel, and later a palace built by Herod the Great to impress his Roman bosses. It shows he tried hard;

Now there are the ruins of a Byzantine church here too. On Herod ruins. Why? Because it's a decent candidiate for the place where John the Baptist was beheaded, and the church was dedicated to him;

Our last official stop took us to Nablus, which is the captial of Samaria. It's huge, and full of people.

Why come here? Because Jacob's Well, THE WELL, is here!

Are we sure? Most towns and cities rely on springs (like Jerusalem), wells out here are very rare. So the odds are not completely certain but most clergy are convinced including the skeptical ones (like me). A giant Greek Orthodox Church covers the site;

Now photographs are rarely permitted inside, but our guide Deeb talked to the priest, explained our pilgrimage, and we were allowed. Now you are going to get mad at me, but I'm not going to post them here. It doesn't feel right. I may share them in worship, but that'll be as far as I go. I'll explain it though; 

You go into a giant cathedral filled with hundreds of images of Jesus, his mother Mary, the disciples, and a beautiful icon of Jesus meeting the Samaritan woman at the well, Jacob's Well (John 4). So we go down into a very small room and there is the well, made of stone. The rope to the bucket is extremely long, and lowering it took forever. When it was drawn, the priest pointed at us and said, "Listen to the water fall." He poured a cup down; 3 1/2 Mississippi's later we heard the splash. Afterward we had the honor of drinking the cool lifegiving water. Remember what Jesus said, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of waterwelling up to eternal life." I think I've had a taste of that this day, and it's a peaceful feeling, holy, pure. I felt refreshed.

Here is the church at a distance as we left. 

Then we returned to Jerusalem at sunset. We're back again, following the footsteps of Christ, and they're going to be painful steps for sure (and it's literally spoken, 7 1/2 miles up and down tomorrow). But we had a detour of sorts. After supper Rev James Howell wanted to take a walk into the Old City. I'm not sure if he wanted to go alone, but a group of us sort of invited ourselves to tag along.

Here is where we ended up;

the Western Wall. It's normally a sea of people but not at this hour (7pm). I'll go into the logistics of the place tomorrow when we return, but know this is all that is left of the Temple (the one Herod the Great reconstructed). It's history, and legacy, and pain, such pain. And in the cracks there is grace. That's how God's grace works. It's in these cracks people leave prayers written on paper, folded, and placed in that crack. My prayer also came to rest in that broken but holy place, and I'll leave the rest to the One True God who loves me.

The remainder of our evening was more random and fun, we explored the street bazaars in the ancient Roman streets.

Most were closed, but a few were open. Some of my friends attempted to haggle (a skill I totally lack) and mostly struck out. I enjoyed watching though!

The evening is now night, but what a day. We followed Jesus, literally, and are back to the place where he warned, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing." (Matthew 23:37). What tomorrow holds, I don't know, but I feel it's going to be heavy. Pray for me, pray for us, and I shall remember you my friends in prayer. Peace be with you.

(Me in front of the ruins of Herod's Palace for Emperor Augustus).