Saturday, March 3, 2007-Day 6
I haven’t written much about the sleeping accommodations. Each place we were at was great for what it was. Since we had a wide variety of places and price ranges when and if I return with a group I will know what kind of places & prices are available.
Today was going to be in Jerusalem and we were all excited. You could just feel it. I knew we were going to have a lot of wow! moments.
We started on the Mount of Olives. The Mount of Olives is a large area where Jesus (1) taught his disciples the Lord's prayer (Luke 11 and Matt 6) (2) where he wept over the city of Jerusalem on Palm Sunday and (3) where he ascended into heaven for the last time and where he will return in the same glory at the Second Coming!! It was there we had a group photo which I later bought for $7. I took some very neat photos of my own. The golden domed EI Aqsa Mosque shone in the morning light. The Dome of the Rock was built in 690AD by Caliphn Abad EI Malik, very close to where the Holy of Holies would have been located in Solomon’s Temple, built over rock where according to Muslims Mohammed met with OT prophets and also converted Jesus (not too likely).
After a few moments we began our walk along and down the Palm Sunday road. “1As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, 2saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her. Untie them and bring them to me.” And so began Jesus’ entry into the city with shouts of Hosanna!
Along that road we stopped for a moment at a cemetery. If you look at pictures of Jerusalem from the Mt. of Olives you immediately see the golden dome of the mosque and then the city walls surrounding the Old City. The walls were built by the Turks during their 400 years of occupation. These walls were built upon walls which were built upon other walls etc. all the way down to the walls built by Hadrian in about 140 BC. The wall is so impressive. I just was enthralled by the picture in front of us.
Our attention was directed to the hundreds or perhaps 1000’s of graves all the way up to the foot of the wall. First of all the markers which look like stone caskets are big – close to the size as the person buried. But the actual grave is under these markers. I honestly don’t remember why the markers are so big. We were told by Micha that the reason the graves go right up to the wall is that since the Messiah will return to Jerusalem these folks want the best seats.
A short distance down the steep road is the church known as Dominus Flevit. It is an impressive structure and has an awesome view of the city from both inside and outside the church. I don’t know what Dominus Flevit means (something about tears) but this is supposed to be where Jesus grieved for the city. In Matthew 23 it says 37“O 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, but you were not willing.” Jerusalem was the capital city of God’s chosen people; the ancestral home of David, Israel’s greatest king; and the location of the Temple, the earthly dwelling place of God. It was intended to be the center of worship of the true God and a model of justice to all people, but Jerusalem had become blind to God and insensitive to human need. So it is here we see the depth of Jesus’ feelings for the lost people and for his beloved city, which soon would be destroyed. The Roman’s destroyed Jerusalem in 73 AD or about 40 years after Jesus ascended into heaven.
At the foot of Palm Sunday Road is the Garden of Gethsemane. “36Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” The Church of All Nations which was constructed using money from many nations is also known as the Church of Agony, or the Church of Gethsemane. This is probably a 10 on Micha’s authenticity scale. This is where Jesus asked his disciples to pray and then asked the Father to "take this cup from Him"; where he sweat blood and then made the conscious decision to go to the cross. The Church of All Nations sits along side a grove of olive trees that may indeed be offspring of the trees there when Jesus prayed there. Olive tree roots rarely die. They continue to send out shoots so the olive trees we saw though very old may not have been there when Jesus was the trees before them certainly were. It is am impressive site. Having said that I should mention that it is also at the intersection of a busy street. So cars and buses zoom by right outside the gates to the olive trees. That seems to be the case with every historical site especially in Jerusalem. After a few moments viewing the Church of All Nations it was back on the bus.
In the Gospel of John it reads “2Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades.” That site was next. I expected to see a pool or at least remnants of a pool at ground level and with the way things were going with a church built over it. Instead we walked between some buildings up to a railing and were shown a 50’ deep pit with remnants of some structures around it. When Jesus visited that pool and healed the lame man the pool would have been closer to ground level.
It really was exciting to be with Cindy in the city where Jesus preached and walked and died for me!!
I may have the sequence of events a bit mixed up but we got on the bus and we went to the House of Caiaphas, the High Priest. This is an area that was outside of the original city of David. There we saw the area Jesus was taken after he was arrested at Gethsemane. “24Then Annas sent “Jesus”, still bound, to Caiaphas the high priest.”
Scripture doesn’t say anything about where Jesus was taken after his trial that night. He was evidently lowered into a pit (really a dry cistern) and kept there in the dark all night - this was after his disciples had fled from him following his arrest and after seeing Peter deny him three times, just as Jesus had prophesied. This was a lonely place. What was it like for Jesus before he was tried, scourged, and crucified - the mental anguish must have been almost unbearable!! I had never ever even thought about this before. I’ve always rushed from his trial before Caiaphas to the trial before Pontius Pilate. There is a monastery built over this area.
We had been informed earlier in the day that we would be changing buses to go into Bethlehem. We would be getting a Palestinian bus and driver to take us across the checkpoint into Bethlehem. Micha got into the back of the bus since the Israelis frown upon their citizens going into Palestinian territory. Our new driver took us through the check-point past a smiling guard with a machine gun up in his tower.
We drove to the Church of the Nativity which is appropriately on Manger St. This is believed by all to be the real site of the birth of Jesus. “4So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. 5He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. 6While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, 7and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.”
We were able to see the cave where he was born and then laid in a stable a few feet away. We could take pictures of everything almost everywhere we went no matter how holy it was. This was surprising to me since you can't take photos in most museums in the US. At the time of Jesus' birth, Bethlehem had about 1000 people living in it - now 120,000. The birthplace has not one but three churches over it -Greek Orthodox, Armenian, and Catholic (St. Catherine's). You have to enter the facility thru a low door so animals could not be brought in, as was the custom of the Turks. Inside 15 lamps light the Altar of Christ's Birth. Attached to the cave is St. Jerome's Grotto where Jerome translated the Bible into Latin ("Vulgate" edition) in 350 AD. He was a scholar and was invited by Pope Damascus to translate the scriptures, which took 20 years. In the process of doing so he built a monastery.
I wish we could have visited the Shepherd's Field but we didn’t have time. Instead we stopped at a restaurant to eat and then next door to shop for an hour. Bethlehem is particularly known for its olive wood carvings.
Back across the border we went and headed to the Garden Tomb.
The Garden Tomb ("Gordon's Calvary") is named after the British General who discovered the site in 1883 about 150 feet from one possible site of the crucifixion and near the Damascus Gate.
Since 1893 this site has been administered by the evangelical Garden Tomb Association. The British accented guide gave a very low key but definite evangelical message as he presented the facts about the tomb and the rationale for the claim of authenticity for Golgatha being at this place. “17Carrying his own cross, Jesus went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). 18Here they crucified him, and with him two others—one on each side and Jesus in the middle.”
Their rationale for this site rather than for the Church of the Holy Sepulcher is: (l) tomb cut from solid rock (2) outside city wall (3) belonged to a rich man (4) by a garden where grapes and olives located (5) never used before or since. The stone formation of Golgatha does looks like a skull and apparently was a place where stoning did take place (though Jews probably pushed people off of a cliff onto sharp, ragged rocks rather than stoning them). It was on the road to Damascus, so many people could see those being crucified. Also the Romans used it for crucifixions and it was outside the city wall.
We celebrated Holy Communion there after we had some time to look into the empty tomb. From Luke 24 - “2They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.”
That whole day was filled with very meaningful experiences. We were pretty tired at the end of it.
And there was evening and there was morning – the sixth day.
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