Shalom from Jerusalem!
We began our day reading Psalm 122—one of the Psalms of ascent as we
drove up to Jerusalem. We left the wilderness, & drove north
along the Dead Sea—looking across (if we could see through the haze) we would
have seen the mountains of Moab.
We passed Masada & En Gedi & at Jericho turned left—as we rose
in elevation, we started seeing more trees & plants. We were on the road the Good Samaritan
would have been taking in Jesus’ parable.
We saw lots of sheep and their shepherds—we learned that shepherds lead
their sheep in circles around the hill to the top—not straight up since they would
develop too much muscle that way.
In Psalm 23 David describes this—“He leads me in circles [in the Hebrew] of righteousness.”
We stopped at a gas station to use the potty & there
were two men with camels giving rides in the parking lot. All the children rode & some of the
adults. Mom & I did not. Too high & too smelly. And holy cow do camels have weird
knees.
We drove to & stopped at Wadi Qelt—a wadi is a valley
between hills. Super cool view
from the top! Hills as far as the eye can see! Several Bedoin men
& boys greeted us there, ready to display their merchandise. One little boy would just come up &
say “candy!” Mom gave him
chocolate & he said, “caramel!” The Bedoins are nomad people who
live in houses & communities made of whatever material they can
find—previously they lived in tents.
They were sure ready for us!
Wadi Qelt--not a great pic, but you can see how the hills go on & on!
We continued up to Jerusalem from there. Jerusalem is a busy city! Our first stop was the Mt of
Olives. Then we walked down the
Dominus Flavit (the path Jesus walked down on Palm Sunday). Our next stop was lunch &
shopping. A Christian man owns a
shop that sells lots of olive wood products & antiquities. He invited us to have lunch in his
shop. Smart business move! I think we all bought lots! He had coins & pottery & other
things dating back to the time of Abraham. I thought I might want a widow’s mite coin but when I
learned that they started at $300 & went up to the $1000’s I decided
against it. It’s so small I might
lose it before getting home!
After lunch we went to the Garden of Gethsemane. Naomi negotiated so that our group
could go in a private area of the garden—no one else was there but our
group. After some time there we
walked across the street to the main section of the garden with the 1000 year
old trees, attached to the Church of All Nations—again, the Catholics got dips
on the site! Beautiful mosaics in
the church! There’s a sign outside
the church that says, “Please no explanations inside the church”—apparently the
church in Corinth isn’t the only one with too much talking in church!
Mt of Olives, overlooking the eastern wall of Jerusalem
In the Garden of Gethsemane
Super old, fat olive trees
We then went to the western wall of the Temple Mount—so cool
to be in an area that dated back to Christ! You could see where shopkeepers would have been selling
sacrificial animals, we saw the stone that Jesus had probably been tempted by
Satan on (it had been on the top of the Temple Mount—when we saw it today, it
was on the ground….those dang Romans & their destruction of the
Temple!). We then walked around to
the southern side of the temple & sat on the steps that would have led up
to the Temple. Surreal that this
is where Jesus was. The Catholics
got beat out by the Muslims on this site.
We didn’t go in the mosque that’s now there, but tomorrow we are going
to the Dome of the Rock—where the temple stood. Naomi told us that since this is such a serious area we
cannot take Bibles, have any Jewish or Christian jewelry on & have to dress
extra modest. We have to go thru
security in order to get in. It’s
supposed to get cold tomorrow & be rainy so it won’t be hard to be
modest! :)
Southern temple steps
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