Israel - Sunday 4/17/2016 Jesus in the da House

Sunday April 17 – Day 5 in Israel

Now that I have totally confused everybody with my Blog post showing one Day in Israel and my photos showing another day…I figure will just start labeling it by day..lol…no worry, I confuse myself as well…that’s what Lori used to always say about me. 

Anyway, this update is for what we did on Sunday and I will make sure the pictures match the information.

We have been moving along pretty well, considering the amount of places we are visiting.  One thing we have come to know is that the schedule could change on the spot and today was one of those days…but it worked out totally great. 

We began the day on Mount Olives, where Jesus came up and through as He headed into Jerusalem to fulfill the prophecy of His pending death and resurrection, the Good News.  We were given a map of all of Israel that includes the map of Jerusalem in the time of Jesus.  I was trying to get my bearings today and finally did, I think.  I will try and post a picture of it and give some location points for you all at the end.  So Mount of Olives is outside of the walls of Jerusalem on the Eastern side.  As Jesus came to the Mount of Olives, He could see the Temple Mount very clearly and He prophesied of what was to come of this Temple.  It’s amazing to think of all the HIS-story is here..it’s so real for me now.  To see what He saw and to walk where He walked.  Below us is the Garden of Gethsemane which we ended our day with.  The story of Jesus entering Jerusalem is told in Luke 19.   The view of the Temple today is much smaller that what is was in Jesus time..the wall structures are the same, but the Temple was 1.5 bigger than what we see today. The Dome of the Rock, where Muslim’s worship now is small compared to what Solomon had built back 3000+ years ago.  And as we were told, many other nations after Jesus death has come and built on or around it, leading up to the current structure.  It was just totally amazing seeing what I saw.  The fun part of this visit, was seeing the joy of Brandi riding a camel…she was initially hesitant cause of how high it would be compared to a horse, but she had so much fun..the smile and joy on her face was worth the $6 5 minute ride.  Lol…once again, we were approached by sellers of all kinds of stuff and today we were made aware of this area having some pick pocketing issues so to be aware.  In the middle of our lesson this morning, there was a work dispute going on between the Palestine sellers..it was pretty funny and you could hear the increased yelling..but it got resolved.  Still not used to this aggressive type of selling..almost like forced sales.  But oh well, that’s the culture as Brandi would say..get used to it…lol.

We then headed down to the Temple Mount which was located right across from Mount Olive..we would drive down the mountain through the Kidron Valley, about a 15 minute bus ride.  The plan today was to visit the Waling Wall (the Western Wall) of the Temple Mount.  The Temple Mount is located on Mount Moriah.  We were supposed to come back to visit the Temple Mount area and Southern Wall on another day but because it was not crowded and we were a bit early, we actually did the full tour of this unreal place today.  Before heading into the Temple Mount, we were able to see the area currently being excavated called the City of David (King David).  It was recently found (back in 1867, less than 200 yeas ago) under a parking lot and they have been digging and excavating ever since.  We were able to see walls and sections of the area.  And we saw it from a great high angle.  It was so cool.

Now to give you all some context, the Temple Mount located on Mount Moriah, in Hebrew HaBayit – Mount of the House of God is a crucial focal point for the Muslim, Jewish and Christian faith, thus the current sensitive nature of this area.  Prior to the temple being built by King Solomon, this is where Abraham took his son Isaac up to, to sacrifice onto the Lord as commanded.  This is supposedly where the Ark of the Covenant maybe, but often disputed by many.  This is where at the South Western part of the temple Jesus was tempted by the devil 3 times to contradict who God was and is.  This is where Jesus taught on the teaching steps on the South Eastern side.  This is where Jesus tossed the tables of the money changers.  This is where Jesus walked and lived and loved and rebuffed many.  This is where the Wailing Wall is on the Western side of the temple.  This is where Jesus said that this temple will fall and no stone will be unturned after His death. There is so much history here for our Christian faith, but also so much history here for the Muslim and Jewish followers.  Everyone of these religions make claim to whose religion is THE choice of God..all believe in a god, but not all believe on how we are to worship, relate and be in line with the Father…for  me, as a Christian it is through my faith in Jesus Christ.  However, one major thing that this place does confirm without of a shadow of doubt, and no religion can dispute or contradict this..is that Jesus was here, He did the things that the Bible says, He fulfilled every single prophetic word written in the Old Testament, He is not a made up story or figment of anyone’s imagination.  History and science have shown that Jesus, Son of God, God Himself walked and lived in this area during that time.  The Temple Mount is now is under Israel control, but Palestinians and Muslim oversee the management of it.  The Dome of the Rock and the Dome of the Chains now sit on the Temple Mount and only Muslims are allowed to worship on the main area of the temple.  All religions are allowed to visit, but no worship nor prayer nor any symbolic thing may be done or performed at the main level. Prior to us making the visit to the Temple Mount as I said earlier we were planning to go on a later date, we were heading thru security into the Wailing Wall area which is outside of the Temple Mount and this is where all chaos broke loose..nothing major, but unsettling a bit.  A bit funny but also a bit apprehensive as we are at the control of a different law and culture. 

One of our guys, Texas Tom brought it to the attention of the guards at the Waling Wall security check that he had a little pocket knife, like 4 inches.  All of sudden the mood at the gate changed. In Israel, it is illegal to carry any form of knife anywhere, unless you have a permit. Due to the recent stabbings that have been happening this was a very hot topic just made real.  They had to call the police to come and see the knife and speak to Tom and our guide Hill-El. Thank God for Hill-El.  So the police guy shows up, oh yeah by the way, around the Temple Mount there is an Israeli Police presence. At the security gate there is Palestine armed guards and police and at the Temple Mount Entry, there are Muslim security personnel, not dressed as police, but security personnel..high tension.  So the police guy show up strapping with an M16 rifle and gun and full battle gear except helmet.  And the 10 minute discussion ensues of how carrying a knife is illegal…in the end, Texas Tom gave up the knife, Hill-El got scolding’s and we moved on.

So since the crowds were not so big and because we had caused some issues at the Wailing Wall check in, we went to the Temple Mount entry way which is located right next to the other Security check.  There is one door for Jewish entry (on right) and one door for all else.  Any Jew, especially those dressed in their customary traditional clothing will be escorted and followed throughout the tour. We were told later that  Muslim women are hired, paid to, yell at any Jew coming into the temple…they yell in Arabic, God is Good or something like that and they just keep yelling every so often as they enter the temple.  The Jews are instructed not to respond so as to not cause any major altercation.  Talk about conflict waiting to happen.  Well, we made our way up the man made huge wooden ramp to the entry at the top, at least 100 feet about the area we entered and about 200 feet above the original street area in the day of Jesus.  Muslim security checks each person coming through..not with a scanner but with their eyes, all backed by armed security around them.  7 of us were told to stand to the side (5 women and 2 men) as they needed to cover us.  Part of the problem of this, was that we were supposed to come and visit on Monday which if we had done that would have dressed differently.  However, since we revised the plan and came today, us 2 guys were in shorts..a big no no and 4 of our women had no covered shoulders and Brandi was wearing tights.  So they rush us off to the side, the whole time yelling at Hill-El (what I take as yelling they consider it as talking..similar to how the Koreans in Hawaii communicate..yelling all the time..lol). Anyway, they hustle us to this side area really quickly, giving us these bags of materials that looks like cheap shoals, charging us $5.00 for each one.  I made like a Polynesian and put it on like a Malo/Lavalava, but they did not like the fact that my legs were still showing..so I had to tuck it in.  One of our ladies, Monica Stoker, they made her cover her legs (she had a work skirt on that went pass her knees) and cover her shoulders and her head.  Brandi they made her wrap the shoal around he lower half.  It was nuts..and chaos..and Hill-El calling it in essence overkill.  The funniest part but a bit scary were 3 Filipino women who were behind us..2 of them could not understand what the main guy was saying in broken English and they took them down to a room farther down…not sure what happened to them..but 1 of the ladies with them, when they were giving them the shoals’ says this, “Uh, I don’t like that color, what other colors are there?”  In her Filipino accent..it was pretty funny and stupid all at the same time..the seriousness of the situation at the item with men who do not bend from their idealistic laws and you asking for a different color as a women..I blurted out and said, “Really, Mam!! Take what they are giving you and don’t’ push any of their buttons.”  So we get all approved and go back to the group.  Later on I found out that Brandi was very disturbed by the disrespect she felt from these men telling her how to or how not to dress. She was covered on her shoulders but was wearing leggings.  Cool to hear her perspective on it.

Now that we are back with the whole group and Hill-El keeps apologizing and we are like, no worries, it’s all good. So we see Muslim’s sitting in groups studying the Koran and talking, we see all kinds of visitors walking around and taking pics, we see military police with guns..but want we don’t see and won’t see is any non-Muslim praying or worshipping here.  That would cause a major political issue for the Muslims. Hill-El said next week is Pass Over, 100000+s of Jewish and Muslim people will be in town coming to the Temple and wanting to visit this Holy place and prayer and worship.  He is sensing some issues to occur and asked us to pray for the peace of Jerusalem.  It is a very conflicted area.  We headed out through a market place area, not aggressively being sold…had to go through another security bag check to enter the Western Wall.  This place is amazing. Men on one side, women on the other side.  Men have to wear a head covering, if you don’t have you are given a white Yamika (?), hats are fine.  You write out your prayers, pray and stick it in the wall.  Hill-El said, once a month or quarter, personnel come and grab them and then take them to be buried at a secret site.  A lot of Jewish men were praying here as they cannot pray in the Temple.  One section of the wall is attached to a building that has A/C and you can pray in there and there are rooms for the Jewish men to pray from the Torah.  In that area, there is also a place along the wall that is covered by glass looking downwards..the actual street city of the wall is another 70-100 feet down from where we are standing and this wall is about 100 feet high.  It’s amazing to see how big this place is.  One thing we learned was that where the Rock Dome and the other dome is at on the main level of the Temple, the original temple was 1.5 bigger than what we were walking on and seeing.  Huge…into comparison of what is there now.  Amazing. 

So we leave the Wailing Wall and take to the South Wall where many things were revealed.  On the South Western side of the wall, is where Jesus and many others walked to enter the Temple.  The original road was discovered in a digging and we could see the areas rebuilt by the Roman and Byzantine eras after.  We also saw rock pillars that still existed from the original destruction of the temple, when Jesus said “no stone will be unturned.’  We were able to see actual stones from that time unearthed and dated.  The Southwestern Wall area also is where Jesus at the top of the Temple Mount and in this area was tempted by the devil to go contrary to the word of God and He denied the devil after fasting for 40 days   Amazing to see the Bible in front of me.  We then head down to the South Eastern side of the wall, the Teaching Steps area, where Jesus taught.  The stairs were so huge..I looked so small in the picture taken by myself sitting above our group.  It was nuts and breathtaking.  While doing this part of the tour, we saw 2 sets of girls dressed in Israeli Military gear, they were part of engineering team going through basic training. All young adults have to serve a 3 year military term after graduating from high school..all meaning all..all Israelis.  They then remain in the reserves until a certain age and can be called into active duty anytime.  Well, the cool thing was that each group were being escorted and protected by 2 armed guards with machine guns, hand gun and vest on and both were women…so cool to see the power a woman has in  this country as an Israeli solider regardless of the overwhelming culture pressures put on by the Muslims.  It was pretty nuts.  Real guns, real ammunitions, real life. 

Up till now it’s only 11:30ish and we visited 2 very historic places of Jesus time..blown away by it all.  We now head to lunch at a great place that has a shop and a restaurant below and no street vendors to avoid…lol.  Lunch as usual was ono..we had falafels, similar to hush puppies..they were ono.  The meat choices were so ono..beef/lamb kababos and chicken and fish.  So much fresh veggies also.

We had 2 more stops and then calling it a early day as we had dinner reservations at 5:30pm. Because it’s Passover this week, our hotel restaurant was on Sabbath today and starting from Monday breakfast there will be no more bread products served, only cracker (unleavened) along with other custom foods.  Even on Monday night, we have to eat at a different place..I think Armenian.

Next stop the pools of Shiloah.  This is where Jesus healed the blind man with mud.  The story is told in John 9.  This is also where, every person entering the Temple back then, had to wash up and clean up their whole body, in a purification manner before entering the temple. A portion of the pool is unearthed but from paintings the pool was huge.  There was path that we were shown that was 600 meters long uphill leading to the Western (Wailing) Wall entry point.  It was unreal..it was unearthed and is different levels of heights due to the excavation but you can walk it up if you want to..the actual walkway stairs are accessible.  Next to that one area, there is a water source tunnel that was found also that was the source of the water to the Temple area above.  In this area too was King Hezekiah’s tunnel also found.  It’s pretty amazing the elaborate architecture and operation of a structure and area back then.  This area was all located when they found the City of David..it is in the City of David just below the Temple South wall.  Unreal. 

Our last stop was the Garden of Gethsemane.  Matthew 26:36-46, where Jesus took the 3 disciples and went up to pray for the Father to take away the physical pain that was about to come in His will..Jesus prayed that 3 times…to a point of bleeding.  Geth Semane means olive press…Jesus was about to be pressed/killed to and…..I cannot even express how I felt here…Brandi shared her devotion today as assigned and she did a great job..I will ask her to post her devotion in a separate blog..as it relates to how we all will suffer in our lives..but how we suffer can either glorify God or struggle on our own.   It was awesome!! Love you Pi’ilani!!

We headed back to our hotel to take a short break, I took a 1 hr power nap and then headed to dinner at a place called Olive and Fish.  It was a great dinner with great company.  When we got there we were the first to be seated but when we left like 2 hours later, it was packed..great food. 

What a day..one take away from today goes back to kind of what I experienced yesterday.  There is major conflict, tension, dissension in this city, in this region.  Every one seems to be able to function and operate on a daily basis, but there is an underlying tension and anticipation for what’s next.  There is much diversity, but also much competition on who is more holier than thou and how does each culture one up each other…like Hill-El said, these issues, these differences can be squashed way before it starts..but it has to do if people want peace or want chaos.  Praying for Peace in Jerusalem, in the middle East is a big thing.  In Jesus time, there was many conflict and chaos,..I believe Jesus came to unify people..all people through Him to the Father.  He loved us so much that He would die for me and for you to be in a relationship a unified relationship with the Father.  He did not come to condemn as the Bible says..but we live in a culture that wants to condemn and suppress others for our own good….so what do we do..for me..its to value all those I come in contact with. Love them for who they are in God..all people here today is a creation of God…different looks, different cultures, different tastes…but we are all humans…only love and compassion will get people to see Jesus..cause violence, fear, condemnation, strife, disunity doesn’t work…look at how it is here now in Israel..in America around the world…fear, chaos, disunity is what keeps us from agreeing and living in peace…the Father sent His Son to bring Peace. 

Father God, I pray for Peace here now in this city, in this, Your land…I pray that we all, especially me set aside my own personal desires, personal views, personal issues and love people to a place of freedom.  Lord help me to be one peg, one hand, one heart in this thing that we call Love that can bring peace not only to Middle East but to Hawaii.  Lord, we are all more similar than we are different.  Lord, thank you for this day and what you have in store for me and for us tomorrow.  Lord, please protect us and guide us.  In Your name I pray.  Amen. 

Well, its 6:30am Monday morning and today, I don’t know where we are off to..lol…our schedule has changed, but changed for the better.  Keep you all posted and thanks for the love..love you all!! God bless!!