Monday April 18 – day 5 in Israel
22 Then
the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 23 “Speak
to Aaron and to his sons, saying, ‘Thus you shall bless the sons of Israel
26 The Lord lift up His countenance on you, And give you peace.’ 27 So they
shall invoke My name on the sons of Israel
My days are so messed up…we arrived Thursday night, April
14, correct? So today is our 5th
day in Israel but our 4th day of touring…lol…anyway, it’s Monday
here in Israel and we have 2 more full days of touring before we jump back on a
plane to NY on Thursday morning.
So before I share about the unreal amazing things of today,
let me share with you that there was a bus fire/explosion on Herbron Road , about 5 miles from our
hotel. We were at the hotel getting
ready to go out to dinner at the Jaffa gate in Jerusalem and all kinds
of sirens were going on outside. The
initial reports and subsequent stories on the internet are contradicting its
own reporting. An article in the Haaretz
News posted at about 8:20pm Monday Israel time confirms that it was a terrorist
attack. Our plans for tomorrow is to go
see Masada and the Dead Sea back where we were
at on Saturday. Will keep you posted on
our adventurers tomorrow. When we were
getting ready for dinner at about 5:30pm, we could here sirens of Police officials
flying by our hotel, on the main drag.
Our dinner was in the opposite direction so our bus driver Hatem was not
to concerned about it. We met Hill-El at
the Jaffa Gate area for dinner and he shared with us what he had known up till
that time. When we got back from dinner
is when we saw on the website of the supposed findings. Please keep Jerusalem , Israel
Still trying to figure out Google photos..it allows me to
upload pics to album, but it won’t allow me to automatically sort out the
photos by time taken..it shows it from last one taken to first one taken. I can
sort it, but I must do it manually..one by one..that takes way to long..maybe I
should take less pics…lol. Anyway…
Today, was an amazing day, regardless of what just
occurred. It will impact some of our
travel, but we are all trusting God for His protection and sovereign
nature. Furthermore, it shows how much
I, we, must pray for this area This
region affects our world in general.
Whatever happens here, regardless of what we think ore believe, affects
how we live in the USA and Hawaii ..we may not see
it daily or constantly, but it will affect our lives..its like the pebble
dropped in the water and ripple effects.
We can do the same from our side by dropping in our own little pebbles
that can affect changer here. Praying
for Bethlehem , Jerusalem , Israel
We made two stops today, but according to my walk-o-meter on
my phone, I took about 12,100 steps or about 5.5 miles walking today…after
dinner, the total is 16,182 steps (Brandi and I walked to the train station
when we came back just to look at some of the restaurants and stores in the
area that Hill-El told us to go check out. So today, we walked a total of 7.31
miles. No wonder my feet is sore and
hamstrings and legs all tight. Lol..
Our first stop today was pretty significant…we were visiting
what is called the Old City of Jerusalem.
We were going to walk the Via Dolorosa, “The Way of the Cross.” This is where we learned in our Christian
faith that Jesus walked this trek to His death at Calvary . There are 12 stations shown by the original
Catholic church, we walked thru all of them.
Some of these stations are not in the Bible, but assumed to be there
based on other writings or confirmations.
But prior to doing the walk we first visited the Pool of Bethesda, where
St. Ann ’s
church now sits. St. Ann was the mother of Mary who was the
mother of Jesus. At this Pool, as John 5
states, was where Jesus healed the man who was crippled for 38 years. Jesus did 3 things during His time on
earth: Preach, Teach and Heal…in no
particular order. At this Pool, He spoke
to the man to get into the pool and the man was healed. The layout of this pool, was pretty
cool..many areas still remain today after years of excavation. Bethesda
as shared by Pastor David in his awesome sharing today of John 5, talked about
the pool being a place of grace and disgrace..grace in the fact of where people
were getting healed by the water and a place of disgrace, cause a lot of people
were sick, based on not only their health issues but also by their sin nature
as the bible said the people said. Jesus
came to heal..not just physical, but emotional and spiritual. The Hebrew word for heal, is rapha, to make
whole..so it was not just about physical healing, but making a person whole in
the Lord. The devotion and discussion
time was amazing.
From here, we walked to the starting point of the final
hours of Jesus’s life. From the
Praetorium of the Roman Court
where Jesus was condemned to death on the grounds of the Antonia Castle, where
a boys school is now located. To right
across the street at the Chapel of Flagellation where Jesus was beaten badly
and had a ring of thorns placed on His head.
The chapel has an area inside its walls that had an area on the ground,
a artifact found that showed where Roman games were played such as dice. As we continue on out through twists and
turns, vendors, Muslim vendors are aggressively trying to sell us stuff. Especially in the corridors we walked through
and not the roadway vendors. They were
not as aggressive. The 3rd, 4th
and 5th locations we saw was where Jesus fell for the first time
with the cross, where Jesus sees His mom Mary and where Simon of Cyrene (modern
day Libya) helped Jesus pick up the cross and helped him carry it. We
walked by the place where historians and not the bible say that the woman, Veronica
wiped His face, where Jesus falls for the 2nd time and where He
consoles the crying women of Jerusalem
in the midst of His own paid. Some of
these stations are not part of the Bible, but have been commemorated by chapels
or a significant structure. This walk is through roadways and corridors with
stairs and pathways heading up to Calvary . Station 9 is where Jesus falls for the 3rd
time and station 10 is where His clothes were stripped and divided. Station 11 is where He is nailed to the cross
and station 12 on Calvary is where He is stood
up on the cross to die. This area of Calvary is now covered by the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Today, it is run by 2 churches in the same
church, the Catholics and the Orthodox Greeks.
In this area, we climbed up these very steep stairs to a tabernacle and
an area where Calvary bedrock is covered and
shown. We had to be reminded by our
guide to take off our eyes of what we are seeing with all these new buildings
and churches on the grounds that Jesus walked and see the area as Jesus walked
through it. We then walked down to where
station 11 was, the area that Jesus body was placed on a long piece of bedrock to
be prepared for burial. We then had
hoped to see the tomb of Jesus, but like the other day, when we went to see
Jesus birthplace, commercialization has taken over this place. Jesus tomb was
now covered by a dome and a structure that was built over this tomb that Joseph
of Arimathea had given for Jesus body.
This area was packed..so we chose to go see the tomb of Joseph of
Arimathea, which was located no more than 40 feet from Jesus tomb to see what
those tombs looked like and where Jesus would have been placed. It was amazing
to see how the bodies were initially placed and then the tombs sealed for a
certain amount of time until someone could go in and place the bones, free of
flesh into a small box (I forgot what the name of those boxes are). But as we all know, Jesus rose from the dead,
so they could not go and get His bones.
We walked by the tomb of Jesus and initially I had wanted to see for my
own eyes that He was not in there…but my faith tells me He is not. It was an amazing thing to see the
progression and the real life moments of the way Jesus lived His last hours on
this earth. This last area was filled with people of all cultures, all
religions all backgrounds….it was weird and a bit frustrating at times to see
and feel some of things going on around me..bumping into me, pushing, lack of
reverent awe for the history of this place. Many people had brought things like
white cloths, beads, bottle of purchased Holy Water and Anointing oils..bag
fulls and placed it on the area of Calvary or on the area of where Jesus body
was laid on the bedrock…I mean, I understand that we all have different customs
and cultures, but to see and feel what I saw disturbed me tremendously…I
remember a lesson we learned about the Prodigal Son and his older brother..they
both were more concerned about the father’s things (inheritance, blessings, money)
than they were about being in relationship with the father….kind of like how we
treat God at times. We desire more of
His blessings, His healings, His favor, His things..than just desiring Him..to
be with Him…now I am not perfect and this is more about my issues than what was
going on around me..but I was more focused on the life of Christ and how and what
He did for us was more important than getting to just see and get something out
of this area to use later. I was praying
a lot during this 30 min timeframe..trying to connect to God and not just go
ballistic on the pushing and shoving. I
actually body blocked a few visitors as they tried to go ahead of our group and
interfere with their silent moment at Calvary…I think I took out/blocked out
like 3 people..still got some size and movement to do this…I repented after
though…lol. When our group was looking
in Joseph’s inner tunnel, I went outside just to pray and meditate on what I
was seeing..the tomb where Jesus laid, but never stayed. He fulfilled His purpose here on earth:
birth, live, spread the Good News, die, resurrect and ascend…all to connect
people to God and His kingdom…wow….I was here at one of the final acts of His
life and earlier in the week, I had been at site where the resurrected Jesus
sat with Peter and the disciples…amazing.
The things of the past are so fresh in my mind right now. This for me, regardless of my flesh being
bothered for that short period of time was so insignificant to what I was
seeing and feeling…no words could totally explain how I felt at that time. There has been a many few times that when I
am in my own personal reflection that I put my earphones on and just listen to worship music where I am
at. At this location and earlier at the
Pool of Bethesda, I played the song “O Praise the Name” Hillsong’s version and
was just blown away by the words and realism of what I was seeing Thank You Lord for this experience.
We walked approximately 3.25 miles from the Pools of
Bethesda, through the Via Dolorosa to Calvary
and ended up in the Jewish Quarter by a square that had food places to
eat. Western Food was available, pizza
and burgers, but we stuck with the schwarma’s…had a chicken one today and it
was huge..like a big burrito. It was
ono. Our lunches have been at the right
time the past few days..hungry and tired after so much action in the
morning.
Our next stop was not a planned site in our trip plans, but
we had time to do it and it gave huge contextual info for us on things we have
seen. We went to the Israel
Museum Jerusalem
during the 2nd temple period.
The time before, during and after Jesus walked this area. The model was so realistic and so big…we looked
at it from the position of where we were yesterday, from the area of Mount
Olives and seeing the Temple Mount on Mount Moriah. The actual temple built was huge compared to
the current Dome of the Rock. We saw the
roads and steps that Jesus took in Jerusalem . We saw the intact South Wall, West Wall area
and the entire path of the Via Dolorosa.
Amazing to see it from the various angles and various major structures. Gave so much contextual visual information
for us all.
2nd thing we saw was the artifacts from the Dead
Sea Scroll area, Qumran . Unreal, stuff, original stuff shown in
exhibits. Shears, sandals, a brush,
dates – actual dates that were burnt and charred. It had actual scrolls, the 3 types talked
about the other day…biblical, apocryphal and society laws. The Book of Isaiah is mounted on this
circular cylinder in the middle of the exhibit, wrapped around a huge
pole. This is the entire Book of Isaiah
with some revisions and missing holes here and there. The actual parchment paper is stored in a
vault so it can remain visible, this is an exact copy replica on
paper…unreal. This area of the exhibit
is built in a dome shaped area, similar to the jars the scrolls were held
in..and at the top is a white mushroom top similar to the covers that were used
to seal the scrolls up..its pretty cool.
The final place we went to, and by this time, I was tired..beat…my feet
and legs were sore..but the things we saw were worth it. Artifacts from all periods of time. We saw that actual stone seat from Caesarea that we saw a replica of that had Pilates name
on it. We saw this piece of foil that
was found in the valley
of Hinnom
We then headed back to the hotel, about a 10 min bus
ride..to get some rest. Like last night, since it is Pass Over, our hotel is
not preparing dinners. Like I mentioned
above, we headed out to the Armenian Quarter for dinner at an Armenian
restaurant. A big group came in after
us..the food was great..very similar to what we have been eating. Fresh veggies and humus for pupus, saffron
rice, kabobs (beef and probably goat), chicken, steamed veggies, lemon juice, a
shot of very strong coffee and something like coconut cornbread. We also had a surprise birthday cake and song
for Amy Webster. Her husband is one
smart man..her birthday is not till Wednesday, but there will be no cake with
leaven in it come that day..due to the Passover and thus he wanted to have a
cake for her to eat that was like a real cake…smart move Tom!!! The group was heading to a Lights of David
show down in the City of David Tower, 4 of us headed back to the hotel with
Hill-El. We walked up to the train
station that Hill-El kept telling us about and it was pretty cool..lots of
restaurants, young families having dinner, music on the radio. Very nice for a
train station. Finally at about 8:30pm approximately 15 hours of being up, we
headed back to the room So that’s it for
this day of adventure.
My take away today for me, is this..I need Jesus
everyday…not just here in Jerusalem ..yes
I have been blessed to see and experience these events..but Jesus, God is more
than just a moment in time. Seeking Him,
desiring Him, listening to Him, obeying Him, praising Him, worshipping Him,
teaching and preaching about Him, healing in His name is a life long
journey. In the mist of chaos,
frustration, hurt, suffering, joy..whatever we may be going through, we need
Jesus more and more. He died so we could
live in His glory…my prayer today for me, is that I decrease so He can increase
in me. I need to see things and hear
things and speak things through His eyes, His ears and His mouth. I need to see what He sees in those around
me.
Lord, thank You for this day. I pray for those that were
injured in the bomb explosion. Lord I
pray for peace, Your peace above all understanding to exists in the people of
this country, in this region. Lord these
are all Your children, trying to live out beliefs in different ways. Lord, please reveal Your Triune nature to us
all so that we all may call You our Lord and Savior. Lord have Your way in all of us. Open our eyes, ears and heart to You. Lord, please grant peace on this area. Love You and thank You!
Well, its 5:30am Tuesday morning as I finish this off. I will be posting this blog to FB and will
include my messed up order pictures. I
will also post the link at the bottom of this blog. Today we head to Masda and the Dead Sea where we get to float in it today. Exciting!!
Thank you all for your comments, support and prayers in this
journey. It has been a blessed blast to
experience it and to do it with Brandi and Lori’s spirit with us. Love you all and Shalom!!!
Here is Pics from Monday 4/18
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