Looking back at yesterday's post I realized I didn't actually describe the last picture. That was a picture I took of the giant wall the Israelis have constructed to fence the Palestinians into the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. This wall has been set up, at times arbitrarily defining the boundaries between Israel proper and the Palestinian territories. There are many on both sides of the wall issue...some view it as necessary, others view it as a harsh social injustice. Since we in America tend to be pro-Israel, here is a link to a site that wants to see the wall building stop. www.stopthewall.org
Here are two of many of a certain type of site that you can find all over Israel. It turns out that all you need to do is put up a sign and say Jesus did something right there and tourists will flock to it, weep over it, and find themselves getting emotionally attached to that specific site. In many ways, it is almost as if people are looking more for an experience than for the truth. The mountain in the left picture is referred to as the Mount of Temptation, because tradition holds that it was that mountain that Satan took Jesus to in order to tempt him in Matthew 4. The Scriptures give few details about where this might have happened, clearly it is conjecture. And then the picture on the right reveals the discovery of the very birth place of Jesus' mother, Mary! There are at least two distinct sites for most of Jesus' ministry, including 2 tombs, 2 caves where Jesus was born, 2 places for the Sermon on the Mount, etc. And the most amazing thing is how many churches: Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and even some Protestant have been erected at all of these many locations. For almost every Roman Catholic holy site the Eastern Orthodox have one right next to it. It's crazy...
All that being said, there are places that have been authenticated fairly accurately as Biblical sites where Jesus did his ministry. This is the excavated pool of Bethesda, just down and below the Temple Mount. This is where Jesus healed the man who had been waiting by the pool for many years.
This is an authentic mikveh, or what we would call a baptismal. There are many of these that have been excavated around the city of Jerusalem. In one location, right outside the entrance to the Temple Mount they have excavated over 40 smaller mikvehs just like this one, and 2 large ones - one being the pool of Siloam which is one location the Scriptures tell us Jesus spent time at. These were right outside of the Temple Mount gates so that people going up to offer their sacrifices to God, could make themselves ceremonially clean according to the Levitical laws.
One of the things you don't really consider when you are going to the Holy Land is the reality that all of the places Jesus would have walked are over 2000 years old. Not only that, but a city like Jerusalem has been conquered about a bazillion different times by Romans, Muslims, and Christians, each then attempting to make it its own city. In America we don't really get the whole "building a city over another city," but in the Middle East they have perfected this form of city building. This picture is from the top of the Southern Steps, the steps just south of the Temple Mount leading from the mikvehs up to this Gate, that would have led up and into the beautiful Temple Courtyard. You can see how later conquerers found this gate to be problematic for defense, so they filled it in. Then, support structures were built over it to hold up the aging walls.
This is the view from our hotel balcony. Mike and I sat out here and spent time with the Lord as we watched the sun come up over the Mt. of Olives (to the left). Jesus spent much time around the Mt. of Olives. Just over to the other side of it was the town of Bethany where Mary, Martha, and Lazarus lived. In all of his travels to Jerusalem, Jesus never actually stayed in the city. He always stayed with his friends in Bethany, which was less than a Sabbath's journey away. Also on the Mt. of Olives is the Garden of Gethsemane (which actually means Olive Press), and a large graveyard of both ancient and modern Jews.
More to come....grace and peace.
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