Written by Rev. Josh Attaway
Today was a very powerful and emotional day as we began our first day in and around Jerusalem. Our tour guide, Rafi, took us to what used to be the upper part of Jerusalem to start the day. It is believed that this is where Jesus celebrated the Passover with his disciples when he instituted the Last Supper. It is also believed that this is the same place the disciples gathered after the resurrection and the Holy Spirit filled them on the day of Pentecost. A building has been built on this site and we had a chance to go in the room where Rev. Wendy Lambert was able to share a beautiful message of hope with us.
Just two floors below this room is a Jewish holy site that is marked as King David’s tomb. We actually don’t know exactly where his tomb is, but they have set up this place as a shrine to David and it is the place where many people come to visit and pay homage to King David.
From there we walked just a little ways down the street to a place where there is a beautiful view of the outer city walls, the Mount of Olives, the Kidron Valley, and the Hinnom Valley (sometimes Hinnom is translated is “Gehenna”). It was a beautiful site to put everything into perspective that we often read about in our Bibles.
Right next to this observation point is a beautiful church that has been built on the ruins of the house of Caiaphas, the high priest who put Jesus on trial and where Peter denied Christ three times before the rooster crowed. In the bottom of this church are the ancient tunnels that lead down into the cistern. According to a fourth century tradition, it is believed that Jesus was held in this cistern in the house of Caiaphas as a prison during his trial. There has been a lot of archaeological evidence to support this claim. We had a chance to go down into the cistern for a time of scripture reading and prayer as we reflected on the thought that we were literally standing in the place where Jesus would have been during the last hours of his life. It was an incredibly powerful moment!
As we left the house of Caiaphas we loaded back up on our bus to head to the Israel Museum. The Israel Museum is a very large museum that we could have spent several days in, but we didn’t have that much time so we just focused on a couple of key things while we were there. First, outside the museum they have reconstructed a giant model of the city of Jerusalem during the Second Temple Period when Jesus would have been there. We got to walk around it and Rafi pointed out to us where everything would have been in the city and we got to see the temple mount as it would have been in that day.
The second point of focus at the museum for us was the collection of the Dead Sea Scrolls. These scrolls are the oldest documents containing scripture in the world. Miraculously, they had been hidden in a cave for nearly 2000 years before two shepherds found them in the 1940s. We got to learn more about the story of the scrolls and had a chance to walk around and actually see some of them at the museum. It was truly incredible!
After the museum we got back in the bus to head to the city of Bethlehem. Because Bethlehem is located in the Palestinian autonomy we had to drop Rafi off in Jerusalem to go the rest of the way. Our bus driver took us to Bethlehem where we had lunch and met our new tour guide, Isa, who showed us around Bethlehem the rest of the afternoon. After lunch we did a little shopping and then headed off for the Shepherd’s field. It is believed that this field is the place where the shepherds were keeping watch over their flock by night when the angels appeared to them and brought them the message of good news. It is also believed that this is the same field that Boaz owned that we read about in the book of Ruth. Today, a small church has been built there to mark the spot.
Finally, we loaded back up in the bus and Isa took us to the Church of the Nativity. It is believed that this is the place where Jesus was born. Emperor Constantine’s mother built this church and it is the longest-running active church in the world. The church is being renovated and restored, but we still got to walk around inside. Directly underneath the altar of the church is the original cave where Mary gave birth to Jesus and where he was placed in the manger. We were able to go down in the cave and see a spot in the floor marked with a silver star where Mary gave birth and a separate spot where the manger rested. Being in the place of our Savior’s birth was completely overwhelming and words cannot describe what that was like!
In one day we saw the place where the life of Jesus began and where he spent some of his final hours at the last supper and in the cistern of Caiaphas’s house. It was a roller coaster of emotions, but we are certainly all grateful to be experiencing this special and holy place. Tomorrow we will go to Masada and the Dead Sea so check back for more pictures and video on the blog!
