New Testament Jerusalem

Up early, we gather as usual outside the hotel talking and laughing. Everyone is charged for this day in which we will see The Holy Sepulcher. Our guide Cindy arrives, and we head out. Peter Nordell and Don Genereaux are taking a taxi. (There is a long and dramatic story about Peter's "taxi" ride with Isaac that you want to hear from somebody other than me. Ask Julia she enquired deeply into the matter-Jonna.) Cindy introduced us to Shabban the money changer and "king pin" in the old city.

He has promised to take care of us fairly and kindly. He warns us about typical tricks that shyster shopkeepers will use to get money out of us. He is charming and helpful. We will see him again. Cindy seated us outside of the Holy Sepulcher and explained the spot. She helped described why this is a very plausible place for the events to have happened and how the land scape had been so dramatically changed beginning with Hadrian who hated Christians and built pagan temples on these hallowed spots to spite the pilgrims who were coming. Constantine's mother identified the site in 326 AD through interviewing locals. The first church was built.



For 1700 years this church has been burnt and rebuilt and burnt again. There are six Christian denominations that lay claim to the church (Armenian, Franciscan [Roman Catholic], Greek Orthodox, Syrian, Ethiopian, and Coptic--these are the oldest Christian sects). All six have divided up the church and rotate through services at the chapel of the cross and the tomb. Cindy described that we would go to the farthest end of the Church and ascend it like it was meant to be walked--slowly up many stairs quieting our hearts for what we were about to experience. She lead us up the stairs past rows of glittering lamps, gorgeously carved staircases, tapestries and pictures. Darkness hung high in the smokey archways and buttresses over us and the church was quiet with only priests and nuns of varying robes and head coverings moving around preparing for the day. Amy Flack nailed the smell of the oil lamps, "They smell like nail polish." Our group got quieter and quieter as we ascended to the traditional place where Jesus was cleaned after the crucifixion. A woman was knelling there kissing the stone tablet in reverence. We talked about the gorgeous mosaic of brilliant color that depicts the crucifixion, the removal of the body from the cross, the hasty preparation of the body and the entombment. Under the cross in that mosaic was a picture of a skull. The Christian tradition says that is where Adams bones were. The Jewish tradition says that Adams bones lie under the temple. We see again the layering of story on story. It grounds our sometimes ethereal and abstract faith to actual places and times no matter where our first ancestor lies. We ascended white deeply worn marble stairs to a chapel which marks the crucifixion. The group was silent in the midst of glittering gold, silver, gem-studded icons and crosses. Lamps hung bringing light to this dark place. Pictures snapped furiously as we each knelt beneath a golden altar and stuck our hands down a golden hole to touch the bedrock of Golgotha. We lingered in awe. Some tears and many prayers as we stood in the place where the man we all love the most suffered his worst moments for our sakes.

Anna Maclean in a beam of holy light...

After leaving the chapel by another stair we went to the gorgeous shrine covering the tomb. There were places where sunlight shot in piercing beams from high windows onto the floor. One had to stoop deeply and then stoop again to kneel by our Jesus' momentary resting place. More tears and trembling. The ornate rooms again decked with the richest metals and gems, the air thick with incense, stones worn smooth. Everywhere glass, gold and fire. Some in the group were profoundly moved while others simply respectful of a historical Church. Lisa Burns commented that the weight of the blood shed lost over these holy sites was so sad, it was hard to enter into the moment. She even felt a flash of anger-a holy moment of her own.

We moved into the unadorned chapel of Joseph of Arimethea that had not been cared for because of the poverty of the church who had control of it. Don Genereaux lead us through a liturgical service of readings and prayers with Marti Windram, Bill McLean, Randy Harsch, and others reading scripture.
As the service closed Julia Steiff broke into song incense to the ears.

Resting in the courtyard ~ Amy Flack, Michele Borne, Mary Ann Harsch, Janice Fantz; Randy Harsch
We walked the Via Del Rosa which is a shop lined street. We moved down hill opposite of Jesus' journey with the cross on his back. The air tasted like bread and fruit. Crosses abounded in every shop on either side. We came upon roman Paving Stones dating to the time of Christ. You just wonder, could his feet......?
We came to the Northern entrance of the Pools of Bethesda. It was a public collection site for water. St Anne's church, a crusader church marks the site. The ruins of a shallower set of pools revealed a Roman Site for worship had been set up beside the deep Jewish Pools. There were for the healing God Asclepius, who had rituals of washing and drug induced dreams. The temple mount is within site of the place. The healing of the lame Jewish man happened here. He was probably waiting by these pagan pools for the healing power that this pagan god might offer when he choose to stir the waters. Jesus reaches out to heal the man, then later sends him to the temple to realign himself with his faith. The Spirit of God through Jesus graciously went to a pagan temple where this man was dying. Heals him and then sends him away from the lie of that pagan faith back to the truth to be found at the temple. We entered St. Anne's church which is a crusader church with a balance of perfect symmetry and imperfect variation. We sang with another group. Then Marti Windram lead us in "Wade in the Water" which melted into Alleluia which underlay a prayer for the healing of human beings which rose to the doxology and finished with the cry for the Spirit of the living God to fall fresh on us all. The echoes of our voices hung and held as the chapel gathered our praised within its fingered arches lifting them to God. Several people commented on having the chills through our worship.
On the way to the Western Wall, Sally Lund was called out to by the local merchants, "Sally in the Alley."
<
Be careful of who you give your name to here. Once they have your name, they have power.
We headed next to the Western Wall where prayer is constantly given. There is a women's section and a men's section. There is only one entrance that non-Muslims can use to come to temple mount. We paused briefly to hear about the tension that lies in this place as the three faiths clash over this most sacred site. We made it into the archaeological Park which welcomed you in with the quote, "The Jerusalem stone, so resilient and supple, bows to the transient follies of human kind, bearing testimony like a hundred witnesses and yet remain silent." Chaim Be'er. Perhaps it is archaeologists who best hear the rocks crying out. We entered the blessedly air conditioned Davidson Center and learned about the excavations around the temple. We watched a movie portraying what a Jewish man on pilgrimage to the temple would have seen and experienced. Herod, who was a roman-phile and a megalomaniac refurbished the temple that Nehemiah and Zerubbabel built to a magnificent structure that was one of the greatest structures in the ancient world. He loved to defy nature and create grand architecture that he felt worthy of a roman ruler. We saw the stones that were thrown down in AD70 still a jumbled heap. Some of the stones made it into the Arabian palaces of princes who later settled the area. We sat on the steps to the Huldah Gates in the blazing afternoon sun completely shadeless where Jesus could have taught. Many Rabbi's used these steps for such instruction. Cindy took us to John 7:37-38 where Jesus would have stood up during the festival of booths where the people prayed for the early rains to begin and said, "If you are thirsty come to me and drink." We felt the thirst in our bodies and how profoundly the people would long for living water gushing from them. A Jewish guide in a tour group next to us asked his students, "What makes a place holy?" After a series of exasperatingly shallow responses he cried out with a prophet's heart, "People praying make a place holy." Amen.



Some walked the short distance to the JUC and some taxied back. We were all hot and exhausted. At lunch we ate another great meal and discovered to our delight a giant ice chest full of...ICE. It was much less full as we filed into our classroom.
Our afternoon class dealt with essentials of life from water, to food, to community, to shelter, to safety. Cindy explained how God met the people of Israel in each of these needs and had laws about each of these to protect the people. She called for questions, comments and reflections. Meg Garret commented that she found the Holy Sepulchre believable and powerful. The Lunds mentioned how great andexperience it all was this time. Special thanks were given to Don for his spiritual leadership. Lisa mentioned that St. Anne's had touched her. Bob echoed her sense of the holiness of it mentioning that he was glad he had known about not showing your knees this time, because he had been denied entrance before. Carol Dobies asked some questions about the Armenian believers and Cindy relayed that a terrible genocide that had hit that faith group killing more Armenians than Jews had died in the Holocaust. Cindy began on some background work for our visits the next few days as we will head out of Jerusalem.
Lectures done several sought out a refreshing nap while others went to meet Shabban, our money changer. He graciously converted our dollars into shekels and then took us around to all the shop keepers who would treat us fairly. He is a man who is greatly respected by his fellow merchants. Many items were purchased. He showed us a short cut to his part of town and to the Holy Sepulcher.
The whole group gathered in the courtyard before supper to exchange stories and to laugh and pray. The Knights Palace continues to offer gourmet cuisine. Many headed out for one last walk in the city in the cool of the evening. Laughter, conversations, shopping and just drinking in the beauty of this city which is giving us our own story back, in a brilliant mosaic of ruins, churches, and well worn streets.