Short and Sick (2/2/09)

Today honestly was one of the worst days on this trip so far for me. Ever since I woke up, I have felt horribly nauseous and could barely go anywhere. But, I fought through the crappiness and went ahead and traveled with the group instead of staying at the house, even though today was the one day this week we walked to our destinations. The first place we walked to was the Western Wall, or Wailing Wall as I usually call it, by walking through the Damascus Gate, through the Muslim quarter, and then to the Wall. Instead of having free time by the wall at first, we went into the Western Wall tunnels. Here we saw the very bottom, original stones from the time of Kind Herod and tunnels that the Roman soldiers used to walk through. It was pretty cool but unfortunately because I felt like I just wanted to crawl in a ball the whole time I wasn’t paying much attention. Once we got we through with the tunnels, we were able to have some free time at the actual Western Walls. I went up to the wall and said a small prayer and then looked over the small separation wall between the men and women’s side of the wall and watched 3 barmitzvas! Its so crazy how different cultures can really be… After all that jazz at the Western Wall, our guide took us through the Jewish quarter and explained all it’s history. Once we were done with that, we went to our next destination – the Temple Mount. We weren’t able to go into any of the mosques because we weren’t Muslim, obviously, but all the detailed décor of the buildings were pretty awesome to see, especially the Dome of the Rock. I actually found out on this trip that on his deathbed, King Hussein donated $7 million to put real gold on the dome of the Dome of the Rock. While we were there, there was a worker putting the gold on the roof. Only one time you’ll be able to see something like that! Once leaving the Temple Mount, we walked to the Old City into the Muslim quarter. There, we had lunch at the “greatest pizza place in Israel.” It definitely wasn’t as good as pizza in the states, but as for Israel, I’d have to agree with their motto. After eating I was luckily able to find people to walk back to the house with me so I could lie down and feel better. I ended up sleeping for 3 hours! It was great =]  I ended up finding out the reason behind my nausea and sickness all day…dehydration. Who would’ve thought?! Julie’s lesson for the day: DRINK TONS OF WATER!!

First day of February!

Today was a busy, long, and very rainy day. Our first stop was the Mount of Beatitudes, where Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount was given. We went to the church on the top of the mountain that serves as an observation point of the mountain and it’s surroundings. I learned that the observation point on top is exactly at sea level, unlike the Sea of Galilee that we could see from the mountain, which is 650 feet below sea level. Also that there has been a lot of controversy on whether Jesus gave his sermon at the top of the mountain or the bottom. Two reasons why most think He gave it standing at the top of the mountain is because when looking down from the top, it resembles that of a theatre and since the winds blow north to south, the sound of His voice would carry to all of the people. Even though no one knows the exact spot of where Jesus gave his sermon, my professor said something that I absolutely agree with. He said, “it’s not the exact place that matters, it’s the events that happened there.” This is so true for me because even though we might not find exact spots, the fact that I’m in the land where Jesus walked and lived is amazing in itself. Anyway, just some interesting facts about that… Our next stop was the Valley of Tabgha, where the Church of Peter’s Primacy is located. This church commemorates when the disciples saw Jesus for the 3^rd time after He rose from the dead and when Jesus forgave Peter and restored him and his calling, asking him “Peter, do you love me more than these?” in John 21. Right next to the church we were at was the Church of Multiplication, where Jesus fed the 5000 Jews. Other than being near to that sight, a cool fact about that miracle is it’s the only miracle that is mentioned in all 4 of the gospels. Across the lake was the Decapolis, where Jeasus fed the 4000 Gentiles. Being close to where both of those miracles took place was an amazing feeling. Something that really touched me about the sight of The Church of Peter’s Primacy is when my professor talked to us about the conversation between Jesus and Peter. These are a few things I got from it: no matter who we are dealing with, we will always be dealing with imperfections. If and when we blow it, it doesn’t mean it’s over; we need to get beyond it. This really spoke to me because as some people know, I have a tendency to hold onto situations and let my emotions control the rest of my day, maybe even longer. Needless to say, God really spoke to me about that. Right in the backyard of the church was the Sea of Galilee, so that was our next stop for the remainder of our time there. I learned a bunch of information about the Sea, but I won’t bore you with a list of random facts. =]  We didn’t get to spend much time there, but we got to walk right up to it and take in it’s beauty. Once we left there, we headed to the Galilee boat ride. Unfortunately since it was a rainy day, the boat ride wasn’t as good as when I went on it the first time I came to Israel. There were tarps on the sides of the boat to cover the riders from the rain and they didn’t have a demonstration of how the fisherman during the time of Jesus used to throw out their nets and catch fish. It’s alright though… A cool thing I saw from the boat was a story coming straight from the Bible that involves the “evangelistic triangle”: Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazim. In Matthew 11 it talks about how God put “woes” on the cities because they took the miraculous, God’s miracles, for granted and didn’t repent. They took the power and presence of God for granted. I saw the physical affect of God’s woe. From the boat, we could see all the cities and each one of them was a pile of rocks. Even though Capernaum is a city that you can still go to and visit, it’s still basically a pile of rocks. Pretty awesome to see with your own eyes! After the boat ride and lunch we went to the museum where the ancient boat is held that archeologists believe is from the time of Jesus. This was cool to see again and relearn the process of how it was excavated. Our next stop was Capernaum, where we saw the remains of Peter’s house and of a synagogue. They were awesome remains to see, but we couldn’t stay for very long because we had an appointment… Baptisms in the Jordan River! Even though I was a little disappointed in the shortened visit to Capernaum, I was SO excited for my baptism. I have been baptized two other times in my life, but this one was different for me. It was a symbol of the rededication of my life to God and His will for me. It was one of the most meaningful things I’ve ever done in my life and was a monumental point for me. A real example of God’s compassion was shown during this time because it had been raining literally the whole day and right before we were going to have our baptisms, it was pouring. WELL, right before we started the baptisms, it stopped raining and was sunny! And to make it even better, the rain didn’t start up again until we finished with the last baptism. How great is that?! God really is good!

Thursday-Saturday, Jan 29-31

Thursday didn’t start off the best, but slowly got better throughout the day. We had to wake up at 4:30 in the morning because we were leaving at 5 to go hike up Masada and watch the sunrise.  Really, the only crappy part about the morning was waking up so early and having to hike up a mountain while being really sick. But, watching the sunrise was pretty worth it. It was beautiful. After being on top of Masada for a while, we left to our day’s next activity – a jeep safari! I don’t know why they call it a “jeep” safari, because we definitely weren’t in a jeep. It was more like…the front of a small semi with part of a section of a bus at Disney World – completely open with lots of rows in it. It’s kind of hard to describe, but I hope you can get somewhat of an idea of what it looked like. Anyway, they picked us up at Masada and we were off, driving all over the Judean wilderness, going places a car should never be able to drive. A definite highlight was having lunch in the middle of a desert, overlooking a monastery that was in a crack in between two mountains. How many people can say they’ve done that?! Pretty cool stuff… So our safari lasted about 6 hours and needless to say, we were glad when it was over. Our butts were hurting from sitting for so long and our bodies were freezing from the cold wind blowing in the open car. But, it was definitely an amazing experience. That ended our 12^th day of our trip (10^th day of actual touring), and that night got a much-needed 12 hours of sleep that night!

Friday, I was a bum. Not much more is needed to be said. =]  The only thing I did was go get lunch with some friends at a place called “Burger Bar”. Kosher burgers, of course. It was actually really really good though, and even though the waiters could barely speak English, one of them just happened to know enough to tell me that I had a beautiful smile. Crazy when that happens. Haha! Friday night we had our second Shabbat service. It wasn’t as intense as last week’s service, but it still touched me. One of my friends actually spoke for a couple minutes about how God tells us to be the salt of the earth and she said some things that really caught my attention. Not too long after service, I went to bed and got another much-needed great night of sleep.

Today has been a lot like yesterday, in the way that I’ve been a bum most of the day. Other than eating breakfast and lunch and meeting with my group for 2 hours, I’ve just been catching up on this blog, writing the events of the past 5 days. Tonight we’re going to the Myer’s church again, so I’m pretty excited for that! All in all, it has been a crazy busy week. I will do better at writing in my blog each night, rather than waiting 3 or more days and then having to write a ton! Haha! Thank you for everyone's prayers for my safety and health. I am feeling a million times better than I have been the past few days and I think whatever I had has finally passed. Love you and hope all is well back at home!

Wednesday, Jan 28

Wednesday was probably my favorite day of the whole trip so far. We started out by going to a place where you overlooked the city of Jericho. Unfortunately, because the city is under Palestinian rule, we aren’t able to physically go into the city, but looking over it all was pretty cool. Our next stop was Qumran. It’s not the actual place where the Dead Sea scrolls were found, but it is possibly the place where a group of Essenes, called the Dead Sea Sect, was located. Ripped up pieces of the DDS were actually found in cave #11, which is near Qumran. Because there are countless numbers of pieces, it’s been almost impossible for the archeologists to piece them together. But as of last year, they began using DNA testing to match the skins of the animals the scrolls were written on in order to at least group them together. I thought that was pretty cool. After Qumran, we went to the Dead Sea!! Fun fun fun! Almost our entire group spread mud over their bodies and we quickly went from an all-white group of 32 to black body-builders. Well, for the guys anyway. (We let them pretend for the time being =]) The last time I went to the Dead Sea, which was the first time I came to Israel, I had a nice size injury on my knee, so I didn’t get the full experience of the sea. But this time was incredible! Some of the students and I went out pretty far and were amazed by the fact we could stand straight up and be standing on absolutely nothing. God has an amazing imagination! So…once that salty experience was over, our group headed to an experience that was added to our trip at the last minute. We drove to a Bedouin camp in the middle of Negev deserts. The Bedouins are people who survive living in the middle of the desert and live in tents and whatnot. Even though the camp we went to was more of a tourist attraction rather than a real Bedouin camp, we still got the experience. When we first arrived, you would never guess what we did. WE RODE CAMELS!! Now that’s something not everyone can say they’ve done! They sat two people per camel and there were four or five camels all attached to each other by a rope in a row. I rode with my friend Brittany and our camel was like the grandpa of all camels. He not only looked old, but he thought he was too good to walk in the line with the other camels, so walked to the side the whole trip. We decided to name him and thought George would fit well. For some reason, that turned into Jorge (sounded out like the Hispanic version of George) and we figured that since most Hispanics have 4 or 5 names anyway, so should our George. SO, his full name was Jorge Gonzalez Luis Lopez. Or for short, George Lopez. =]  The only downside to the camel ride was that the camel behind me seriously had rabies. It was like coughing up loogies (spelling?) and foaming at the mouth and almost spitting on my leg! Luckily, it never happened. After riding the camels, we set up our things in one of the tents at the camp and went to a meeting. One of the leaders at the camp talked to us about the Bedouin culture and we got to taste Bedouin tea and coffee. The tea was amazing; it was made of dates! Definitely not expected. The coffee on the other hand…ugh! I had to shoot it down because it was so bitter! I think that’s how pretty much all coffee is here though. Their culture is so interesting! For example, they believe in polygamy and can have up to 4 wives, and whenever you stay at a camp, if they give you a full cup of tea it means that they don’t like you and you aren’t welcome to stay – very different than any of us are used to. They served us dinner not too long after and it was incredible! Probably the best meal I’ve had since I’ve been on this trip. They served us a huge bowl of rice with lamb kabobs and different sauces and toppings with homemade pita bread, they all made that night. Yummm! After dinner, we were taught a number of Israeli dances by our bus driver. His name is Moti and he used to be in a professional Israeli dance group. So fun, but surprisingly tiring! A couple people took videos, so those should be interesting to watch! Not much else happened that night, but it was okay because it had been a busy day. That then leads me to our next day – Thursday.

Tuesday, Jan 27

Wow… I can’t even tell y’all how awesome these past few days have been… I know three days is a long time to go without blogging, but the past two days (not including today) we weren’t in Jerusalem, so it was kind of impossible. To start off Tuesday morning, I woke up really early and couldn’t go back to sleep. So…instead of trying to fall back asleep knowing it wasn’t going to happen, I went onto the roof/balcony of our house that overlooks Jerusalem to just be alone and with God. When I got up there it was pitch black except for the streetlights that were on around the city. Of course, that was also because it was only 5 in the morning. So as I was watching the sun slowly rise over the city, God was speaking to my heart. I haven’t written in a while, and everyone who knows me knows that I love to write, especially poetry. What God was speaking to me wasn’t necessarily poetry, but it was precious to my heart.

“I watch this city as it sleeps in peace

and the sounds of reality slowly arise.

As the birds chirp their good morning symphony

The Lord speaks softly and calls me by name.

‘Julie, my daughter, my beautiful bride,

I move these clouds just as I move your heart.

You are in my home, my love and my land,

Breathe in the air, for it is I that you breathe.

Just as I have given this city rain,

I have given you peace in the depths of your soul.

I love you more than you can even fathom,

So love me in the way I have always loved you.’

The horizon appears slowly as the sun awakes from sleep.

The sky has changed from black,

To a rainbow of blue and orange.

Then an added yellow, purple and bright pink

And the sounds of a new day that has finally come.

I say through morning brisk and the distant church bell’s song,

‘good morning sweet Jerusalem, a new day has come.’”

Anyway, I just felt like I should share that with those who know we the best on this world… Once the day truly got started, we went to the big city of Tel Aviv and I loved that place! It’s the second largest city in Israel and is one of the most populated. It was pretty easy to see why, I felt. It was really modernized and had a cosmopolitan lifestyle, and of course was on the coast of the Mediterranean. We first went to the supposed tomb of Samuel, and then the Simon the Tanner’s house. By that time, it was time for lunch, so we ate schwarma at this little hole-in-the-wall restaurant. It was so yummy!! I can’t remember if I had eaten schwarma before, but I definitely think I liked it more than falafels. =]  Something random to add: when we were walking on the street, we passed by a cave with fruit bats! Weird, right? And then we had walked to a Roman statue in the middle of the city and while looking at the Mediterranean Sea in the distance, there was some random old guy who looked like he tanned for at least 30 minutes a day doing yoga in the middle of the park. He was putting himself in positions no man should ever be in. *shiver* haha! ANYWAY, after eating, we went to Tel Aviv University to visit the Diaspora Museum on the campus. It was about the history of Israel and the scattering of the Jews among the nations. Since we were going to the Arab market after the museum, we were all pretty quick going through all the rooms! Haha! The market was so much fun! I bought some really cute stuff =]  I love experiencing all the aspects of these different cultures…it’s unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. The market was only a couple blocks away from the Mediterranean Sea, so once everyone who was in my group was done shopping and walking around, we went to the Med. Unfortunately, the part of the sea we were on was all rocks. So we weren’t able to stick our feet in the water, but we stood on the rocks and looked out on the horizon of the beautiful sea. We left not too long after that, which ended up being a good thing because being sick and walking around all day in cold winds without a jacket isn’t a good combination!

Sunday and Monday

Sunday and today were both pretty filled days! Starting on Sunday, we went to the Israel Museum and learned all about the Dead Sea Scrolls. It was awesome! I think the coolest piece of information I found out was how the scrolls were actually found. Two Shepard boys were throwing rocks in caves trying to get their sheep to come out, and they heard one of the rocks break something on the inside of the cave. So when they went to investigate, they found the scrolls, but had no idea what they even were. After passing through the hands of a number of people, the scrolls were finally put in the right place, and I got to see them! There were a number of different scrolls there that they had found; the complete book of Isaiah, and parts of the books of the Temple Scroll, the War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness, the Pesher Habakkuk Scroll, the Community Rule Scroll, and the Thanksgiving Scroll. It was amazing to see the actual REAL hand written scrolls right in front of my eyes... the handwriting was so perfect and everything was perfectly spaced. Only someone with extreme patience could have that job, I think. After that museum, we went to where the famous Menorah is, right in front of the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, basically. The Menorah was so pretty and had such amazing detail. On it are scenes from different stories in the Bible, which I will put a picture up of tomorrow with its description. We didn’t get to go into the Knesset, but the outside architecture was different, being designed after the tabernacle. When we left there, instead of going to the Rockefeller Museum as planned, we went to the birthplace of John the Baptist – Zachariah and Elizabeth’s home. Like most of the sights here, there was a Catholic church built over the actual spot, but inside of the church was a small nook built inside of the actual house. It was way cool! Connecting with this time in the Bible, we also went to the place where Elizabeth and Mary met when they were both pregnant, during the period where all the babies were being killed (vague, I know.) Once again, a church was built there, but I do have to say, it was a gorgeous one.

Today, we started out our touring by going to a cave that was mistakenly found in 1968, filled with stalagmites and stalactites. I don’t really know how to describe them, but they’re way cool looking. (Look it up!) Next we went to Bet Shemesh, the place, or near the place, where the story of Sampson and Delilah occurred, and the exact spot where the Philistines returned the Arc of the Covenant to the Israelites after taking it into captivity. From where we were standing, we could see the Valley of Sorik, which is where Delilah is actually from. Keeping on with the cave theme, we then went to two Sidonian caves where Phenesian people would place their dead. Morbid, I know, but the artwork and Greek writing on the walls made it a little better for me. Supposedly they were all original pieces. But who knows for sure. =]  The last caves we went to were called bell caves because they looked like bells. Creative, right?! These caves were pretty incredible though…they were completely made of limestone and at the top of each of the caves were holes. Whenever these caves were made, the person/people would start at the top and carve their way down and pull out all this limestone to make this ginormous cave. This was one of the funnest and most uneducational parts of the day. =]  Along with walking all through out these caves, we took group pictures, sang “This is the Day” as we heard ourselves echo, and played ring around the rosy. Some memories I’ll never forget. The last place we stopped was one of my favorites – the Valley of Ela, where David slew Goliath. To have our lesson, we sat along the edge of the brook where David chose his five smooth stones. In front of us was the actually valley itself, behind us was the hill (it looked more like a mountain to me) where the Israelite army stood and hid from the Philistines and Goliath, and to the northeast of us was the hill where the Philistine army stood. You could almost see the event playing out in your head as you were sitting there. This was definitely an “A” spot and to be there was an experience like no other.

Well, that’s all for these past two busy days! I’m off to bed in the city of peace! Good night!

Sorry it's been a few days!

Hey y’all! These past couple days have been busy with travel and such, and I have been pretty tired at night, therefore why there is no blog for the past two days. So! I’m making up for it now. On Thursday, we had a 3.5 hour drive up to the highest point north in Israel; Tel Dan. Throughout the drive there, it felt like we were literally driving through the Bible. We passed by the Bedowin deserts, the first original inhabitants of Israel, and which is known as the land of milk in the Bible because they were shepherds and their animals, such as camels, goats, sheep, etc., produce milk. We also passed by Jericho, which is called the land of honey because of their agricultural abundance. It’s also known as the world’s oldest city, the lowest city in the world, and the oasis in the desert. Almost the whole drive, we were alongside the Jordan River – Jerusalem’s longest border. And obviously, we also passed by the country of Jordan and the West Bank. Something I found out that some of you might have already known is that the West Bank isn’t actually on the west; of Israel, that is. Geographically, it’s on the east of Israel, but west of Jordan. Pretty interesting… We saw the Moab Mountains east of the Jordan, and it’s highest point, Mount Nebo, where Moses is buried. Then we passed through Somaria, where Mount Gilboa is located, which is where King Saul took his last stand in war and afterwards David cursed the mountain saying that it will never see a drop of rain again. What really got to me about that is when looking at Mount Gilboa, it seriously looks like it hasn’t gotten any rain in forever. It was very bleak and dry, which shows the realness of these stories in the Bible. We also passed by the Sea of Galilee, which I found out is the only body of water that’s below sea level and has fresh water. Next to the Sea of Galilee, we passed through Tiberius, and Migdal, the city where Mary Magdalene lived. When we finally got to our stop, we went to the nature reserve in Tel Dan. This was pretty cool because I didn’t remember going there when we came to Israel about 5 years ago with Uncle Robert, until we got to the top and were at the spot where the golden calf was placed as an idol and animal sacrifices were made. Then I remembered and got really excited! It’s so cool because I remember a lot of places we went to 5 years ago, but I never remembered the history and now that I’m learning all of it, it makes all the sights and stories that much better and more worthwhile! After the reserve, we went to Ceaseria Philipi and learned about all that went down there, and after ate lunch at a Druse falafel restaurant. It was amazing!! My first falafel since I’ve been on this trip so far =] Our last stop was the Golan Heights. Like before, I didn’t remember this sight until I was actually up there, and when I got out of the bus pretty much started freaking out. It was coffee in the clouds!! I got a little emotional at first because I was just thinking about the significance of that spot and seeing the pictures in my mind of us cousins with grandpa in the coffee shop…but it was really cool to be back there. I didn’t have any coffee, but being there was good enough for me. SO FINALLY, after all that, we drove the 3.5 hours back and finally came back home.

On Friday, we didn’t really do anything too interesting. We decided that Fridays and Saturdays of each week were going to be chill days since Shabbat begins on sundown on Fridays and ends Saturday nights. But we did have two people come speak to us, John and Calev Myers, a father and son that run a church here in Jerusalem for Messianic Jews, if I’m not mistaken. They just had a word for us and wanted to speak to us about the culture here and gave us a small sermon. After that, we were free for the rest of the day and I went to the open market strip. I know that’s not exactly what it’s called, but it was pretty cool. SUPER busy because everyone was getting stocked up for the weekend since everything would be closed for over 24 hours, but it was a neat experience. That night, Dr. Hemby, one of the professors here, gave a Shabbat service and afterwards we had a time of worship. During this time, the Holy Spirit was completely surrounding each of us and moved in a huge way. Many people were spoken to and it was an amazing time of worship and prayer.

Today, Saturday, since it was Shabbat, we didn’t do hardly anything. The day was laid back, which was nice for a change, and the only thing we did as a group was go to a church service held by the Myers, who had spoken to us the day before. It was a great service, but was a little difficult to connect to since everything had to be translated.

So, that’s it! This first week has been truly incredible and I’ve grown not only in my knowledge and understanding of the land and it’s history, but spiritually as well. I’m excited for all the new adventures next week holds!