(Day 7 - 3/11) Mt of Olives and Bethlehem

Jerusalem -- the Holy City

We have definitely left the peace and beauty of the waters of the Sea of Galilee and its green hill sides, the ancient communities where Jesus walked and the quiet churches and their grounds to the coolness and bustle of Jerusalem.  The crowds are definitely here.  The atmosphere is full of worldly activity.  How can we work through all of the "noise" and take in that part of Jerusalem that can offer us the Christ experience?  It was so easy in Galilee to hear it in all that quiet.  Will it be possible here?  Perhaps it will take a miracle, but maybe that is the point.

Mt of Olives

After the usual early rise and breakfast, we are off in the wind and coolness to the Mt. of Olives, anticipating even rain.  As it turns out, the day stayed sunny with only a few clouds.  We drive a couple of blocks in the heavy traffic and past the King David Hotel, famous in history and movies.  Men walk on the sidewalks to work in business suits not unlike what one sees in Boston or New York on a work day.  Betty Ann offers us a prayer, asking God to keep us safe, especially from the street sales people.  She also gave thanks that Bob is doing better.  We drive down past several gates of the old city, seeing some bed rock upon which the walls have been built, down into the Kidron Valley, the Valley of the Kings, the Valley of the Shadow of Death, then up the other side, part the way up the Mt. of Olives, then got out of the bus.  Looking due West, we saw the brilliant sunshine glowing off the Old City of Jerusalem, Jerusalem the Golden, with the golden Dome of the Rock shining brightly and the rest of Mt Moriah running North to South, the same mount on which Abraham took his son Issac to be sacrificed.  Above on the top of the ridge easily seen were a half a dozen towering construction cranes working on a building boom going on in Jerusalem.   Just below our view on the Mt. of Olives were thousands of grave stones, the original and current graves of people who die in Jerusalem as no one could be buried in the City.  

LuAnn and Kojak (the camel)

Yes, a certain pastor road a camel.  We then walked part way down to a Franciscan property among thorn and pine trees for an anointing service, the same walk way Jesus took when palms were waved for him on his triumphal entry into Jerusalem.  The church on the property was built to commemorate his stop to weep for Jerusalem.  

Dominus Flavit -- where our Lord wept over Jerusalem

During the reverent service, we heard above us in the air over our voices in the service the sounds of other pilgrims speaking in many languages, chirping birds, barking dogs, helicopter traffic, cars on Mt. Moriah, emergency vehicles, workmen working, cameras clicking and wind in the trees.  In Jerusalem there is no silence.  Were we able to hear God's voice through the noise?  How can one sitting on the West side of the Mt. of Olives and keep from looking over the Valley at all that is built on the East side of Mt. Moriah? 

Anointing Service

Anointing Service on the Mt of Olives

Anointing Service

Further down we walk between the walls to the Garden of Gethsemane and the Church of the Agony of Christ, where Jesus could see the guards with their torches walk out of the East Gate and wind their way to the place of his arrest.  

Walking down the Palm Sunday Path

Our group admiring the ancient olive trees in the Garden of Gethsemane

We ride the bus to the place where Jesus was taken to be judged by the Sanhedrin, the house of Caiaphas, the Chief Priest.  We saw the pit, the dungeon where he was held.  We saw remains of the path that Jesus had walked to the Garden, then taken back to Caiaphas home.  We went into the church.  There were large crowds of pilgrims.  Were we touched by something mysterious while there even in the crowds?  Did we hear other pilgrims in the pit speaking in tongues?  We are seeing visually and hearing stories that more and more reveal to us pieces of the large puzzle that is Jerusalem.

Dickie and Angie waiting to enter the Grotto where Jesus was born

Back on the bus we ride the 7 miles to Bethlehem (the city of David, the city of abundance and generosity) to the Church of the Nativity, a church shared by Greek Orthodox, Franciscans and Armenians.  We enter through a border check out of Israel into Bethlehem, which is inside territory governed by the Palestinian Authority.      We see school girls in various uniforms, some with white scarfs, some with other colored scarfs, wrapped around their heads.  The road is lined with small shops selling food and anything else needed for daily life.  The Church is the only church or synagogue not destroyed Israel by the Moslem invaders because it has the image of the Three Magi carved on its walls.  The Church is under extensive repair.  We stoop through the "Eye of the Needle" door to enter during a service.  We wait to see the said to be birthplace of Jesus in a lower area beneath the church alter.  Magnificent icons are all over the walls, some of wood, some of precious jewels.  Mary has a happy face as she is celebrating the birth.  In Jerusalem she is sad in the icons because she is mourning the loss of Jesus.  While waiting inside the Church, we hear from the outside the Moslem call to prayer.  We have a devotion in which Bill Deerhake tells us that the birth of Jesus causes us to see history as being divided into the period before Jesus's birth then after his birth.  The one who spoke the world into existence came into the world to fulfill a divine purpose, that is to give us the gift of salvation.  An echo enveloped us as we spoke our verbal response to Bill's reading of the word.

Bethlehem man creating a mosaic on the way to the Church of the Nativity

We then bused to Shepherd's Fields, again Franciscan Property, to see a cave perhaps used by shepherds.  Jesus was the shepherd and gate keeper for us, his sheep.  The shepherds were not favored or clean people to the Jews, but they came in haste to worship Jesus.  How wise were the Wise Men?  It took them up to two years to come to worship Jesus.  They were wealthy and riding camels.  They told Herod a new king had been born.  We wonder.  Perhaps, as was said, a better pilgrim is one who walks a lot and suffers some.  A pilgrim searches for answers to questions he can not answer.  Is that a description of us?

Paul Carruth