Student Activity Day

Yesterday (Saturday) was our “student activity day.” We took a 3 hour bus ride to Golan, a little bit past the Sea of Galilee, and went on a hike. We had packed lunches and a hot, sunny day.

This is Naomi, Jessica and I a little past the beginning of the hike down.

At the bottom of the valley, there was a waterfall. The water was freezing, but we managed to get into a little nook behind the waterfall and jump into the water.

On the climb back up, I used photo-ops as an excuse to stop and breathe before continuing to the top. 

This is when I was very close to the top. You can kind of see how far down the bottom of the valley is. It was definitely a hike back up.

And in case anyone is worried about my safety, don’t worry. All of the minefields that surrounded our hike were well marked with yellow signs and barbed wire.

Friday Field Study.

Last Friday, our class had a field study to Samaria. We went to Shechem, Mt. Gerazim, Samaria, and Shiloh.

This field study was not my favorite. It was mostly boring, and we spent a lot of time looking down onto the cities rather than being in them. So I’m not going to write about all of the places we went. Just the ones I’m going to post pictures of.

This is one of two towns in Samaria. Apparently there are only a couple hundred Samaritans and so they marry their cousins. Ew. Oh, and the big building in the back-right is a private home.

We also went to Mt. Gerizim. The gate was closed, so we had to go through the fence. I chose to go through the hole on the right, but some people wanted to go underneath.

My favorite place of the day was Jacob’s well. Scholars and archaeologists are pretty confident that this is the same well that Jesus sat at with the Samaritan woman. We got to draw and drink water from it. Unfortunately, no pictures were allowed at the actual well, so this picture will have to do.

In the Land of Benjamin.

*Many of you have commented about the brownness of my pictures. This is just to show you that some parts of the country are green. In this case, it is Jericho - a true oasis in the desert.

Anyways, we took a field trip day this Sunday to Benjamin. Our class started out walking through some of the Judean wilderness to get a feel for what it would have been like to travel between Jericho and Jerusalem - something Jesus did many times. This is our group walking up the ridges of the wilderness. 

Not exactly the kind of wilderness I pictured Jesus being tempted in, or the wilderness that the Israelites wandered around in for 40 years. We stopped at the top and had class. You know, in our normal, very brown, classroom. :)

On our way back from the top of the wilderness some of the Bedouins were waiting by our bus to try to sell us stuff. This man brought his camel to sell us camel rides. I didn't get a ride, but at least I got a picture.

After the Judean wilderness we spent most of the morning in Jericho - both the Old Testament and New Testament sites. We went to Herod the Great's winter palace in Jericho. As we walked around the ruins, Bedouin children came out and played with us. They were so cute!

Of course, we had to see the old walls of Jericho. (Go back and read the story, apparently the whole wall didn't fall down, maybe just a part of it.) Notice the palm trees in the background. The Bible calls Jericho the city of palms. 

Our last stop was at Gezer - the "front door" of Benjamin. Gezer is important because it gives Jerusalem access to the Coast and the trade routes to the sea port at Joppa. I didn't really get why these were important, but they are standing stones of some sort and no one really knows what they were for. After Dr. Wright made a comment about how girls were better at climbing them than guys were, some of the guys had to make sure that they were the first to get to the top.

The last thing we saw in Gezer was this city gate constructed under Solomon's reign. It had six little chambers inside and a casemate wall. This picture was taken after we took a group picture and then all began to explore the site.

It's been a while.

Ok. So I admit that I haven't been a very good blogger lately. I've decided that I hate taking pictures. I often forget that I should be taking them, and then its just annoying to have to dig in my backpack to find my camera and pull it out for one or two pictures at each place. But whatever, these pictures are from the limited amount that I took on our field study in the places immediately surrounding Jerusalem.

We started off at the Mount of Olives and saw these first century tombs on the hillside.

Then we headed to the traditional site of the garden of Gethsemane and saw all of the olive trees. There were a bunch of guys selling olive branches outside of the garden because people aren't allowed to pick them from inside.

After Gethsemane, our group hiked up the Herodian and stopped by Herod's palace.

After seeing Herod's palace, we went down into the cisterns and tunnels underneath. It was so deep and there were so many stairs. It felt kind of like a maze.

We made a group stop in the cistern to talk about the history of Herod and also to enjoy the coolness of the underground.

On the way to Bethlehem we stopped at an ancient threshing floor next to grain fields. It was so weird to have learned about these in Sunday School and then to actually be standing in one. This is probably only a little less than half of the one we went to.

Our last stop was Bethlehem where we visited the Church of the Nativity, which remembers the place where Christ was born. The entrance was super small, and only one person could go in at a time.

So that was our last field trip, and I'll hopefully be getting pictures from my hiking trip in En Gedi to post later. That's all folks!

Quick trip to the Temple Mount.

This morning nine of us took a quick trip to the Temple Mount. Its like a ten minute walk from campus and free. The Temple Mount is where the Dome of the Rock (a muslim mosque) is today. It was interesting to me that Jews are not allowed to go up to the Dome of the Rock because they might walk near where the Holy of Holies used to be, and according to the big sign, it is "Against Torah Law." We also were not allowed to bring our Bibles because apparently the Muslims there do not tolerate the Jewish history of the area.

The Dome of the Rock is where muslims believe Muhammad ascended into heaven. We obviously weren't allowed to go inside the mosque, but we were allowed to go up to it and touch it and walk around the Temple Mount. It is so hard for me to grasp the fact that the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy of Holies were once in (or very near) the place that I walked around this morning.

Here I am in front of the Dome of the Rock. My black jacket is not because I'm cold, it's to cover my elbows for modesty.

And here it is by itself.

A walk to the laundry room.

So while I'm working on getting pictures from last weekend, I thought you might like to see a little bit of where I'm living. This is a video of about half of the walk to the laundry room.

An OT and NT view of Jerusalem: Part 1

Whoa. Two full days of field trips back-to-back and I haven’t even updated about Hezekiah’s tunnel on Thursday. I have a lot to catch you up on. J

BUT I didn’t bring my camera to Hezekiah’s tunnel because of the water, and then on the first day of field trips I took about five pictures before my memory card was full, and even though I deleted all of the pictures from the card, it still said it was full. L So I’ll have to get pictures from friends and update on those things later.

Luckily, my roommate, Joanna, had an extra memory card, so I borrowed hers for today’s field trip.

We left campus at 7am to start the day. This field trip was about Old and New Testament locations in Jerusalem. Because we were just going around the city, we walked everywhere we went. And let me tell you – Jerusalem really is a city on a hill!

Our first major stop on our trip was the Western wall. In this picture, you can see the Wailing Wall to the very left and the Dome of the Rock above it. (I’m pretty sure you can click any of these pictures and they will show up larger.) 

The Wailing Wall is separated between men and women (the men have a much larger side). I was a little surprised that we were able to go up to it. I prayed in the chair to the left of the girl in the blue!  It was nice to be able to sit there and thank the Lord that in His divine will He has united Jews and Gentiles together in the opportunity of being His people. 

The next place I took pictures of was the pool of Bethesda. This is the place in John 5 where sick, blind, lame or weak people would wait for angels to stir up the water and then they would all run in. It is here where Jesus healed man who had been sick for 38 years and wasn’t fast enough to get to the waters. Its also called the “sheep gate” pool because people would wash their sheep in it before sacrificing them. 

St. Anna’s Church is just around the corner from the pool of Bethesda, so we got permission to go inside and sing. We sang a few songs (Doxology, In Christ Alone, I Love You Lord, Amazing Grace, and Come Thou Fount) and the acoustics were so good. I mean, we weren’t anything close to a choir, but it sounded amazing.  

Then we went to Mt. Moriah, which Jewish people believe is the same Mt. Moriah as the one Abraham went to sacrifice Isaac. It is also where they built their temple before it was destroyed. Now there is a mosque on top of it.  

Around Mt. Moriah, we saw around where the old Temple used to be. The floor here is the same level as it was during Jesus’ day, but it was repaved later. You can see where shops used to be in the upper left of the picture. This is where they sold animals for sacrifice to the pilgrims coming to the temple.  

An OT and NT view of Jerusalem: Part 2

We also got to sit in an ancient Byzantine home. It is just one small room, and the bed is made of stone. 

These are the main stairs up to the Temple Mount. 

This is where Gamaliel taught and where Paul and Jesus taught from at one point in time. I’m pretty sure this was my favorite place that we went today. Here I am at the top of the stairs where Paul and Christ have almost certainly been. 

This is an old house. Notice the toilet in the lower right hand side. 

We went to Hezekiah’s tunnel, which I will explain in greater detail in the next post when I get those pictures. But we only walked through the dry tunnel, called the Canaanite tunnel. This is one of the wider sections of the Canaanite tunnel. 

Our last stop was the pool of Siloam. This is the place in John 9 where Jesus healed a blind beggar by putting mud on his eyes and telling him to wash it off in the pool. Here I am inside the pool next to the steps leading down to it. (They haven’t excavated it all the way.) I’d say that this was a close second for my favorite spot of the day. 

The field study lasted all day and it was a lot of walking in the heat. We took a few stops like the one below for our guide to explain some things and for us to catch our breath. Chris, a grad student, was our guide and Dr. Wright took all of the first year grad students and married people. So our group was all of the undergrads. It was a lot of fun. (P.S. I think the guy in the bright blue shirt and sunglasses looks a little bit like Kyle.)  

Other places we went to, but I didn’t take pictures of include the “broad wall” that Hezekiah built, which increased the size of Jerusalem by five times, and the arches on the Via Dolorosa route.

Overall, it was great day and I can’t believe I do these almost every weekend that I’m here!