Israel and the Bible

The Bible starts to take on a different meaning when you are in the same place that the stories were written about. 

Nazareth

Jesus’ childhood home is now under a basilica like most important Christian places. The property of the church takes up almost the entire land mass of biblical Nazareth since it was a small town. The unique part of Nazareth is that an organization has set up a place called Nazareth village to look and run the town as it would have been in Jesus’ day.

We read Isaiah 61:1-2 in the temple construction like Jesus would have in Luke 4. A man worked on construction and carpentry work using the same kinds of tools Jesus would have used working with Joseph. We don’t know much about Jesus’ childhood, but I like to think I have a bit more of a glimpse now. 

The Sea of Galilee

Most of Jesus’ ministry took place in the region of Galilee. Truthfully, this is where I felt the closest to Jesus’ life, not in Jerusalem at the place of His sacrifice or in Bethlehem where He was born. Maybe it’s because I often feel closest to God in nature, but there was just something moving about reading parables and teachings in the places that Jesus told them. 

I read about Jesus walking on the water, and then tried to walk on the sea myself—spoiler: it didn’t work. We read about the demon possessed man and the herd of pigs at Hippos. We read about the reinstatement of Peter after the resurrection on the possible shore at the very rock (a guess of course but still cool). I read through the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7 while sitting under a tree on the Mount of the Beautitudes. We read the Transfiguration after hiking up Mount Tabor. 

It was while seeing all of these places and reading the stories that I started to realize how much we really don’t know about Jesus’ earthly life. I began to ponder way too many questions about Jesus’ life and what He liked to do or what he did while on earth, but that is an entirely different topic that I could rant about for hours. John 21:25 is really the only thing that stopped me from continuing to overwhelm my teammates with my questions.

The Psalms

Psalms 120-134 are the psalms of ascent which means that they were sang by the Jewish people when they traveled to Jerusalem for festivals. Jerusalem is 4000 feet above the Dead Sea region and higher than all the surrounding land, so their names were literal. Two of my favorite Psalms, 121 and 130 are psalms of ascent, so reading them as we drove up to Jerusalem from the Dead Sea region was special and gave them and their neighboring psalms a new meaning.

Psalm 121 says, “I lift my eyes up to the hills,” well guess what y’all, they literally were climbing mountains when singing these, and if I was hiking up these desert mountains, I too would be looking up and knowing that I needed God to help me not stumble and just get to my destination. 

Psalm 130 really spoke to me before this trip, as it focuses around crying out to the Lord and waiting for him. To me, it became a place to turn and look for peace. “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning” (130:5-6). This became my prayer, and if the word adventure wasn’t written on my wrist, there was a good chance that it said “more than watchmen.” Now I’m on this trip so I don’t have to keep waiting, and although I’m naturally an anticipatory person who is always excited for the next thing, I’m not struggling with patience now. Instead when reading this verse on the way to Jerusalem, I tried to imagine myself with the Israelites making their ascent and how they really would have just been waiting for their journey to end and to find rest. They probably would have had watchmen looking over their encampments on the way too who literally would have waited for the morning, and that’s how our souls wait on the Lord. 

Psalm 125:2 says “As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people, from this time forth and forevermore.” This is a beautiful verse in my new context. Jerusalem literally is surrounded with mountains. The people ascending to Jerusalem would be comforted to know that the Lord was surrounding them as they journeyed. Forevermore—it still applies to us! I’ve always loved the mountain reference and thought of my Rocky Mountains, but now I’ve see the mountains that this verse speaks of. God still surrounds us like the mountains surround the city, even now, almost 3000 years later. 

Jerusalem

A great deal happened in Jerusalem in the Bible and on our trip, so I’m only going to hit on two of the sites. I probably felt a closer connection to the Bible stories up in Galilee, but there is something special about reading through the passion of Jesus in the place it happened.

The Church of the Holy Sepulcher 

The Church of the Holy Sepulcher covers the place where Jesus died and was buried.  It’s supposedly the most holy place in Christianity, shared by 6 different church bodies. I wasn’t a fan. Ornate and smelling of incense, the place was crowded and overwhelming already at 9 AM. I tried to go up to the place where they believed Jesus was crucified, but it was chaotic, so I found a dark corner nearby where I read the crucifixion story from Luke. In Luke 24:27 it says “a great multitude” followed him. This verse gave me peace and carried me through the rest of the day. Despite the tourists and chaos, I knew that it was the same when Jesus was alive, and he loved them.

Mount of Olives

The Church of the Agony is now over the Garden of Gethsemane. It’s a beautiful church, but very dark. The church building tries to personify Jesus’ suffering and time in the garden through the dark interior and purple stained glass that contrast with the olive trees outside in a small garden. I sat in a pew and read the the story. The disciples fell asleep many times even though Jesus kept pleading with them to stay awake and keep watch. I wasn’t falling asleep while in the church, but I thought about how often I am fighting to stay awake on this trip whether its during class, conversations, or homework. I related to the disciples as they tried to follow Jesus, but kept failing. It’s really only by the following events of that day over 2000 years ago that we can stay awake.