Love's First Light: ISRAEL

We crossed the Egypt/Israeli border on foot, on a very hot day in late May. The border is literally ON the Red Sea! It's probably one of the more intimidating borders to cross, but it's also got to be one of the world's most beautiful! We sat down to wait for our bus right next to the sea and everything in me wished I could have jumped right in! If we didn't have hours of travel ahead of us, I would have. So, I did the next best thing and just waded around in it. The water is crystal clear, the rocks are smooth and a multitude of colors and little brightly colored tropical fish dart here and there. It is truly one of the most beautiful bodies of water I've ever seen. Stunning!

JHOP

We spent our first few weeks at the Jerusalem House of Prayer on top of the Mount of Olives. The very top floor is a prayer room and they are committed to 24 hour prayer for all the nations of the world. They divide the day up into 2 hour prayer sets focused on praying for a specific set of nations. It's quite a commitment they've made. The view from the top of the house is a 360* shot of Jerusalem. It was beautiful at night...

It was so surreal to be staying on the Mount of Olives, where "Jesus would often go to pray" (Luke 22:39) It's incredible to imagine Jesus, the manifestation of God himself, praying! What a thought. Looking out onto the hills, you can see so many olive trees and it's easy to imagine the quiet retreat it would have been for Jesus in that day, when he wanted to get away from the madness and just meet with God.

Masada

Masada is a mountain that has a fortress on top of it, built by King Herod and used in the battle of Jewish freedom fighters against the rule of the Romans. The fortress was ultimately taken by the Romans in the battle and the story of the historical event is pretty amazing. I didn't take any pictures of Masada, but you can read the story and see pictures here. From the top of the mountain you can see the Mountains of Moab, which are often mentioned in the Bible as the Israelites wandered through the desert for 40 years. It's awesome to see things that the Bible talked about thousands and thousands of years ago and to be in the land the Israelites wandered in.

The Dead Sea

The Dead Sea was beautiful and it was fun to float like a buoy! All the bedrocks had thick layers of salt on them and the water was so dense with salt that it hurt so badly if you got it in your eye, which I did, twice. It feels like your eyes are disintegrating behind your lids. You can't open them for a few minutes, so you just become a blind buoy. We slathered the world renowned Dead Sea Mud all over us and I tell you what, my skin has never been smoother since I entered the world. Amazing!

Yea, we're tough. We know.

Photo Fun

While at JHOP, we thought we'd take a little break from our intense studies and have a fun photo shoot. That's the same view of Jerusalem behind us in the photos as in the night shot above. Christian (our Bible teacher during Egypt & part of Israel) and Zach were with us from the Kona base AND we have Lily back with us! Lily couldn't get a visa to South Africa, so we parted with her back in Brazil and met up again in Israel! Christian's in maroon, Zach's in the stripes and Miss Lily's in green.

Anytime people say "make a funny face!" for a picture, I fail miserably and wind up being the smiling face amongst silly faces. I try to make funny faces, but I just can't help it! I smile...it's what I do!

The OLD CITY

Old City Jerusalem has been destroyed and rebuilt many times throughout the course of history. First in 586 B.C. by the Babylonians, then in 70 A.D. it was destroyed under the Romans, and again in 135 A.D. by another Roman conquest and rebuilt as a pagan Roman city that the Jews were then forbidden to enter. It has been destroyed and rebuilt even into the 20th century...the timeline of destruction is seemingly endless. The present street level Old City is approximately 20 feet higher than street level in Jesus' day.

Headed toward the Jaffa Gate

The Ramparts walk along the top of the wall

Dome of the Rock

Building on the left is said to house King David's Tomb

View of Jerusalem from the top of the wall

Near the Western Wall

My feeble attempt to grab a shot of the Orthodox Jew head-to-toe wear

Another attempt. They generally didn't like having their pictures taken!

A bar mitzvah in the Old City

On David Street, near Jaffa Gate

20 feet below ground level, these stones are believed
to be the ground level of Jerusalem in Jesus' day!

The ARMENIAN Quarter

Within the Old City, there are four quarters. The Jewish Quarter, the Muslim Quarter, the Christian Quarter and the Armenian Quarter. Being 1/2 Armenian, and it being such a tiny little nation, I have always been extra proud of that 50% of my heritage (not that I'm not proud of my German, Dad, I absolutely am!). But coming across an Armenian is much more rare than coming across a German, so I was just so excited that we Armenians actually have our own quarter in the Old City! Wow... go Armenia! Although, it's more like a 1/6, not a 1/4. In any case, I went snap happy just cause so many things boasted ARMENIA on them. This is a big shout-out to my Armenian clan!