Two Remarkable Experiences

This morning we started the second week of our Israel experience, and what a start it was!  The intensive, fast-paced touring is over, and now only six of our original sixteen group members are here for a one-week seminar designed to help us apply what we've seen into our teaching and preaching.  So this morning we went back to the Mount of Olives to begin taking a closer look at the events of "Holy Week" -- the last week of Jesus' life from Palm Sunday to Easter.

The whole day was great as we began at Bethphage (pronounced Beth'-fuh-gee), on the Mount of Olives, directly across the Kidron Valley from the eastern wall of Jerusalem.  It's here that Jesus began his Palm Sunday ride into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey.  Then we walked down through the Kidron Valley and up again into Jerusalem, where we again went to the massive scale model of Jerusalem as it probably looked back in Jesus' time.  All along the way we stopped to talk about the events of Palm Sunday and how they reflected a drama that was probably very carefully scripted by Jesus himself.

In the photo below you see a view of present-day Jerusalem as it looks from the Mount of Olives.

View of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives

As I said, the whole day was great, but the way it started out was incredible.  Before we ever started down the Mount of Olives our leader wanted to have some time to talk with us, so he asked a caretaker of some of the property there if we might be able to use a certain patio for teaching.  The caretaker agreed, so we talked there for about 30 minutes.  Then, just as we were about to leave, the caretaker pointed to a 3'X4' metal plate on the stone patio floor and asked our leader, "Have you ever seen this?"

Our leader asked what it was, and the caretaker responded that it was an underground Roman tomb, dating back to the time of Jesus.  A little skeptical, our leader asked if we could see it.  So the caretaker took a small tool and pried up the metal plate, revealing a deep shaft cut down through the rock with a couple of steps carved into the side of the shaft.  (see next photo)

Shaft leading to ancient Roman tomb

He began to describe to us the layout of the tomb, but my curiosity got the best of me, so I asked, "Would you allow someone to go down in there?"  Long story short... a minute later I'm about 10' underground in a 1st century Roman family tomb, completely carved out of the rock, with three separate burial areas joined by a small center "aisle".  Picture a three-leafed clover and you'll get the idea.  Each leaf of the "clover" tomb has three places hollowed out into the rock floor, each of which is 5-6' long -- big enough to contain the body of a normal sized adult -- and the roof is so low that I had to squat to get in it.  (see photo)

Inside of ancient Roman tomb, showing spaces for each body

After looking around and taking photos I climbed back out.

Pastor Dave coming up from the grave (ancient Roman tomb)

It was a strange, but exhilirating experience to connect with ancient history like that, to imagine who the tomb might have belonged to, and to picture what the area might have looked like back then.

Now, onto a totally different experience...

A couple of nights ago a few of us decided to take a walk to an area on Ben Yehuda Street that's sort of like an upscaled strip mall.  While walking the mall we kept noticing young men and women in regular street clothes -- they looked to be no older than twenty years of age -- with automatic weapons slung over their shoulders. 

Puzzled, one of our group members asked one of the if they were with the Israeli army, since all Israelis, upon reaching the age of eighteen, are required to serve at least two years in the military.  They replied that they were.  So this same group member asked if he might take a picture of them.  Well, they did him one better:  They invited us to dance with them!  So the next thing we know they have us circle up and then they lead us in a traditional Israeli dance, right in the middle of the open mall area!

I got a video of the event (see still photo below) that I think I'll make into a movie entitled, "Dances with Soldiers".

When a young Israeli woman carrying an automatic weapon asks you to dance, what's a guy supposed to do?!