Jerusalem walking

Field Study 2: Jerusalem walking

In this field study and this past week I have been amazed at the history and the stories that are connected to Jerusalem. There is an incredible amount of stories and history wrapped up in and among the places and people of Jerusalem.  The question, ‘where have you put your trust?’ was a question that kept on recurring to me throughout the day.

            At church on Saturday I had the opportunity to talk with a lady that has come to Jerusalem from Mexico. Her story and her trust that God is leading her is incredible. It seems that everyone that I have met has a story. And many of them come to Jerusalem trusting that God is leading them.

2 Chronicles 32:7-8

  “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged because of the king of Assyria and the vast army with him, for there is a greater power with us than with him.  With him is only the arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God to help us and to fight our battles.”

            It isn't new. I've been learning that often nothing is new here. The conflicts over land have been conflicts that have gone on over 'that' piece of land for the past five thousand years. The clashes between the different groups of people are the clashes between the 'same' groups of people that have been going on for the past thousands of years.  Holy places are built where other holy places previously have been, and roads follow the same paths.  People and nations are tempted and struggle with the same things.  And God pursues his people again and again.

Psalm 121

A song of ascents.

1 I lift up my eyes to the mountains—    where does my help come from?

2 My help comes from the Lord,

 the Maker of heaven and earth.

3 He will not let your foot slip—

    he who watches over you will not slumber;

4 indeed, he who watches over Israel

    will neither slumber nor sleep.

5 The Lord watches over you—

    the Lord is your shade at your right hand;

6 the sun will not harm you by day,

    nor the moon by night.

7 The Lord will keep you from all harm—

    he will watch over your life;

8 the Lord will watch over your coming and going

    both now and forevermore

            We started off the morning by going into the old city. After the war of independence there was an opportunity to do a salvage dig because all of the residents of that part of the city were not there for a period of time. In the process of this they uncovered some things that have shaped our picture about Jerusalem and the events that have gone on around there. One of these was the 'broad wall'. Although there is still debate on the size of ancient Jerusalem, we know that Hezekiah ruled there when Sennacherib king of Assyria came to attack.  In a frantic effort to protect themselves from the sweeping conquest of Assyria, he had all the springs dammed up, the wall fortified and another wall build.

This sign was found by boys from Bishop Gobat's School,
the Anglican school for boys was located where JUC is now
until the war of independence.

This wall, the broad wall, was a wall that literally cut through houses. The edges built up with large stones and the middle filled with rubble and smaller stone. Maybe the people, hearing how Sennacherib was systematically take out all of the other cities, desperately threw the stones from their houses on the walls hoping that maybe they could escape with their lives.

Yet, it wasn’t this wall that save the people of Israel. It wasn’t that fact that the Assyrians no longer had access to the springs in the surrounding area but Hezekiah’s faith and persistence that God was the only one who could protect His people. It was Hezekiah crying out to God to deliver them, and God slaying many of the Assyrians that night they were camped outside Jerusalem’s walls.

From there we went to look at Hezekiah’s water system. Before we went done into the tunnel, we climbed up to the top and looked out over what was once David’s city. The oldest part of Jerusalem and the part that is believed to have had David’s palace built there. From on top we could see the Kidron valley along the east of the hill, the Tyropoeon valley ran the length of the other side. These defended the city of David from the east, south and west leaving the most vulnerable point to the North.  Directly north of the city of David stood the temple mount. A threshing floor that had David bought, a Holy place for people to gather. A place believed to be the place where Abraham trusted God when he was told to sacrifice his son.  Maybe this is the place that David had in mind when he wrote a Psalm of praise, maybe he had his eyes on the mountain that protected the city to the east and the west and realized that the only one he could put his trust in fully was the Lord.

John 9:27 He answered, “I have told you already and you did not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples too?”

            The idea of trusting God came up again when considering the two stories of Jesus healing the blind man (John 9) and Jesus healing the man at the pool of Bethsaida. The man in John 9 displays incredible trust in Jesus when he poses the question to the Pharisees, “Do you want to become his disciples too?” Earlier Jesus’ explanation to the disciples about this man’s disability, that it wasn’t sin that caused it, but that it was so that God might be glorified through it. That makes sense, and that explanation for the bad things that happen is what I had been familiar with growing up.

John 5:14 Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.”

But then we encounter another story, the healing of the man at the pool of Bethsaida in John chapter 5.  Just four chapters earlier and it seems as if Jesus’ approach is completely different.  It was helpful to hear about the remains of the Aesculaptic cult that were found nearby. The cult of Aesculapium was a cult to a Greek god of healing. It was particularly popular among soldier, and on this side of Jerusalem, with the Antonium nearby, there was no shortage of soldiers. Jesus asked this man who was sick for 38 years if he wants to get well. Instead of answering yes or no, he refers back to an idea that the first one who gets into the pool after it is stirred will be made well. Jesus still heals him and later confronts him the temple. Maybe this man, how wasn’t impaired from birth, had his trust in the wrong spot. Maybe he had more trust in the myths and healing practices of the cult just north of the temple instead of God.

Interesting thought!

We were taught that the temple was destroyed by fire. Because the temple was built of limestone, which tends to be a porous rock, the Romans placed a pile of burnable stuff (trees, wood, ect.) against the walls and got out of the way. As the fire got hotter it caused the water in the rocks to expand and explode throwing rock off of rock.  What was left to do was simply use levers to push the remaining rocks off of the temple mount to the streets below.

We made a stop at the base of the temple mount. There is an extensive archaeological site there where they have uncovered the southern steps and many buildings. We saw some mikvahs and briefly talked out them.  On the larger ones the people would actually enter on the one side and leave on the other. It makes me wonder.  Did people put their trust in this massive temple? A temple that would be destroyed by human hands?  Was it their rituals and purity that comforted them?

         At the corner of the temple mount they have found the place where the trumpeter would sound and blow the horn. We considered this and wondered maybe this was the place where Christ stood while the devil tempted him to jump off. Even after fasting for 40 days, weak, hungry and being so close to death he was able to put his trust in his Father, and rebuke the devil once more.

 Matthew 23:37 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you 

were not willing. 38 Look, your house is left to you desolate.

 From sitting on the southern stairs we considered Jesus’ word to the Jews. The list of warnings included many images that can be seen from the steps of the temple. The white washed tombs covered the hill to the east. The rules and regulations the ruling priests of the temple had kept people at a distance from God, while their own lifestyle didn’t measure up.  Jesus ends it off with a plea. Echoing what the prophet Isaiah spoke to the people of Israel about a hen gathering her chicks under her wings. Looking south from the steps of the temple, two mountain ranges come together protecting and shelter Jerusalem which is on a slightly lower mountain, the Mount of Olives to the East and the Watershed Ridge to the right.

The two mountain ranges meeting south of Jerusalem

 Maybe this is God’s way of pleading out to us to trust him, to let him be the one who will gather us up like a hen gather’s her chicks. It raises the question in my heart, what do I put my trust in? Have I put more trust in the defenses I can build up or the superstitions that don’t even realize we hold to.  Have I put my trust in what I can accomplish by my own will?