Jesus and Peter

My favorite moment of today, was probably at the place where Jesus asked Peter 3 times "Do you love me?" I was reading the passage, and Jesus responds to Peter every time with "Then feed my sheep." In the past, that hasn't really struck me as anything more than Jesus teaching Peter a lesson, or something of the sort. However, today a few things struck me about this particular passage. First off, when Jesus first calls Peter, the way He phrases the work Peter has to do is "be a fisher of men". This would be language that would be enticing to Peter, who was by trade a fisherman. So, why would Christ change the language? Several things could explain this. First, maybe Peter has become accustom to the life of a Shepherd in the past 3 years of hanging out with Jesus. Problem. Jesus was a carpenter and not a shepherd by trade. (Side note, carpenter does not just mean wood worker, it means he was a builder and used all kinds of materials, whatever the local stuff was.) So why would Jesus use a shepherd term? The land for shepherding is far from the land of fishing. I think it is two fold.

First, our professor made a good point. While fishing, the main goal is to catch fish and kill them to provide food. The goal of a shepherd is to keep his sheep alive. What Jesus is doing (among other more blatant things) is showing Peter his new role. Peter's main role has gone from being an Evangelist Preacher (getting folks to die to themselves) to a Care Preacher (keeping his congregation alive and well). This doesn't seem to mean that Peter is supposed to stop evangelizing. He in fact continues to do this throughout Acts. It simply means that his main job has changed.

Secondly, this could be a call from Jesus for Peter to prepare himself to leave his comfort zone. Peter had grown up around Galilee and was familiar with fishing. So equating following Christ with fishing helped Peter adjust to his role as a disciple. Not only that, but the area in which Peter was being a "Fisher of Men" was mainly in the North, and in fact was mostly around the lake where He grew up. This lake was mixed cultures of Jewish and Roman. Peter was used to the climate and Jesus was face of the movement called "The Way". But now, Christ was preparing to leave. This means 2 things for Peter. First, he will need to step up to be a leader. Maybe, he needs to reign in his impulsivity a bit. But the greater lesson is that Peter needs to prepare himself to leave the comfort of his own home. He needs to prepare to step out of the things he is used to (Galilee, the sea, the culture, the political climate, family and friends always by his side) and step into territory that is different and uncomfortable (Leadership, jail, Jerusalem, other cities, Rome, and even death). Christ is subtly telling Peter to step out of what is today called the "comfort zone".

Just a thought.

The Climax of Our Time in Israel

So, for the past 4 days, we have be "Working up to the Climax of our 3 weeks here in Israel" according the Paul Wright. (Paul is the President of the Institution here in Israel, and he is our Professor and personal tour guide. The man is Superman with an amazing knowledge of the land of Israel and the Bible). We spent our time in the north.

The First Day, we looked at approaches to Galilee. First, we went to Caesarea, an ancient city on the Northwest coast of Israel. This city was straight up Roman. It had theaters, a hippodrome (place where they could have chariot races or fight gladiators), Aquaducts, a Sea Palace (For Herod), and a Prison. Incidentally, in the 1st century, this prison held a jewish man from a place called Tarsus (in Modern-day Turkey). Apparently, he was going around to cities and stirring up a group of people who followed Jesus. Once he was put on trial, this man revealed that he had roman citizenship and was promptly shipped off to Rome. His boat crashed and he kept on preaching about Jesus. Later that day, we went to Mt. Carmel, Meggido, and other sights in the Jezreel valley. We spent the night in a Hotel overlooking Nazareth.

The second day, we continued from our resting spot, to a first century Roman settlement, which I can't remember the name of right now. The one with the Mona Lisa mosaic.... ZIPPORI! I remembered. We continued and looked over Nazareth, and eventually moved to the Cliffs of Arbel. From here, we could see the entirety of the Sea of Galilee. We climbed down these cliffs (actually literally climbing at parts), and ended the day south of the Sea at a Roman Settlement called Beth-Shean. This place was huge, and very VERY Roman. Corinthian Columns and everything. (As you can probably tell, we focused on the Helenization of Galilee for the first few days). We ended the day, staying at basically a resort right on the Sea of Galilee. We saw, ate dinner, watched the sunset over the Sea, and swam some more.

The Third day, we traveled north. (Just a note. The night before, some Syrian protesters decided to try and cross Israel's boarder. This happened up on the Golan Heights... which is where we ended up for the afternoon on the Third day. We went through an impromptu check-point, and overall didn't feel very threatened.) We say places like Hazor (the head of all the cities in the North), Caesarea Philipi (where Christ asked the Disciples who they thought he was), and saw from a mountain the place where that guy that I talked about earlier (the one in the roman prison, and ship wreck) would have been heading to Damascus to persecute Christians (the people who he would eventually come to lead and instruct) and would encounter Jesus. This day, my foot hurt the entire day. I'm not sure what happened to it. I woke up in the morning and the entire right side of my right foot hurt when I walked. (Yes dad, I know... just walk it off.) I limped through the day, avoiding putting a ton of pressure on that side of my foot. By the end of the day, the right side of my foot was feeling a little better, but the left side, where I had focused most of the pressure, was riddled with blisters. Not really sure what was wrong with it in the end, it was probably just a muscle strain from climbing down the cliffs. I wasn't going to complain about it though. Too many people on this trip have already gone to the hospital. I'm beginning to think that the professors are a bit over-cautious. In the end, my foot felt even better this morning and other than the blisters, it feels pretty normal now.

The final day (today), was our climax for the time in Israel. We spent the entire time circling the Sea of Galilee seeing sights. We saw the place where Christ cast legion into the pigs and they ran off the cliffs into the sea, we saw the place where Andrew, Peter, James, and John were supposedly from (we also talked about how these men were fishermen and might have lived multiple places along the Sea), we saw the Jordan river up close and personal, we saw the Mt. of the Beatitudes, we saw Capernaum, we saw the place where the feeding of the 5,000 took place, we saw the place where Jesus asked Peter 3 times if He loved Jesus, and we finally saw the 2,000 year old boat that was recovered and preserved. Quite a day. Feeling overwhelmed and tired, we returned to JUC finally after 4 long days. But Paul Wright was right. Today was the climax of our time here in Israel. I have really gained a better view of who Jesus was and who the disciples were.

Sweat, Salt, and Cheers

So, remember how Moses led the Israelites on a 40 year walk through the wilderness? I do. Remember how we just sorta skip over that 40 year period, and move onto Joshua? I used to do that. However, this past 3 days (more like 2) we spent in the wilderness of the Negev (means southern dry land). Trust me, it was hot and sunny. This land gets less than 4 inches of rain the entire year! I felt like I was sweating rivers the entire time... and I wasn't the only person doing so. Let me break down the different days:

Monday: We spent the day monday focused on the verse 1 Kings 4:25 (in fact most of the three days focused on this verse) and the open land to the west of Jerusalem. The verse talks about every person from Dan to Beer Sheva living under their own vine. This looks very different for many people in the land of Judah. For the people in the foothills, this was almost literal. We saw a cave where people lived for over 2,000 years. Coming to Israel, I would never have considered the hilly country to be the safe and comfortable land. Being from the flat land of Ohio, I would have thought the open plains to the west are the comfortable country. There you can see for leagues and leagues, you can easily talk to those surrounding you, and you don't have to deal with walking up and down all day. However, in ancient times, this meant that you were exposed and vulnerable. The hills provide safety at the expense of connectivity. (This is why Judah is always warring with someone around them.) Plus, up in the hills, you get a nice breeze which helps cool the noonday sun. In the afternoon, we looked at the plains. Here we focused on 2 Old Testament stories. First, we saw the place where Samson did all of his work. We saw the village where he came from and the village he set on fire via fox tails. (I also found a piece of possible philistine pottery but probable crusader era pottery here.) We then continued to the valley where David fought Goliath. Still can't believe I saw that place. We finished out the day by seeing Lachish (A Judean Stronghold that was overrun by both the Assyrians AND the Babylonians), seeing Ashkelon (A huge, ancient city on the coast), and some swimming in the Mediterranean sea. It was an amazing day, and I learned a ton.

Tuesday: We spent the day in the Negev. First, we went and saw Beer-Sheeba. This place was the place that Abraham was supposed to have settled, but the Archeology showed no middle bronze age remains. But not much should be expected to be found from that time, since Abraham would have had a goat hair tent. That would have totally decayed. But, we still should have found a well or something. But instead, it was merely and Iron Age city and well. However, this doesn't mean that Abraham was some fake, archetypal character. His well could be anywhere under the modern city or out in the desert surrounding the area known as Beer-Sheeba today. We then went to an archeological sight called "Arad". This was a fortress built out in the middle of no where seemingly. But at second glance, and prodding from the professor, we realized that this sight was an Egyptian area of control for the Salt and Tar route. Arad was also a spot, where they found some interesting finds in the Temple at the fortress. First off.... there was a temple. Secondly, the temple could have been used to worship both Yahweh and some other deity (or, the duel stones found at the sight, one standing one laying on the ground, could represent the power of Yahweh over all the other deities). We then climbed and hiked the Zin Wadi, a place of wilderness wandering. We saw a major sight on the great spice route from Saudi Arabia, and ended the day overlooking the worlds greatest erosion crater. It was far down (don't worry mom, I stayed away from the edge for the most part...)

Wednesday: Today, we spent the morning at Masada. This was the greatest of Herod's Palaces. I saw 1st Century mosaic, a million gallon cistern, and heard the possibly incongruous story of the Zealots vs. the Romans. We then did the grossest swimming ever... in the dead sea. It didn't feel gross getting in. But when in, it slowly goes from being novel to icky. My lips tasted of salt even though the water never got past my neck (from the evaporating water around me). One of the guys got water in his eye and freaked out. He said it hurt a ton. Once I left the water, I realized how nasty I actually felt. Luckily, all my scratched bug bites were cleaned nicely. We then went to natural springs and swam some, and ended the day at Qumran (the place where they found the dead sea scrolls). That is where we thought the day ended and we would head back to JUC (Jerusalem University College, our residence while in Israel). Well, not quite. Today was the beginning of a festival called "Jerusalem Day". And apparently it is where people from around the country come to celebrate Jerusalem. The streets were flowing with people and everyone was chanting in Hebrew, waving flags, and having a generally good time. However, on the other hand, it felt as if the people were at a near point of rioting. In fact, 24 people were arrested around the gate we entered into Old Jerusalem for throwing stones at Arabs. The tension in the city was possibly palpable, or maybe the place where we were was the only place of tension and everything else was peaceful. I felt ok once we got through the area, and the crowds thinned out.

But, while we were there, I was glad that I looked American and everyone there assumes most Americans support Israel whole-heartedly. Which brings us to the subject of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I think that it is a complex subject. Often, American Christians believe that we are told in the Bible that we are to support Israel. I agree we are told to support the people of God. Whether or not this is still the entirety of the Jewish people is still an area of debate. However, this entity occupying the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea is not that. It is now a political entity. Still, that does not disclude them from any support. It simply keeps them from that wholesale inclusion of the people of God (at least in my eyes.) I believe that all who follow Jesus Christ, void of any ethnicity, culture, or nationality are the People of God. I believe that Jesus died and fulfilled and expanded the covenant that was given, like when he expanded it during Moses' and David's time. I always believe that we are told to love everyone and help those in need. I don't believe that we have a biblical mandate beyond those to support the political entity that is Israel. However, neither the Israeli's nor the Palestinians are without blame in the conflict. And generalizing a population on any single feature, such as religion, is a dangerous tactic. I do not know how to solve the problem here, but I do believe that violence (any kind, be it rockets or concrete walls) here only makes things worse. To make it clear, I am neither a supporter of Israel nor Hamas. I am a supporter of peace (I don't know how to enact this peace, nor do I feel that I am in a place to make a difference here.) And in the words of Forest Gump.... That's all I have to say about that.

This Past Week

So, I intended to post on this almost daily. However, I fiddled around with the video blog for too long trying to get it to work, and I ended up not posting anything. So, I will give a run down of what we did this week by day, then give some general thoughts.

Monday: Toured Jerusalem- we did a general run through of the old city of Jerusalem. As we walked through, we talked about the intricacies of having a city so fully grounded in three different religions. We talked about how the religions (Jewish, Christian, Muslim) in the city are like trees planted near each other. Although the 3 trees grow separately and are their own identities, they are so old that their branches in some place being to intertwine. (This is not to say that they mix doctrines or that they are becoming one mega super religion. But rather their histories and understanding of the land are beginning to become complex and difficult to untangle.) Similarly, if their branches are becoming intertwined, their roots are becoming a warped mess, so much so that it would be nearly impossible to remove one tree without nearly destroying the other two. But as it is, they survive, and except for a few isolated instances they get along just fine. And it's true, almost every spot in the old city is a holy or historical spot for one of the religions, and at times two or three of the religions. Such as the upper room. It is what we as Christians consider to be the place of the last supper. The Muslims turned it into a mosque at one point, and the Jewish people remember King David's grave there. All three have a vested interest in this spot, and removing one would damage the stability of the entire city. Also, saw the church of the Holy Sepulcher I went to the Western Wall after.

Tuesday- We did another walk through of the Old City, this time focusing on the Old Testament. We saw walls that were supposedly the original walls that Hezekiah put up to repel the invading Assyrian army. Next, we saw the original City of David. It is on the eastern hill in Jerusalem (we have learned a ton about geology and geography and how it affects our understanding of the Bible... see below). We walked Hezekiah's tunnel, which is an extremely small and cramped route for the passage of water from the Gihon spring to be brought into the city. We also saw the pool of Siloam, where Christ sent the man who was born blind to wash his eyes and be healed.

Wednesday: We started out going to the Temple Mount. Here we saw the Dome of the Rock, and the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Furthermore, I believe this to be the place where Solomon built the Temple, and thus, the place where God's divine presence dwelt during OT times. After, we went to the place of the original street in Jerusalem. A place where Christ would have most certainly walked. Wow. Then we went to the steps which originally went up to the temple. These would be steps that Jesus walked and also possibly the steps where the Pentecost happened. Finally, we ended up at the Pools of Bethesda and Church of Ann (Mother of Mary). Here is the place where Christ healed the man born lame.

Thursday: This was the first of our 2 11-hour days during the week. We saw the Mt. of Olives, and had our first glimpse into the wasteland beyond Jerusalem. We went to the Church in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here I saw the rock that marks the place where Christ cried blood. From here, we went to the Herodian (Herod's palace south of Jerusalem). That dude was rich beyond belief. After, we went to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, and saw the place where Christ was supposed to be born. We also met with Palestinian Christians and talked about how they feel about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It was interesting.

Friday: Our second 11 hour day. We traveled into the wasteland. "Wow, it is desolate out here", was my first thought. There is practically no vegetation and even less water. It was hot, and there was very little shade. It brought new meaning to the words "Valley of the Shadow of Death". Furthermore, come to find out, this area was part of the "promise land" which God gave to the Israelites. So much for a prosperity gospel. We went down to Jericho and talked about how we reconcile the fact that we have text and geography pointing to a place where Jericho should be, but we have no archeological remains of the walls (or any part for that matter) of Jericho that Joshua knocked down. We then finally left the hot area of the rift valley. We continued to look at the northern approaches to Jerusalem, here is where seeing and studying opens up great amounts of the Bible. We looked at places that were around Jerusalem and how the borders were constantly in flux. Knowing where these cities are, and who the players and kingdoms are, opens up great understanding of the books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles.

Close Geography of Jerusalem: It is built on 2 hills. The hills of Jerusalem (named the western and eastern hills) are separated by a valley (today merely a dip in elevation) named the central valley. On either side of Jerusalem's hills are two valleys. The Hinnom valley is to the West and after that the ground rises into the Watershed ridge. The Kidron Valley is to the east and rises to the Mt. of Olives. To the south, the Valleys combine and the Watershed Ridge curves around. The North is the weak point. This helps us understand many things in scripture. For example, when David in Psalm 121 says "I lift my eyes up to the hill, where shall my help come from? My help comes from the LORD who made heaven and earth." Understanding the nature of Jerusalem's solitude and the way the City is cut off from friends, helps understand the place of despair and faith that David writes. Furthermore, in Psalm 125 David says that as the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people forever. Understanding the geography of Jerusalem helps greatly in understanding the theology built into the text. Furthermore, the Solomon's temple, a great and powerful temple was built on the high spot of the city, which was the north. This helps explain the importance of the Temple being so mighty and well fortified... It was part of the protection of the city.

I have much more to say, but I do have a test this afternoon on everything I just wrote, so I should study. But I will try and be better about posting soon.

The Legendary Old City

Monday was our first walkthrough of the old city. WOW. It was such a unique experience. We first went through a 4 hour lecture on why geography is important to our reading the text of the Bible. Here are some thoughts:

1.) Upper Room- I didn't realize that the first place we went was considered to be the place of the last supper. It was that mundane. However, there were some interesting tid bits about the area. For 1, it had the 3 major religions all tied up in this one room. The room was originally thought to be the place of the last supper. Then, the Jews placed David's tomb to be there. Finally, the Muslims took control of the room and turned it into a Mosque. Eventually, the state took it over, and it is now open from the public. Little side note, from the roof of this building, I saw the wall that separates Israel from the West Bank. It is quite imposing.

2.) The Western Wall- We saw it early in the afternoon and didn't even walk down to it. We looked at it from a distance. It is one of the biggest structures that I've seen. And to think that it was made out of rock by men, WOW. What's even crazier is when I try and think of the grandiosity of the city of Jerusalem back in Solomon's time, when all the walls were like that, and the Temple was in place. (Yes, I realize that these walls were built more around Jesus' time.... but the idea still applies.) That would be one of the most impressive, if not THE most impressive structure of it's time... Especially since the structure is mind blowing now when we have buildings like the Sears Tower or Empire State Building. We left the wall pretty quickly. But once we had finished out walk, two of the girls in the group convinced me to join them, and we walked down to the wall. They both had to pray on the women's side. I threw on a Yarmulka and went to the men's side. Even thought I am not Jewish, the experience was quiet intense. Here I was at the Western Wall. I prayed for Unity among God's people, and for peace in Israel. I figured those were appropriate things to pray for at that particular location.

3.) Lastly, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. I'd never really thought about it before this trip. This place is considered to be both the place of the crucifixion, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. It houses 7 different churches. The smell of incense that wafts over you as you walk in is both entices you to continue in and awakens you to the reverent nature of the church. We are spending some time with one of the Fathers there, after it closes later this week. I'm excited to see it more in-depth and better understand exactly where everything is.

Other than that, life in Jerusalem is good. I'll keep you posted.

I'm an Idiot....

I've done this before. I travel on one of these long summer trips, (yes.... ANOTHER Youth Hostel Ministry comparison... get over it, It was probably the most formative experience of my personal experience) and I freak out when I get off the first plane. I did that during YHM. London was such a scary place in my opinion. I felt as if I were being constantly judged or stereotyped. In addition to this, the thought "WHAT AM I DOING HERE?!?!?!" went through my mind. This happened again as I arrived in Rome for a transfer flight. However, I do have a distinct memory of stepping off the plan onto the stairs and having the sun rising and a nice breeze and just feeling the Peace of God flow over me. No other description. I proceeded to still freak. I slept some on the second plane. And we got into Israel. WOW! This place is amazing. It is such a surreal feeling to be here. We are right on the edge of the Old City, right near the Joffa gate for a reference point. We didn't go in today. But we will tomorrow. I'm excited. I will write more about everything that's going on when I get a chance.

The Beginning

In the words of Bilbo Baggins, "It's dangerous business, Frodo, going out your front door. You step into the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to." As I embark on this great journey, I can't help but feel as if I have been preparing for this for at least a year (and I didn't even realize it.) And I don't just mean the actual going and seeing. Because in all honesty, that's what I figured this trip would be about. The great tour of the land. But God has really brought about some interesting changes in my life. So this post is to describe the two fold preparation God has been doing in me to prepare me for this trip.

1.) God has prepared me to handle travel. This one seems pretty obvious. I did YHM. That's a ton of traveling. This 6 weeks should be a breeze. However, there is a deeper part of this trip that God has prepared me for through YHM. That is uncertainty. I am really good at adjusting. Coming to college was a big adjustment. I did plenty fine. Sure I miss my family, but I love being here. Even the parts that I don't love can be worked around. But I think I adjusted fine because I knew what was coming. Doing Wheaton Passage (2 1/2 weeks of canoeing/backpacking) helped me understand the limits of my ability to adjust to situations. I do great when I know what's coming. However, when I don't... I can psych myself out. I could have easily done that on this trip. Sure, we have an Itinerary. But that is vague at best. However, I am prepared for this. I've had to deal with worse, and I survived. On YHM, the only Itinerary we had was what city to be in on what day. I was in a group of 4. Much less support. 10 times less actually. This will be a great trip. Just gotta go with the flow.

2.) God has used this past year to help me get over my "Great Prejudice". What was my great prejudice you might ask? Well, mainly it was against theology. I know right! A good Wheaton student like me not liking theology? Unheard of! Well, it's true. Last summer, I went on YHM hoping to love people to Jesus. Which, don't get me wrong, is a great way of going about stuff but definitely not sufficient a lot of the time. And I found myself in situations where I wanted to get into conversations and explain my faith to others, but I didn't have the words to do so. Nor did I have the wisdom to think through that kind of thing before. The Office of Christian Outreach did a great job of preparing me. I did a poor job of preparing myself. Even when I came back from YHM, I had an aversion to theology. I think it was because I do not see myself as a deep intellectual thinker, and I considered theology to be a deep intellectual task. And I do not like to feel incompetent. So that is why I avoided theology. Then, second semester, I had to take my Christian Thought class. Basically it was theology 101. Well, come to find out, I enjoy talking about stuff like that. I loved learning about it. And then came this week. This week, I spent 3 1/2 hours a morning talking about theology. A lot of it was review. But I did learn a lot of new information: mainly about the Orthodox Church and their beliefs, and the Catholic Church and it's belief. Quite interesting. In the past year, God has taken me from not really thinking about Theology, to not really liking theology, to loving theology. Crazy how He does stuff like that.

On a side note, one thing that I found out this week was that I had a pretty narrow view of Christianity. In the past, I considered "Christian" (what I now understand as Protestants), "Catholic", and "Orthodox" to be three completely separate faiths. However, after taking my theology classes, I understand now that we are three different parts of the "Christian faith." (Maybe this fact doesn't come as a shocker to you. But to me it was a !LIGHTBULB! moment.) Yes, we disagree on some doctrine, even some major doctrine. However, we hold much in common. We should be looking at these similarities more, like the similarity that we all follow Jesus Christ as the Incarnate Son of God. Yes, that looks different for each of our traditions. But the church is supposed to be the unified body of Christ. And for that reason, it is the one thing that we should fight hardest for in this world. So, now I go to sleep. Tomorrow: Exam and Flight.

This is just the beginning.....