And the Spirit led Jesus into the desert...

Greetings Friends and Family,

We began our morning refreshed and ready for another day in Israel. Yesterday was a bit exhausting and overwhelming, as the pace of things was catching up with us...but this morning we felt great and ready to go.

Kealy got her morning mocha! 

 We headed over to the Armenian and Jewish sections of the Old City (the part of Jerusalem inside the old walls) and entered through the Zion Gate. In front of the gate, lining up for inspection were the young Israeli soldiers. Each Sunday morning, the soldiers visit various holy Jewish, Christian and Muslim sites so they learn and appreciate the history of the city. We walked through the Old City, visiting the Upper Room and King David's Tomb. The amazing streets and stone buildings were awesome and it was really cool to be standing in front of the tomb of King David, a man after God's own heart.

Church and street next to the Upper Room

Statue of David playing the harp for Saul

Phoenix column (a symbol of the early church)

the Tomb of King David

Kealy and a travel friend, Amanda, in the Armenian Quarter

the Jewish Quarter

From the Old City we headed down the hill of Mt. Zion, through the Kidron Valley towards the dead sea. There is a road that is built over the ancient way from Jerusalem to Jericho, the same road that the parable of the Good Samaritan takes place. It doesn't take long to get out of Jerusalem before the terrain changes and you are in the desert.

Our first stop was in Qumran. Qumran was built by a Jewish separatist community named the Essenes who lived in the desert from 150 bce to 68 ce. They purified themselves twice a day, studied the Scriptures, wrote them down as an act of worship, and waited for the coming of the Messiah. When they Romans attacked in 68 ce, they knew they would be overrun and so they hid their scrolls and writings in jars and placed them in caves. Almost 2000 years later in 1947 these jars with ancient scrolls in them were discovered on ancient by a young Bedouin boy. It is the greatest literary find of all time. This one cave pictured below had nearly 15,000 fragments of over 530 scrolls of all the books of the Old Testament, which confirmed that many of the biblical writings had been preserved over time. The desert was a balmy 97 degrees but it felt great!

a teaching of the Essenes (perfect for our home group)

Sweating in the desert at Qumran

the Desert

A Cave discovered in 1959 with over 15,000 scroll fragments

We continued onto Jericho, the oldest city in the world. Here there are ruins of a city from a long time ago and it is here where Joshua entered the promised land and conquered the city by trusting in God for the victory. When the city was destroyed by Joshua another one was later built next to it, and this is where Jesus heals the blind man Bartimaeus and has dinner with Zacchaeus...we even saw a 2000 year old Sycamore tree.

the walls of Jericho

Kealy overlooking the city of Jericho

Sitting at the spring of Elisha

This evening we also had a chance to attend a Christian worship service downtown full of people from all over the world. It was an amazing experience of God's kingdom to be able to sing songs of worship, in Hebrew, with Christians from all over the world, in Jerusalem. Knowing that you all are at home in our corner of the world worshipping the same God, the same Saviour, Yeshua HaMeshiacha (Jesus the Messiah) was extremely moving.

Kealy and I had a fun evening walk together to the Damascus Gate again and bought the kids some gifts. We enjoy talking with the vendors and everyone is friendly and we have felt very safe the whole time.

Thank you all for continuing to follow along! Tomorrow we are in the Christian Quarter of the Old City, walking the Via Dolorosa and visiting the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the traditional city of the crucifixion and burial (and Resurrection) of Jesus.

Grace and Peace,

Ryan and Kealy