My Favorite Stop #2 - Baptism in the River Jordan

Yardenit, located at the Jordan River right as it exits the Sea of Galilee, welcomes Christians to the waters of Jordan for baptism.  Its paths are manicured and there are shade coverings for groups to sit in and a large gift shop that carries all sorts of Israel souvenirs is hard to resist.  It was neat to go there and sit on its banks.



There are lots of different types of baptism throughout Christendom and our tour guide explained that she sees it all when taking groups to Yardenit.  She says there are some that sprinkle water over their heads.  Some that come in groups with a priest or minister that performs immersion baptisms and some, like the Greek Orthodox women below, who ritualistically re-baptize themselves over and over again.



These women would go up and down and up and down, kind of like doing bobs in a swimming pool, again and again.  They seemed so happy and full of faith.





Greek Orthodox women wearing skirts and hose (the married women covered their heads, and then men wearing the long black robe.

As the week progressed and I learned more about the history of Israel and the conflict in the Middle East, I understood why there was a baptismal site at a place on the Jordan River no one believes it the place where Christ was baptized.  For centuries, pilgrims came to a place on the Jordan River called Qasr al Yahud near Jericho, which the scriptures describe as a holy.  The Israelites crossed the Jordan here when coming from Egypt.  Joshua crossed here before the battle of Jericho.  But, in 1948, when Israel was declared a state, there was immediate war between Israel and Jordan and Qasr al Yahud was inaccessible.  It became a military zone and land mines were placed throughout the area on both sides of the river.  For 44 years, it was completely closed and then only opened a few times a year for special visitors, like the Pope, with assistance from the army.  In 2010, it reopened.



Warnings of land mines still buried nearby.



A Jordanian soldier across the river.



An Israeli soldier on the side we were.  A tenuous peace.



The Jordan River is the boundary between Jordan and Israel.  This part of the river is actually located in the West Bank, which does not officially belong to Israel but is a disputed territory.  I'm so glad we were able to stop here.



Recent rains had flooded the river and it was very easy to picture Christ and John the Baptist here to fulfill the law.



When I looked a bit south, I had a special feeling that this area was not only visited by Christ but that the entire Godhead converged at here one moment in body, voice and in the form of a dove.  I wasn't like the Greek Orthodox and believe my baptism when I was eight "took" but I did get on my knees and put my hands in the river.

 Not a scheduled stop on our tour but Maureen and I were so glad it happened.  A special, special place.

My Favorite Stop #3 - Eyewitnesses of the Firstborn

My mom asked me the other day if I was finished posting. Almost!  I have 7 more posts and then I will have completed my goal of writing down not just where I went and what I saw but how I felt and what I learned. For me, those memories are the ones I want to be able to re-read and remember in 25 years time.

I've saved my favorite stops for last. It's the kind of thing where I didn't realize these were my favorites until my brain started to process, organize and rank experiences. At each of these places, I felt the spirit testify that the events that history and scripture say took place actually happened and that I was standing on holy ground.

Bethlehem and Jerusalem are only 6 miles apart.  Like most city sprawl, these two cities now connect.  Unlike most metropolitan areas, these two cities are controlled by two different governments: Jerusalem by Israel and Bethlehem by the Palestinian Authority.




The land surrounding both areas is still used by shepherds to graze their flocks.  The hills have all of these horizontal ridges that the sheep travel across.  I loved seeing this group of sheep on a hillside right where they would have been 2,000 years ago.  It was a very helpful visual aid.



It will come as no surprise that a mammoth church was built upon the cave believed to be where Christ was born in Bethlehem by Constantine's mother, Helena. Called the Church of the Nativity, it is the oldest, continually operating Christian church in the world. Like the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, various sects have control over different sections of the building and the cave has been split into two sections and sealed by a wall. There was a line to visit the area believed to be the spot where Christ would have been born, or the back part of the cave, and there was a separate line to what would have been the entrance to the cave and the area where an early Christian named St. Jerome lived and translated the Bible into Latin. We only visited the first area.



The entrance to the church was incredibly small. Our Arab guide (we had to switch guides at the checkpoint between Israel and Palestinian controlled land.  Our Israeli guide was not allowed in this area), explained that it had been lowered hundreds of years ago, I believe by the crusaders, to defend the church.



Even though it was a cold, rainy day, there were lots of visitors in line waiting to go down in the cave.  I'm glad we didn't have the sort of crowds and lines the church sees around Christmas time.



The altar built above the cave is ornate.  The Armenian priest performed a mass while we waited in line.



Going down the steps to the cave.



A better picture I got from the internet.



Here is the fourteen point star marking the spot on the ground in the cave where Christ was born.  The fourteen points represent the fourteen generations between Abraham and David, then fourteen more from David to the Babylonian Exile then fourteen more between the Exile and the birth of Christ.



Slightly behind and to the right is an altar built where Mary is believed to have laid the baby in a manger.



Inside the cave. I'm not certain which wall is sealed off from the rest of the cave.

After leaving the church, which was interesting but in a detached and almost numb way like most of the church sites were, we drove a short distance to an area of land purchased by Franciscans.  We went inside another cave that did have some pictures on the walls and pews to sit on but was much more cave like and easier to imagine what things might have looked like 2,000 years ago.

Our tour guide, Steve Perry, shared some insight to the story of the shepherds and the birth of Christ that I had never thought of before.  He asked us why an angel appeared to shepherds to go see and visit the infant Jesus and not to the candle makers or carpenters.  I couldn't think of an answer other than they were who were close by.  But, he explained, there would have been other kinds of tradesmen living around Bethlehem and yet the scriptures teach that shepherds were specifically asked to go.

As I mentioned earlier, Bethlehem is close to Jerusalem.  Visitors coming to the temple brought animals to sacrifice: pigeons and turtle doves, goats, sheep, cows and lambs. According to Judaic law, some sacrifices required the animal to be unblemished and the first born.

Those traveling long distances usually couldn't bring their sacrifice with them.  Instead, animals were purchased nearby and brought to the temple. Someone purchasing a sheep or lamb would have no idea which of the flock was a first born. The shepherds, knowing this information was important for their trade, would know. Their flocks were their livelihood and they brought their flocks inside their cave/homes if necessary to protect them. When a request for a firstborn came, they could swear as eyewitnesses that certain lambs qualified under the law.

When the angel told to them to hurry and go, they became eyewitnesses again to the firstborn Lamb of God. Their witness and testimony qualified Christ under the law to be that sacrifice to God - to fulfill His plan.

Sitting inside the cave and hearing this explanation combined into a powerful experience for me. Christ is often associated with being a good shepherd as well as being the Lamb of God but I had never quite thought of it this way. I had never quite thought about the shepherds this way.  It makes me look at a nativity scene quite differently.

I sit here in tears once again and I know that this happened. From His humble birth inside a cave, he fulfilled all requirements of justice through His great and loving sacrifice.





Not my picture but I thought it was so nice.



As we left Bethlehem, this beautiful rainbow appeared to end on Shepherd's Field.  It felt like a sign of God's great love and beautiful plan.

Women of Faith

Like pretty much every sacred site in Israel, the traditionally celebrated place where Mary was visited by the angel Gabriel to reveal that she would be the mother of the Savior of the word has a big church built right on top of it. The first time we visited Nazareth, we only stopped at Mt. Precipice and didn't drive down into the city and to the church.  No one in our group really seemed to mind. The large church was a Roman Catholic basilica, after all, and those apses, naves, murals, windows and crosses can be uncomfortable for the LDS tourist.

A couple of days later, however, we went back to Nazareth for lunch and our guides decided to squeeze in a visit to the church, known as The Church of Annunciation.



A repeat picture of Nazareth from Mt. Precipice  The red arrow is pointing to the Church of Annunciation.



A close-up view of the church.



Our tour guide pointed out to us that the gold dome is in the location of the synagogue that Christ would have been teaching in before he got chased out.  We didn't visit it and I don't know how they know that.

The inside of the church is actually quite amazing.  There are two levels.  The lower level has access to the grotto, or cave that is believed to be Mary's home.  I'm not sure if it is because we went to the church right after lunch or if because I wasn't expecting anything to be picture worthy, but I didn't have my nice camera so all of the following pictures were taken with my iphone in low light and they are a bit crappy. I apologize.



Nazareth was built on top of stone so scholars believe most residents during Christ's time had a grotto, or cave, that then had stairs that led to more rooms above it.  You can see the cave and the stairs behind the altar.



Even more blurry with the zooming in.



This is what the underneath of the dome looks like.  It is supposed to resemble a flower, a lily, I believe,  which is a symbol in the church for the Virgin Mary.



Excavated remains of an older church.  I love the flower details.


From the grotto level, stairs lead to a grand chapel where the walls are decorated with murals sent from around the world depicting the mother and child.  I loved the nationalistic ones.




This one is from Japan.


The USA sent a rather abstract mural of Mary, I think.

Outside, underneath the great structure of the church, were the simple ruins of ancient Nazareth. You can see how it was all stone.  Our tour guide shared with us here that the Hebrew word from which carpenter was interpreted actually means craftsman and that it is more likely that Christ would have been a type of stone mason but no one really knows.



I ended up really loving this stop and wondered why it wasn't in the original plans. I realize any hint of Mary worship is worrisome in my line of faith, but if you are a Christian, Mary, the mother of Jesus, is a pretty big deal.  So is the place where she humbly accepted God's will.

The more I thought about it, the more I wondered why her role in Heavenly Father's plan seems less comfortable for some members of my church to openly honor or praise. As the week progressed and we visited more shops and shooed away street vendor after street vendor, it was obvious there were souvenirs for sale from the Holy Land that interested me and those that did not. Nativity - yes.  Crosses - no. Olive wood statue of Ammon and the Title of Liberty (they had a statue at one of the wood shops.  They clearly get a lot of LDS visitors) - yes. Statue of Mary - no. Way too catholic, right?

I think I understand where the discomfort comes from and the reasons the leaders of the church have moved away from using and displaying certain icons of Christianity but it makes me a little sad that feeling a connection to one of the few women mentioned in the scriptures whose purpose for being mentioned isn't limited to who she was married to or what child she bore. Clearly, both of those things are probably the only reason we do hear about her but we also know through inference or commentary that she wasn't a whiner (traveling for days on foot and donkey while nine months pregnant?  No, thank you), that she worried as a mother would worry about an almost teenager, even knowing Christ was divine, and that she had to watch her son painfully suffer and die.  Feeling embarrassed or that it's wrong to freely adore her for her unique earthly mission seems wrong. I guess I think that if we are able to know the difference between having a statue of Ammon on a shelf in our home and worshipping Ammon, we might be able to do the same for Mary. Or Eve. Or Sarah. But, due to lack of revelation or because of revelation, more is known about the masculine members of the Plan of Salvation.  I make every effort not to let that bother me and, for the most part, it doesn't. I think being feminine is just as wonderful and divine and we are even told that it is so. We just don't have the same kind of information to pattern our lives after female celestial beings. I am looking forward to a time when we know more.

Throughout the tour, I was able to observe a lot of people from different faiths whose doctrines I do not know. I saw ultra orthodox Jewish men wearing hats with ringlets of hair falling beside each ear. I saw lots of Jewish men wearing a Kippah on their heads. I saw monks wearing simple brown clothes with a rope belt and priests wearing collars.I saw Greek Orthodox men with long beards wearing flat top hats and long black robes.  I saw Muslim men wearing designer jeans and t-shirts (I didn't see a single Arab man wearing robes). Some covered their heads with scarves secured with ropes.

I also saw many women from different faiths but there was less variety amongst them. Oh, sure, there were style differences and color preferences (the Jewish people seem to prefer the color black) but a few items of apparel were universal to believers: women covered their hair, covered their skin and wore skirts. Thinking of my own reasons for modesty, I wondered what doctrine within these faiths led women to dress and act the way they do.

I'm never one to expose much skin but it was helpful to visit the Holy Land in the winter because it was easy and comfortable to wear things that covered my arms and legs.  Almost all of the holy sites, whether they are Muslim, Christian or Jewish, have rules against wearing anything revealing. Pictures show no swimwear but also no shorts or tank tops. Modesty is key.

It is for me too.  I spent a year and a half serving in Young Womens were there was much emphasis placed on dressing modestly.  I would say LDS youth, girls especially who are encouraged to cover chests, shoulders, thighs and midriffs, are some of the most conservatively dressed teens today.  But, they wouldn't win any kind of conservative dress competition held in Israel.  Not with their long, shiny curled hair and wearing those skinny jeans.  Not even with a shade shirt underneath a maxi dress (modest sleeve length should come at least to the elbow. My Relief Society jiggle arms love rules like this!)

Our guide explained the reasons for their appearance to us. In Judaism,  a woman's hair is considered her "crowning glory" and to show it to anyone but her husband is considered immodest.  Muslim women also do not show their hair to anyone other than their husband once they are married.  I guess seeing hair is irresistible and too tempting for men. It makes those fundamental polygamous women, with their hair piled on top of their heads behind the bang bump seem almost scandalous. Some ultra conservative Jews even go beyond covering their hair and shave their heads so that their modesty will remain intact.  Even more strange than that, to me, is that they can then wear a wig (a head covering) and be considered ok. Huh.

Besides hair being too tempting for men, the area of a woman's body where her legs meet is never to be shown in public.  I saw many Muslim women wearing pants but a skirt or long coat was always worn over them.  Jewish women preferred long skirts with tights.

In both mosques and synagogues, women and men usually separate during prayers.  At synagogue, the women's area is usually a level above and women are behind a prayer screen.  In a mosque, women are usually sequestered to a separate place room from men but in some mosques are allowed to pray behind or adjacent to me. I don't know anything about Greek Orthodox but I wouldn't be surprised if they, too, separated by gender while worshipping.  I'm very familiar with men and women being separated during sacred worship in my own religion.

After learning the reasons why Jewish women are separated from the men in synagogue, I wondered why other faiths separate by gender during worship.  Jewish women are considered unclean during menstration and for 7 days following the end of their period.  Until they have immersed in a mikveh, or ritual bath, they cannot sleep in the same bed as their husbands.  Our hotels always had two twin beds that could be separated or pushed together.  As individual women are not inspected or interviewed about where in their cycles they are, all women are kept separate from men.  I guess they consider it being on the safe side of things.  I don't know why Muslim women separate but I suspect it's for the same reason.  I don't think that's why we separate in the temple but maybe I'm wrong.  No one has ever told me.  I always thought it was due to the order of things.

It made me think of the story in the New Testament about the woman with an issue of blood touching the hem of Christ's robe.  This was a big deal.  A man touched by an unclean woman would have also been considered unclean.  Two things impressed me more after learning more about how the jewish faith viewed this sort of uncleanliness.

First, that the woman admitted to the touching.  She obviously had great faith to believe that her action would have had the result that it did but I think she showed even greater faith to admit to a crowd of Jews what she did.  The scriptures admit that she was scared.

Second, I love Christ's reaction and I think there is much to learn from it.  Christ knew something had happened.  I'm not sure why the laws concerning blood were originally given but he sensed a physical difference when something unclean had touched him.  We know that Christ perfectly followed God's laws as well as His will.  By law, he could have been angry and vengeful.  Instead, he rewarded her faith and ushered in the end of Mosaic law.

After witnessing all of this covering and separating and the various reasons for it, I wondered, "Are we women more than our bodies? Are we more than hair to show or not show and legs to show or not show?  Am I more than my uterus?"

I know that I am. I don't deny the unique and essential role women have in childbearing but because we know through revelation that gender is an essential part of our eternal identities, and the promise and hope of becoming like God isn't to become a uniform, sexless being, I know that who I am, as an individual with thoughts and goals and talents and likes and dislikes is important to God. As a female.

I see all these women and though our beliefs, reason and understanding are all different, I respect their faith. We are obedient to what we have been taught, whether it is to cover our shoulders or our hair.  We live in communities with traditions and habits.  Some wear wigs.  Some don't buy crucifixes or Mary icons. But, like a young Mary who was told by an angel what her role on earth would be, we trust that God knows us and loves us and like the woman with the issue of blood, we know He has the power to fix what seems unfixable.

12 of 12 - February

Obsessed with toothbrushes right now.

Entertainment for the 8 hours Sam, Daniel and I will spend in the car today.

Waiting for Sam's appointment at the opthamologist in GJ.

Testing to see the strength of prism adaptation they'll put on his glasses to prepare him for surgery in a month.

On the way home.  The roads are less snowpacked and I'm calm enough to take pictures of the beautiful scenery. (This morning...not so much.  I was trying not to slide off the road). 

A nice view of Purgatory on the way home. 

Jay had dinner ready when we got home.  Chicken, rice, quinoa and celery.  

The prism stickers.  Way more obtrusive than I thought they'd be. 

They force Sam's eyes to cross and make his vision blurry.  This is going to be a long, hard month.  Please pray for Sam. 

Listening to the State of the Union.  

Trying desperately to get in several photos so I gave in and just took one of him.  

Making his Valentine box.

When The Messiah Comes...

I don't know much about the book of Revelations.  I know....I know.  I am embarrassed that, once again, I am forced to admit my deficient scripture knowledge.  Honestly, the Book of Revelations kind of scares me.  Beasts and fire and war.  Those aren't my favorite things to think about.  I know somewhere in there, there is a promise that the righteous need not fear so I'm working that angle.

With that admission out of the way, I can say that when our group arrived at Megiddo, an ancient fortress upon a tell, and we were told it will be the site of Armageddon (which is actually a mispronunciation of Har (Mountain) Megiddo.  Say it fast.  Harmegiddo.  Armeggedon.  You see?), I wish I had come better prepared.  It was the first day of our tour and even though I took lots of pictures, it wasn't until we had spent a few days in Jerusalem that I really started to appreciate the reality of the end of times happening in this very land.  Not that it felt dangerous or I was fear ridden, but simply due to the recipe for disaster all of that history, geography, religious strife, economy, pride add up to create.




Megiddo has already seen its fair share of war.  I think it highly interesting that an essentially abandoned area that archeologists say already say has seen 26 different civilizations come and go, will be the site of war once more.  In fact, it was the site of a major battle during World War I when the Ottomon Empire fell to the British.  If you think about it, the British winning that battle and then essentially ruling over the area for the next 30 years during the British Mandate of Palestine facilitated the returning of Jews to Israel.  And, I have no doubt, the Jews being back in Israel is going to play a major part in that great, final battle on earth.

I learned several things about tells, or ancient fortresses built and rebuilt throughout history.  First is there is always a city gate and the gate is usually at the lowest elevation of whichever fortress.  That fact has aided archeologists at excavation sites because they can usually start digging at the lowest spot, find the city gate, and then predict where other notable fortress cites will be because most were built in a similar design.  I felt awfully proud of myself when our guide stopped in front of these stairs and asked the group what we were looking at.  When I answered, "The gate!" she smiled and said someone had been paying attention.  One is never too old to enjoy being teacher's pet:)





The stairs leading to a path up to the fortified walls.



Passing through the gate where the sentinels would be.



At the top.  You can see exactly what these non-excavated tells look like.  The spot we were standing on had ruins exposed and that grassy hill behind Maureen undoubtedly has more.



Megiddo's location is the reason for its 26 different civilizations.  It is located exactly where anyone traveling between Egypt and the Far East or Europe would need to stop.  All empires wanted control of it.



A German archeologist kind of tore up the place in the early 1900s.  He wanted to get to the bottom of it, literally, and sort of blasted his way down as far as he could go.  I'm no expert and looking at the side of that mountain is like reading Chinese characters, but for those in the know, it reveals 26 different civilizations.  Huh.




This ancient altar was found down low.  And see all of those date palm trees?  They think soldiers must have eaten dates and tossed the pit aside.  Some took and, voila!  Date trees!



Advanced water and food storage was also discovered.  During Roman times, each kingdom was responsible for feeding the Roman army for a month.  They would need areas like this, with a stairway going down and another going up, to store large amounts of food.



Do you know what this is?  It's called a manger.  This stone structure is what was probably used to cradle the infant Jesus.  It's the perfect size! Put a little bit of hay in it and it'd be kind of cozy. They are found everywhere.  Remember, Israel is the land of rock and stone.  I also realized, for the first time, that manger is what animals used to feed from.  Manger.  In french, manger means "to eat."  It's just one of those lightbulbs that probably should have been lit a long time ago.



The national park system had some ironworks to help us visualize the history.  Kind of cheesy.



Unless you liven it up a bit.  Giddyup!



Another visual.  A horse eating from a manger.  Or, in french, un cheval mange dans manger!



A bit of history, should you be interested.

So, what does that have to do with Christ coming again?  Well...we know all nations will come to battle against Jerusalem and they will gather at Megiddo. O.K.  I didn't know that but now I do.  And, having been in Jerusalem, I think it's interesting that the assembly, I'm thinking United Nations or something, strategically setting up camp there would block Jerusalem from their food supply.  Or, maybe that's where the defensive base camp will be.

We also know that Christ will return in triumph at the Mount of Olives. I've tried to show in other posts the location of the Mount of Olives in relation to the temple mount, so if you're looking at the model below, and you had binoculars, you could be standing on the Mount of Olives where Christ will stand.



Notice the gate at the bottom of the temple.  It is the east facing gate and the gate many believe Christ entered on palm Sunday.  It was and is called the Golden Gate and also the Mercy Gate because Jews used to pray for mercy at this gate.



Look at the gate now.  It is sealed.  On maps, its area is described as "out of bounds."  Neither the walls nor the gate are original but each of the 8 gates within the city walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt where they were originally located.  When the muslims took control of the city, they sealed this gate because Jewish theology contains a prophesy that the Messiah will enter Jerusalem through the Golden Gate.  Whenever it was in view, I couldn't stop staring at it.

Not only that, but muslims know that the Elijah is prophesied to return to earth to herald the coming of the Messiah.  They've done their family history and know that Elijah is a descendant of Aaron making him a priest and Jewish priests are not allowed in cemeteries.  So, what did they do?  They built a muslim cemetery directly below the Golden Gate.  Maureen and I walked the ramparts of the city walls and this picture was taken from the city wall looking below at the muslim cemetery.  Across the Kidron valley is the Mount of Olives, where Christ will return.



Also on the Mount of Olives is an enormous Jewish cemetery.  In most Jewish cemeteries, the feet of the deceased are pointed in the direction of Jerusalem, where all resurrected are promised to return.




They also believe, or used to believe, that the closer they were buried to the temple, the earlier they'd be resurrected.  Look at that hillside.  It is all graves.  It's a cemetery against a cemetery.

No man knoweth when Christ will appear again on the earth but Jerusalem, Megiddo, Israel, is where it is going to take place.