Field Trip! Field Trip!

This past Monday we had our first field trip!  This particular field trip lasted only ¾ of the day, but they can last a full day depending on where we are going.  Since we have only been here about a week, this field trip was geared towards helping us orient ourselves with the city and to see Jerusalem from a bunch of different viewpoints.  We started out at 8:00 and headed towards Hebrew University to look at an overlook there.  Hebrew University is very close to the JC and their campus is beautiful!  We had an awesome view of the city and learned some really interesting facts there.  

The next stop we took was at the Seven Arches Hotel overlook.  This must be a popular site to take tourists because there was a ton of people here and there was even a camel!  Unfortunately we weren’t able to take pictures with the camel, but it was still cool to see.  At this hotel, we got a great view of Jerusalem looking towards the west.  It was interesting to see the different gravesites.  You have the Muslim cemetery on the west side of the Kidron Valley and you have the Jewish cemetery on the east.

We then went over to Augusta Victoria tower at the Lutheran Church of the Ascension.  We had a little devotional behind the building and got to see the Judean wilderness.  If it had been a little clearer we could have seen the Dead Sea, but it was really hazy.  Once we were inside, we were filed into the chapel portion of the church.  It was very open and beautiful inside.  The pictures I have don’t do it justice.  The ceilings and walls were covered in mosaics and had stained glass windows. The German Emperor wanted to incorporate himself into the church somehow so there are a bunch of coat of arms along the walls as well.  The church commemorates the event of Christ ascending into heaven.  We were able to pull out our hymnbooks here and sing four hymns.   Even though we don’t know for certain that this is the spot that Christ ascended into Heaven, when we were singing those few hymns, you could feel the spirit so strong.  It sounded so beautiful and it gave me the chills many many times.  That was probably my favorite part of the day.  After we snapped a few pictures, we went up the tower there and had a little discussion with Professor Stratford.  He can seem intense sometimes, but he really knows his stuff.  The view from up the tower was beautiful as well.

After this we went to Nabi Samwil.  This is believed to be the site where the Prophet Samuel died.  But as Professor Judd has said, no one really knows where all these events have taken place.  We had a really cool devotional here as well.  Out towards the north there is a place called Gibeon where two events from the Bible took place.  In short, 1 Kings 3: 4-12 is where one event took place.  This is where Solomon becomes a king and feels very overwhelmed and he asks the Lord to bless him with wisdom.  Another event is Joshua 10: 6-14.  This is where Joshua commands the sun and moon to stand still.  How cool is that? 

Gibeon- the hill place in the middle of the picture

Our last stop was at the Bethlehem overlook. Later this semester we will go into Bethlehem and visit the Church of the Nativity.  But we talked about Christ’s birth, sang a hymn, and discussed more events that took place here.  One interesting thing is that when Lehi left Jerusalem, He could have taken three routes to leave the city.  Where we were standing could have been one of them.  That just blows my mind!  I have had a lot of experiences like that lately.

Sorry for all the text!  I just had so much to write about!!