Today was our final day in Israel.  We awoke with a mixture of joy and sadness.  Joy at the amazing things that we've seen and what's in store for us today, and sadness that we'd be leaving this place at the end of the day.

We started with a trip to the Holocaust museum, for a very personal and painful recounting of the massacre of the Jewish people at the hands of the Nazi's.

To begin our tour Tsvika had arranged for a Jewish Rabbi to perform a private ceremony for us. The setting was in a maze like forest of Jerusalem Stone. Etched into the rock walls were the names of the towns, villages and cities that were destroyed as a result of the persecution of the Jews during the Holocaust.

The Rabbi started the service by singing Psalm 89 and 93.  He was dressed in his Rabbinical robes complete with prayer shawl as he sang through the various Psalms and prayers.  His voice raised in praise and prayer had a sad tone which accentuated the sadness of the maze in which we were standing.

As he sang I could pick out various words in Hebrew that I recognized, "Adonai", "Elohim" and "Shalom".  Words that spoke of God and his peace being sung by an elderly Rabbi among the names of places that no longer exist was a stark and sad reminder of the extent the Jewish people have suffered.

The next stop on our tour of the Holocaust museum was a visit to the Children's Memorial.  Made with only 5 burning candles and hundreds of mirrors all around, you walk into a virtual starry night with millions of tiny points of light all around.  Each speck of light represents the life of one child taken by the Holocaust.  Tsvika explained that there were over six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust.  Of those, 1.5 million were children.  To give you an idea of the extent of this number, there are currently 1.3 million children attending school in all of Israel right now.  As you walked through the memorial, you heard the names of each of the children and the age when they died read in Hebrew, English, and Yiddish. There are so many children that it takes two months before a name is repeated.

Unfortunately the children's memorial was just the beginning of a one and a half hour excruciating journey through the main exhibit of the Holocaust.  Here we walked through a chronology of the events leading up to and during the Holocaust.  To say that the exhibit is emotionally draining would be a huge understatement.  The news clippings, personal journals, pieces of clothing, photographs, and video interviews are woven together in such a way that you get a full picture of the horror of what took place during those days, weeks, months and years of the Holocaust.

The exhibition opens with a quote from MARTIN NIEMOELLER:
When they came for the communists, I was silent, because I was not a communist
When they came for the socialists, I was silent, because I was not a socialist
When they came for the trade unionists, I did not protest, because I was not a trade unionist
When they came for the Jews, I did not protest, because I was not a Jew
When they came for me, there was no one left to protest on my behalf

There were no cameras allowed inside the exhibition hall and words are inadequate to describe all that we saw, heard and experienced.  It was moving to the point of tears. 

We must never forget what happened during those dreadful years and we must never allow anything like that to happen again.  We must meet evil of this type head on and not fear or shrink back. 

To be passive while atrocities of this type are happening, is to be an accomplice in its commission.  Proverbs 3:27 tells us, "Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, When it is in your power to do it."

Our next stop was a visit to another museum where we saw a model of what the city of Jerusalem would have looked like in the days of what is known as the second temple.  Solomon built a wonderfully beautiful temple that was destroyed during the Babylonian conquest during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar.  Ezra and Nehemiah reconstructed the city of Jerusalem and King Herod the Great rebuilt the temple and the temple mount area.

The model is built to scale and shrunk down immensely.  None the less, you get a great feel for what the city must have looked like during the time Jesus walked the earth.  It was a fantastic way to visualize how things might have been. One inch was equivalent to two yards.

The level of detail on this model was amazing.  The location of the hill that is known as Golgotha where Jesus was crucified is not known with any degree of certainty, but according to some Bible scholars might have been north of the city walls, since crucifixion took place outside the city.  We would finish our day in that area, but I'm getting ahead of myself again.

In the picture to the left, there is a rocky area just outside the city walls.  This is one of the possible places called Golgotha.

From the scale model of the city we went to see the original Dead Sea Scrolls.  This dovetailed quite nicely with our earlier visit to Qumran, the area where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. There were no cameras allowed here either, so I can't show you any pictures of original Dead Sea Scrolls.

We grabbed lunch in the little cafeteria at the museum and guess what?  They didn't serve falafel! Whoo hoo! Something different for lunch.  Kelly had the mozzarella sandwich and I had a blue cheese sandwich.  Yummm.

Before we went to our last stop on our tour we went shopping in the markets in the Old City.  It was quite an experience haggling with the shop keepers.  I must confess that I'm not as adept at haggling as others are, but I think everyone walked away feeling good about their purchases. 

At one place we found what was advertised as "David's sling".  It was a small leather pouch with a leather sling and five rocks inside.  They wanted $57! Ouch.  I tried to negotiate but at $50 they wouldn't budge any further.  Eric said that if it had five rocks it couldn't have been authentic, because David used one on Goliath.  Smart man that Eric, he saved me $50.

Walking through the market place north to the Damascus gate was the first time I encountered any anti American sentiment.  One shop keeper looked at me and said, "American?".  I proudly answered, "Yes!".  His face turned sour and dark as he shouted, "America, NO!"  No problem dude, I just won't purchase from your shop.

Finally we arrived at our last and perhaps most important stop of the tour, the Garden Tomb.  Here we saw the side of the hill known as Golgotha and saw how the shape of the hill, looked like a skull.  Golgotha is described as having an appearance like that of a skull and it was located near a park like setting.

Look at the picture to the left and tell me.  Do you see the skull?

The tomb is located nearby the hill, just as the Bible describes. It belonged to a wealthy man and has the right dimensions and characteristics of the tomb that might have been used to house the body of Jesus.

As we all filed into the tomb one at a time to take a look. There was a plaque on the door that has been made to replace the stone that once was rolled over the entrance.  The plaque says it all.

We took communion together just a short distance away from the tomb where Jesus rose from the grave and conquered sin and death.

It was a deeply moving, touching personal time to share in the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ in the very place where His victory for us was won.

We were so grateful to end our trip in Israel in this way.  It was the pinnacle experience.  The Garden Tomb was carefully preserved. It is green and lush and stands as a testimony to the Grace and Love that is ever present and offered to all mankind.

Revelation 3:20 says,  'Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.'

The stories are true, the people and places are real.  The only thing left for mankind is to realize that Almighty God desires to have relationship with each person and He sent His own Son to make that possible.

As with John the Apostle I say, "but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name." (John 20:31)

We hope to return one day to Israel with many more of our friends, for the journey has just begun.

Shalom!