The experience of a lifetime happened this week!

This has been a pretty interesting week. We finished classes for the semester. We just have 2 days of field trip going to the places of Jesus’ last week. They are tomorrow and Tuesday.

Sandy Autry and her sister Lori arrived on Thursday night. We got to go to the Western Wall to welcome in the Sabbath with the students. They had a wonderful time and they definitely have “shiny eyes” that make them stand out in a crowd.

On the weekend we had District Conference. Elder Rasband (Senior President of Seventy) and Elder Price (Area Authority) came. We had a new District Presidency called. It’s David Whitchurch, who is the Academic Associate Director here at the center. His life was already busy. I guess it just got more so!

Our field trip last week took us down to the Dead Sea: Qumran, Masada, En Gedi, and swimming in the Dead Sea—not that I went swimming. We had the clearest conditions—the best I had ever experienced.

This Picture shows the Dead Sea out of the bus. You can see all of the way to Jordan! It was gorgeous! The Dead Sea at 1300 feet below sea level is usually hot, so it was nice for the girls to cool their feet in a pool at En Gedi. This was the place where David was hiding from Saul and had the opportunity to kill him, but refused because Saul was the “Lord’s anointed.”

The Falls here are beautiful. We didn’t go all of the way up because we were too exhausted!

But the most exciting this week was that a group of us were guests of the WAQF (which controls the haram es-Shariff where the Dome of the Rock is) and were taken on a tour of the al-Aksa mosque and the Dome of the Rock!!!!!!! We got to go inside both of them. I didn’t think that would be possible because non-Muslims are rarely allowed in there any more!

                                                                                   Me in the Mosque.

These pictures are in the Dome of the Rock. Both buildings are going through renovations at the moment, but they are still gorgeous buildings!

Continuation of the Easter Celebration

We're off on our Dead Sea field trip in a couple of hours. I only have 9 more days with Lana. I'm not ready for the students to leave! Final exams are this week.

This week continued the Easter celebrations. On Saturday there was the Holy Fire celebration at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. I didn't go because of church and Lana was teaching Relief Society. But some of our students were able to get into the church. Reports were that there were 10,000 people in the church, which is insane to think about. They have a fire in the tombs (which we experienced earlier on our field trip this week). People take candles to light from the fire and then pass on the fire. Some of it is put in containers and rushed to the airport where it is flown all over the world! Picture #1 shows our students in the midst of all of the celebrations!

Picture #2 is Rayna, Sarah, Lauren and I at the Good Friday Via Dolorosa parade. We're just about to enter the church of the Holy Sepulcher courtyard. On our field trip to the Christian churches this week we were able to see parts of a Coptic Washing of the Feet ceremony. That was a fun experience. Especially as we were studying John 13 at the time. I taught part of our lesson at the Wohl Museum in front of a foot washing basin from the first century!

On our field trip to the Jewish Quarter we went to the excavations of the Burnt House. It was destroyed when the temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD. Picture #3 are pictures of a spear and a child's arm that were found in the excavation: a very sad reminder of the human tragedy of that time. 

Returned from Galilee just in time for Good Friday

Sorry that I haven’t written for a couple of weeks. We were up in the Galilee for 11 days and we’re constantly on the go up there. It’s all that I can do to keep up every thing. It’s a wonderful trip. Just exhausting! We went to all of the same sites as last semester, but we didn’t have the rainy weather when we were on field trips, which was nice. It was good to have Lana up there, but I hardly saw her. The two classes are going in different directions except for the last three days, which are long field trip days. 

This picture is sunset on the Galilee from my bungalow! Did you see the Church’s latest Easter video clip, “He lives”? The last scene is of Mount Arbel and it looks like it is taken from En Gev, where we stay. The students had fun sitting on the beach watching it, and seeing the live picture and comparing it with the video. We actually had remarkably clear visibility this trip, which was lovely. I felt a little more at ease with the field trips this time. On the last day I even flew solo, because Jeff Chadwick had sprained his ankle so he drove straight back to Jerusalem. I did ok though, so I was happy with that. 

Again, I loved the visit to the Mormon pioneers in the local cemetery. I was especially touched when one of the students, Mary, began pulling the weeds on Georg Grau’s grave as I was speaking. I think that she wanted to honor this man who sacrificed so much for the Church in Haifa.

We got back late on Thursday night. Friday was Good Friday, so we had class and then headed down to the Old City to participate in the Via Dolorosa parade from the Antonia Fortress to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. The parade winds its way through the old city past each of the stations of the cross. It was a wonderful atmosphere. It was all in Arabic, but I loved being in the middle of the devotion of all of the people who were participating.

This morning, (resurrection Sunday) we all got up early and went to a dawn service at the Garden Tomb. It was a wonderful service: a great sermon by a Pastor from Oxford and great music. I loved being there.

I have really enjoyed celebrating Easter here in Jerusalem. I am so grateful for blessings of the atonement in Gethsemane and on the cross and for the Savior’s resurrection, which makes possible everything that I hold dear in my life.

I can’t believe that this group of students will be leaving in just two weeks. Where has the time gone? I have loved getting to know them and working together. I have felt the Spirit so strongly as we have studied the Old and New Testaments and my love for the gospel has tangibly deepened, in ways that I have never experienced before.