TJ in the Holy Land – Bethlehem

Arriving to Jerusalem was almost overwhelming, as we drove through the city. Here, there was no more of the plains and fields that I saw previously but, there are lots of rock and hills in this area. It amazed me at how fast the climate had changed in the area, from Caesarea to Jerusalem. In Jerusalem there is a large blend of Jews and Muslims in the city, with the very small minority of Christians bringing only about 0.8 to 2% of the population(about 800,000 people). The community in Jerusalem is dependent on the government and city for support in order to live. There is nothing flat about Jerusalem. It, and other neighboring towns and cities are built on the hills.

Bethlehem was a very interesting town to visit and see. Not only that it was the birthplace of Jesus, which is awesome, but also of the unfortunate conflict and problems in Bethlehem and it’s people. Bethlehem was separated from Jerusalem from a giant wall, which began in the early 2000s,  pushing away Palestinian-Arab Christian and Muslims from the entrance to Jerusalem. The walls were decorated with tons of graffiti from the locals and even people who have visited it. Some of the art was showing signs of freedom and hope and other depressing ones showed brokenness and a loss of hope. The people in Bethlehem depends heavily on the tourism and their souvenirs that they sell. Later, we learned about the great injustice towards Palestinians and the Christians in Bethlehem. Many Palestinian families are separated from each other from different areas because of what nationality they are. It’s pretty messed up. Long story short, we get spoiled in America and we take our daily like for granted. Ever since then I had a new perspective to look through now as I looked in the town of Bethlehem. It’s too bad that Bethlehem, the place of Jesus’s birth was turned into this broken town. 

Well, as sad as it was it was time to move on. We went next to the Church of the Nativity, which was built on top of the place of where people believe Jesus was born at. In the inside we got to see how the church had aged and also who was in it. The pillars of the church was branded with engravings of people’s signatures and comments throughout time. Some of these engravings dated back many centuries ago. Though when we got adjusted to this historical and spiritual place we noticed the long and continuous line of anticipated people for what lied ahead of them. After  a long wait of, give or take, an hour and forty five minutes to two hours we were able to go down into the special place of Jesus’s birth. As you went in you saw a star and in the middle was a hole where you could put your hand on and rejoice. But so much happened so fast and I wasn’t able to process anything before I was pushed out into the exit of this sacred space. It wasn’t until I was out and actually had a second and to take in everything, that I finally understood what I just encountered. I just touched where our lord and savior, Jesus, was born and sent into this world. Sorry I just got all preachy but I just love the truth and powerfulness to that thought.

After this we went to the Shepherds’ Field where the angels came from heaven to this spot in Bethlehem to tell the shepherds that Jesus has come. On the hills there was a church that showed depictions of the scenes where the angels met the shepherds and other parts of Jesus’s life. Near the church their was a cave where we got to see what it would kind of look like at where Jesus was born.

The last thing we saw was the Herodium, which was super cool! It is a fortress built by Herod built after he became the King of the Jews, not the true one if you know what I’m saying, after he was proclaimed king by the emperor. On the top we could see the dominating view that Herod had for himself over the land. The interesting thing was that he had to literally move a mountain so he could have the grand view over Bethlehem and it’s surroundings. So much could be seen from here like churches, mosques, synagogues, mountains, towns/cities, and you could even see the Dead Sea if you looked hard enough by the desert mountains in the background.This place defiantly had the best view out of any other mounts or vintage points that I have seen so far. But there is still so much more to see…our journey isn’t over yet.