Jerusalem, Pizza Hut, and Israel in Israel.

Hello again my good readers. I was thinking today, with a little help from a Friend, that these long posts may be scaring away some of my readership. Let me promise you all this: a long post means a full day. A full day means a good one and typically I will blog about important days, not just everyday types. So I will try to keep it short, but I know ya'll want to know about life over here and about what I get to experience, hence the rush of large posts. That said, let's get to it.

Yesterday I went to Jerusalem. Wow, what a packed statement. It seems so commonplace around here already and I've been here what, three days? But really we did. It was so cool to go back. We arrived by bus at Jaffa Gate (West side of town) - the same place we arrived as a Corban posse last May. From there we toured David's Citadel, a big Herodian/Roman/Crusader/Muslim/Turk fortress at the gate. It is possible (nay, even probable) that Jesus stood before Pilate and was beaten in that area, a reality that was hard to grasp so early into our adventure and even now seems so far from real for me. From there we went to Christ Church just across the street in the Old City. It's the first Christian (Protestant is the word around here since there are SO MANY Greek Orthodox and Catholic churches/sites/monasteries etc. around here) church in Israel. We heard from a young Brit named Aaron about the history of it and how Believers witness to Jews, a young Messianic Jewish gal also explained a lot of that to us. It was really neat and super eye-opening. We just don't get it. Witnessing to Jews is the ultimate version of friendship evangelism. None of this mass evangelism bogus, it just isn't effective and/or it turns them away. Fast.
Then came lunch :) We had Pizza Hut of all things. But it was kosher of course, which means no meat because meat and cheese DO NOT go together over here. We ate in the little square outside the church, next to where the little Bible School "Word of Life" meets. The class had a break and one of the students (which are aged from roughly my age to one-foot-in-the-grave-the-other-on-a-banana-peel types) asked me where we were from and what we were doing. We had a good little conversation and I have a new friend, William, from France. The pronunciation of his name is more like Gillum (but with the Spanish double-l pronunciation, so it's like Gee-yum) Anyway, one of the men who walked out at the beginning of the break looked very familiar, so I asked William if a pastor named Israel taught there. He did, the man I saw was him, and I know him. Israel and his coworker, Max, met with our Corban group last spring and we got to see them when we were in Jerusalem. It was amazing to see him, it was a highlight of the day. (PS- pray for him. In brief, he's facing some persecution and has a court appearance coming up. If you know Dr. Trull or Dr. Anderson you can ask them for more info)
After lunch we began our long walk of the day. We stopped at a shop owned by another new friend of all of us IBEXers, Shabaan, and exchanged money. Then we went to the church of the Holy Sepulchre, the possible site of Jesus' burial and maybe crucifixion (but who knows for sure). Then onward through the crowded streets to the Damascus Gate, where we mounted a lot of stairs and began the North/East wall ramparts walk. We walked from there to Stephen's gate, where we came down and went to the pools of Bethesda. Oh, before that we saw no fewer than 7 soccer games going on inside the Old City. Gotta love that. Anway, the pools of Bethesda and the church of St. Anne. The church is probably one of my favorite places, the acoustics are phenomenal. I will try to post a video of us singing there, it is pretty sweet to say the least.
From there it was more walking through the busy streets and we eventually made it back to Jaffa Gate. All in all a long day, a good day, a lot of weird sights and smells and sounds. Day one of many more to come in The City. Afterwards I could have fallen into my bed and slept until the Rapture, but I decided it would be more beneficial to stay up until dinner and then do some homework. Good choice... Mostly.
As for Wednesday (which if you read this right away, is just starting for you :) It was our first real day of classes. I had History of Ancient Israel (HAI from now on) and Life of Christ (LC). Those classes will be absolutely amazing. Here's a cool fun fact: The prof, Abner Chou (less than 30 almost 2 doctorates guy) is more about learning and trying and understanding than he is about grading. Here's a good summary quote of how it will be, "You get two grades in this class, a deserved and an actual. The deserved is what you would get if a mean teacher graded your papers. The actual is what I give you. You don't need the pressures of grades, there's enough pressures as it is." I love this guy. And he has a great sense of humor (Dad, Dr. Anderson, Justin - and others - you would get this guy, he's a kick). After lunch I had Modern Hebrew. Let me explain something real quick. Everyone takes Land of the Bible (40 ish students). Maybe 8 aren't taking HAI. Maybe 2 aren't taking LC. In Hebrew class? Well that is a different story. There are less than 10 of us. And boy did we dive in today. I now know the alphabet (side note: Hebrew is where that word comes from, ask me sometime if you don't already know) and the correct pronunciations. This will be by far the most challenging simply because it is so very foreign (duh.) I would Really appreciate your prayers in that realm, I am hoping the gift of languages descends on me soon. But in all seriousness, all of my classes are going to be absolutely wonderful and I don't want to waste any of it so I would covet your prayers very much.
This has gone on long enough. I am sick of hearing my own voice and all I am doing is typing, so that is really saying something. Or maybe it's not saying anything... whatever. Until next time, enjoy life under our new pres. (will someone please email me a 5 sentence summary of the inauguration or something, we're clueless over here) don't cause too many problems in your local church, and take care of yourselves. I will avoid all rocket fire and IDF personnel as best I can.