Palm Sunday

APRIL 6, 2009
As you all know, Sunday was Palm Sunday—the day that Jesus rode a donkey in to Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives. I was incredibly blessed to follow that same path walking with throngs of people of all nationalities. Most had big palm branches or small olive branches like I had. Some groups had musical instruments—and played as we walked. It was very meaningful …mostly I walked along and could hardly talk just trying to take it all in.

We were blessed to have one of the Arab teachers to be our guide—Rula. She was just wonderful—a very gregarious, pretty lady who knew so many people. We (Austin, Katie, Eula, Lisa, Kristen, Trish, me) met her at her church, which is a large Catholic Church down the street from our school—she had a taxi van come pick us up—and she knew just where to take us. We walked down the backside of Mount of Olives—on the road coming from Bethany—and there were children selling palm branches & olive branches—so we all got one. We walked a good ways, and then she told us to wait…and when her church group came by, we joined in the crowd. We were walking down a road with all these people—some of whom were singing with musical instruments—I even saw a violin among the group. Someone would be carrying a speaker, so we could hear the music. Mostly it was singing, “Hosanna” or “Jerusalem”—in different dialects and languages. The area is all Arab, so there were people above us watching as we walked along—hundreds upon hundreds of people snaking our way toward Jerusalem. As we walked, we looked out at the city of Jerusalem all spread out before us…so beautiful …and so much like it must have been when He rode in on the donkey. I was so filled with gratitude that I could be there and see how it must have been and feel the excitement and joy of that crowd. I believe it was very similar to that 2000 years ago—everyone so happy to see Jesus…and then at the end of the week, the same crowd turning against Him.

The walk was quite a ways—it took over 2 hours—I have pictures as we walked along and made the climbs and then walked down—and then we arrived at the Mount of Olives, and the walk narrowed to steps leading down in to the Old City. We went in to the Lions’ Gate—and went to a patio with so many people…then we went back out the gate and stood/sat on either side of the walkway out to watch a parade of “scouts.” Rula had been telling us we needed to stay to see the scouts, but I couldn’t figure out what ever she was talking about—well, it was scout troops—several of them played bagpipes! It was just amazing—these people playing bagpipes—and we spotted two of our students in different groups. They were so cute—we were jumping around getting pictures. That parade was quite long—went out on to streets of Jerusalem.

It was late when it was over, so we all walked (a long way!) to Spaghetime’s and enjoyed a meal—ended up being 12 of us to eat. We were all very, very tired but had a great day. I am very blessed to have been in Jerusalem on that day.

I appreciate your prayers and emails. Please continue to pray for my friend Wilma—she is still having health problems. Also, please pray for me, my family and Jerusalem School.
Love
Beth