Haylie

Today was our first day in Israel! With all of the built up excitement from the last four months the time has finally come! After a long trip on a plane, we were still thrilled to get here. We didn’t even unpack that night because we were too excited to get to the festival of lights that was happening in the city of Jerusalem. We did not get much sleep this night even though we had a great day ahead of us! Today, Tuesday morning we got to walk down the streets of the old city. We went to Saint Mark’s Syrian Orthodox church, which claims to have the upper room where Jesus had his last supper. This was amazing to see and be in the presence of this site. Everything here is built with lime stone the architecture is absolutely beautiful! This place is so full of history and biblical imagery. Today was a great orientation of the campus and the city. We had the privilege of the president of JUC (Paul Wright) come and welcome us. He immediately read to us Psalm 122:1 which says, “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’ Our feet have been standing within your gates of Jerusalem!” This is when it sunk in that I was here and that for the next five weeks I will be reading my bible and be able to be in these places that I am reading about. I am completely overwhelmed by what is in store for this trip and today was a complete eye opening experience for me. I’m happy to say that my journey through the history, the bible, and the geography of this beautiful land is only at its beginning!