hear O Israel… Part 3
(Panorama taken from the top of Mt. Tabor)
It has yet to cease in it’s amazement the fury and pace of my time in Israel. I have had more thoughts and questions, insights and renewed conviction than ever before in my life. I think it’s what draws this story line out. It seems to be more and more a part of my daily life.
Photos do tell a story. I guess that’s why I love photography. Jesus told word pictures called parables… “The Kingdom of heaven is like…” a man who… a woman who… a mustard seed… a treasure… a net… king… a landowner… Jesus had a way of drawing the crowd into a physical thing to reveal a spiritual thing.
I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
What an image… Children? hmm.
In Israel, things are very physical. I know that sounds like a stupid statement and it probably is. However, growing up in a protestant/restorationist movement, I was always taught physical wasn’t the point. We don’t worship idols or anything physical because God is spirit and we only worship in spirit and truth. It was the scripture that said, “you believe because you’ve seen, blessed are those who believe but have never seen.” So for me the physical Israel vs. the Spiritual Israel, started to clash in my system… and I had been in Israel less than 24 hours. Everything that I had read about, that I believed about I was seeing. My photos and my eyes began to capture glimpses of the kingdom of heaven.
After leaving Nazareth, Nir and I headed further north to Mt. Tabor.
Mt. Tabor sits at the eastern end of the Jezreel Valley, 11 miles (17 km) west of the Sea of Galilee. Its elevation at the summit is 1,843 feet (575 m) high and believe me, it seems higher. It is used in Scripture as a symbol of majesty. Jeremiah 46:18 (NASB) “‘As I live,’ declares the King Whose name is the Lord of hosts, ‘Surely one shall come who looms up like Tabor among the mountains, Or like Carmel by the sea’” It is majestic.
As we made the climb, in our vehicle not with our legs, I was amazed at the view. It is no wonder early church fathers would have considered this to be a place of importance and claimed it for the majesty of Christ’s Transfiguration. And that is what lies at the top of this mountain, the Basilica of the Transfiguration.
The date of the earliest churches on Mt. Tabor is unknown. The Anonymous Pilgrim of Piacenza saw three basilicas in 570. Willibald, 8th Century, mentions only one church dedicated to Jesus, Moses, and Elijah. The current church was built in 1924 and belongs to the Franciscans.
There were a few pilgrims there… some were re-reading the accounts from their bibles Matthew chapter 17 or perhaps Mark 9, and I found myself having a hard time relating. My mind and my teaching was screaming, “THIS IS NOT THE PLACE!” “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”
My spiritual instruction taught:
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