Posted 2013-12 -29 by AGF 

 After a few hours inside The Old City I started my walk to The Mountain of Olives but first I stood and just looked out on the canvas of history that was in front of me, to think I was standing in a part of the world that changed the world, the very place where we all began.  A place so peaceful yet it is known for the acts of violence are taken against it.  A place where beauty in the present is overshadowed by the ugliness of its past.

  I made my way down the Mount of Olives Jewish Cemetery, the most important cemetery in Jerusalem.  Burials started 3,000 years ago and now have 70,000 tombs from different times, among them tombs of famous figures in Jewish History.  Among them Menachem Begin, Israel’s sixth Prime Minister.  The cemetery lay just across the Kidron Valley, according to Jewish tradition this is where The Resurrection of the Dead would begin once Messiah appeared on the Mountain of Olives and head toward the Temple Mount.

  After walking through the cemetery and the Kidron Valley, I found a place and just sat and looked at the Old City and just appreciated where I was, a place most people don’t dream of going, least of all a black man in his mid forties.  And while most people go on a journey because the country they visit is safe, what drew me to Israel was the complete opposite.  I don’t know what it was inside me but I had to see all of this for real and sitting there staring out onto this beautiful land I knew I’d be back.

Now this mountain I must climb
Feels like the world upon my shoulders
Through the clouds, I see love shine
It keeps me warm as life grows colder

I can’t think of a better way to finish my time than walking up The Mountain of Olives.  It was one of the steepest climbs I’d ever done in my life, but it was worth every single step, and I will do it again one sweet day.  Once you reach the top and see all of Jerusalem there is no sight like it on the planet.