Lecture

Every time I come to Jerusalem to teach, I make this my first stop because it’s a place where I remember why I’ve come, why the Lord has brought me to this place. The huge wall that rises above me is old. It dates to the sixteenth century, the same time as the Protestant Reformation in Europe. But that wall is modern in Jerusalem’s history. In fact, that 16th century wall is called the modern old city wall. Take a look at this. This offset wall here contains stones that builders shaped in the period between the Old and New Testament and has, actually, stones that were built in the New Testament era. And even older than that, I’ve got a limestone ledge on which the builders of Jerusalem always built the western wall of the city. These stones remind me how small and insignificant my time is here, and yet how important the Jerusalem stories are that need to be told in this place, how they all participate in my understanding and reading of God’s Word.

Jerusalem is the only place to start our journey. Why? Because Jerusalem brings meaning to the rest of the stories of this holy land. It’s amazing how Jerusalem attracts the attention of the world, and always has. Jerusalem is mentioned more than any other city in the Bible. And that’s because Jerusalem stands center stage in God’s unfolding plan of salvation.

Jerusalem resides at 2,400 feet above sea level, perched on top of the central mountain spine of the promised land, sixteen miles west of the Dead Sea and thirty-six miles east of the Mediterranean Sea. But a city like this really shouldn’t be here.

This is one of my favorite places to be in Jerusalem, particularly for understanding what Jerusalem became, and more importantly for us today, what Jerusalem was not at the time of its founding, the time of David. Let me help you understand the space. To the north is the place that Solomon eventually builds his temple. That was not there. It was a threshing floor and farm field. To the east, the long ridge of the Mount of Olives. New Testament cemetery, Old Testament cemetery. Nobody living there at the time of David. And then as we go from south towards the setting sun to the west and back around again to the north, nothing in that arc would have looked like it does now. Take away all the buildings, put in little villages, put in pasture lands, put in agricultural fields, and that’s what the space looked like.

So where was the city of David? Where was the first Jerusalem? Come here, I’ll show you. I don’t think you’re going to believe me, but honest, just here, in ten soccer fields, running from this point to the south is where the city of Jebus was, captured by David and made the city of David what became Jerusalem, the capital of Israel.

And we know something about where ancient near eastern capital cities went. And I’ve got to tell you this is a shocker to me as a geographer because it has none of the qualities that we would expect of a major city, much less the capital city of a country. It lacks, in order of importance, adequate supplies of water. Man, how can you have a huge city grow where you have such modest water supplies? Secondly, the topography does not allow you to farm many acres here, so you’ve got to import your food from somewhere else. And thirdly, you’ve got no connections to international markets either directly over land or by sea, and as a result, your economy is going to suffer. And nobody in their right mind would think of putting a capital city here on this ridge. The Lord did, and there’s only one reason why this became the capital of Israel. It was because the Lord chose it.

The Bible opens in ways that are very, very difficult to explain until you experience it. I just so long for other people to meet the place in the way that the biblical authors did. If you haven’t done this before, it’s not a very complicated art and you start one place at a time, and you start with places that are familiar to you, and you try to construct some sort of mental image of the space. And the next thing we can do is just learn everything we can about that place. What was it like there physically? What was it like there historically? What was it like there culturally? And one by one, I can begin to collect the idea pool that will help me to meet those places more closely to the way in which they were intended for me to meet them, as the poets and authors of Scripture intended.

Jerusalem is one of the ten oldest continuously occupied cities in the world. During the time of the Bible, Jerusalem covered only 1 percent of the space covered by the modern city today. Originally it was a small city-state called Jebus. King David saw it as a highly defensible site on which to set up his capital city. But how do you capture a city surrounded by deep valleys?

The stones that I’m walking on, the Jebusites would have built their city wall up on these same stones, and that’s what David was looking at when he looked at this place. Imagine having not only to get past this huge wall that would have existed here, but imagine the challenge then of fighting your way uphill to get into the city. He had a good idea. He used the water system.

We’re just beginning to enter the water system that actually was built at the time the Israelites were in Egypt. It’s a tunnel system that connects the Jebusite cities to their water source that’s outside their defensive walls. Where we are is in a power base. If you look down below here, you’re seeing where the water would have collected as it came in from the Gihon spring, and it becomes the source of water for the people who are living up in the city of Jebus. David had to worry about how he was going to get into this place. A frontal assault is going to cost lots of lives, and so the water system we’re in is the most likely way in which his general Joab carefully, secretly, quietly gained access to the city that would become Jerusalem.

This is one of those places I love. You don’t just hear a Bible story in a place like this, you feel it. You feel the danger, you feel the risk. Imagine taking this small guerrilla force that Joab had with him, moving quietly through these tunnels, trying to gain access to the city, and knowing all the while if you’re discovered you weren’t going to come out alive. These tunnels are narrow and difficult to fight in. It’s hand to hand combat. There was no artificial lighting when Joab was in this place. The tunnel was black. It was dark. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face, and you certainly couldn’t see your opponent, who might be hiding, waiting for your arrival.

Once the city was in David’s hands, this capital needed a palace. For years archaeologists wondered where that special building might be. King David’s palace. This is a place that enjoys lots of visitors. I love coming here because I couldn’t always do what we’re about to do. Beneath this set of stairs is archaeology that only began in 2005.

This place that you’re looking at right now was buried. When I came here there was a smaller platform and a visitor center, but this was all underground. And so for the first, what, maybe decade of the visits that I spent here, I walked over the top of this place, unaware that I was walking over the top of King David’s palace.

There are two things, architecturally, that really stand out. One of them is the capitol top that I see just here to my left. That is not something that would relate to Canaanite design but is clearly designed related to the way Phoenicians built in the north, which connects it to David because Hiram, king of Tyre, is the one who built this palace for him. And then beyond us here there’s a retaining wall, older than this building, but it’s interesting to me because it connects with the description of the building in 2 Samuel 5. David is said to have built his fortress palace inward from the foundation. That sounds strange to me because I build my house upward from the foundation. The foundation that we’re talking about is a retaining wall, and we’ve got an example of an ancient retaining wall here. So, all of the pieces fit: the size, the distinction in the architecture, the construction inward, and when you put all of that evidence together, I’m convinced that you and I are visiting the palace of King David, the building that marks the city of David as the capital of Israel.

Jerusalem is personified. It is given emotion and cognitive thought process. The authors and poets of Bible times didn’t think of this as a cold physical place on the ground. They thought of it as a person, as a companion in the enterprise of the kingdom of God. If you can feel that as a Bible reader, then you get Jerusalem. To appreciate Jerusalem, Bible readers need to know the story of its founding. But to fully understand Jerusalem, Bible readers need to see how God made this city His home.