Armageddon

We met up with our new tour group early Friday morning in Tel Aviv. We started off the morning exploring Jaffa. Apparently, Jaffa is the original port city and Tel Aviv grew around it. Now, Tel Aviv is so big that Jaffa is seen as a little port lining Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv houses all the embassies even thought Jerusalem is the actual capital of Israel. That is because the Arabics as well as some other countries refuse to recognize Jerusalem as the capital due to its religious significance. Tel Aviv inhabits a quarter of Israel’s population, and consists mostly of immigrants. We visited the house of Simon the Tanner (where the apostle Peter stayed).

Jaffa (or Joppa) has great significance. In Greek history, it is the site of the Andromeda rock. In Biblical history, it is where Jonah was swallowed by the whale, where Peter raised Tabitha from the dead, and where Peter received the vision from God about eating unclean food (or ministering to the Gentiles). Unlike most of Jerusalem, the buildings in Jaffa are constructed from sandstone. The roads are still built from limestone, however, as limestone is better able to handle the wear and tear of travelers.

We then went to Caesarea, the city Herod the Great built to honor Caesar Augustus. It was extremely grand, featuring a theater, an amphitheater, a beautiful palace, and an extravagant bathhouse. It is said that Caesarea was even more extravagant than Rome. Here, Pontius Pilate governed and Herod, the last Jewish king, died Caesarea is where the first Gentile (Cornelius) became a believer, and where Paul was imprisoned at the end of ministry (and wrote the majority of the New Testament). We also explored vestiges of the Crusader’s fortresses that they left in the 1100’s.

We then headed to Megiddo, aka Armageddon. Because Megiddo lies on the crosswords of many many countries, it is the site of numerous and battles and wars. In fact, the city has been conquered and razed so many times that it is actually 25 different cities build on top of one another.

Many famous Old Testament battles were fought here including ones involving Deborah, and later King Josiah.  We climbed to the top of the city and looked down on the valley where people believe that the last battles in Revelation are to take place. Up to a hundred years ago, the city was surrounded by swamp. Now it is a dry desert. We exited the city by climbing through the city’s secret source of water – a hidden underground water tunnel that leads into the swamp surrounding Megiddo.