This and That

I found a wonderful new site for school ideas. (And I'm thinking of making some of these file folder games for our Wisconsin trip in Nov.). I'll try to add the link to my sidebar, but not sure it'll do it. Just in case I don't get it or forget to try (kids' naptime is nearly over) it's www.filefolderfun.com

Melissa and Mike (Matt's sister and husband) and their three little girls were here this past week. We had 7 kids 5 and under in the house and it went amazingly well. Seems like last year there were more squabbles, but with everyone being a little older there wasn't so much toy battling. Micah thought Uncle Mike was great, and Aunt Lamissa or Samissa too for that matter. Lissy called her Aunt Beelissa. One day she and I took Micah and the babies with us to Mobile to the thrift store while Mike kept the 4 older girls at home. Well, ages 5,3 1/2, 3, and 2 doesn't sound "older" does it? Bless you Mike. :) I've not taken Micah shopping without the girls much before so I didn't know how much fun he is to shop with. He helped me pick out shoes for myself. I was looking for high heels so I showed him some to give him an idea what I was looking for. From then on he would (loudly) announce "Deez are coot. (These are cute). I hope deez fit you. I tink dey don't." and on and on. He has pretty stylish taste. Then we found the biking helmets and sports gear. He wore a red bicycle helmet (which we ended up getting. How could I resist when he grins so big at his "mo-cylce" helmet?), those football things that go over their shoulders like giant shoulder pads, a badminton raquet, and a baseball glove. All at the same time. He'd grin and run to Aunt Melissa saying "Wook at me!" She really stole his heart when she gave him a box of Fiddle Faddle to snack on.



I've been reading in a book off and on for a while called Jerusalem, the Tragedy and the Triumph by Charles Gulston. It is a history of Jerusalem, starting way back with Abraham and Mt. Moriah, where Abraham went to offer Isaac. I am now up to the point in its history where Jesus died. It is contrasting the traditionally accepted site of Golgotha inside the city on which the shrine The Church of the Holy Sepulcher has been built to mark it as the crucifixion site, to a small hill outside the city wall in an area that is now Arab Jerusalem which is the only place in Jerusalem that is said to have borne and still bears the name "Skull Hill".

Excavations have revealed the tops of two Roman gates, and appear to confirm the belief that the present north wall follows the line of the ancient wall and is just where it was in Jesus' day. If this is so, then Golgotha could not have been where the Church of the Holy Sepulcher now stands, because it was "without the gate" that Christ suffered (Hebrews 13:12). I said all that to explain that "Skull Hill" on Mt. Moriah mentioned below, although not where man has for over a thousand years said Christ was crucified, fits the description very well.

I love how the Lord ties things together throughout history:

"It is also believed that 'Skull Hill' is a continuation of Mount Moriah, being its southern end. The abrupt face of the hill is the result of a moat cut be the Maccabees to keep their enemies at bay, and few realize that Golgatha was at one time connected with the northen portion of Mount Moriah on which the temple was built. Moriah was the scene of Abraham's preparation for the sacrifice of Isaac. Calvary was enacted there, in type. Later, at the same spot when 'an angel of the Lord stood by the thresing floor of Araunah the Jebusite,' Judgement on Jerusalem had been stayed. At Golgotha, judgement on the believer was canceled. On the threshing floor David built an altar; at Golgotha stood a cross, on which was offered the supreme sacrifice."

Another paragraph I liked said:

And it is John who tells us that "in the place where Jesus was crucified there was a garden" (John 19:41). There is something peculiarly significant about this piece of information. Man began his long sojourn on the earth in a garden, Christ spent many hours in a garden. This one on the Mount of Olives, and heaven itself could be a garden. This one could very well have been at the base of the Crucifixion hillock, for it "was near by" with the newly hewn sepulcher in the cliff face where it was customary to place tombs.

Gotta go get kids ready for church.

I'll post some pictures later.
Rose