It was a week before Good Friday sometime between noon and one o’clock in the afternoon. Together with 31 other Alabama Baptists, I had spent the morning walking the Via Dolorosa or Way of the Cross in Jerusalem. We had started at the Antonia Fortress where Jesus was tried before Pilate. We had stepped on stones believed to be from Jesus’ day; stones marking the place where Jesus was whipped with the cat-of-nine-tails and mocked by soldiers as “King of the Jews.”
We had stopped where Jesus stumbled under the weight of His physical burden and other sites marked along the way to Calvary.
Our group had climbed the steps that cover a rock outcropping where tradition says Jesus was crucified. We had looked through glass at that rock on either side of the marble altar erected atop the crucifixion site, touched the very place where the cross was said to stand and even noticed a split in the rock caused by the earthquake following Jesus’ death, at least according to tradition.
All of us had stood in line to enter the marble enclosed tomb from which Jesus was raised. Now only a single piece of original stone remains at the entrance for visitors to see. The rest is what crusader aristocracy thought fit for a king’s burial when they rebuilt the church in 1048 after it was torn down by a Muslim ruler.
Both Calvary and the empty tomb stand under the dome of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. According to early church fathers, the first believers in the Jerusalem church venerated this spot as the place where Jesus died. But Roman Emperor Hadrian so despised Christians that he destroyed their worship places and in 135 AD built a temple dedicated to Venus atop the place they worshipped.
About 200 years later (326 AD), Emperor Constantine tore down the pagan temple and constructed the first Christian church there. Since that time, Christians have been worshipping at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre almost continuously.
On this day I was preparing for a worship service later in the day at the Garden Tomb. The Garden Tomb, also known as Gordon’s Calvary, does not have much historical support as the site of Jesus’ tomb but it is much more spiritually satisfying to me and most other evangelical Christians than all the marble and incenses associated with the Church of the Holy Sepulchre — but that is another story.
My wife Pat and I had sat in the courtyard outside the entrance of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre trying to shelter from the strong gusts of wind that made havoc of displays outside the countless shops in the Old City of Jerusalem. After a while, we decided to escape the winds and went inside the church.
To the left of the entrance we found a stone bench where I continued my Bible study reading from John 11 where Jesus told Martha that He was the “Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in Me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in Me will never die.”
I read from Matthew 28 about the stone being rolled away from the tomb and the angel’s announcement that “He is not here. He has risen just as he said.” I read from 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 6. I read 1 Peter 1:3–4, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade.”
It was only then that I looked up and realized I was looking directly at the site of the crucifixion. There was almost a straight line between me and the mosaic display of Christ hanging on a cross, which hangs just in front of the silver star placed over the stone marking the crucifixion site.
Instinctively I looked to my left and found I was looking at the entrance to the traditional empty tomb.
Can you imagine the impact of reading about the hope of every believer because Jesus paid the price for sin on Calvary’s cross and was raised from the dead by the power of God, providing hope for eternity to all who accept His free gift, and then looking up to realize that you are looking at the place where it happened; to turn your head and see the empty tomb?
As if to add impact to the moment, the organ in one of the Roman chapels was playing softly and its melodious sound echoed off the ancient stone walls.
The moment was simply overwhelming. I was not the tourist I had been earlier that day as we explored the alcoves of the church. Now I was a worshipper caught up in the Bible, God’s Holy Word, and overcome by the sites of Calvary and the empty tomb in such proximity to one another. All I could do was bow my head and thank God for His steadfast love and abundant mercy.
That afternoon we visited the Garden Tomb. All of us took turns entering a tomb hewed out of the side of a stone cliff. We were surrounded by trees and flowers. It was more of a garden; more of a first-century feel than the marble slabs of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. We had a worship service there, prayed, sang and read Scripture. It was a good time.
Personally I wish Constantine had not moved those tons of rock and dirt in order to make a site for a church. I wished he had left it alone so believers could get a first-century feel at the more authentic site. But if he had, there might be a big box store sitting on the site instead of a church.
But no matter the condition of the place, I will never forget the moment of startling awe when I looked up from studying God’s Holy Word and saw both Calvary and the empty tomb.
Thank you, God, for that moment.
Share with others: