Palm Sunday Road is steep, the road curves sharply, and the pavement is worn smooth from the centuries of pilgrims who have walked it. So be careful coming down! Your calves are definitely going to get a work out.
And now, we come to the Garden of Gethsemane.
Some of the trees here date back to 1st century AD, so they could have been in the garden on that night that Jesus sweated blood and pled with the Father before surrendering.
Of course, being on the Mount of Olives, I assume the whole mountain was covered in trees. So was it exactly here in this section? I don't know. But we do know there was an actual Garden of Gethsemane.
And what happened here is what is most important. Gethsemane means "oil press". The process of pressing the olives was (and still is) very specific. It involves 3 separate pressings.
This is where Jesus was pressed; as He agonized over what was before Him.
This is actually one of my favorite churches to visit in Israel. The interior is made to look like night in a garden: midnight blues and golds, stars and garden imagery. Beautiful!
At the altar is the rock said to be where Jesus prayed. People come from all over the world to visit this garden and pray here.
And of course, the view outside of incredible:
While the Land has changed so much over the millennia, can you still see it? Can you imagine Jesus somewhere on the Mount of Olives at night, in a garden of olive trees where they pressed olives to make oil, pleading with His father as the Sanhedrin and Roman soldiers led by Judas are on their way?
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