I had not given this day a single thought before I woke up and faced it. I've had my itinerary for a couple months, and I knew what was going to happen on this day, but for some out of character reason I didn't let my imagination tell me what it would be like. I could not have imagined a better day.
After breakfast this morning I fell into a panic; I had yet to decide which church I would attend, and convoys of my fellow travellers were already beginning to set out in taxis and buses to their various religious destinations around the city and across the wall. To make matters infinitely worse, I couldn't decide what to wear. In a fit of exasperation I threw together an outfit and forced myself to leave the room and decide my destination based on which group I would find in the lobby when I arrived there. The group in question was just about to head off to Christ Church Anglican, the first Protestant church ever built in Jerusalem. I thought I was probably in need of some choir and liturgy, so I took it as a sign. All the way to the old city I tried to imagine a nice high Anglican service. I pictured myself at the Cathedral Church of the Redeemer back home.
What I found when I arrived was quite a different picture. The setting was undeniably beautiful and serene; we walked through a verdant courtyard and into the neo-Gothic Victorian church. It was much smaller than any of the churches we had visited, and much, much simpler in its decoration- although I guess even Westminster is simple compared to the most insignificant of Greek Orthodox shrines. We arrived early, so we had a chance to sit and soak it all in.
Things I then noticed:
a man wearing a clerical collar, checking mics at the front
a piano, a keyboard, and a guitar set up off to one side
a projector screen
stained glass windows without any human subjects
an extremely attractive boy at the end of our row
Hebrew inscriptions on the altar
I was surprised by all of these things, but not disappointed. In yet another atypical Nans moment I decided that I was okay with not worrying what kind of gong show congregation I had walked into.
I somehow managed to forget that it was Pentecost Sunday. I have no idea how that happened. But that made it all the better when the service began and I was reminded.
I think it was when I realized it was Pentecost that things started to take on a whole new level of meaning. Before the service, my lovely trip friend Carol had struck up a conversation with the cutie at the end of the row, and it turned out that he was from Germany, but his father was Kenyan (shabbam!), and he had just arrived in town from Tel Aviv and had stumbled upon the church almost by accident. I could hear that half the people sitting behind us were American (southeeern draaaawl) and the other half were Swedish. One of the priests was Australian, another American, and the third Canadian. There were of course Brits all over the place, too. As we read Acts 2, I was struck by the synchronicity between the story of Pentecost and the story I was living out. Not only that, it hit me that the event described in the New Testament had occurred about a five minute walk from where I was sitting. And, by a small miracle of scheduling, I had witnessed the festival of Shavuot, the day on which Pentecost occurred, at the Western Wall a few days previously. The whole story took on layer after layer of new meaning. I could have cried.
By another strange coincidence, I knew absolutely every song that was sung during the service, from the awkward opening hymn to the 90s power choruses to the contemporary songs to the time-signature-less offertory hymn (although, to be fair, I learned it in Latin and thus had difficulty singing the English words). Even though no one else in the congregation seemed to know the songs like I did, that didn't stop them from completely givin' 'er vocally all the time. By the end of the service, people were shouting out for joy, and I was sending up a prayer of thanksgiving for my waterproof mascara. We ended with a song I hadn't heard for probably eight years but remembered word for word. There's nothing like spiritual nostalgia.
But the thing that I realized towards the end that almost brought me to my knees was that this was the first Pentecost since my September Transformation, which is when I would contend that I felt filled with the Spirit for the very first time. And the more I thought about it, the less I could ignore how God must have intended to have me in Jerusalem on this day.
I realized and experienced a whole lot of things during that service, most of which I will keep to myself until I can't anymore.
I fully remember, not just cognitively, exactly how I felt in September. I am overwhelmed by God's faithfulness in bringing me back to that place after all the shit that hit in February and March and April. I am vindicated in having looked at this adventure through those almost unbearable times as the light at the end of the tunnel. And I am furthermore overjoyed to think that this is just the beginning of the life I will make for myself as I constantly rely on my steadfast Provider.
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