At the Western Wall

Today I went to the Western Wall. As I knelt with my hands on the wall, a woman came and stood beside me and began weeping her heart out to God.

Listening to her heart-wrenching cries to Adonai, I could see on the ground beneath me countless slips of paper: crumpled, folded, some covered with a hurried Hebrew scrawl and others neatly printed. The prayers of other pilgrims offered up here to Yahweh. Drops of water in between slips marked the tears of the woman standing in my place before me.

Mostly I just felt and was moved and knelt in the Presence of God and the precious Hebrew women around me. Why do I always think I need words? There’s something so beautiful about just weeping in prayer before God. I just felt so...cleansed.

I wanted more than anything to wrap my arms around the weeping woman beside me. The language and cultural barriers suddenly seemed so insignificant. "As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maid look to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the LORD our God, till he shows us his mercy…pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge."*

She’s not the only one. The aching and searching and longing in her heart must be so real for many who come to this site where God once dwelt tangibly on earth with man, now ancient remains.

If only they knew the glorious hope that awaits and is available to them. A verse that was impressed on my heart as I knelt there was Revelation 21:2-4: “‎I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband...They will be His people and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Rev. 21:2-4).

The promises of long ago that God made for His people here remain. They just haven’t been fully realized yet. But they have been secured for them by the Lamb, if they will receive Him and His hope.

Even now, there is more than just weeping at this place. On the other side of the wall dividing the men’s and women’s quarters, several bar mitzvah’s were taking place with much rejoicing. The women stood on plastic chairs to see, laughing and calling out to their sons, brothers, and friends. People from both sides threw candy across
to each other in a sort of game.

On the men’s side a little boy stood eagerly beside his father with a cluster of men strapping on phylacteries on their arms (see picture below), face lighting up when he caught a stray piece of candy. Some of the younger men laughed and bantered playfully back and forth. An older man mouthed prayers as he repeatedly kissed his shawl.

Nearby, a boy with wide eyes held a Torah scroll out before him with a sort of stunned excitement. A series of animated blessings were given to him by all the men clustered around him, punctuated periodically with emphatic amen’s.

What rich fullness of life and community. Rejoicing before the Torah and each other as their sons became men.

These things point heavenward too, don’t they? Not, this time, by contrast but by reflecting very dimly the fullness and life and rejoicing that is to come. I mean, if these things are only a shadow, how much more glorious will the coming kingdom be?


*Ps. 123:2; Ps. 62:8