Central to today’s readings is Mount Zion, which appears in all of our passages. Mount Zion is “the holy mount of God” (Ezekiel 28:14) – a special expression for God’s place and presence on earth. In Psalm 126, we read, “When the LORD brought back the captives to Mt. Zion, they were like men who dreamed [of restoration] – their mouths laden with laughter and their tongues fraught with songs of joy” (verses 1-2). What had earlier seemed forever lost and impossible to them had been accomplished by God – Who specializes in achieving the impossible (cf., Luke 18:27). As a result, “it was said among the nations, ‘the LORD has done great things for them … and for us’” (repeated twice in verses 2-3). Although we may “sow in tears and even go out weeping” (verses 5-6), God enables us to return with “songs of joy” (verse 6). Proper, biblical worship requires that we deliberately acknowledge and personally recognize God’s sovereign majesty and then “enter into His courts with praise” (Psalm 100:4). Such was the privilege of the Israelites in Psalm 126, and they “were filled with joy” (verse 4).
In Ezekiel 28-29, this theme is addressed again in God’s judgment on Tyre, Sidon, and Egypt. These nations were filled – not with joy – but with pride. Tyre and its king constitute a picture of Satan himself, and his fall. Notice what Ezekiel writes: “You were the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden … on the holy mount of God … blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you” (verses 11-15). For this reason, “God drove him in disgrace from the mount of God and expelled him” (verse 16). God also told Ezekiel to prophesy against the city of Sidon – a symbol of Israel’s malicious enemies – by judgment with a plague (verse 23). In chapter 29, we read the first part of Ezekiel’s prophecy against Egypt – a portrait of the disgusting pride of all mankind. God calls Egypt “a great monster lying among the streams of the Nile” (verse 3). He promised to “desolate Egypt and scatter the Egyptians for forty years, then regather them, and make Egypt a lowly kingdom” (verses 12-16). And what does history reveal? Egypt has outlived its glory.
Hebrews 12:14-29 continues today’s theme of Mount Zion, the holy mount of God. Three times, the writer admonishes us to “see” or to “see to it” (verses 15; 16; and 25), an action which we cannot do without the deliberate resolve to perform the required task. The writer calls us to recognize that we have not come to any ordinary “mountain;” we have come to “Mt Zion – the city of the living God,” – and the writer indicates that this means coming directly into God’s very presence (verses 22-23). Proper, biblical worship requires us to recognize that God is holy – “He is high, lofty, and lifted up” (cf., Isaiah 6:1; 57:15-19). In verse 28, we see the twelfth “Let us” statement of Hebrews: “Let us be thankful and so worship God acceptably.” Acceptable worship requires thanksgiving.
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