LORD’S DAY, AUGUST 19
Psalm 48:1-14
Isaiah 37:33-38

“… the angel of the LORD went forth,
and smote in the camp of the Assyrians …”

ZION, THE BEAUTIFUL CITY OF GOD

Zion is another name for Jerusalem. It is where David’s palace is located. As this is where the king lives, it is the capital city. As the Temple is built here, it is God’s House (Ps 48:9), so Jerusalem is the holiest and most beautiful. Yea, God is in the midst of the City. It is the hope of the exiles in every age. So when the exiles take leave of one another, they would say, “Next year in Jerusalem!” Today the Israelis have retaken Jerusalem, even the Zion City of David their king. They will never relinquish it at any cost.

Mount Zion is the joy of the whole earth; yea, Jerusalem is the world’s star, from which has shone the light from heaven, even from the oracles of her prophets. Physically, Jerusalem excels all other cities in Israel by virtue of her location. As one drives up from the coast today, from Tel Aviv, one sees Jerusalem perched 2,600 feet above the sea on the mountain ridges, climbing higher and higher as one advances.

As it is the City where God dwells, foreign armies coming to invade it (before its destruction because of apostasy in Nebuchadnezzar’s time) withdrew of their own accord (Ps 48:5). The following verse (Ps 48:6) surely was fulfilled in the rout of the Assyrian King Sennacherib, whereby in one night 185,000 of his troops were slain by the angel of the Lord (Isa 37:36-37). Now, Zion is beautiful and honourable not merely because it is the city of Israelite and Judean kings, but because the Great King (Ps 48:2), even God the Lord Omnipotentate, is there ruling over the earthly monarchs. God who rules not by might but rather by Right, with lovingkindness (Ps 48:9), with righteousness (Ps 48:10), with judgment (Ps 48:11). He is the God of the godly and their Guide even to death (Ps 48:14).

THOUGHT: Every nation or city that rules justly and righteously patterned after Jerusalem or Zion is bound to prosper. When an evil government reigns, even Jerusalem herself could not stand, so it was destroyed in 586 B.C. Jerusalem is revived today for the sake of the coming of the Lord, in the Great Day, to rule this earth in peace in a golden Millennium. Am I a citizen of Zion, of the Heavenly Jerusalem?
PRAYER: Lord, Thou art my Guide all through life, and through death.