church

INI
20th Sunday after Trinity(text for 16th)
October 25, 2009
Ascension Lutheran Church, Tacoma WA
Paul Naumann, Pastor

YOU HAVE COME TO MOUNT ZION
Hebrews 12:18-24

Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ our
Savior. Amen. Today we consider the Word of God in the 12th chapter of the
Epistle to the Hebrews, beginning with the 18th verse, as follows:

For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned
with fire, and to blackness and darkness and tempest, and the sound of a
trumpet and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the
word should not be spoken to them anymore. (For they could not endure what
was commanded: "And if so much as a beast touches the mountain, it shall be
stoned or shot with an arrow." And so terrifying was the sight that Moses said,
"I am exceedingly afraid and trembling.") But you have come to Mount Zion
and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable
company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are
registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made
perfect, to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of
sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel. This is the Word of God.

In the Name of Jesus Christ, for whose sake every believer is a citizen of
heaven already on this earth, Dear Fellow Redeemed,

Like a lot of people who live here in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, I love the
mountains. But I have to confess I don't know a lot about them. The Olympic
Mountains, the Cascades, the Blue Mountains - I might be able to place them
approximately on a map, but my expertise ends there. There aren't many
individual peaks I can recognize. When our family lived up north in Lynnwood,
I could never keep Mount Baker and Mount Rainier separate in my mind. I
finally figured out that, when you're driving north on I-5, the big mountain
straight ahead of you is Mount Baker, when you're driving south, it's Mount
Rainier.

Maybe I'm not the only one to make such a mistake - at least those two
mountains look somewhat similar. But can you imagine someone confusing two
completely opposite mountains? Two mountains as different, say, as Mount
Everest in Tibet and Mount Kilauea in Hawaii? One is a remote, snow-covered
peak and the other an actively-erupting volcano. No one would ever make that
mistake, would they? You'd be surprised! In a spiritual sense, there are a lot of
people in this world who set out for the snow-covered peak and end up at the
smoking volcano instead. They confuse God's Law, through which no one can
be saved, with the Gospel, through which anyone can be saved! What about
you? Well, if you're a believer in Christ, says the writer to the Hebrews, then
you've already arrived. Let's look at the way our text for today compares and
contrasts these two mountain peaks, as we consider the theme,

YOU HAVE COME TO MOUNT ZION

I. Not to the fear and punishment of the Law
II. But to the atonement and salvation of the Gospel.

Our text for today is a tale of two mountains, Mount Sinai and Mount Zion.
Mount Sinai, as you know, is where God delivered His Law to Moses and the
people of Israel. A stark and desert peak, Mount Sinai is located near the
southernmost tip of the Sinai Peninsula and rises to just under 7500 feet. Some
250 miles to the northeast, Mount Zion rises to an elevation of 2533 feet.
Unlike the other, though, Mount Zion is not located in a wilderness - just the
opposite. It's the hill on which the city of Jerusalem was built. Sinai and Zion -
these two mountains provide the perfect analogy for the writer to the Hebrews.
They let him compare salvation by the Law, which is impossible, to salvation by
the Gospel.

The Epistle to the Hebrews was written - obviously - to the Hebrews. It was
written to Jewish Christians, people who had been Jewish all their life and had
recently come to faith in Jesus as the Messiah and their Savior from sin. They
had one problem, though, and that was that they tended to get stuck at Mount
Sinai. They tended to focus on the Law.

Now of course the Law of God is good and holy. It served a holy purpose, as
we're told in Galatians: Now before faith came, we were confined under the
law, kept under restraint until faith should be revealed. 24 So that the law was
our custodian until Christ came, that we might be justified by faith. 25 But now
that faith has come, we are no longer under a custodian -- Gal 3:24 RSV. In
other words, one purpose the Law does not serve is to justify us, to provide
salvation. That's what faith is for. But you know, it's amazing how many people
try to bend the Law to serve this exact purpose for which God says it's not
suited. They think they can make up for their sins and please God by doing
good deeds. They think they can get to heaven by the works of their hands. In
effect, they're wandering around Mount Sinai looking for salvation. They'll
never find it. It's like coming to a volcano in the hopes of going skiing - "You've
come to the wrong mountain, my friend!"

No, our text says, as a Christian, you have not come to Mount Sinai. You have
not come to the fear and punishment of the Law. Our text says, For you have
not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire, and
to blackness and darkness and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet and the
voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be
spoken to them anymore. (For they could not endure what was commanded:
"And if so much as a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned or shot with
an arrow." And so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, "I am exceedingly
afraid and trembling.") You remember the terrifying circumstances of the giving
of the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai. God's holiness was present in the smoke
and fire of the mountain. The area was strictly cordoned off - if so much as an
animal touched the mountain it would die, much less a human being! Even
Moses himself was "exceedingly afraid."

And yet right down to this day, people keep coming to Sinai, to this terrifying
place, looking for salvation. Why? Because they don't understand the holiness
of God and what God's Law requires. Do you do this? Is Mount Sinai your
destination? Do you, consciously or unconsciously, try to make up for past
mistakes by doing extra good deeds? Do you try to earn God's favor by making
promises about how good you're going to be in the future? Are you, in effect,
looking for salvation on Mount Sinai? It's like skiing on a volcano - it will never
work! Remember what the real Mount Sinai was like! Remember the absolute
holiness that God has, and the absolute holiness that God requires of His
subjects! If you break a single commandment, you've broken them all. For as
many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written,
"Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the
book of the law, to do them." -- Gal3:10. No, Sinai is not the place to find
salvation. For that we must look elsewhere.

As a Christian, you have a different destination - a unique destination that
places you in the most elite and exclusive minority imaginable. For YOU
HAVE COME TO MOUNT ZION. Not to the fear and punishment of the
Law, but to the atonement and salvation of the Gospel.

"Gospel" literally means "beneficial announcement," or, "Good News." And
the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the most beneficial announcement, the best
possible news there could ever be! Because when you place your whole trust in
Jesus Christ as your Savior from sin, guess what? That terrifying Mount Sinai,
that's not where you belong anymore. That's no longer your destination. As a
Christian, YOU HAVE COME TO MOUNT ZION.

"But pastor," you say, "does that mean the Law is no longer valid? I guess we
can throw our catechism out the window now, right, because the Ten
Commandments no longer apply?" Not at all. In fact, Jesus Himself said, "Do
not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to
destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass
away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled."
-- Mt 5:17-18. And this is wonderful news for you, too. For the Law is just as
valid as it ever was, the difference is that Jesus has completely fulfilled the
requirements of the Law in your place, on your behalf. Through your faith,
Jesus' perfect obedience to the Law - His unwavering adherence to all of God's
commandments - that perfect record becomes your own possession. Perfect
righteousness, just as if you had never committed a single sin, is yours through
faith in Christ.

What a wonderful, refreshing truth! Your place is Mount Zion, not Mount
Sinai! I like to read about mountain climbers. They are a strange bunch of
people. The wife of a mountain climber was once asked why they do it and she
said, "They like to get to the top of the mountain and feel the wind blowing
through the holes in their heads." Well, we Christians have good reason to feel
braced and refreshed, not because of the holes in our heads, but because our
Savior has rescued us from the terrifying volcano of Sinai and delivered us to a
different destination, here to the beautiful top of Mount Zion!

YOU HAVE COME TO MOUNT ZION, to the atonement and salvation of
the Gospel. And now that you've arrived, I'd like you to look around and notice
a few things... For one thing, you are in good company. Do you ever feel
someone isolated and alone as a Christian? Like you're all by yourself? Nothing
could be further from the truth! You're in good company! Our text says, You
have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly
Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and
church of the firstborn. Jerusalem itself - situated atop Mount Zion - meant
beauty to the Hebrews. For them it symbolized salvation. No doubt that's one
reason that Scripture repeatedly uses Zion, or Jerusalem, as a picture of the
Christian Church. The "Heavenly Jerusalem" is the Church of all believers - the
congregation of all those who base their hope of eternal life solely in the merits
and righteousness of Jesus Christ. This spiritual Jerusalem is the destination at
which you've now arrived. All the faithful believers who have gone before you
are among that company. All the prophets, apostles and martyrs. St. Augustine
is there, as is Martin Luther and C.F.W. Walther. Rick Hawley is there, and so
are Dennis Mantei, Alexander Horst and Bertram Naumann. Your sainted
parents and grandparents who died in the faith, they are part of that glorious
company of all believers - they belong to Mount Zion just like you! Further, our
text says you've come to an innumerable company of angels. The angels -
powerful spirit-beings, mighty servants of God - countless myriads of them
stand with you on Mount Zion. You're not alone at all! In fact, a little earlier in
this book the writer talks about all the past heroes of faith and says, Therefore
we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay
aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with
endurance the race that is set before us. -- Heb 12:1.

I'd like you to notice something else that's comforting here: our text says you
are enrolled. I used to live in a place where the question "Are you enrolled?"
governed nearly every aspect of life. It was the Rosebud Sioux Indian
reservation in South Dakota. And let me tell you, in that part of the country
enrollment was everything! If you were enrolled as an official member of the
Rosebud Sioux Tribe, that meant you got X amount of benefits, you got X
amount of money from the government, you got X amount as your share from
the tribal casinos. But you had to be officially enrolled. Well, here's something
reassuring - God says that you as a Christian have been officially enrolled in
heaven. "You have come to Mount Zion...to the general assembly and church
of the firstborn who are registered in heaven." By virtue of your faith in Christ,
your name has already been registered in heaven. You've been enrolled in God's
book of eternal life. Now you haven't gotten to heaven yet, obviously, but
you're enrolled there, just as sure as if you could look into heaven right now and
see your name printed in God's book. Talk about something encouraging for
your daily walk - you're enrolled! What's going to spoil your day when you are
enrolled in God's book of eternal life?! You remember that time when Jesus sent
His disciples out to preach and they got all excited because He'd given them
power to heal diseases and cast out demons. Jesus said, That's nothing! "Do not
rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your
names are written in heaven.� -- Lk 10:20.

Finally, perhaps the most important thing of all: you have an Advocate. Our
text says, "You have come to Mount Zion...to Jesus the Mediator of the new
covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of
Abel." An advocate is someone who speaks for you. When Cain killed his
brother Abel, God says that Abel's blood cried out on behalf of Abel from the
ground. It cried out for vengeance, and it was a very effective advocate. You
may feel at times that your sins are like Abel's blood, crying out for God to
punish you. But you have something crying out in your favor as well, and it's an
even more effective advocate. Jesus Christ is your advocate, and His blood
speaks better things than that of Abel. His blood cries out, not for vengeance,
not for your punishment, but for mercy and peace, for your pardon and your
forgiveness. And how can you be condemned, after all, if the precious blood of
God's Son Himself cries out for your pardon? Paul asks the same question in a
different way: Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who
justifies. 34 Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is
also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession
for us. -- Rom 8:33-34.

Your destination makes a difference in life, have you noticed? People view you
differently when you're obviously headed for success. It's true even in the
workplace. When there's a smart young person moving up quickly through the
ranks of management, people like to associate themselves with that person.
Everybody says, "That's someone important. He's going to do great things.
Before he's finished he's going to attain the very highest levels in the company!"
Well, destination makes even more of a difference in the life of a Christian.
Why not let the people around you see what your destination is. Let your words
and your behavior, let everything you do and everything you say tell people
that, because of Jesus, "My destination is Mount Zion." -Not the fear and
punishment of the Law, but the atonement and salvation of the Gospel. It
shouldn't be hard to convince people because, in many ways, this is a
destination at which you're already arrived. Though Christ, YOU HAVE
COME TO MOUNT ZION! AMEN.