SPEAKER_00: You are listening to the Gateway Franklin Church podcast.
SPEAKER_00: To learn more about Gateway Franklin Church, including our service times here in Franklin, Tennessee, visit us online at gatewayfranklin.com.
SPEAKER_00: And now, here is this week's message.
SPEAKER_01: I've had three ministry lives.
SPEAKER_01: I had uh nine years of being a middle school, high school pastor, and nine years of uh being a missions pastor, and then the last 20 here at Gateway.
SPEAKER_01: Um one of the biggest decisions I made as a missions pastor was um was early in my time, it was 1998, I recall, and this young man came to see me and he wanted to attend a school.
SPEAKER_01: Uh you if you're familiar with Youth with a Mission, maybe maybe you're not, but a Wawam school in Jerusalem called a School of Frontier Missions.
SPEAKER_01: And basically was a training school on training you how to reach least reach people in dangerous parts of the world.
SPEAKER_01: And um I had not known him very long, um, but I felt compelled that we were to get behind this young man in his endeavor.
SPEAKER_01: Fast forward to summer of 99, I believe it was, when he falls in love with another student at the school, uh, a German young lady, um, and he calls to announce to me that they're engaged.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but his then the sadness hit his voice because um neither of his, neither his family or her family were believers at the time, and they informed them they not only did they not approve of them getting married, an American marrying a German, and a German marrying an American, but they didn't agree with even what they were doing, and so they would not attend.
SPEAKER_01: They would not attend their wedding.
SPEAKER_01: So for me, the decision was already made.
SPEAKER_01: We began trying to book my trip, um, my trip to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: So it was my first and only time to go to Jerusalem was for their for their wedding.
SPEAKER_01: Um, which it was a quick trip because they weren't going to be there.
SPEAKER_01: Right.
SPEAKER_01: So I land, I land one day, they get married the next day, I leave late in the evening the next day, and I tacked on another missionary to see in Scotland on the way.
SPEAKER_01: So I was in six airports in 10 days to make all of this trip.
SPEAKER_01: But I remember um the drive from Tel Aviv into Jerusalem and them putting me at a hotel um on the outside of the Kidron Valley.
SPEAKER_01: So they, you know, I I don't know the geography, I know the I know the words, right?
SPEAKER_01: And so here's your hotel, it's uh the board of the Kidron Valley.
SPEAKER_01: I went, oh, Kidron Valley?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, Jesus went up and down this valley his whole life.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, he he crosses the Kidron Valley to get to the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of his arrest.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, I was I was two things.
SPEAKER_01: I was so amazed at where I was, and I was still so jet-lagged that I couldn't sleep, that I read the entire book of Ezekiel that night.
SPEAKER_01: I read it, I read it start to finish because it's like chapter 38, you're getting into the prophecy.
SPEAKER_01: Now Israel is in um uh exile, and God asks Ezekiel to describe what he sees in this valley, and it was a valley of dry bones.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Do you believe, prophet of God, do you believe these dry bones can wake?
SPEAKER_01: And he says, I uh only you know God.
SPEAKER_01: He said, Prophesy to the bones, and and breath coming into the bones, and then the bones joining with the sinew and the and the tendons and the muscle.
SPEAKER_01: And so Ezekiel kind of in this prophetic vision sees Israel come back to life.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's what was that was going on in my mind.
SPEAKER_01: And it that Ezekiel ends, that the book ends.
SPEAKER_01: Um, did I even write it down?
SPEAKER_01: I might not have written it down.
SPEAKER_01: It kind of ends with that this will be my place forevermore.
SPEAKER_01: And so that really gets my attention.
SPEAKER_01: The next morning, after not much sleep, the person who was coming to get me to walk me through old Jerusalem to get me to the place where they're married, we hit this kind of crossroads area.
SPEAKER_01: And it was just slam packed with people that he was able to get through.
SPEAKER_01: And I was having trouble getting through.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and we got to the other side now.
SPEAKER_01: We were late, and um, he's really rushing through Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: And I say, What, what, why were there that many people going in one direction?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it wasn't two-way traffic, it was one-way traffic.
SPEAKER_01: What why are so many people on that street?
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Well, that's the Via Della Rosa, and those are tourists.
SPEAKER_01: Well, the Via Della Rosa was the road Christ carries his cross, the way of sorrows, through the city to Calvary.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Those are those are tourists on that road.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Look, I know we're late, but I'm gonna need a minute.
SPEAKER_01: I I was just the the complexity of the moment was for me was was staggering.
SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm trying to get somewhere.
SPEAKER_01: Someone's trying to get me there.
SPEAKER_01: I came for that reason.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't I knew there wasn't going to be this sightseeing in Jerusalem because of my limited time.
SPEAKER_01: And yet the moment just struck me.
SPEAKER_01: So these aren't my pictures, but um this is kind of the traffic we were trying to cross coming from another side.
SPEAKER_01: I mean that would be a group of tourists um making their way on the path of Jesus carrying his cross.
SPEAKER_01: And then this next picture, this is what it would normally look like without that.
SPEAKER_01: You can see what's striking is these shops to our left and right, there would have been shops to the left and right.
SPEAKER_01: So this is a this is a normal day in Jerusalem in which Jesus is carrying his cross for another public execution by the Romans.
SPEAKER_01: And what struck me was if I didn't pause in that moment, I would have let the hurriedness and the agenda of that day move me past a moment to encounter Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You don't need me to connect the dots there, do you?
SPEAKER_01: Of how how often, two, two, two ways, and how often the hurriedness, the hurriedness, the agenda, the need to move on, the need to get here, the need to do that, that we can miss moments with Christ, that's one side of it.
SPEAKER_01: The other side would be how many moments Christ wants to spend with us.
SPEAKER_01: It's a it's a it's a it's a both, it's a both and.
SPEAKER_01: So the way I wrote it for the notes that will be on the, you know, if you if you ever miss a message or you want to get back to a message on the we have a podcast, you can just just get the audio, you can watch the whole worship service, and then every note that I put on a screen, all those notes are available on the website.
SPEAKER_01: But here's what I wrote for that purpose.
SPEAKER_01: I almost missed an amazing experience with Christ because of the hurriedness of the day.
SPEAKER_01: So today we pick up um we pick up our series in the Psalms of Ascent with Psalm 122.
SPEAKER_01: So if you you brought your Bibles, you want to look directly at the Psalm, that's where we'll get to.
SPEAKER_01: Um as a reminder or as a refresher, uh, the Psalms of Ascent are 15 consecutive Psalms from 120 to 134, four written by David, one's written by Solomon 10.
SPEAKER_01: Uh we do not know who wrote them, but they were compiled together sequentially for the purpose of being taught generation after generation after generation uh to the families that would go to Jerusalem for the three major uh festivals of the year.
SPEAKER_01: Um, I I don't have to tell you that Jerusalem is an historical place, but but do you know how historical of a place?
SPEAKER_01: Um the Temple of Jerusalem sits on Mount Moriah.
SPEAKER_01: You first read of Mount Moriah as the place in which Abraham, God has led Abraham to for the for the stated purpose of sacrificing his son Isaac.
SPEAKER_01: Now, that sounds horrid.
SPEAKER_01: But if you if you if you peel the onion back a little bit, God takes this man and he tells them that I'm I'm gonna make you the father of a nation.
SPEAKER_01: And to illustrate that point of how vast of an impact this was gonna be, he literally takes him outside at night and says, Look up into the stars, that your descendants will exceed the number.
SPEAKER_01: How's that for a meeting with God?
SPEAKER_01: But don't miss the fact that it was 25 years before Isaac is born.
SPEAKER_01: So here's this vast prophecy of how I'm gonna use you, Abraham.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, he's he said, I'm gonna I need to I'm gonna take you to a place you do not know.
SPEAKER_01: Are you going to leave and follow me there?
SPEAKER_01: If you leave and follow me there, this is what this is what's in store.
SPEAKER_01: And then Isaac gets to be probably around 12, and then the next thing you know, God's saying, Oh yeah, that son I gave you to start this nation.
SPEAKER_01: I I I want to take you to a place where you are to offer him to me.
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't next door.
SPEAKER_01: Gets a servant and he gets the wood, he takes his son.
SPEAKER_01: The son's like, hey, I see the sacrifice.
SPEAKER_01: Like we're going to worship.
SPEAKER_01: You say we're going to worship, I see the sacrifice.
SPEAKER_01: I see, I mean, I see the wood.
SPEAKER_01: Um, I see the fire.
SPEAKER_01: I don't see the sacrifice.
SPEAKER_01: Son, God will provide.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is where we get, this is where we get introduced to Jehovah Jireh as the name of God, as God will provide.
SPEAKER_01: Like we're looking for rent, right?
SPEAKER_01: Abraham's looking for his son, right?
SPEAKER_01: That God would restore.
SPEAKER_01: So, so they make that trek up to Mount Moriah.
SPEAKER_01: About a thousand years later, this is where Solomon builds the temple.
SPEAKER_01: This is the promise land.
SPEAKER_01: This Mount Moriah is the land in which God promises Israel out of Egypt, a land that he's already been to, right?
SPEAKER_01: We know he created it, right?
SPEAKER_01: A thousand years before and starting the nation, this is where the temple gets built.
SPEAKER_01: Well, when Solomon dedicates his temple, you can read it in 1 Kings 8.
SPEAKER_01: There's his prayer is amazing.
SPEAKER_01: The the sacrifices given to dedicate this temple are staggering.
SPEAKER_01: Um, what the pieces of that passage that that move me the most, it says that after they have Solomon has prayed and they've they've had the worship and the sacrifices that the the Spirit of God descends onto that into that temple at such a density that no one could stand up to perform their duties.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you've been in situations where you feel like it's heavy, right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you think that it's so it's so dense that the weight of the presence of God was of the amount that you couldn't you you couldn't stand up, you couldn't try to stand up.
SPEAKER_01: It just continued to put everybody in this posture, this posture of worship.
SPEAKER_01: And this is kind of what the presence of God does.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, just it just puts you into this this posture of worship.
SPEAKER_01: But what I want to get to is God's response.
SPEAKER_01: Then then God doesn't just physically respond to the prayer and to the sacrifices, he verbalizes a response.
SPEAKER_01: You pick this up in 1 Kings 9 and 3.
SPEAKER_01: So when it says the Lord said to him, the Lord said to said to Solomon, the Lord said to Solomon, I have heard the prayer and plea you have made before me.
SPEAKER_01: I have consecrated this temple, which means I have set this place apart.
SPEAKER_01: I've set it apart, which you have built by putting my name there forever.
SPEAKER_01: And the Greek, uh the Hebrew there is the some call the fame name of God, his renown, his character, his reputation name of God.
SPEAKER_01: My eyes and my heart will always be there.
SPEAKER_01: My attention, my emotion will always be there.
SPEAKER_01: Those are pretty significant things.
SPEAKER_01: My name will be there forever.
SPEAKER_01: My attention and affections will always be there.
SPEAKER_01: 426 years later, the temple is destroyed by Babylon in response to Israel's, get this, ongoing worship malpractice.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we have Babylonian captivity.
SPEAKER_01: This is why the temple is destroyed.
SPEAKER_01: Ezekiel, this is where it was in my notes, and I was just ahead of myself.
SPEAKER_01: The end of Ezekiel, so Ezekiel's prophesying to the end of the Babylonian movement, when the when the temple would be restored, and his last words are, and the name of the city from that time on will be the Lord is there.
SPEAKER_01: So temple's destroyed.
SPEAKER_01: It seems as if for 400 and some years Israel is a byword, but God's prophecy through Ezekiel is that the Lord is there.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, the Lord was always there.
SPEAKER_01: Nehemiah ends up rebuilding this temple on the very same mountain.
SPEAKER_01: By the time we get to Christ, 4,000 years later, Christ is crucified on Calvary, which is a ridgeline of Mount Moriah.
SPEAKER_01: So although God is not bound by geography, I believe the nation and the city still holds significant spiritual significance.
SPEAKER_01: So, with that historical background, yes, I will now do Psalm 122.
SPEAKER_01: Here's how it reads.
SPEAKER_01: Our feet are standing in your gates, Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: Jerusalem is built like a city that is closely compacted together.
SPEAKER_01: That is where the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, to praise the name of the Lord according to the statute given to Israel.
SPEAKER_01: There stand the thrones for judgment, the thrones of the house of David.
SPEAKER_01: Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: Remember, David's writing this.
SPEAKER_01: No one probably would have had the appreciation for Jerusalem the way David would have.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: May those who love you be secure.
SPEAKER_01: May there be peace within your walls, security within your citadels.
SPEAKER_01: For the sake of my family and friends, I will say, peace be within you.
SPEAKER_01: For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your prosperity.
SPEAKER_01: So the text breaks down in three sections.
SPEAKER_01: Here's kind of how I've labeled them.
SPEAKER_01: Verses one and two is an invitation to worship, is an invitation to joy.
SPEAKER_01: Verses three and five, refuge, unity, and justice are found in worship, i.e., they're found in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: And I'll unpack these.
SPEAKER_01: Verses six through nine, peace, security, and prosperity are all petitions that come out of worship.
SPEAKER_01: Leave that up just for a second, Kitty.
SPEAKER_01: I see I see pens going.
SPEAKER_01: Again, and this this will be on the website in the notes.
SPEAKER_01: When does it get up there, Eric?
unknown: By Monday.
SPEAKER_01: He's fast.
SPEAKER_01: All right, so look, an invitation to worship brings joy.
SPEAKER_01: I rejoiced with those who said to me, Let us go to the house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Our feet are standing in your gates, Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: Don't miss that David expresses joy with the mere invitation to go to worship.
SPEAKER_01: It's just the invitation.
SPEAKER_01: I was glad.
SPEAKER_01: I rejoiced with those who said to me, Let us go.
SPEAKER_01: Now, many times I talk about uh the three, the three festivals that every Jewish family were required to attend.
SPEAKER_01: Um the Passover, which was a celebration of the deliverance out of Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: Um, the Feast of Weeks, also called the Feast of Tabernacles, the Feast of Pentecost, we might know it more by, which was a celebration of the giving of the law to Moses on Mount Sinai.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to do a series at some point on mountains, of so much gets done on mountains.
SPEAKER_01: And then it was also the celebration of the first uh wheat harvest.
SPEAKER_01: And then the third was um booths, the festival of booths, it was to celebrate God's sustaining power through the 40 years of uh wandering in the desert.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, scripture is really cool when you when you read that in Exodus, that for 40 years they wandered, and the scripture says that their clothes nor shoes were out.
SPEAKER_01: If you've got if you got boys, I want you to think about how many pairs of sneakers you buy.
SPEAKER_01: And and in 40 years it doesn't wear out.
SPEAKER_01: So so now generally when I've been when I've studied this, when I've taught this, um my mind unfortunately always kind of drifts a little bit into how inconvenient.
SPEAKER_01: How inconvenient.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, like, I want to go to the beach, but I can't afford the beach because three times I got to make my way to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's it had to be.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, isn't it logical?
SPEAKER_01: You go, like, we got a budget for three trips to Jerusalem this year.
SPEAKER_01: We got to get the family, all right, you know, hey dad, can we go?
SPEAKER_01: No, we can't go because that month, you know, we got to go to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: And but David is given this instruction and this emotion that's gonna be passed through generations to say, no, no, no, we we get to go to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: We get to go into the presence of God, we get to go to worship, we get to celebrate all that he's done and what he's doing and all that he's gonna do, and we can't see all of that.
SPEAKER_01: Look, there's a reason why people live in the past.
SPEAKER_01: People live in the past because we know the past.
SPEAKER_01: You don't know the future, we barely understand the present.
SPEAKER_01: So I can understand why people would, but in this case, this is a good case to live in the past.
SPEAKER_01: It's a good case to live in the past of all of what God has done.
SPEAKER_01: Imagine every, maybe every generation, the new things that God had done.
SPEAKER_01: And so, and so here comes this trip to Judith.
SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you what God did this year.
SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you what God did this month.
SPEAKER_01: And it, you know, and so so there is a there's a joy at the invitation of coming into the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: Um He's teaching, David is teaching successive generations that an invitation into the presence of God is an invitation to joy.
SPEAKER_01: I rejoiced with those.
SPEAKER_01: That worship is an inconvenient or it's not an add-on activity, that worship is central to our identity as a people of God.
SPEAKER_01: You'd have to be under a rock or hate soccer to know that it is World Cup.
SPEAKER_01: And there are thousands and tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of people spending a lot of money, a lot of money going to great lengths to attend one of these events.
SPEAKER_01: And if you add up all those people in those stadiums during the World Cup, it wouldn't come close to measuring how many people around the world are in worship on the Sabbath today.
SPEAKER_01: Longing to be in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: I I I can't I can't say it enough.
SPEAKER_01: I understand the hurriedness of life.
SPEAKER_01: I I live the same life you live.
SPEAKER_01: I understand the demands of life.
SPEAKER_01: It is so easy for everything else to supplant the joy that's possible in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: I commend all our young families with with little ones.
SPEAKER_01: So I I couldn't say this in the first service because my daughter and son and I were here, and they're two kids.
SPEAKER_01: So they're staying with us for a couple months while a house is being finished.
SPEAKER_01: And so generally speaking, you get to love on grandkids and leave.
SPEAKER_01: Ain't no leaving.
SPEAKER_01: I so we're like we're like firsthand watching all the all the the juggle of how do you and so my daughter's a wedding planner, so she works weekends and she had a wedding last night and got home after midnight and I I've stopped years ago I've I've tried to stop saying d you remember I'm the pastor, right?
SPEAKER_01: You need to be in church.
SPEAKER_01: Um and to see them both to see them both at nine o'clock service with both the kids.
SPEAKER_01: Um and the kids clean, right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean they look like they had baths.
SPEAKER_01: I mean it's just and I spoke to so many young families after service, like like one mom with tears in her eyes saying, You you it the struggle is real.
SPEAKER_01: But but the seeds planted, the seeds planted of this is not just this is not a cultural experience, it's not a social experience.
SPEAKER_01: This is the place of God with the people of God and the joy of being there is motivation enough to what to anticipate what what could happen if we get in front of God today?
SPEAKER_01: When we we end the and then he ends the second verse and he said, My f our our feet are at the gates of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: I I I think about the family pictures I see when people get to where they're going, and you know, they got the picture in front of the sign, you know, the state you just crossed, right?
SPEAKER_01: Or or or where you've landed, and and you know, you want to get a picture of that sign of that national park, you know, because you're excited because your feet are there.
SPEAKER_01: So I got here early enough to get a picture for myself here.
SPEAKER_01: What you can't see is that was a jump.
SPEAKER_01: Um Gina told me I did not get off the ground high enough.
SPEAKER_01: So she deleted those pictures.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, for those you don't know, I've had a knee replaced, and uh, but um I don't think she was giving me credit for that.
SPEAKER_01: So so that was my that was my picture um of you know how you know how easy it would be after 37 years of full-time pastoral ministry to look at a Sunday as another Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not saying I haven't done that, I'm just saying I haven't done it much.
SPEAKER_01: I haven't done it much.
SPEAKER_01: Because what a joy and privilege to gather with the people of God and the place of God, opening up the word of God, inviting the Spirit of God to change us.
SPEAKER_01: So David writes this psalm, it's included in the Psalms of Ascent.
SPEAKER_01: I think specifically for those families that say we gotta go again, we gotta go again.
SPEAKER_01: And then it's early, oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_01: No, we get we get to be in the presence.
SPEAKER_01: We get to be in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: And then he goes on, the psalm goes on, tells us what what happens, what happens in that.
SPEAKER_01: Um verse three, four, and five.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm skipping a little bit, Kitty.
SPEAKER_01: Uh refuge, unity, and justice are found in worship.
SPEAKER_01: They're found in God's presence.
SPEAKER_01: It says Jerusalem is built like a city that is closely compacted together.
SPEAKER_01: That is where the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, to praise the name of the Lord according to the statutes given to Israel.
SPEAKER_01: There stands the thrones for judgment, the thrones of the house of David.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't look like there's much there, but there's a lot there.
SPEAKER_01: Interesting language talking about how the city was constructed.
SPEAKER_01: How, how, why would how the city is constructed matter?
SPEAKER_01: Because when it says it was like a city compacted together, it was speaking of it as a place, it was a safe place.
SPEAKER_01: There was safety.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, if it wasn't for God taking his hand off of this city multiple times, because again, worship malpractice, it would still, the fact that 4,000 years later we still have stone, I mean, still, I'll show you pictures later.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, tells you just how this thing was built.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was built strategically, specifically, from the tabernacle to the temple.
SPEAKER_01: It was done under precise, precise measurement, precise order, because God is speaking to the security that's found when you're in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: He consistently uses dirt and geography and structures and all this other stuff to speak about his continuity and who he is.
SPEAKER_01: What I love the temple, in fact, the scripture says that not one, not one iron tool was to be used in building the temple.
SPEAKER_01: That that was going to be a defilement.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I can't explain that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just telling you what the directive was, which meant that every big stone, and when you see there's just huge stones, all these stones were finished at the quarry.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I don't know, did they have to put A16?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I don't know how they put this thing together, but they're they're formed at the quarry, transported to Jerusalem, and put in place and have stood thousands and thousands and thousands of years.
SPEAKER_01: Ain't no mortar, there's no rebar.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, this this was put and constructed in a way to say, when when I'm a part of constructing your life, it is secure.
SPEAKER_01: It will stay put no matter what kind of forces, what kind of weather, what kind of, it will stay put.
SPEAKER_01: He's communicating that when the presence of God, there is security in this, it's a refuge to be in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: And then David, it's unique that David would speak about the unity because David was king during a divided kingdom.
SPEAKER_01: The twelve tribes were ten and two, and yet when David becomes king in Jerusalem, then that he unites the kingdoms.
SPEAKER_01: And now the people of God, who with some even fighting and at war with one another, becomes unified in this place.
SPEAKER_01: There is unity that gets brought together in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: We can be so different in background and story and experience, but we can be unified under the presence of God, that it's his banner that marks us, identifies us, and that and that this is what we kind of unify underneath.
SPEAKER_01: And then so there's a there's a refuge, there's a unity that being in the presence of God brings.
SPEAKER_01: Um I'll say this sometimes I might be overseeing some kind of um dispute and argument, maybe sometimes with me, sometimes as couples, sometimes as other people.
SPEAKER_01: And I can tell you that when I when I pray, so I don't always pray, so you'll know my secret.
SPEAKER_01: I don't always pray when first time when you come into my office about something.
SPEAKER_01: Like you might be in marriage class, I might not pray.
SPEAKER_01: And you go, that's really strange.
SPEAKER_01: Now I'm strategically waiting for the time where that prayer is going to change the temperature in the room.
SPEAKER_01: And it happens.
SPEAKER_01: It happens.
SPEAKER_01: The emotion gets out, and here comes a pause.
SPEAKER_01: All right, that's an let's remember who we're underneath.
SPEAKER_01: And it changes the dynamic.
SPEAKER_01: There is there's a unity even in disunifying moments in the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: And then justice is a unique one.
SPEAKER_01: How do you find justice in worship?
SPEAKER_01: Well, they weren't just loading up to go to worship.
SPEAKER_01: Many times they were loading up, going to worship, and also this was an opportunity to be in Jerusalem to see the king, to see other government officials, to bring their case before the governing body to speak and write justice into what their problem was.
SPEAKER_01: So when we're in the presence of God, it's an opportunity for us to petition God on our behalf for justice.
SPEAKER_01: That we have his attention and worship.
SPEAKER_01: And listen, the Psalms are full of it, right?
SPEAKER_01: You know, David's like, I'm not gonna mess with them, but I would really like you to destroy them.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the the pit they dug for me, can they fall in it?
SPEAKER_01: The snare they set for me, will you snare?
SPEAKER_01: It's like you think, oh, those good Christians, we're supposed to keep all this to himself.
SPEAKER_01: Well, I would what I would say is you can keep it to yourself, but don't keep it away from God.
SPEAKER_01: It's okay to scream to him for justice because we're putting it in the right hands.
SPEAKER_01: It's not my hands.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not very just.
SPEAKER_01: Or I can say I'm just, but it seems like I always win like that, right?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, justice always falls in my corner, right?
SPEAKER_01: Like that.
SPEAKER_01: We're putting it in justice.
SPEAKER_01: So he's he's excited about bringing them into the presence of God for the refuge, for the security, for the unity, and for the justice.
SPEAKER_01: Then we go to the next part.
SPEAKER_01: Peace, security, and prosperity are petitions of worship.
SPEAKER_01: That that these are things by which to pray for.
SPEAKER_01: Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: May those who love you be secure.
SPEAKER_01: May there be peace within your walls and security within your citadels.
SPEAKER_01: For the sake of my family and friends, I will say, peace be within you.
SPEAKER_01: He's praying for Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: For the sake of the house of the Lord, I will seek your prosperity.
SPEAKER_01: There was rarely a time that Israel wasn't underneath some geopolitical force, just like now.
SPEAKER_01: And if you recognize this, when Israel's at war, the world's at war.
SPEAKER_01: And when Israel's at peace, the world's at peace.
SPEAKER_01: And I don't want you to fall for the political rhetoric around diminishing the state of Israel, the city of Jerusalem, and the and the Jewish people.
SPEAKER_01: There is a high, it has been a high, concentrated attempt to paint them in a light other than who they are and what they do.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not, I'm not, I can get into a discussion with you that's policy driven, and I'm not getting into you now.
SPEAKER_01: What I'm saying is this still applies to Jerusalem, and it still applies for reason.
SPEAKER_01: But this but the dirt of Jerusalem, my dirt at 1288 Lewisburg Pike, and your dirt at 1280 Lewisburg Pike are both equally important to God.
SPEAKER_01: But it doesn't diminish that dirt in Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: We have personal dirt.
SPEAKER_01: You know, we're made out of dirt.
SPEAKER_01: You kind of breathe into dirt.
SPEAKER_01: So we're dirt.
SPEAKER_01: I I carry the presence of God in my dirt.
SPEAKER_01: So wherever I worship, whatever dirt I'm on, remarks that as geography for God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not I'm not losing that.
SPEAKER_01: I just don't want us to lose the significance of that other dirt.
SPEAKER_01: So we're supposed to pray for its peace.
SPEAKER_01: The most comprehensive word, Hebrew word for peace is shalom.
SPEAKER_01: Wholeness.
SPEAKER_01: We're to pray for the wholeness of the place where we are.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: Because when when you're at peace, the people around you are at peace.
SPEAKER_01: When you're whole, the people around you are whole.
SPEAKER_01: So it is it's a layered prayer.
SPEAKER_01: David writes in terms of, hey, when when Jerusalem is at peace, we're all at peace.
SPEAKER_01: But we're to pray that I'm pr I should be praying this over Franklin, in Williams County, and Mara County, in Murfersburg, and Springham, Columbia, wherever I am praying the people where I work, my my house address, I'm praying for the wholeness of God.
SPEAKER_01: The Hebrew there for security, salah, means an ease.
SPEAKER_01: I'm praying for an ease.
SPEAKER_01: An ease.
SPEAKER_01: The movement would be at ease.
SPEAKER_01: And then prosperity, it does carry the the Hebrew there does carry the the nature of prosperity, but but it also carries a nuance of moral goodness.
SPEAKER_01: To pray for the moral goodness, right?
SPEAKER_01: So think about it as a people of God.
SPEAKER_01: If we are whole, peaceful, at ease, morally good, there is this representation of the presence of God there.
SPEAKER_01: So when people enter into our presence, they experience the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: So let me show you, let me show you a couple pictures here of Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_01: This is uh this is known as the Wailing Wall, the Western Wall.
SPEAKER_01: You probably have seen things over the years.
SPEAKER_01: What's really unique here is you see that that's not litter stuffed in those, they're not cracks, these would have been where where whatever would have joined these, you know, of just over 4,000 years, right?
SPEAKER_01: They're prayers.
SPEAKER_01: People would have written prayers.
SPEAKER_01: In the 80s, in fact, there was a fax machine down there.
SPEAKER_01: You could fax your prayer down.
SPEAKER_01: And you put it in there.
SPEAKER_01: I'm sure there was a fee involved, but you know.
SPEAKER_01: Um let's show the let's show the next next picture there.
SPEAKER_01: And so from just a handful to hundredths of praying.
SPEAKER_01: Well, what makes that piece of geography special?
SPEAKER_01: Well, it's because it is the closest place, it's the closest place to on the Temple Mount where the Holy of Holies would have been.
SPEAKER_01: Holy of Holies.
SPEAKER_01: This is where the high priest, one time a year, Yom Kippur, would enter behind the veil and offer sacrifice for the sin of a nation.
SPEAKER_01: Happened once a year.
SPEAKER_01: The priest, it would, it would, the priest would have bells woven into the robe, their robe, the bottom of the robe, and there would have been a rope tied to their ankle, because if you were not, if you were not sinless, holy covered, and you entered into the presence of God, you would die.
SPEAKER_01: And so all that was, hey, is he still there, you know?
SPEAKER_01: And so this veil that separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple is the same veil when we read that Christ then says it is finished on the cross that is torn from top to bottom.
SPEAKER_01: This ain't this ain't a little curtain, right?
SPEAKER_01: This this is would make a theatrical curtain seem small, 40 feet or so ripped from top, top to bottom.
SPEAKER_01: And this is the closest they feel comfortable getting to that place.
SPEAKER_01: And this is why people flock to that wall.
SPEAKER_01: They're flocking not to a wall, they're flocking to an historic presence of God that said that my name will be there forever.
SPEAKER_01: My eyes and heart will be attentive to that place forever.
SPEAKER_01: And I get that that applies to me too, but it hasn't stopped applying to there either.
SPEAKER_01: Let's show the next picture.
SPEAKER_01: This is the eastern gate.
SPEAKER_01: You notice there's a cemetery in front of the eastern gate.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus enters through the eastern gate.
SPEAKER_01: When he comes into Jerusalem, well he would have, who knows how many hundreds of times he did, but on the weekend of the crucifixion, that's the gate he entered into the temple.
SPEAKER_01: And when he exited the temple, sometime later, that gate was sealed.
SPEAKER_01: Ezekiel says the gate would remain sealed.
SPEAKER_01: But Ezekiel also says that Jesus will return to the Eastern Gate.
SPEAKER_01: It's been sealed off and on for generations, but it's been sealed for the last 500 years.
SPEAKER_01: It was sealed by the Ottoman Empire, Islamic movement.
SPEAKER_01: Um and there was a there was a stated um uh safety piece to it.
SPEAKER_01: There's a valley down there, we limit how many people, we limit the entrance into the city, we can be more secure.
SPEAKER_01: But I mean, there were sources that I read also state to knowing the prophecy and sealing the gate for Jesus not to be able to come back.
SPEAKER_01: So then you compound that later with an Islamic cemetery.
SPEAKER_01: As if I mean, obviously, we know two different gods, right?
SPEAKER_01: I don't I don't believe if death and a stone can take him out.
SPEAKER_01: I don't believe this is gonna hinder his return.
SPEAKER_01: But it goes a little step further.
SPEAKER_01: So this is the top, this is the top of the Temple Mount.
SPEAKER_01: And um next, there he is.
SPEAKER_01: That's that's the dome of the rock.
SPEAKER_01: Show show the panoramic.
SPEAKER_01: So from from this point, Eastern Gates way over here to the right.
SPEAKER_01: Um, so that's the that's an aerial view, panoramic view of the top mount.
SPEAKER_01: The dome of the rock was was was built by Muslims, and guess where they built it when they had control of Jerusalem?
SPEAKER_01: That is one of the two geographic places believed to be the place of the Holy Holies.
SPEAKER_01: When I was on the Temple Mount, my guide took me around and said, he just said, this this is where many Bible scholars believe it, believe it was, which it wasn't.
SPEAKER_01: There, there's the one, two places.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, a devout Jew will not walk even across this particular place.
SPEAKER_01: Um so the message is pretty multifaceted.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want you to, I don't want you to fall into, I don't want you to fall into the rhetoric that we get told about Israel being this colonizing, warring country.
SPEAKER_01: There's been war on that land for a long time.
SPEAKER_01: This is why two-state solution, in my opinion, will never will never function.
SPEAKER_01: But this is not even the first nor the second most holy site of Islam.
SPEAKER_01: This is their third.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't appear in the beginnings.
SPEAKER_01: You don't even read about it in the Quran.
SPEAKER_01: So it's it's it's this it was this outward pressure always on the people of God.
SPEAKER_01: I read one commentator said that if if if uh Iran laid down their arms, um, there would be peace.
SPEAKER_01: If Israel laid down their arms, there would be no more Israel.
SPEAKER_01: And so the way this the way this war gets fought anymore.
SPEAKER_01: It gets fought through the through the social fabric of our country, that if we can erode the social fabric of our Christian nation of believing that that this geography is still special, it's still God's place that has not just historical significance, but it will have future significance.
SPEAKER_01: Then we start losing our our our support for Israel.
SPEAKER_01: We start, yeah, but I don't like the way they're acting.
SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, God has dealt with the way they've acted their whole history, right?
SPEAKER_01: So it's not saying that any particular administration in Israeli politics is somehow following God's guidebook.
SPEAKER_01: It means that that's God's place, and God has been doing a great job taking care, and I believe we are close.
SPEAKER_01: We are close to the return of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So here's the other facet of the message today.
SPEAKER_01: The other facet is to not allow the hurriedness of our lives to keep us from the opportunity of experiencing Christ in worship, in his presence with the people of God, at home and my family of God.
SPEAKER_01: I was reading, I read my Bible.
SPEAKER_01: I'm actually about 40 days behind on my 180 reading plan.
SPEAKER_01: If you're if you've been around here, I try to read the Bible twice through a year.
SPEAKER_01: Turn your life 180, we call it.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not doing as great this year.
SPEAKER_01: I just finished the Old Testament, so I'm about 40 days behind.
SPEAKER_01: But I'm reading in Panera one day.
SPEAKER_01: I'm front and center, Bible open, reading it, and a woman walks by and she said, and that's why I like living here.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Well, I mean, I I know how special, but I mean I didn't know if someone wanted to move here because because uh and she said that that I can see people openly reading their Bible.
SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, guys, if you're from here, don't underestimate the power of that.
SPEAKER_01: Secondly, can I encourage some more public Bible reading of at your desk or in a restaurant or it communicate?
SPEAKER_01: I've had more conversations in that Panerum 31 because I've sat there and read my my Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Um miss those opportunities.
SPEAKER_01: So in prayer today, I I don't know where this I don't know where this message hits you, right?
SPEAKER_01: I I'm just trying to go through the Psalms of Ascent and what do they speak to us in the moment.
SPEAKER_01: And I was very dependent on what the Holy Spirit speaks to you in these moments.
SPEAKER_01: So the way we conclude every service, you have an opportunity to come and pray here by yourself.
SPEAKER_01: You have an opportunity to come and pray with others, other elders and other people of our prayer team.
SPEAKER_01: We can link and borrow and lend faith today.
SPEAKER_01: There's communion on my left and these bowls here, and to my right, and the bowls here for the Eucharist if you want to participate in that.
SPEAKER_01: So uh I'll ask you to stand.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to pray.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to invite you to move.
SPEAKER_01: We'll close out and worship.
SPEAKER_01: So, Father, as as your people, as the people of God have heard your word today, Lord, I understand that it's come through my frame and my filter.
SPEAKER_01: But I also understand that your spirit can, from my mouth to their heart, it is a limitless, it's limitless what you can do.
SPEAKER_01: And I believe you're doing something.
SPEAKER_01: So in this last closing moments, Lord, of the time that we're going to have collectively together, I pray that you would cement something or start something.
SPEAKER_01: Cement something or start something.
SPEAKER_01: In the name of Jesus, I ask.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: The more I dig, especially through these Psalms, the more I learn of the complexity, complexity of God.
SPEAKER_01: How complex he is, how detailed he is, how specific he is.
SPEAKER_01: And at the same time, then to be blown away by how present he is.
SPEAKER_01: Which then feels like how simple it is.
SPEAKER_01: You know, I've told you this before.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to worship someone.
SPEAKER_01: Um I don't want to worship someone that's not smarter than me.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to worship somebody I can understand.
SPEAKER_01: There needs to be something deeper out there than you and me.
SPEAKER_01: And there is.
SPEAKER_01: And he has made himself evident and keeps around even dirt to remind us of how deep and complex and wide and long that he is.
SPEAKER_01: This is this is encouraging.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm not sure what you do with the history lessonslash expository sermon on Psalm 122.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I've I've already been amazed at the detail in these Psalms of Santa.
SPEAKER_01: I look forward to next week with you, 123.
SPEAKER_01: Um, if you're a guest with us today, so good having you.
SPEAKER_01: Um if uh if you're ready kind of to be kind of known, um tapping that circle in the back of your chair or going to the um the connect center, that's kind of a way to let us know that you're ready, you're ready to be be known.
SPEAKER_01: Uh I made this joke.
SPEAKER_01: And and Madison, it's it's fun seeing you here today because I said that dirt's so important, addresses are so important to me that that's if I don't see you like four or six weeks and I have your phone number, sometimes all I do is text you 1288 Lewisburg Pike.
SPEAKER_01: And Madison was the first recipient of that years ago, and and uh she belly laughed, so I thought it was safe to do.
SPEAKER_01: Um guys, this dirt is special.
SPEAKER_01: I um there was, I don't even know how many people and how many times it was circled before we ever built anything on it, praying that the grace of God would be tangible here.
SPEAKER_01: That was a specific prayer, prayed by hundreds of people walking hundreds of loops.
SPEAKER_01: And someone was a guest in the first service, spoke to me afterwards were tears in our eyes, and he said, I felt that grace as soon as I drove on property.
SPEAKER_01: It's definitely what God does.
SPEAKER_01: It's a privilege for Gina and I to serve you as pastors.
SPEAKER_01: We love you and love this place dearly.
SPEAKER_01: I'm grateful to be able to share a Sabbath with you today.
SPEAKER_01: Now may the Lord bless you and keep you.
SPEAKER_01: May make his face to shine on you and be gracious to you.
SPEAKER_01: May he turn his countenance to you, towards you, and grant you peace, wholeness, ease, refuge, security.
SPEAKER_01: And you're rising up and in your laying down, and you're going out and coming in both now and forevermore.
SPEAKER_01: Let's give our response.
SPEAKER_01: And let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable on your sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer.
SPEAKER_01: God bless you.
SPEAKER_01: Enjoy the remainder of your weekend.
SPEAKER_00: We hope you were encouraged and challenged by today's message.
SPEAKER_00: Again, to learn more about Gateway Franklin Church, find us online at gatewayfranklin.com.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for joining us today.