Turn with me if you have Bibles to Hebrews chapter 12. Our sermon text today is Hebrews 12:18-29.

18 For you have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire and darkness and gloom and a tempest 19 and the sound of a trumpet and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that no further messages be spoken to them. 20 For they could not endure the order that was given, “If even a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned.” 21 Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I tremble with fear.” 22 But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.
25 See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven. 26 At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” 27 This phrase, “Yet once more,” indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain. 28 Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, 29 for our God is a consuming fire.
Hebrews 12:18-29, ESV

This is the word of the Lord. Anyone who has attempted to summit one of the highest mountain peaks in the world would tell you, they'd caution you that if you were to do the same, you have to be prepared to face the dangers of doing that and the costs that are associated with that. For example, on Mount Everest, a standard expedition usually requires that the prospective climber be ready to hand over tens of thousands of dollars and spend about two months in one of the most remote places in the world. You have to be prepared that on that climb, you're also going to face unpredictable weather. The real possibility of frostbite as you ascend higher and higher. Delusion and confusion as you approach the summit and lack of oxygen starves your brain of the fuel that it needs and ultimately the real possibility of death. The steep costs and the very real dangers in attempting to summit a peak like Everest are well documented. It's well known that each year people die in attempting that feat.

There's another mountain peak in the world, a mountain that looks somewhat tame by comparison, but in fact has cost the lives of over 150 people since the 19th century. Now, that mountain is Mount Washington in New Hampshire. Mount Washington looks nothing like Mount Everest. It may be the tallest mountain in New England, but at just over 6000 feet tall, it's nothing compared to Everest's 29,000 foot summit. It's within a short driving distance to people in the region, and you can easily climb Mount Washington all in a day.

Yet, Mount Washington has been called the most dangerous small mountain in the world. While it draws in hikers by its somewhat tame appearance, it's also known for rapid changes of weather that have trapped and even killed many unprepared hikers. The summit of Mount Washington is known for sudden blizzards and hurricane force winds, winds that once reached a speed of up to 230 miles per hour. You see, to many unprepared hikers, the valley below may look serene and calm and the mountain itself may look relatively friendly and accessible. But that appearance has over the years lulled many into a false sense of security. Those who have been unprepared and climbed Mount Washington accordingly have ended up paying for it with their lives.

Well, when we turn to our text and we consider the story of two other mountains that our author has in view, it's important that we recall first and foremost what exactly the original readers, to whom our author is writing back in the first century AD, were facing in their own day. You see, our author is very likely writing to a group comprised mostly of Jewish Christians. That is Christians who probably grew up as Jews, but along the way saw Christ Jesus for who He really is and became Christians. They saw him as the Messiah and they put their faith in Christ.

Since then, they've paid a heavy price for being Christians and have been ostracized to the fringes of society. As a result, their Jewish neighbors are probably against them. The Roman authorities are no friends of theirs. Amid these pressures that they're surrounded by some of his readers, our author's readers are growing a bit cold to Christ and have begun to look back with fondness to some of those Jewish old covenant systems that they once embraced. Systems like bloody sacrifices and the temple. Systems that had actually fulfilled their purpose in Christ and were no longer valid, but systems that for them may seem to offer more earthly security in the moment amid the raging uncertainties and pressures they face in their own day.

With these temptations in view, our author warns his readers, much like he does throughout Hebrews, that to turn back to those old covenant systems would be, in fact, to embrace a false sense of security. Because they wouldn't actually be resting in something tamer or more secure. They'd in fact be going back to Mount Sinai, where God could not be approached freely. Where no worshiper had the assurance that their sin had been finally and decisively dealt with it. To turn back to those things, just like they're tempted to do, would be like running up Mount Washington in a T-shirt, shorts and sandals, completely unaware of the all-consuming whirlwind that awaits of the summit.

So our author warns them not to be lured back to a mountain that may seem came in view of the forces around them that they see with their eyes. Instead almost paradoxically, he invites them up another mountain, a mountain that's just as frightening, if not more so, but a mountain that in Christ Jesus is their home. Where they're secure, where they belong, and where they have been freed to participate in what they were created and redeemed to do, namely worship.

The message our author impresses upon his readers in their own day is also, of course, a message for us too. You see, when we face the temptation, not to return to Judaism, but the temptation to be more palatable in the world and more accepted by our neighbors. Even if that means diluting the gospel of our salvation and its many implications. Our author warns us, you and me in our own day, that to reject Christ in that way also places us in a frightening position where we are also at Sinai and alienated from God.

Instead, then our author would have us understand the mountain home to which we have come in Christ. The security and the meaning that that mountain offers for us in Christ. Then to live more and more as residents of that forever and eternal home, whatever ways the currents batter us here on earth.

So a big idea this morning as we prepare to study the text is this Live as residents of the Heavenly Zion.

Two points to our passage. First, we're going to look at the two mountains that call. This is, in fact, a story of two separate mountains of Mount Sinai and Mount Zion. We're going to look at the two mountains first, that call. Then we'll see in the second half of our passage that there is only one mountain to call home.

1. Two Mountains That Call
2. One Mountain to Call Home.

Two Mountains That Call

So let's look first at the mountains that call, the two mountains that call. Notice that when our passage opens, we are dropped, as it were, into the biblical landscape, where we find two mountains that reach into the heavens. Both of the mountains, we're going to discover and see in a moment, are pretty imposing mountains. Both mountains are filled with wild, heavenly activity, and on both mountains, we encounter the same Lord.

While similarities between these two mountains exist, we also discover that there's a crucial difference between them. A difference that's, in fact so important that our author presses us to pursue one and run away from the other. So let's look at the two mountains that our author has in view and what's said about them.

So if you're looking at your text, the first mountain we come to is in verses 18 through 21, and it's a mountain that's not actually identified explicitly by its name, but it's pretty clear in the description that this is none other than Mount Sinai. In the description that follows, we're invited to recall the specific event that unfolded at Mount Sinai when Israel approached the mountain after their deliverance out of slavery in Egypt. As the story goes from the Book of Exodus, after God displayed his power over Egypt in the famous, well known ten plagues. He then brought his people through the Red Sea while drowning Pharaoh's army. Then finally into the wilderness to Mount Sinai. But Sinai, we learned from Exodus, was no tame mountain. Unlike Mount Washington, it didn't look tame either.

First, our author reminds us of some of the features of Mount Sinai that they encountered and tells us in verse 18 that this mountain, unlike the one we come to in Christ, can be touched. It was a physical place. That's his point. A physical place that you could in history, that Israel journey to that you could point to on a map. Just because it could be touched doesn't mean it should have been touched. Because back in Exodus 19:12, when Israel comes to the mountain, the Lord warns Moses as Israel draws near to the base of it, saying, "You shall set limits for the people all around, saying, take care not to go up into the mountain or touch the edge of it. For whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death." In other words, this was a physical place, yes, that could be identified on a map. Like every other physical place, could theoretically be touched. But if you got too close to Sinai, if you tried to ascend Sinai or even touch it as an average Israelite, you die.

As the memory of Mount Sinai continues to be built by our author, we're also reminded that this wasn't a mountain that the average Israelite wanted it to touch either. They weren't really tempted to touch it too, because it was terrifying. We're next reminded of what happened three days after Israel arrived at Mount Sinai. In the Book of Exodus chapter 19, the second half of that chapter, we learn, that on the third day after Israel came to the base, the foot of Mount Sinai, they were gathered there and there they saw the mountain engulfed in fire and smoke, and then they heard the increasing crescendo of a trumpet.

Now, at that point in Exodus, Moses was invited to ascend the mountain and to meet with the Lord while the people of Israel were again reminded, even after having ceremonially cleansed themselves for the previous three days, that if any of them dare approach the mountain or touch the mountain, that they are going to perish. But once again, Israel seems to appreciate the unparalleled holiness of the Lord because they eventually begged Moses. Moses, we don't even want the Lord to speak to us. It's too scary. You speak to us and we'll listen, but don't let God speak to us lest we die. In other words, they recognize in a powerful way that God is holy. So holy, in fact, that even indirect contact with his holiness was off limits.

You see, in verse 20 of our passage, we're reminded that if even an animal wandered on to holy ground, it had to be stoned. What's significant about that command is that they couldn't even touch something that had itself touched the mountain. They had to kill the animal by standing back from the animal and hurling stones at it from afar in order to kill it. You see, this whole experience at Sinai was intended to emphasize for Israel the unapproachability of God. No one and nothing except for Moses and Aaron were permitted to approach God on the mountain. The people of Israel, at least at this point in the narrative, they seem to appreciate the boundaries. They stand in awe of the Lord from a distance, and they're well aware of the significance that it is to set foot on the mountain where God himself dwells.

Now we're going to see in a moment that while the predominant message of Sinai and the so called old covenant that Sinai represents was to stand back. The case is different with Zion, with the second mountain that we're going to look at in just a moment. We'll see in a moment that in Zion and the so called New Covenant that Zion represents, the predominant message is actually an invitation to draw near through the blood of Christ. But though the message of these two mountains, Sinai and Zion, differs, the God of Sinai and of Zion is still the same God.

Notice that by the end of our passage in verse 29, even for those who find their home in Zion, God is still described as a consuming fire. He's still a God who we in the New Covenant should stand in all of. But like Israel, is that your posture before the Lord? Or if you're honest with yourself, are you more awed in this world by facades of grandeur?

I recently read just this week a story I learned of this place in West London. It's in a neighborhood. It's a specific street called I think I'm pronouncing it right; Leinster Gardens is the name of the street. If you were strolling down the sidewalk of Leinster Gardens, you would see this long continuous row of five storied, picturesque Victorian style, relatively expensive homes. Some of the homes in fact go for millions of pounds, English currency, millions of dollars.

Now I know nothing about London geography or the London real estate market, but I was looking at images of the of these homes, I would imagine that it's a place that many people wouldn't mind living in. It looks like a pretty well-to-do neighborhood, a pretty well-to-do street. Yet if you approached a couple homes on that block and you knocked on the door of two of those homes, no one would answer. Because two of those homes on that expensive London block are only a facade. Behind, which is a big gaping hole in the ground that looks into the London Tube. Now the facades look pretty convincing. It looks from the sidewalk like every other house. But if you were enticed into buying one of those homes and you thought you could purchase one of those homes and make it into your home, you'd be mistaken. You'd come to find out that those two homes were empty shells and ultimately worthless.

Well, understand that, like these two West London homes appearances often trick us too. You see, the problem for us isn't that we don't know what it's like to be awed by something in this world. You know, Paul Tripp once wrote that human beings are hard wired for awe. The problem is that on the one hand, we're too often spellbound in this world by all the wrong things. The things we stand in awe before, the things that grip our hearts, the things that activate our imagination are too often false facades. Things with a lot of bark, but no bite.

Then, on the other hand, where when our restless hearts search for awe never feels complete. Because we find that the objects, one after another, turn out to be great disappointments, ultimately facades. We are at the same time bored with the all-consuming, infinite holy God we claim to know and love. Friends, if we find ourselves in a position where this God of Sinai seems boring to us or somehow tame, we need to recalibrate our sense of what is really and truly awesome in this world.

The God of our passage, the God our passage magnifies is the God who is categorically holier than any created thing and is therefore more worthy, categorically more worthy, of greater awe than any perishable object or experience that might appeal to our hardwired awe seeking nature. The Lord's majesty we find, is no facade. His holiness we find will consume every other object in this world. Even as Psalm 97, tells us, which we're going to study tonight, the most imposing mountains of grandeur, well they all melt like wax before his presence.

Israel's encounter with this God is what led them to respond the way that they did. Yet the good news of our passage is that while we don't draw near to a lesser God, we are enabled as the people of God in Christ to stand in awe of this God in his courts, in His very presence. But on a very different mountain where we can do just that and live.

There was a 19th century naturalist. His name was John Muir. I'm pretty sure he wasn't a Christian and he said some pretty weird things. But one of the quotes that he's well known for is when he said, "The mountains are calling and I must go." This was an expression of his fascination with the natural world and specifically places that would later become natural parks in America. While he was speaking only figuratively, when he said what he said in the case of the mountains in our text, they quite literally call out to us. Whereas everything with Sinai called out and said, stay back, don't come near. In the case of Mount Zion, we have come to a mountain that invites us and bids us in Christ to come.

Now, if you recall, back in verse 18 our author also reminded us right out of the gate that we have not come to Mount Sinai. Yes, he described for us Mount Sinai, but only really for the purpose of reminding his readers and us what it would be like to reject Jesus Christ now. If you reject Christ, God is unapproachable like he was at Sinai. Now, that's not to say that Sinai didn't serve an important purpose in its own day, because it did. In its own day. Sinai held forth God's unapproachable holiness so that worshippers would long for a better mediator, and many of them did indeed look forward in faith to the promised Christ. Now that Christ has come, and this is our author's point, to return back to Sinai would be to reject Christ and stand forever at a distance from God and outside of fellowship with him.

Fortunately, again, that's not the situation of our author's audience. That's not our situation in Christ. In what follows in verses 22 through 24, our author explains to them and to us the reality of our present situation as we stand here right now. It's a reality that might otherwise be obscured by their present sufferings and perhaps even a reality often obscured by our present sufferings. But it's a reality that he presses them to live according to an increasing measure day by day. So what is the reality of their true mountain home and of our mountain home?

Well, he begins in verse 22 by ascribing to Mount Zion, this place to which we have come, a variety of different names, that indicate that unlike Sinai that he just described, this Zion is no place you can point to on a map. Now, to provide a bit of background for a moment, in the Old Testament, Mount Zion was first and foremost a physical place. In the days of King David, Mount Zion belonged first to a people called the Jebusites. When David became King, he ended up capturing Mount Zion, which was also known as Jerusalem. Then later he moved the Ark of the Covenant to Mount Zion, where it rested.

Then after David died and his son Solomon was raised up as king. Solomon built the temple on Mount Zion such that Zion became the symbolic meeting place between heaven and earth. Where God dwelt among his people. Now, when our author invokes Zion, he also has in mind the meeting place between God and his people, but he's no longer thinking of some earthly place or physical place any longer. After all, he already told us back in verse 18 that this mountain to which we have come, unlike Sinai, is a mountain that cannot be touched. Then here he calls the mountain to which we have come, the City of the Living God and the Heavenly Jerusalem.

This is the same home that Abraham, back in chapter 11, was looking forward to all the days of his earthly sojourn. The home that our author previously called the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. It's not a place that we can point to on a map. It's not a physical place we can touch, but make no mistake about it, it's just as real as Sinai.

So what does he tell us about this heavenly Zion to which we come? Well, he tells us that this is a place, Zion, with innumerable angels in festival gathering. That is so many angels that they cannot be counted standing before the throne of God in worship. Right away, we hear just how different this mountain is than Mount Sinai. Because you see, back in the Book of Deuteronomy, as Moses reflects upon the experience of Sinai, we learned that at Sinai when Israel was standing before the mountain, there were actually a myriad of angels on the mountain. But at Sinai, God's people didn't come close to actually see those angels. One can even imagine that some of those angels on Sinai were like the cherub who guarded the Garden of Eden after the fall, forbidding any unclean thing from ascending the mount of the Lord. Whatever we say about that, when we take stock of Zion, we're told that we join with the company of worshiping angels in the courts of God. We are with them and they are with us.

We also come, our author tells us, to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven and the spirits of the righteous made perfect. Now, these references are references that are loaded with significance, but in essence, they describe for us the one church, the one people of God, spanning both Old Testament and New Testament. Typically theologians in speaking about different aspects of the one church, the one people of God, use these terms the church militant and the church triumphant.

The church militant refers to the church here on Earth, those believers all around the world who right now are engaged in the race that is the Christian life. That's us. We are the church militant. The church triumphant refers to all of those Old Testament and New Testament believers who have finished the race and who now rest in heaven and glory.

According to our author here, the Zion to which we come, is a mountain occupied by both the church militant and the church triumphant. It's a mountain filled with believers all around the world. Believers who worship right now with us in Colombia and Romania, in India and all around the world. But it's also filled with believers from the Old Testament and New Testament who have already died and gone to be with the Lord. Together on Zion, we have come as both the church militant and the church triumphant in worship, and specifically to God, the judge of all.

Now, as soon as we come across that reference to God as judge, that may make us stop in our tracks for a moment and think, hold on, that sounds a lot like Sinai. We've already heard that back at Sinai, you can't approach this God who is judge. So how is it that we can approach this one God on Zion, but not on Sinai? Well, the answer to this question comes in verse 24, where we hear that Zion stands out, because on this mountain is Jesus, the mediator of the New Covenant and the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.

Understand that it is the crucified, resurrected and ascended Jesus Christ who sets these two mountain destinations apart. Calvin writes this he says, "The author of Hebrews adds this reference to Jesus in the last place because it is he alone through whom the Father is reconciled to us and who renders his face serene and lovely to us so that we may come to him without fear." Understand that the approachability that's characteristic of our mountain home, of Zion, has nothing to do with God lessening his standards of perfection, or God setting aside his perfect holiness. It has nothing to do with that or with you or I becoming somehow more acceptable and lovely in a sight. Rather, it has everything to do with the better mediator of the New Covenant, Jesus Christ, our Lord, and His more precious blood that speaks a better word than Abel's.

Through faith in Christ and through Christ alone, we are invited to ascend this mountain and to worship with both the church militant and triumphant, and to stand in all with the worshipping community, including the celestial beings who join with us. But while it's Jesus who brings us to this better mountain, the question remains when and where do we actually enjoy the privileges that accompany Mount Zion? You see, if this is the mountain to which we have already come in Christ, our author told us that in verse 18. It's not a mountain necessarily that we look forward to in the future. It's a mountain that we have already come to right now. Then the question remains, when do we enjoy all the benefits of gathering with the church militant here on earth, and the church triumphant in heaven and innumerable angels who worship before the throne?

Well, in part, the answer to that question is right now. Understand that when we worship, when local churches around the world gather together each Lord's day, there is an even greater assembly, spiritually speaking, to which we come. Theologian Edmund Clowney puts it like this. He says, quote, "In corporate worship, we rise by faith to enter the heavenly assembly of the saints and angels. We join in a very real way, the praises of heaven."

You see, our author is pulling back the veil, as it were, for us to gaze on the reality of where we belong right now. Our citizenship is in heaven. We've mentioned that many, many a times. This is what the place we call home looks like. The worship that rings out in heaven is the same worship in which we, Harvest Community Church are participating right now as we speak.

So let me ask you this, with that in view, is your present posture fitted for that kind of worship? Is your present posture fitted for that kind of worship? A few years ago, I attended a fairly large theology conference where thousands of professors and students from various seminaries and universities around the world gathered to present research and talk about a host of important theology topics.

Now, this nerd conference, you can call it, was business casual. Most of the men who were there were dressed like I am right now. That's how I dressed, too. But there was one evening of the conference where I was invited to a social that was put on by a fairly large seminary outside the formal time of the conference. It was presented to me as something of an informal meet and greet. So before I went downstairs to the ballroom that evening for to gather and participate in that social, I changed into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, and then I went downstairs.

As soon as I walked in and I felt embarrassed and overwhelmed and completely out of place. For one thing, no one else interpreted informal meet and greet as an opportunity to dress down. Everyone else was just as well dressed as they were during the day. For another thing, this wasn't any small, informal meet and greet that I was invited to, because when I walked in, I couldn't find my friend anywhere, but I did run in to a number of some of the greatest theological minds out there, theologians that I greatly admire and looked up to. You might think that was a pleasant surprise, but it was incredibly intimidating to me in a way that I didn't expect to be intimidated. You see, at every point, both my dress and my expectations, were completely unfit for the setting in which I now found myself.

Now, I'm sure all of us can recall experiences of social awkwardness like that in our own lives, where we felt completely out of place and uncomfortable. Settings, where we discover that there was in fact a great discrepancy between what we expected and what actually we encountered. When it comes to the worship of the living God and we see the reality in our text of where we have come every time we enter into this assembly and corporate worship. Do you find that your posture is actually fitted for that reality?

Now, don't mistake what I'm saying here. I'm not talking about something as simple or superficial about the clothes that we wear in worship or anything like that. Rather, I'm talking about the posture of our hearts and our expectations for what happens in worship. Whether you are preparing yourselves when you come in here in a way that's fitted for the cosmic setting in which our little worship service actually unfolds.

Understand that if this description of Zion is the reality of our worship, our worship right now, as we speak, then that has to affect our attitude, our posture and our expectations. It means that when we come together, we bring the best of ourselves. That when we come together, that we come with the same diligence and focus that many of us apply to our own vocations throughout the week. It means that we take this time seriously, that we feel the weight and gravitas of what this is, and that we humble ourselves enough to let the one we approach through his word and spirit actually work on us and change us.

So let me ask you this. Where is your mind right now? Yes. You're physically here. I see you. But are you actually engaged in what we're doing or are your thoughts instead drifting to things like the English Premier League scoreboard? I can relate with that. Or all the things that you're hoping to accomplish later this afternoon. Remember, our big idea is to live as residents of the Heavenly Zion and one of the ways we do that is by checking the posture of our hearts and the attentiveness of our minds and asking whether or not they are fitted in the moment for the heavenly worship in which we have come.

One Mountain to Call Home

So our author describes these two mountain destinations and he tells us that we belong right now to one and not the other. But as we move to the second half of our passage, it will be much shorter here. We hear that Zion is the only place to call home. It's a kingdom that we have already received, and it's the only kingdom that will, in the end, stand.

Earlier this week, I was I was reminded that it's been 42 years since the massive Mount St Helens volcanic eruption that took place on May 18, 1980. If you've ever seen pictures in the aftermath of that eruption, the whole region right around northern Washington just looked like a barren wasteland. Nearly 100 square miles of forest were leveled, mud and ash buried, everything. Rivers were rerouted. Tragically, 57 people who were positioned way too close to the mountains were unable to escape from the fury of superheated mud, ash and lava, and were killed.

Well, when we turn to the second half of our passage, we hear that those who find their home not on Mount Zion but on Mount Sinai, will sadly and tragically not escape on the day when God judges the world. You see our author in verses 25 through 29, he turns from the present choice facing his audience. That is the choice to either go back to Mount Sinai or to live for where you already are, Mount Zion. He shows us a window into the future. In the future he tells us a day is coming when the Lord is going to shake both heaven and earth in a way that exponentially surpasses any shaking that happened on Sinai.

Our author authors quoting here in verse 26 from a passage in the Old Testament from Haggai 2:6, which likewise looked forward to a day when God would make all things right, when He would put away all rebellion against him and his kingdom and make all things that were wrong right again. In that day, he tells us, Zion and its residents have nothing to fear because they belong to a kingdom, we belong to a kingdom in Christ that cannot be shaken. But Sinai and its residents, they face a terrifying prospect to which Mount St Helens pales in comparison.

So in view of this terrifying future that our author portends, that he looks forward to in verse 25, he explicitly calls us to recognize there's a lot at stake in the future based on the decisions, the faith decisions that we make right now.

First thing, he gives us a lesson from history, and he reminds us that God's people in the Old Testament didn't escape judgment when they eventually failed to heed what God commanded them to heed at Sinai. If we were to look back at the books of Exodus and Numbers, we would learn that while that initial encounter with God at Sinai initially produced an obedient response among Israel, by the time Israel left Mount Sinai and wandered into the desert, we learned that they were hardened again in their sin and they became a people marked by unbelief. As a result, a whole generation was condemned to death in the wilderness, unable to arrive at the land of promise because of their unbelief. You can read all about that in the Book of Numbers.

Now, in view of what we've come to in Christ, our author tells us that the stakes are exponentially higher. If we reject Christ, the final sacrifice for sins, the sacrifice that the whole Old Covenant administration eagerly anticipated. The hope of Zion that people like Abraham and his sons looked forward to all the days of their earthly sojourn and we decide instead to go about life on our own terms. If we decide to listen to whatever voices we find more palatable, voices that pamper us in every sinful tendency we have. It's not a physical death that we have to worry about. It's an eternal death.

Friends, the stakes couldn't be higher. Yet, in this final appeal to his readers, including to you and me, in view of what is at stake, it's significant that our author doesn't tell us to strap on our climbing gear, cross our fingers, and hope against all, hope that we make it to the top before that earthquake breaks out. Rather, he tells us, reminds us again, that in Christ we've already reached the top. In Christ, Zion is already our home.

You know, sometimes when we talk about the Christian life, you might hear it said that we never arrive in the sense that we're always repenting of our sins, being renewed in the truth of the gospel, and that will always be the case until we die. That's most certainly true. At the same time, there's an equally true sense in which we already have arrived.

You see, if Christ is your trust, you've already received a kingdom that cannot be shaken. It's a kingdom that you didn't work for. It's a kingdom you didn't build yourself. It's a kingdom you did not earn. Rather, in the same way that the earth receives the rain, so to we in Christ have received an unshakable kingdom. Already, it's yours, right now it's mine as we speak. Our present posture then, isn't to try to earn what we already have. Rather, it's to live our lives more and more in accordance with what we already possess.

Application

So how do we do that? When our author closes the passage, he directs us according to that question with two pretty simple commands. He tells us, first, to be grateful, be thankful, and then the second to worship.

You know, back in the spring of 2016, there was a little known English Premier League soccer team named Leicester City. Leicester City shocked the world when they overcame 5000 to 1 odds from the beginning of the season to actually win the Premier League title. The odds they came overcame were so ridiculous that if you were a betting man or woman and you bet $25 on Leicester City winning the title at the start of the season, you ended up with $125,000 on the day they claim the title. That's what actually happened for a few people, talk about a missed opportunity. It remains one of the biggest upsets in professional sports history.

Well, in the aftermath of that unprecedented victory, the owner of the club was so undone, he was so appreciative of his players and what they had achieved. That as an expression of his gratitude, he purchased 19 custom order BMWs, each with each price that well over $100,000 for each of his players. It wasn't, as far as I know, out of obligation or duty. It was a tremendous expression of gratitude for the coveted prize that they had won for both him and for the club.

Well, brothers and sisters, the victory that Christ won for the salvation of our souls, the victory that brought us to Zion was a victory that dwarfs in every way the victory that some soccer club won one season. It's a victory far more dramatic, too. Because the odds that we would have had to overcome on our own because of our sin were infinite to one. Yet they were odds that Christ overcame for us. Yet for as much as Christ did for us, which we could not do for ourselves, remember the kingdom that we have come to, the kingdom that we that we have in our possession right now is a kingdom we have received. Do we respond to that with a fitting posture of gratitude or not?

If the home we've received in this mountain home described in our passage is truly what our author describes, then shouldn't we be willing to give up anything in gratitude for what we've received? Should we not live our thanks by giving up those things that are more suited to the kingdoms of this world, and in turn give the best of what we have in worship of this king and his kingdom into whose presence we have come in Christ? What we have in Christ is, again, not something we could ever buy. It's not something we could ever earn, but it's something that we have indeed received, inherited as a gift. The only way that we could ever dare respond to a gift of this magnitude is by the gratitude and the totality giving the totality of our lives in surrender to the King of Zion and worship him and him alone.

So as we prepare to close, let me leave us with this closing thought. Build your home in the kingdom that you have already received. Invest in the home in which you already have on Zion. At the end of the day, or more properly, at the end of the age, our author reminds us that only eternal things will endure. That is, things pertaining to heaven, things pertaining to the Kingdom of God. At the end of the day, so many of the things that we obsess over endlessly in this world are just not going to matter. They will be shaken and removed.

While that's not to say that we don't enjoy God's creation at present or anything like that. It is to force us to think about whether we're spending enough time thinking about and living for the kingdom that we already possess and the King who we call our own? Or are we focused more on things that will eventually pass away? That's the question I want to leave us with. At the end of the day, our passage would want to leave us with that, too. Our passage would have us build our home; invest in the kingdom that we have already received through Christ Jesus our Lord.

Let's do that and pray with me. Gracious Heavenly Father, Lord, you have brought us to a place of awe. You've brought us to you, through Christ, through the blood, through the way that Christ has opened up through His own precious blood. You have brought us to this cosmic worship setting. Lord, I pray that we would be attentive to that very reality. Attentive to that reality in our worship, attentive to that reality in our lives, and that we would invest more and more in that present reality as we live more and more as citizens, not of Sinai, but of where we actually are, what we've already come into possession of, namely Zion. We ask this in Christ name. Amen.