Let Us Go to the House of the Lord! (A sermon based on Psalm 122)

Let Us Go to the House of the Lord!
A sermon based on Psalm 122
Sunday, June 14, 2009 - Pentecost 2B

    Imagine for a moment that there were no Bibles, that there were no churches in Raleigh, and no churches in North Carolina. The only church is in Washington D.C. That's the only place for you to worship. The only place to hear the Word of God. Now you can't fly there, because there are no planes. And you can't drive, because there are no cars. You have to make the 270 mile trip on foot or the back of an animal, but you do it anyway, because that's the only place where you can meet God and it's that important to you!

    Well, that's sort of what it was like for the Israelites. The only place to worship was in Jerusalem. Yet three times a year they would make the long, dangerous trek to the city where God's temple was to celebrate the festivals prescribed by God. And when they finally made it there, what excitement!

    I got a touch of that feeling last November when after sitting on a plane for 14 hours without standing up once, we finally landed. Then two days later, there we stood in Jerusalem. We were finally there! What excitement! To be in Jerusalem with its countless layers of history. To be on the very steps on which Jesus himself stood and from which Jesus taught!

    It's with the excitement of being in Jerusalem that King David wrote our text for consideration this morning, a Psalm of Ascent, that pilgrims would sing going up to the city and to the temple mount, Psalm 122...

1 I rejoiced with those who said to me, "Let us go to the house of the LORD." 2 Our feet are standing in your gates, O Jerusalem. 3 Jerusalem is built like a city that is closely compacted together. 4 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. 5 There the thrones for judgment stand, the thrones of the house of David. 6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: "May those who love you be secure. 7 May there be peace within your walls and security within your citadels." 8 For the sake of my brothers and friends, I will say, "Peace be within you." 9 For the sake of the house of the LORD our God, I will seek your prosperity.

    When then presidential candidate, Barack Obama, visited Israel last July, he of course went to the Western Wall of the temple mount. And when he was there, he read Psalm 122 and prayed a prayer for the peace of Israel. When the Muslims who thought he was praying that God give the temple mount back to the Israelites, Obama explained that no, he was only praying that the barbed wire that kept the territories divided would soon come down.

When Pope Benedict visited Jerusalem this past May he too read Psalm 122. When the Jews were upset that he made the sign of the cross, the Pope suggested that the peace of Jerusalem for which he prayed was that all faiths might get along and that we focus on helping others more than on our own plight.

    But did the president and the pope get it right? What kind of peace was King David talking about when he wrote Psalm 122? Was it a literal peace? Or a figurative one? A spiritual peace? Well, there are a few clues in the text itself. Verse 3 says, "Jerusalem is built like a city that is closely compacted together." Some have suggested that the word "like" indicates that this is not to be understood as a literal city. Others have noted the present tense, "Jerusalem is being built." Yet, at the time King David wrote this Psalm, the city was completed.

    But perhaps a better indication of how this Psalm is to be understood is found in what Jesus said. In Matthew 23:37 he said, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing." In Matthew 24:2 Jesus said of Jerusalem, "I tell you the truth, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down." In fact, today if you go to Jerusalem, you can literally see the layers of history with a different style of brick for each time the city's been destroyed and rebuilt. It doesn't seem that Jesus understood the peace of Jerusalem as a literal, political peace of the city, does it?

    So what did the Holy Spirit mean when he had King David refer to Jerusalem and the House of the Lord? Well, you can probably figure it out. By now, most of you know that Zion, the Mountain of the Lord, and the city of Jerusalem are all pictures of the Church--not any congregation or denomination, but the Holy Christian Church, that is, all people who believe that Jesus death on the cross has paid for their sins. In that sense, this Psalm very much applies to us, whose feet are standing in the gates of Jerusalem, who are inside the Church. God's church is no longer in a specific location, but is right here and wherever the Word is preached in its truth and the Sacraments are rightly administered.

    So, let me ask you: Are do you always rejoice when someone says to you, "Let's go to the house of the Lord!"? Are you always excited to make the most of every opportunity to hear God's Word? Our worship attendance and our Bible class attendance says otherwise. And why are you here this morning? Were you excited to get up this morning and come to the House of the Lord? Or did you come out of obligation, because your spouse made you, because "What would others think if I didn't show up?" or simply out of routine and habit? In his explanation to the 3rd Commandment on Remembering the Sabbath Day, Martin Luther said, "We should fear and love God that we do not despise preaching and the Word, but regard it as holy and gladly hear and learn it." Do you always hear and learn God's Word gladly? Are you always eager to worship him?

    King David wrote, "May those who love you be secure." Implicitly he suggest that those who don't love God's church and gladly hear and learn God's Word deserve to be insecure. You and I deserve to have the priviledge of worship lost. We deserve to lose the Means of Grace that we so often take for granted. and before the thrones of judgment we are guilty and deserve to be banished to an eternity of torment in hell. That's what we deserve.

    But work of Christ in and just outside Jerusalem, changes everything. Remember how Jesus acted in Jerusalem at the House of the Lord? He was outraged at the abuses that he saw and drove the moneychangers out of the temple. And "His disciples remembered that it is written: "Zeal for your house will consume me." (John 2:17) Jesus did regard the Word as holy and gladly heard and learned it. He did rejoice at the opportunity to go to the House of the Lord! And yet, even though he had a perfect love for God's house and God's Word, he was dragged outside of the city that he held so dear. He was tortured. He was crucified. He was abandoned to hell. Why? He was sacrificed for us to remove our sin--our apathy toward worship, our lack of love for the Word. He has removed every one of our sins and made us perfect and holy before God. Now the thrones of Judgment aren't terrifying, but wonderful, because we know we are declared "Not guilty!" We are perfect through Jesus and are secure in him.

    Maybe you saw the headlines this week about the woman to tried to help out her elderly mother. Noticing her mattress was pretty worn and shabby, she went and bought her mother a brand new one and took the old one to the dump. Her mother certainly was surprised... but not in a good way. You see, her mother didn't trust banks and so had kept her life savings―over $1 Million!―in that mattress now in some landfill. Where that woman thought she had security―in the dollars she's saved over a lifetime―is now all gone.

    I don't need to tell you that your dollars, whether losing value in a bank, or stuffed securely in your mattress, don't really proved security. They can be gone in a day, lost in a fire or taken by a theif. Last year the US Department of Defense spent over $8 billion on our nation's security, intelligence, and defense, and yet in spite of all the measures taken, bombs still explode, shootings happen, terrorists attack. And even if we could guard off all enemies outside our borders and within, there would still be diseases that could infiltrate the toughest of security mesures. True security can't be found in these things.

    Every year over two million Muslims make a journey much like the Israelites made. They travel to the city of Mecca to perform the religious ceremonies every devout Muslim must perform. Why do they do it? They long for security. If they do this great work for Allah, they think, then he must love them and they will have a better hope of going to heaven. Every day countless Christians think that the key to finding security with God is in what they do for him. In how much they give away, how kind they are to others, how patient and loving they can be. But you know that no amount of works, no matter how good, can never satisfy a God who demands perfection. They cannot give security.

    You know that the only place to find real peace and security is in Christ. If you lose everything you own in a stock market crash, you still have your retirement property in heaven! Nothing can take that away! If a zealous terrorist blows you up and takes your life, you will go to glory! How do you know? Because your sins are forgiven! And so you have peace and security! There is no need to be insecure as you struggle to earn God's favor. You know that you already have it through Christ! And you know this message because someone in the Church shared it with you!

    And so, because your feet stand within the church, you are secure! There is peace within your walls and security within your citadels! And God's church has walls that are closely compacted together—that is the stones are close together, with no gaps. It has tight security! Martin Luther put it this way in his beloved hymn: A Mighty Fortress Is Our God. And as long as we stay within the Church, wherever the truth is taught and Sacraments are administered, we're safe! And God will continue to keep us safe until he takes us to his heavenly city, Jerusalem the Golden—heaven.

    Legend has it that after Jesus came to his house, Zacchaus got up early every morning and left the house for an hour or two, returning just as his wife woke up. Before long she was suspicious and followed him one morning. She saw him take a large jar from the house and go to the river. There he filled the jar to the top and carried it to the sycamore tree he had once climbed. He carefully brushed away any debris or fallen branches from the around the trunk and gently poured the water around the roots. He stood at the base of the tree and wistfully touched the trunk. Later his wife confronted him and asked him why he did all that? Wasn't it Jesus that he loved? Oh yes! He replied, but it was because of that tree that he ever saw Jesus and so he loved it too!

    In the same way the Israelites loved Jerusalem and we love our church, because it's here that we see Jesus! Here we hear the beautiful message of how we're secure in him! Here we take his very body and blood for the assurance that we are forgiven! And we love our church as we love him!

    And because we love it so, we pray for the peace of our church! We long to see it healed of all divisions and to find true unity based on the truth! We work for the peace of our church when, for the sake of our brothers and friends, we proclaim that peace that can be found here—when we say to others, Come with me! Let us go to the House of the Lord! And we work for the prosperity of the Church by our generous offerings to support its work of proclaiming the peace and security that we have in Jesus! And as we love our church and seek its prosperity we'll continue to enjoy the peace and security that belongs to all who love it! In Jesus' name, dear friends, amen!