Jerusalem; City of Destiny…miracle nation pt 61

Again the word of the Lord of hosts came to me, saying,  Thus saith the Lord of hosts; I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I was jealous for her with great fury.  Thus saith the Lord; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth; and the mountain of the Lord of hosts the holy mountain. Thus saith the Lord of hosts; There shall yet old men and old women dwell in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for very age. And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof. (Zechariah 8:1-5)

Jerusalem is the most important city on Earth, bar none. Not London, New York, Rome or Mecca, or Mumbai, but it is in Jerusalem that the issues which affect every single soul on earth have been raised, and the future of the human race is wrapped up in the destiny of this ancient city.

It was in Jerusalem that the very temple of God was raised up according to the pattern given from heaven, and the cloud of God’s glory descended. The infinite personal  God of the Bible dwelt in the Holy of Holies of the temple in Jerusalem. God has said in several places, that He has “put His name there forever”.

For example Solomon prayed at the dedication of the Temple;

But will God indeed dwell on the earth? behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded?  Yet have thou respect unto the prayer of thy servant, and to his supplication, O Lord my God, to hearken unto the cry and to the prayer, which thy servant prayeth before thee to day:  That thine eyes may be open toward this house night and day, even toward the place of which thou hast said, My name shall be there: that thou mayest hearken unto the prayer which thy servant shall make toward this place. And hearken thou to the supplication of thy servant, and of thy people Israel, when they shall pray toward this place: and hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place: and when thou hearest, forgive.( I Kings 8:27-30)

Now mine eyes shall be open, and mine ears attent unto the prayer that is made in this place.  For now have I chosen and sanctified this house, that my name may be there for ever: and mine eyes and mine heart shall be there perpetually.( I Chronicles 7:15-16)

Jerusalem is mentioned by name 800 times in the Bible. It is one of the subjects of Bible Prophecy. The prophetic ideal future is the Law(Teaching) of God flowing out from MT Zion(In Jerusalem), and streams of Gentiles flowing into it.

The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.  And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.  And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.  And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.  O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord.(Isaiah 5:1-5)

Jerusalem is “the city of David”. The Son of David, the King whom God chose to be “his Son” and promised him that one of his descendants would reign on the throne of God forever, will reign from Jerusalem.

The city of Zion as it is also called, is the place where Jesus confronted in the name of God, the corrupt Sadducees and Pharisees, who had misled and destroyed the nation. Outside of Jerusalem on Mt Calvary, Jesus was crucified and buried in a Sanhedrinist’s new tomb.

Three days later, as the women came to finish the hasty embalming, they found the tomb of Jesus  empty and Angels proclaiming “Why seek the Living among the dead?”. It was in Jerusalem that Jesus appeared to his disciples, and up to 500 people at once. Days later the Christian church was established in Jerusalem, within a 15 minute walk of the empty tomb!

The Prophets tell us that Jerusalem is where the LORD shall touch down upon his return to judge the world in righteousness,

Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee.  For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city.  Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.  And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.(Zechariah 14:1-4)

The Holy City of Jerusalem is also the center of World attention in the very last days, being the focus of the three major world monotheistic faiths, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Jerusalem is obviously a Jewish city. The Catholics want to have custody of it, so also the Muslims, and the secular atheistic U.N. also.

The United States Supreme court recently ruled in the Zavatinskey case that the State Department is not compelled to  issue passports to anyone claiming to be from ‘Jerusalem,Israel’, since they insist that Jerusalem is not part of Israel, and that the status of Jerusalem is not yet decided.

The U.N. spends about a third of its time arguing and voting about the status of Jerusalem, the borders of Israel and the population of Judah. Zechariah’s vision of the last days is an ominous siege around Judah and Jerusalem,

The burden of the word of the Lord for Israel, saith the Lord, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him.  Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem.  And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.(Zechariah 12:1-3)