From Charlotte Pass, we walked in to Kosciusko. Provided you can last the distance, there's nothing difficult about the walk. In fact, at our first view of the mountain from Seaman's Hut, there was a momentary sense of disappointment. The changing vegetation had borne witness to a steady increase in elevation throughout the walk. Yet our favourite Girraween National Park in southern Queensland had afforded us all much greater challenges than this. Next to Kosciusko is Mount Townsend. It isn't quite as high as Kosciusko, but surely a more striking and worthy mountain to be honoured in Australia.
Odd momentary thoughts? I assure you that when we reached the summit we had a real sense of achievement as we looked out in every direction over the country we call home.
Isaiah wrote, "In the last days the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it" (Is. 2.2).
Why should one mountain be regarded any more highly than any other? we may ask. It depends on your perspective. As bush-walkers, Mount Townsend had more appeal - it would have to wait to another visit (it's still waiting!). As Australians, Mount Kosciusko is much more significant.
In the ancient world, there were other levels of significance. A mountain gave prominence to a city. There were strategic benefits too. The walled city on a hill couldn't be hidden, but it could be defended more easily. Then too, hills became important centres for worship. That was one of the problems when the Israelites came into the land of Canaan. Every hill seemed to have a shrine to some local Baal. The temptation to be drawn into that kind of worship was strong.
But the mountain was also an important place for the worship of the true God. At the command of the Lord, Abraham took his son of promise, Isaac, to Mount Moriah to sacrifice him there. Having shown his willingness to obey the Lord, such a sacrifice wasn't in fact expected of him - the Lord indeed provided "the lamb for the burnt offering" (Gen. 22).
It is believed that this is the same spot where the first Temple was built in Solomon's time. It was still standing in Isaiah's time, though not even the Temple would provide them protection from the invading Babylonians.
In Genesis 12.2-3, we read of the Lord's promise to Abraham, "I will bless you and you will be a blessing... all peoples on earth will be blessed through you."
Isaiah saw this promise of the Lord being fulfilled right here at "the mountain of the Lord" - "Many peoples will come and say, 'Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.' The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem" (Is. 2.3).
We live in a world of many gods. People today have a whole smorgasbord of choices before them. That is so in Australia as well as in other countries. Why listen to the Lord and not Buddha? Why Jesus and not Muhammed? Why the gospel and not the new age?
There is only one true God - a God who has revealed himself in the history of the Israelite race, a God to whom sacrifices were offered continually because no perfect sacrifice had yet been offered, a God who was revealing his character and also his expectations for those who would be his people, a God who was promising to fulfil his purposes by sending the Messiah - an "anointed one" who would bring in his rule for all peoples.
As Christians, we understand that all this points forward to the coming of Jesus Christ. But the early Christians didn't immediately grasp that the new wine could no longer be contained in the old wine skins (Mt. 9.17).
Yes, in Christ there was the fulfilment of the Jewish hope. But the Christian Church wasn't a reformed synagogue movement into which Gentile proselytes were to be brought. It wasn't in reformed synagogues that people would be instructed in the Lord's way. Rather, God himself would be teaching them his ways "so that we may walk in his paths."
Further, "He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war any more" (v. 4).
In other words, as the peoples of the world submit their lives to the Lord, they will allow him to settle disputes among them - on the basis of mutually acknowledged justice and equity.
In these days when billions of dollars are spent on armies and armaments and when poverty and starvation afflict millions of people, we long for a peace in which swords can be beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning-hooks. Just such a peace is promised when the peoples of the world come to the God of Jacob to learn his ways with the intention of walking in his paths.
In February 2001 our first view of the old Jerusalem and the Temple Mount was from Mount Scopus. It was Friday. We arrived at our vantage point just as the amplified Muslim call to prayer was echoing across the valley from several minarets. Those who have travelled in Arab countries assure me that there is nothing unusual about that. Yet, as we listened, it seemed to be arranged to give maximum irritation to Jews as they prepared for the Sabbath.
We could see the Temple Mount, made conspicuous by the golden Dome of the Rock. Later in the afternoon - before the Sabbath had begun at dusk - we visited the Western Wall - the massive foundation stones, some dating back to Solomon's Temple, others to the Second Temple begun by Kind Herod and still not quite complete in Jesus' time.
Because of the present troubles non-Muslims weren't permitted on the Temple Mount. It is the third most sacred Muslim site in the world - after Mecca and Medina. They call it Haram ash-Sharif ("noble sanctuary"). According to Muslim tradition, the angel Gabriel transported Muhammed here one night and from this rock took him into heaven where many things were revealed to him (Koran, Sura XVII).
About a fortnight after our tour, the Palestinian-appointed mufti of Jerusalem declared that the so-called Western Wall had no historical or religious significance to anyone other than Muslims. It is nothing more than the foundation of the al-Aqsa mosque and should be renamed accordingly. The claim was both untrue and inflammatory - whatever one thinks about who should control what goes on there.
Some Jewish groups have expressed concern about heavy equipment seen working on the Temple Mount. These groups suspect that the Muslims are seeking to remove the archaeological evidence that there ever was a Jewish Temple on the site. The Temple, they say, is just the creation of Jewish imagination. This certainly concurs with the mufti's declaration about the Western Wall.
Apparently, it was to investigate whether this was happening that Ariel Sharon - now Prime Minister - went onto the Temple Mount with an armed guard in October 2000. It was this visit that sparked the present round of unrest.
It seems that "the mountain of the Lord's temple" has become the cause of conflict and bloodshed, rather than the place where people are learning to walk in the Lord's paths - and not to train for war any more.
And thus it will ever be while people take issue over sacred sites and real estate. As long as Jews fail to grasp that they have been blessed to be a blessing to all nations - and as long as Christians fail to get the same point - there will be wars and rumours of wars.
Listen to the last verse of our reading - "Come, O house of Jacob, let us walk in the light of the Lord" (v. 5).
In the midst of the present conflict, surely this is the call to every one of us. Gentiles and Jews, Muslims and Christians... all need to come to the Lord to learn his ways "so that we may walk in his paths." Come then, let us walk together in the light of the Lord.
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