End is Near? Biggest Tragedy JUST Happened in JERUSALEM! The Whole World is Scared


Life in Israel, once normal, routine, safe, was shattered by the fury of the earth itself.

Something has shifted in Jerusalem tonight.

A tragedy that no one saw coming.

When disaster comes to a city, has not the Lord caused it? Amos 3:6.

And tonight, with the dust of Jerusalem still rising, that scripture no longer feels like an ancient warning.

It feels like the voice of God echoing through the smoke of a wounded city calling us, forcing us to reflect on our sins and the sins of our land.

If we truly believe that God governs the nations, then we cannot pretend that calamity unfolds outside his hand.

And if we believe that he is righteous, then we must admit he does not strike a penitent without cause.

We as a people have wandered far.

Our country’s mine, yours are stained with rebellion, and now through the devastation that has shaken Jerusalem, God is speaking again.

The fields of the world grow thin, conflicts multiply, and famine knocks on doors once thought secure.

The trumpet of warning has sounded not only in Israel, but across the nations, and our own consciences must testify that this judgment is not undeserved.

If my heart were as tender as it should be, I would lift my voice like a trumpet and spare no one, including myself, declaring the truth of our transgressions.

For the question trembling over Jerusalem tonight is the same question trembling over us.

How long will we ignore the God who calls us back? And if this message stirs something in you, if it awakens even a small hunger to discern what God is doing in these days, then stay close.

Share this word.

Let others hear it and remain with us as we watch and pray.

These are not ours to drift alone.

Look around our land.

What do you see? Vice standing tall and unashamed while righteousness retreats into the shadows.

Cities drowning in pleasure, distraction, and noise, yet starving for holiness.

Mouths filled with cursing.

Hearts numb to the weight of eternity.

Greed hoarding what it can never keep.

Corruption scheming for what it does not deserve.

Luxury flaunting her feasts while humility starves.

Entertainment replacing worship.

Screens replacing scripture.

noise replacing prayer.

Cards and bedding tables are touched more often than the word of God.

Fleeting amusements carry more excitement than the call of the spirit.

The outcome of a sports match matters more to many than the destiny of their souls.

Families no longer pray.

Children grow up unrestrained, trained by a world that mocks repentance.

Entire crowds wear the name Christian, yet live as if God were a myth.

Church services are attended lightly, even carelessly, as though we gather to pass time, not to face eternity.

And beneath this thin layer of religion, lies a deeper danger, a quiet unbelief that steals into hearts like smoke.

Jerusalem’s tragedy tonight is not only a wound, it is a mirror.

every community, every soul.

He announces judgment not only to a city of stone and ancient walls, but to a world that has forgotten him.

And the question is no longer distant or theoretical.

It stands before us now with trembling urgency.

Will we hear the warning? Will we turn? Or will we wait for the next judgment to fall? Alas, has that holy faith born from the labor, blood, and death of the son of God, carried forward by apostles and countless martyrs, entrusted to us as the very hinge of eternal life? Has that faith become so small, so trivial in our generation that even in these days of trembling, men still approach its most sacred moments without seriousness or fear? Look around
you.

Even as Jerusalem lies shaken, its streets dusted with sorrow.

The Middle East burns with tension, nations groan under unrest, the earth quivers beneath ancient fault lines.

And yet crowds chase the vanities of time as though nothing eternal were at stake.

They hurry after pleasures, but remain numb to the reality of a world beyond this one.

A world into which every soul must soon pass when flesh and dust can no longer hold them.

So few grieve over their sins.

So few cry out for mercy.

So few seek a new heart or run to the only mediator who stands between judgment and grace.

Yes, you may find a measure of kindness among men, a little courtesy here, or a polite smile there, a bowing of clay to clay, of guilt to guilt.

But where is the reverence due to the Lord of heaven and earth? If God is our father, where is his honor? If he is our master, where is his fear? If he is our sustainer, where is our gratitude? Even now, after Jerusalem’s night of sorrow has shaken the conscience of the world, how little true humility rises in response, you may find scattered examples of self-righteous virtue or outward morality.

But where is the deep living faith rooted in a renewed heart, pulsing with love for God, grounded in obedience to his word? Where is the religion that is full of Christ, conscious of his mediation, dependent on his righteousness for acceptance? Such faith has become precious and rare, rarer perhaps than peace in the Middle East itself.

Oh blessed redeemer, how little room sinners have made for you in their own religion.

How many sermons are preached? How many prayers uttered? How many works performed yet almost empty of Christ? Deeds without Christ are but shining sins.

Glittering crimes beautiful on the surface but hollow before a holy God.

As we go on, if this message is stirring something in your spirit, if you sense the gravity of this hour, let your voice join ours.

A simple like a shared word or subscribing to stay near these reflections helps this call reach hearts that are still asleep.

How few hunger for you, Lord Jesus.

How few refuse to rest satisfied with mere improvement or outward morality until they are clothed in your righteousness and transformed by your spirit.

Children recognize their parents’ provision.

Nations acknowledge their dependence on sun, rain, and soil.

Even beasts know their owners.

Even a dog recognizes kindness and returns affection.

Yet humanity made in God’s image denies him in his own world.

How few receive life’s blessings as from his hand.

How few offer him gratitude.

And now with Jerusalem wounded, with the Middle East trembling, with nations groaning beneath the weight of divine displeasure, you would expect a flood of repentance.

But how few prayers rise, how few brokenhearted cries are heard.

Survey the land yourself, observe the people, judge by scripture and plain reason.

Is this not the condition of our generation? Yes, there are faithful remnants.

Thank God for them.

But can the most generous honesty deny that the great majority walk in coldness, distraction, and unbelief? What happened in Jerusalem is not merely a tragedy.

It is a mirror.

And God through it is calling nations back to himself.

Something has shifted, my friends.

The weight in the air tonight is different.

And the tragedy that has just unfolded in Jerusalem, raw, sudden, heartbreaking, stands as the starkkest reminder yet, that warnings long spoken are no longer distant echoes.

They have broken into our world.

For years, people spoke of judgment as though it were a metaphor, a poetic thunder hidden safely in ancient pages.

But what happens when that thunder finally rolls? When a city that has carried the footprints of prophets becomes the stage for a sorrow that feels painfully intentional, almost scripted by a divine hand to awaken those who would not listen.

Jerusalem has known its share of burdens.

But what has happened tonight presses on the conscience of the world.

It confronts us with the truth that a land cannot build layer upon layer of rebellion and expect no answer from heaven.

The prophets warned of days when the deeds of nations would ripen like grain in the fields.

When God would say, “Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe, for their wickedness is great.

” And though those words were once spoken into the winds of antiquity, they seem to rise again with chilling clarity.

Yet even now there remains a faint steady promise that turning hearts can still turn outcomes.

that repentance can still soften what judgment seeks to harden.

God has always said that if a people will humble themselves, he will listen.

He has never despised a contrite soul.

But tonight is not the night to speak of comfort lightly.

Tonight, the wound is real.

A holy city has been struck in a way that forces the whole world to pause and tremble.

This tragedy is not merely another line in the news cycle.

It is a signpost, a flashing warning on the road we have been speeding down far too long.

And so before we step into the full weight of what has occurred, let us recognize this moment for what it is.

A divine interruption, a call to awaken, a sign written not in ink but in sorrow.

Before we continue, if your heart senses the weight of what God is allowing in our world, stay close with us.

Share this message so others may awaken and subscribe so you can walk with us as we watch, pray, and discern these unfolding signs together.

Now, let us look directly at what has taken place.

The reports began to surface just after dawn.

But the earth had spoken before any human voice could at 4:14 a.

m.

While the city was still wrapped in darkness, a sudden tremor rippled beneath the foundations of the Temple Mount.

What authorities had initially classified as a lowrisk microquake became in a matter of seconds a violent jolt that tore at the ancient seams of the land.

The epicenter, geologists later confirmed, lay directly under the Temple Mount platform, an area long known for its delicate network of fault lines.

But the worst of the impact did not remain there.

It raced eastward as though following an invisible path and struck with unforgiving force at the foot of the Mount of Olives.

The mount, so often described as a place of quiet reflection and gentle slopes, did not look gentle this morning.

The beloved tourist walkway, the path that thousands tread every week to overlook Jerusalem’s golden horizon, was split open by jagged fissures.

Stones that had sat undisturbed for generations were now dislodged, leaning, tilting, displaced like scattered pieces of a prophecy that had suddenly come to life.

Eyewitnesses who were awake at that hour, pilgrims praying, night shift guards, elderly residents who sleep lightly, reported the same eerie detail.

It was as if the ground exhaled and then groaned.

Some said the tremor felt directional, almost guided, moving from the Temple Mount toward the Mount of Olives, as if tracing the ancient route of judgment described in the prophets.

And that is precisely what startled scholars and pastors alike because of all places in scripture, the Mount of Olives is the one location where the earth itself is prophesied to respond to the arrival and actions of the Lord.

And then came the detail no one can ignore.

The time 4:14 am reversed 14-4.

In Zechariah 14 to4 it is written, “On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two.

” No, the mountain did not split in half today.

But the fractures running across its tourist road, the cracks that travel like veins through limestone and dust feel like the first trembling syllables of that ancient promise.

Not fulfillment yet, but foreshadowing.

Seismologists pointed out that the region is long overdue for a significant seismic shift.

They noted the pressure points beneath the Kidron Valley, the instability along the East Jerusalem fault, and the historical pattern of sudden tremors in this corridor.

They explained it with charts and models, and their explanations were not wrong, but they were incomplete.

Because while the scientists mapped the fault lines beneath the surface, ordinary people felt the fault lines beneath their souls, local historians reminded the world that the Mount of Olives has been a stage for divine encounters since the days of David.

Rabbis whispered that the mountain has always been tied to the end of the age.

And Christians could not forget that it is the very mount where Jesus wept over Jerusalem, spoke of the last days, and ascended with the promise of his return.

So what do we make of a quake that begins beneath the temple mount, travels toward the Mount of Olives, and strikes hardest at the very place where the prophet said the earth would one day respond to God? What do we say when its timing 4:14 mirrors a verse about the Mount of Olives trembling under divine presence? And what do we do with the unnerving truth that this was a quake no
expert expected to carry such force? For now, we do not claim more than what has occurred.

But neither do we dare ignore what the land itself has whispered.

Tonight Jerusalem bears wounds that cannot be dismissed as coincidence.

And the fishers on the Mount of Olives stand as a solemn reminder.

Even creation knows how to tremble before the unfolding of God’s plan.

For those who read scripture as more than background, the timing and the place cut deep.

The Mount of Olives is not only topography.

It is a locust of prophetic imagery in the scriptures.

A hill that in prophetic texts is associated with a great overturning and with the decisive intervention of God.

compare the vision sometimes read through the lens of Zechariah.

The detail of the hour 4:14 will be read symbolically by many.

The numbers mirrored back as 14 to4 inviting listeners to the text and to the time as if the city itself had been given a script to read aloud.

I do not press an automatic onetoone proof, but the combination of place, time, and sudden unlooked for rupture makes this event feel to many witnesses and to many hearts like a sign layered on top of geology.

Witnesses and quick assessments tell a consistent story.

Roads cleaved, ancient retaining stones shifted, terraces that have held pilgrims and processions for centuries now gaped with new brakes.

Engineers on site reported that the pavement failures were not uniformly the result of ground shaking alone, but of differential movement on the slope, the sort of sliding that can follow when an old scarp mobilizes.

Emergency crews focused first on stabilizing accessible paths and on moving people away from exposed tombs and historic walkways.

Archaeological authorities were urgently cataloging which benches, walls, and fragments had been dislodged so that sacred fabric might at least be secured.

Local social media and early local reports note newly visible cracks along tourist tracks.

Those posts are still being verified by official teams on the ground.

This tremor did not fall into a political vacuum.

Jerusalem and the wider region live under intense strain, a tense overlay of military operations, raids, and fragile truses that had already left neighborhoods raw and nerves taught.

Within days of the tremor, newswires had been filled with accounts of security operations and civilian displacements in East Jerusalem and around the broader conflicts to the north and south.

Those ongoing geopolitical pressures do two things.

They magnify the human cost of any natural disaster because populations are already vulnerable.

and they sharpen the sense among many observers that this is a moment of uncanny convergence where natural rupture and human rupture are read together as part of one larger judgment or moral summons.

What emerges from the first reports is not a tidy moral claim but a heavy two-fold fact.

first that a clear measurable geological event struck the city at a sacred politically charged place and produced damage concentrated on the Mount of Olives.

And second, that its timing and place when placed beside biblical motifs and the pressure of current events give it an extraordinary prophetic resonance in the public imagination.

Scientists will measure magnitudes, slip vectors, and aftershock sequences.

Historians will map the event against older tremors.

Pastors and poets will press the images of the cracked slope into sermons and songs.

All of those responses are needed now.

Precise technical work to understand the earth.

Calm civic action to care for the injured and the vulnerable.

and sober spiritual reflection for a city that has always listened for meaning in both ruin and rescue.

A small but essential note of hope.

Even in this scene of rupture, there are human stories of aid neighbors hauling water, local volunteers marking unstable zones, and rescue teams working through the ruins to protect what can be protected.

Those acts of mercy, practical and immediate, will be the first counter sign to fear.

Further on, we will lay out the forensic geological findings and the testimonies from survivors.

For now, keep the images of cracked stone and of hands passing a flashlight to one another.

The children of Israel were beyond all controversy a typical people.

And therefore, God’s dealings with Israel after the flesh were typical of his dealings with his elect family, Israel after the spirit.

This typical character of God’s dealings with them we may trace throughout the whole of the Old Testament.

I need not multiply instances for they are to be found in almost every page.

But I shall confine myself this morning to that portion of their history which with God’s blessing may throw some light upon the text.

You know that as a chastisement for their sins, the children of Israel were carried captive to Babylon and remained there 70 years.

When the 70 years, however, were expired, the Lord, we read, stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and put it also in writing, saying, “The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth.

He has appointed me to build
him a temple at Jerusalem in the land of Judah.

All of you who are his people may return to Jerusalem in Judah to rebuild this temple of the Lord, the God of Israel who lives in Jerusalem.

And may your God be with you.

Ezra 1:1 to3.

In obedience to this edict, many of the children of Israel left Babylon to return to the land of their fathers and to Jerusalem, their beloved abode.

And one of the first things which they did after they had set the altar upon its base.

Ezra 3:3 was to commence rebuilding the temple of the Lord which had been laid in ruins by Nebuchadnezzar.

We have an account of the laying of the foundation which I need not enter into.

in the book of Ezra 3:8-13 where we find that Zerubbabel who was the temporal head and Joshua who was the spiritual head the one being the prince and the other the high priest set forward the work of the house of the Lord and we gather from Zech 4:9 that
the hands of Zerubbabel in particular laid the foundation stone he being the governor of Judah and the lineal descendant of David, and thus a type of the Lord Jesus.

But no sooner was the foundation of the temple laid.

Then difficulties arose as to its completion.

The adversaries of Judah when their offer to become co-partners and co-workers was refused by Zerubbabel and Joshua hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose during several reigns and wrote an accusation against the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem
to King Ard Xerxes, complaining that they were building up the rebellious and the bad city once more.

And if they succeeded in setting up the walls again, there would be no more tax or tribute paid to the kings of Babylon.

In consequence of these obstacles, for 13 or 14 years was the building of the temple much hindered.

And during the latter portion of that period entirely suspended.

But at the end of this period of 14 years, the Lord raised up two prophets, Haggi and Zachchariah, in order to stir up the spirits of the people to go on with the building of the temple in spite of all the opposition made to it.

As we find Ezra 5:1 2, at that time the prophets Haggi and Zachchariah, son of Ido, prophesied in the name of the God of Israel to the Jews in Judah and Jerusalem.

Zerubbabel son of Shiel and Jeshua son of Jehosedac responded by beginning the task of rebuilding the temple of God in Jerusalem.

And the prophets of God were with them and helped them.

And we find the Lord prospering the undertaking and moving the heart of Darius, king of Persia, so that he gave command that they should not be interrupted in the building of the temple, but should have money given them from the king’s tribute towards the completion.

Ezra 6:8.

at the time then that this prophecy was delivered which was just at the end of the 14 years.

But while all the difficulties still existed in the way of finishing the temple, the heart of the people was faint and desponding.

For they saw no prospect of the temple ever being completed.

It was begun.

But how it was to be finished they knew not.

And their hearts sank within them at seeing the walls of the temple only half reared.

and no probability of the headstone being ever put on.

Under these trying circumstances, it was that the Lord spoke these words to Zerubbabel, who had laid the foundation of the temple.

Who are you, oh great mountain? Thus alluding to the difficulties, opposition and impediments that lay in the way of completing the temple.

Who are you, oh great mountain? What are all those adversaries? All this opposition, all these difficulties before Zerubabel, you shall become a plain.

All the difficulties shall as much disappear as though a mountain in a moment were to sink down into a level.

Therefore, this is what the Lord says.

I have returned to show mercy to Jerusalem.

My temple will be rebuilt, says the Lord Almighty, and plans will be made for the reconstruction of Jerusalem.

Zech 116.

He who has begun the temple shall also complete it.

As we read, the hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house.

His hands shall also finish it.

Zech 4:9.

And so it happened.

The prophecy was literally and historically fulfilled.

The mountain became a plain and the headstone was brought forth and put upon the temple with shoutings of grace, grace unto it.

As we read, the temple was completed on March 12.

During the sixth year of King Darius’s reign, the temple of God was then dedicated with great joy by the people of Israel, the priests, the Levites, and the rest of the people who had returned from exile.

Ezra 6 15 16 These then are the historical circumstances on which I hope with God’s blessing this morning to build up a spiritual and experimental interpretation and to show spiritually if God enables me how all the mountains and many there are which stand in the way of the completion of the work of grace in the soul and the building of the inward temple where the Holy Spirit takes up his abode.

For your bodies are the temples of the Holy Spirit.

All disappear before the spiritual Zerubbabel, the Lord of life and glory.

And how he is sure to bring forth the headstone and put it upon the spiritual building with shoutings of grace, grace unto it.

As this spiritual interpretation is my object and this the line of things I mean to pursue, I shall with God’s blessing.

Take up the words as they lie before me.

What an extraordinary mercy it is to come into this life with a strong body and spirit and even more so to be born into a home where the fear of the Lord shapes every step.

When a child grows up walking in the way of the Lord from the earliest days, it sets a course that colors their entire journey.

The difference that a home built on prayer and consecration makes, especially when the family altar is the heart of daily life, is profound and lasting.

Yet, even the best beginnings in life, cannot guarantee a victorious finish.

A solid foundation is essential.

Without it, everything else becomes uncertain.

The habits, choices, and faith we cultivate in youth shape our future character.

Scripture reminds us, “What we sow in our early days, we will reap in the years to come.

” This is no different in the spiritual life.

Forming godly habits early prepares us for the battles and blessings ahead.

As we step into a new year, it is not enough to celebrate with empty merntiment or self-indulgence.

True blessing requires honor and reverence for God.

Grace does not owe us anything, but it delights when we respond with humility and obedience.

Remember the words of 1 Samuel 2 30.

Those who honor me, I will honor, but those who despise me shall be lightly esteemed.

God’s hand is upon all who earnestly seek him.

Start this year aresh by casting your sins upon the cleansing blood of Christ.

Just as the Israelites removed levan before Passover and sheltered under the blood of the lamb, so must we purify our hearts and trust fully in his sacrifice.

Confess with sincerity, knowing that God is faithful to forgive and cleanse us completely.

In Jerusalem’s history lies a somber reminder of what happens when a people stray from God’s path.

Remember the destruction of the second temple in 70 AD.

A heartbreaking moment when the city was ravaged, the temple burned, and countless lives were lost.

It was a devastating consequence of turning away from God’s covenant.

A tragic echo of a community that had forgotten to keep the altar of their hearts consecrated.

This event calls us to a sober reflection as we renew our commitment to God today.

A warning that a glorious beginning can be undone by neglect, but also a call to repentance and transformation.

Give thanks for God’s mercies in the past, even amid trials, and renew your wholehearted dedication.

The Christian life is a daily offering of oneself, not for earthly praise, but to glorify Christ in all things.

1 Corinthians 10:31.

Let your heart cry out with the resolve Jesus showed from the very beginning.

I must be about my father’s business.

May this year be your good beginning, a year marked by deep surrender, constant thanksgiving, and a fierce commitment to live holy for God’s glory.

No matter what challenges may come, follow the footsteps of the one who pleased not himself, but sought always to do the father’s will.

Then by his grace, you will walk into the future with confidence, knowing his hand leads you every step of the way.

I, the Lord here, begins with an inquiry.

Who are you, oh great mountain? There are many probably here who have never seen a mountain.

And if you have never seen one, you can have a faint conception what a mountain is.

I never saw one until I was more than 23 years old.

And I shall never forget how surprised I was as I was traveling through North Wales when I first beheld its steep and rocky sides.

My idea of a mountain was that it was a high grassy hill, an elevated null covered with beautiful trees and herbage up to the very top.

But as to those lofty peaks that thrust themselves into the sky, completely barren of verger, with their deep and rugged precipaces of such a mountain as that, in carrying then into your mind what a mountain is.

You must not think of such a hill as primrose hill or such grassy nolles as are in this level cultivated country.

But you must conceive an object that rears up its lofty peaks into the sky and presents an insuperable and impenetrable barrier, an obstacle not to be climbed over, but which must be entirely removed that a free passage may be afforded.

And unless you carry into your mind this idea that these tall peaks, deep precipaces, and unfathomable abysses present an insuperable obstacle, you cannot enter into the mind of the spirit in the text and will therefore lose much of the sweetness, beauty, and force of it.

The Lord then addresses
himself to this mountain and says, “Who are you, oh great mountain?” as though he had said, “Let us look at you.

Let us take your dimensions.

Let us see your heights.

Let us look at your depths.

Let us view you in all your magnitude and examine this insuperable obstacle that stands in the way.

Who are you? Be you ever so high.

Be you ever so huge.

Be your precipaces ever so deep.

Be your peaks ever so lofty.

Who are you, oh great mountain? Before Zerubbabel, let him but speak.

Let him but appear.

You shall become a plain.

It matters not how high.

It matters not how deep.

Before Zerubbabel, you shall become a plain.

Now let us look at this spiritually.

Say that the Lord has begun a work of grace upon your hearts.

Zerubbabel.

Jesus set forth by that name, the true prince of Israel, through the operation of God, the Holy Spirit, has laid the foundation of a spiritual temple in your conscience.

But no sooner is the foundation stone of God’s grace laid in the soul than it is with us spiritually, as it was with the Jews naturally.

Opposition arises and enemies start up on every hand and the great mountain which before did not appear rears up its head.

The adversaries of the church were quiet enough when she was in Babylon.

But when she came forth to build up the temple at Jerusalem.

Then they started up.

So spiritually all the enemies, obstacles, impediments, and difficulties that the quickened soul meets with were dead as stones when there was no work going on in the conscience.

But no sooner does Zerubabel lay the foundation stone of grace in the heart, then adversaries rise up thick, lofty mountains begin to start up, and where before there was nothing but a plane, thrust up their lofty peaks into the sky.

One, for instance, there is the mountain of God’s inflexible justice.

Who knows anything of God’s justice, righteousness, purity, holiness, and indignation against sin while in a state of nature? But when the spiritual Zerubbabel lays the foundation stone of grace in the heart, this lofty mountain for the first time begins to appear.

the
high and rugged peaks of God’s immutable justice and the deep abysses and precipaces of eternal woe.

This Sinai mountain hitherto not perceived rises up between heaven and the soul.

Now this mountain cannot be climbed over.

There are many who are trying to wind their way around this mountain, but they will only fall down its precipaces.

Some skillful engineers are attempting to lower its peaks and bridge its ravines, but the rocks will fall upon them, and the bridges break under them and let them down into ever devouring flames.

The mountain of God’s justice in a broken law is not to be passed over by a fallen creature like man.

It ever stands up as an impenetrable barrier between God and the soul until Zerubabel appears.

But before Zerubabel, this lofty mountain of God’s inflexible justice becomes a plain.

He has fulfilled it.

Therefore, he has removed it out of the way, as the apostle speaks, blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.

Cole 21:14.

By fulfilling the law, he removed the impenetrable barrier of God’s inflexible justice.

He made no bridge over the precipaces.

He did not lower a little the peaks that the sinner might by degrees climb over them.

But by fulfilling the law, he completely put it out of the way.

Thus, before the spiritual zerubbable, this mountain of inflexible justice becomes a plain two.

But there is also an unbelieving heart which stands up as a great mountain between salvation and the soul.

We know nothing of an unbelieving heart until God the Spirit makes the conscience tender in his fear.

Deceived by Satan.

We mistake presumption for faith and vain confidence for a good hope through grace.

The unbelief and infidelity of our fallen nature are completely hidden from us.

And we know no more about the workings of a fearful doubting heart and the utter impossibility of creating spiritual faith in our own souls than the dead in the graveyard.

But when the spiritual Zerubabel sets his hand to the work and lays the foundation stone of grace in the conscience, then for the first time this mountain begins to appear, the mountain of a doubting, unbelieving and infidel heart which questions everything that God has revealed and will not and cannot receive the truth as it is in Jesus.

And oh what struggles, difficulties, perplexities and exercises are felt in the soul through this great mountain of unbelief which rears up its huge head so unexpectedly.

When God the Spirit convinces us of unbelief, he does not create the mountain, for if he did, it would make God the author of sin.

But he shows us the mountain which before was hidden from our view and makes us feel what a barrier it is between heaven and our souls.

The mountain was there before but we did not see it.

When this truth is revealed by the spirit in the conscience that without faith it is impossible to please God.

We are brought to see that to live and die in unbelief is to live and die in our sins.

As soon then as we get faith, we feel unbelief in our hearts.

For we need living faith to believe our own unbelief, spiritual light to see its existence, and divine life to feel its power.

Oh, this great mountain that stands up as an insuperable obstacle between heaven and our souls.

But the Lord says, “Who are you, oh great mountain? Are you so high? Are you so deep? Are you so immense that you cannot be removed? For if it is not removed, not a single soul can get to heaven.

But some say we must do our best to get over this mountain.

We must take God at his word.

We must believe his promises, look to Jesus, and rely upon his truth.

In other words, we must with a great deal of pains and skill lower this mountain, level it, tunnel it, cut through it, or make a road over it.

But a living soul finds it no such easy thing to take God at his word.

No such simple thing to believe the Lord’s promises.

He finds that all this taking God at his word leaves him still in the mud and mire of doubt and fear.

Still in the dry pit where there is no water still under the curse and sentence of a broken law.

Therefore, all this taking God at his word, looking to the promises, relying on Jesus without the spirit’s inward work and witness is found in our experience to be utterly unable to remove the mountain of unbelief.

Now the Lord says, “Who are
you, oh great mountain? Before Zerubbable, you shall become a plane.

The spiritual Zerubbable with one glance of his eye, with one touch of his finger, with one word of his lips, in one moment, can cause faith to spring up in the soul to receive him in all his covenant fullness.

And thus the great mountain of unbelief which seemed completely irreovable and utterly impassible sinks down into a plane.

And we can no more refuse to believe when the spiritual Zerubable gives us faith than we could believe before he gave it.

When faith is given of all things it is most easy to believe.

The mountain before Zerubbabible sinks into a plane.

Three.

But there is also the burden of sin that lies hard and heavy on a tender conscience.

The iniquities and transgressions of his past life.

The base base backsliding of which he has been and is perpetually guilty.

The slips falls and inconsistent words and actions and the horrible workings of a depraved nature.

All these at times lie with great weight and power on the conscience of an awakened sinner and like a mountain press down his soul to the earth.

How is this great mountain of sin and sinfulness? Asks the soul to be removed.

I cannot change my own heart.

I cannot take away the burden of sin.

I cannot purge my guilty conscience.

I cannot bring spiritual, holy, and heavenly thoughts into my mind.

How is this great mountain to be removed? Why, such a mountain as that left upon the soul would be a millstone to sink it into the lowest depths of hell.

But when the Lord says, “Who are you, oh great mountain? This burden of sin, this weight of guilt that makes your soul cry and groan.

What are you before Zerubbabel? Let him but speak with power.

It shall become a plain.

For Zerubbabel, the spiritual Zerubbabel, has shed atoning blood to wash away all this guilt, has brought in everlasting righteousness to justify the ungodly, and has a heart full of love, which he can and does shed abroad in the soul of his beloved ones.

Thus then this burden of guilt and shame, this great mountain before Zerubbabel, let him but speak, becomes a plain for a hard heart.

And oh, what a burden a hard heart is to one whose conscience has been made tender in God’s fear.

A hard, rocky, unfeilling heart.

What a great mountain is this between God and the soul.

When we cannot produce one feeling of contrition, when we cannot raise up one pang of godly sorrow, when not a sigh will come out of our steely bosom.

Not a single tear fall from our iron eye.

Oh, at what a distance does this hard heart keep us from the Lord.

What a burden, what a plague, what a source of guilt and trouble is a hard heart to all who fear his name.

Oh, this great mountain that thrusts up its lofty peak into the sky, so that heaven is not seen, nor the countenance of God beheld, nor the loving kindness of Jesus’s heart is realized, but nothing seen except this dark and impenetrable barrier between God and our souls.

We cannot move it.

All the preaching in the world cannot stir it.

All the praying in the world cannot move it.

And all the exertions of the creature cannot alter it.

You might as well try to remove London from its place as try to move away the rocky barrier of a hard unfeilling impenetrable heart.

But before Zerubbabel, the spiritual Zerubbabel, the mountain becomes a plane.

In one moment, the hard unfeilling heart that seems shut up in chains of adamantine ice.

In one moment, can he make it flow down and dissolve? Did not the church feel this when she cried, “Oh, that you would rend the heavens, that you would come down, that the mountains might flow down at your presence.

” Issa 64:1.

This is the way whereby Zerubbabible removes the mountain of a hard heart.

He does not remove the mountain, if I may use the expression physically, but he makes it dissolve, flow down, and melt into a plain.

He softens the heart, as Job says, God makes my heart soft.

23:16, and makes it tender and contrite before him.

Five.

But a thousand difficulties, a thousand perplexities stand in the way of a soul that fears God.

Men devoid of the grace of God in a fleshly profession of religion have no difficulties.

The constant burden of their song is what a pleasant thing religion is.

It never was designed, they quote, to make our pleasure less.

Cheerful piety, how delightful it is, is the great song of the day.

But if such silken holiday professors knew anything of the difficulties, exercises, temptations, and sorrows that lie in the path of every real Christian, we would not hear so much about cheerful piety, which is often but another name for delusion and
hypocrisy.

Look at the rebuilding of the temple by the remnant that returned from Babylon.

View the obstacles thrown in the way of its completion.

See how the enemies start up at every stop.

How the great king sends his commands not to go on with it.

How the builders are compelled for many years to desist from putting a single stone upon the walls.

What despondency seized the breasts of those that loved Zion to see the place of God’s abode desolate.

And how indeed they found that prophecy fulfilled that the wall should be built in troubles times.

Dan 9:25.

Had they much cheerful piety as they surveyed the unfinished pile? But does not this delay of the work set forth one of the great mountains that the children of God find in their path? The work of grace seems often at a standstill in them.

And what a trying path it is to God’s people that perhaps for 13 or 14 years they cannot trace the hands of the spiritual Zerubabible to have laid a single stone in their heart or raised up one clear and striking Ebenezer.

This apparently complete suspension of the work makes them often say, “Surely if I were the Lord’s, I would feel more than I do.

I would have more going on in my soul.

I would certainly experience more sorrow or more joy, more castings down or more liftings up, more darkness or more light, more striking dealings of the Lord in providence, more manifest testimonies in grace.

Surely if the Lord were at work on my conscience, I would not be at this standstill for so many years.

But look at the temple.

Several years elapsed without a single stone being put upon the walls.

The foundation had been laid and the walls raised to a certain height.

But for a long time there was a complete suspension of work.

This entire sessation from building producing hopelessness and despondency in the minds of the people as to its completion was chiefly the great mountain that the Lord declared should be removed.

the hands of Zerubbabel would complete what his hands had begun.

And we know that this great mountain became a plain that King Darius issued orders that the temple should be completed and that he who opposed the work would be hanged and his house made a ash hill.

Ezra 6:11.

Thus, Zerubbabel literally and actually brought forth the headstone with the shoutings of those exalting in this manifestations of the Lord’s grace and favor who had once sunk into distress and dispondency.

But what a mountain is this in the way of God’s people to feel so little faith in exercise, so little love, so little joy, their affections so cold, and so little life and power in their hearts is indeed at times to a tender conscience a great mountain.

Oh, says such in one, that I could feel more.

How many sermons do I hear and not a single word comes with power to my heart? How many chapters I read and not a verse is applied with sweetness to my soul.

How I go on sighing and groaning and yet seem not to advance one step forward in the heavenly road.

Who are you, oh great mountain? The Lord still says by his prophet, “Who are you? What is this mountain too great to be removed? Are these peaks too lofty to flow down at the Lord’s presence? Who are you before Zerubabel? Let him but speak.

Let him but appear.

Let him but smile.

Let him but drop one soft word into the conscience before Zerubbable.

You shall become a plain.

Six.

But whatever good thing we try to do, whatever spiritual thing we are engaged in, we are sure to find some mountain or other in the way.

When busy in the world, when engaged in business, when occupied with the things of time and sense, there are no difficulties.

Then you can use your head and hands and employ your thoughts without interruption.

But no sooner does the soul become engaged in spiritual things than a thousand vain thoughts intrude.

A thousand worldly things fill the mind.

And it seems scarcely possible to be spiritual and heavenly minded for a single half hour.

this apparent for in the case of the spiritual building of the temple of mercy there is no real suspension of the Lord’s dealings with the soul is indeed a great mountain oh says the poor groaning soul if I could but be spiritual if I were but heavenly minded if I had more sweet communion with Jesus if I could see him agonizing under my sins.

if I could but have a solemn sight of the son of God suffering and dying for me.

But whenever I try to take up spiritual things, a host of vain and worldly thoughts rush into my mind and my gading, roving, roaming, adulterous, idolatrous heart is running everywhere.

I cannot read the word.

I cannot fix my attention.

I cannot understand nor feel what the Bible says.

I cannot lift up my heart to God for 5 minutes.

Nor is my soul melted by his love.

Oh, what a mountain, what a barrier, what an obstacle there is in the way between God and my soul.

Who are you, oh great mountain? How the Lord challenges the mountain to stand forth in all its stature.

How he takes a survey of it in every part.

He gauges the depth and measures the height and looks at it in all its towering bulk and all its huge dimensions.

Who are you? What? Too great to be removed? Too hard and rocky to knock down before Zerobel.

One touch of his finger, one glance from his eye, one word from his lips.

Let it be the highest mountain.

Although it be a second Andes, it shall at once become a plane.

Do not you find it sometimes to be so? Your hard thoughts of God are removed.

Your doubts and fears take wing and fly away.

Your carnality and earthliness are for a time dispersed.

Heavenly affections, spiritual desires, holy breathing and ardent longings come into your heart and you feel some embracement of Jesus in the arms of faith.

Because before Zerubbabel, this mountain has become a plain.

But some may ask, why has the Lord appointed that these mountains should stand up between himself and our hearts? I will answer this question by another.

Why did the Lord permit the temple to be so interrupted by the adversaries of Judah? Was it not his sovereign pleasure that the temple should be rebuilt? Did he not declare that the glory of the latter house should exceed the glory of the former? Did he not mean it to come to pass? Why did he then allow these adversaries to rise up on every hand to
stop its completion? To show them these two things which man cannot learn in any other way.

One, the utter helplessness, complete weakness and thorough impotency of the creature to everything good.

Two, the almighty power of the Lord displayed in removing every obstacle in the way of his will.

People talk of Almighty God.

The Almighty is on everybody’s lips.

But how few know that he is the Almighty and the people of God too, though persuaded that he is Almighty and that the spiritual Zerubabel has all power in heaven and earth, yet when they come into the slightest difficulty, their faith staggers and gives way, and they cannot believe that he has power or will to deliver.

Have you not been in temptations out of which you believed the Lord himself could not deliver you? At least if the words did not come from your lips, the thought passed in your heart.

Have you not been in trials out of which you have been confident no good could come? And have you not been in straits and difficulties when it seemed utterly impossible for the Lord to appear? What was all this? Were you not doubting the very omnipotency of God which is the foremost article of your creed and secretly saying he is not almighty? Now the Lord to show that he
is almighty causes or permits these mountains to rise up in our paths that he may have the glory of taking them out of the way that he may convince us that we have not the least power to remove them ourselves and when he removes them that he may get glory to himself for he is a jealous God and will not give his glory to another.

Now I would ask those here who know the Lord, have not you ever found the highest mercy to be shown forth in the deepest misery, your clearest deliverances to come out of your sorest temptations and the greatest power of God to appear in the greatest weakness of the creature.

And why is this? in order to convince you, not as a cut and dried article of a Calvinistic creed, but to show you in your very heart of hearts, in the very depths of your conscience, what a poor, helpless creature you are in the things of God, and thus to make it plain that the hand
of the Lord has done it all.

If there were no mountains of difficulties, perplexities, and obstacles for the soul to be harassed and exercised with, we would not need a zerubbable, an almighty Jesus to appear.

We would not need the power of God to be put forth in our hearts.

We would be satisfied with a sound Calvinistic creed, with a dead formal profession, with a name to live, and merely seeing the truth in the letter.

But having these mountains of difficulties, obstacles, perplexities, and exercises, we are brought to feel our need of the almighty power of God experimentally put forth to remove them.

And when the Lord does remove them, the soul can give him all the praise and glory.

Then before Zerubabel, every mountain becomes a plain.

And if you are a child of God, let these two things be written on your conscience.

God himself in mercy, write them there.

You will have a mountain in your way, well near every step that you take in the divine life.

If you ever were to visit a mountainous country, you would see that it was a continued chain of eminences.

So that one is only the introduction to another.

that mountain rises after mountain and peak after peak.

So that the whole journey is a succession of mountains.

So spiritually there will be a succession of mountains in the path of everyone who fears God.

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