The Highest Mountain

Isaiah 2:1-4

In the last days, the mountain of the LORD’s house will be the highest of all—the most important place on earth. It will be raised above the other hills, and people from all over the world will stream there to worship. (Isaiah 2:2)

H. RICHARD NIEBUHR’S SEMINAL book in the 1950s, Christ and Culture, explores the question of how our position of being in the world but not of the world plays out. Is following Jesus and participating in the world an either-or choice (Christ against culture)? Are Christians to make the world a better place (Christ of culture)? Is the Kingdom of God above the world but working with it (Christ above culture)? Do we live in two realms at the same time, giving to God what is God’s and to Caesar what is Caesar’s (Christ and culture in paradox)? Or can cultures be converted to resemble the Kingdom of God (Christ the transformer of culture)?

Each of these has its advocates and biblical support; each has its detractors and biblical counterpoints. Whatever the answer, as “salt and light” in this world, we have to believe in the possibility of transformation—that Jesus really can make a difference in people’s lives. He saves spiritually, but he also redeems and restores. We have a significant role in his restoration project.

Isaiah envisioned a transformation of the world’s response to God—not after the last days but in the midst of them. However literally you take his vision, it also represents God’s desire for his people in general—that he would be exalted in the earth and that his people would be influencers of a world that needs him. Ultimate fulfillment of that vision will come. In the meantime, we are to be moving in that direction—pointing to God’s “mountain,” his way of doing things, his promises and purposes, his own glory at the center of the universe. We are to offer the promise of transformed hearts, minds, relationships, and experiences, even in our own age. We are to present the mountain of the Lord as the highest, best, most satisfying and fulfilling of all worlds.

{Father, your ways are best, not only for me but for all the endeavors of this world. May I never shrink back from the excellence of your plans, and may I demonstrate them well to others. Amen.