by Charles Welch
“Ye are come to mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem ... the church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven” (Heb. 12:22-23). Sion is mentioned also in the book of the Revelation where we see the 144,000 overcomers stand on mount Sion with the Lamb (Rev. 14:1-4).
Hebrews 12 and Galatians 4 place mount Sinai in contrast with mount Sion, and in Galatians 4 the apostle speaks of “Jerusalem which is above” (Gal. 4:25-26). Paul would be familiar with the fact noted by Josephus that Sion was referred to as “The upper city” (he ano agora),[1] using the same word ano as is found in Galatians 4:26, he ano Ierousalem. Putting these references together, we perceive that Sion differs from Jerusalem in that it is associated with overcoming, it is the Upper City, it is the alternative title to the heavenly Jerusalem. In the Old Testament this heavenly city is unrevealed, and Zion refers there to the centre of the Lord”s administration not in days of perfect peace, but in the midst of enemies:
“The Lord shall send the rod of Thy strength out of Zion: rule Thou In the Midst of Thine Enemies”
“The Lord at Thy right hand shall Strike Through Kings in the day of His Wrath” (Psa. 110:2-5).
This passage is comparable with Psalm 2. There we have the kings of the earth setting themselves against the Lord, and against His anointed, but He that sitteth in the heavens shall have them in derision, and when He speaks to them, it is in His Wrath, saying:
“Yet have I set My King upon My holy hill of Zion” (Psa. 2:6).
This King whose dominion includes “the uttermost parts of the earth” shall “break them with a rod of iron” and these kings are enjoined to “Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way, When His Wrath is kindled but a little” (Psa. 2:6, 2:8-9, 2:12).
The Millennium follows immediately upon the Coming of Christ (Rev. 19:21; 20:1-2). There is no interval for a PreMillennial kingdom in the records of the Apocalypse except it be the kingdom of the Beast. When Christ come He comes to Zion:
“The Redeemer shall come to Zion ... Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee” (Isa. 59:20; 60:1) .
At the selfsame time, namely at the coming of the Lord to Zion, “darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people…and Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising…the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish; yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted” (Isa. 59:20, 60:1-3, 60:12). Again we read in the prophecy of Joel:
“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in My holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand…The Lord also shall roar out of Zion…and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the Lord will be the hope of His people, and the strength of the children of Israel…for the Lord dwelleth in Zion” (Joel 2:1; 3:16, 3:21) .
The Millennium opens (1) with the Lord reigning in Zion, or (2) it does not. If it does, then the Millennium cannot be a kingdom of universal peace; to say so denies the testimony of Scripture. When the Lord reigns in Zion it is in the midst of enemies. Wrath is to be feared. Rule will be severe -- a rod of Iron. Nations are in danger of perishing and so are kings, and the nation and the kingdom that refuse to serve Israel shall perish, “Yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted” (Isa. 60:12). This will be the day when Israel shall be named “The Priests of the Lord” and “Ministers of our God”, the day when those that mourn “in Zion” shall have beauty for ashes (Isa. 61:3-6).
So we could continue. We must either believe that when the Lord reigns in Zion, it will be on an earth where enemies still exist, or we can believe one or other of the theories with which the Millennial kingdom has been invested, but it is impossible to believe both.
From ZION, THE OVERCOMER, and the MILLENNIUM by Charles H. Welch
[1] “The Upper City was the neighborhood of the rich, with large, elaborate dwellings inhabited by the families of the high priests and of the local aristocracy. Here were the palaces of the Hasmonean kings, of King Herod and of the High Priest Caiaphas (who is mentioned in the New Testament). Here, Jesus was arrested and held for a night before he was handed over to the Roman procurator, Pontius Pilate, for sentencing. (Matthew 26: 57-75; Luke 22:54-71, 23:1) According to Christian tradition, the palace of the High Priest Caiaphas stood on Mt. Zion, which today is outside the Old City wall, to the south.
The walls, the towers and the elaborate palaces of the Upper City are described in detail by the contemporary Jewish historian and native Jerusalemite, Josephus Flavius. He was an eyewitness to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE, and he also describes the conquest of the Upper City, where the Roman soldiers plundered the palaces and elegant homes and burnt them to their foundations, on the 8th day of Elul in the year 70 CE, one month after the destruction of the Temple:
‘Caesar, finding it impracticable to reduce the upper city without earthworks, owing to the precipitous nature of the site, on the twentieth of the month Lous (Ab) apportioned the task among his forces. The conveyance of timber was, however, arduous, all the environs of the city to a distance of a hundred furlongs having, as I said, been stripped bare. The earthworks having now been completed after eighteen days' labor, on the seventh of the month Gorpiaeus (Elul) the Romans brought up the engines. Of the rebels, some already despairing of the city, retired from the ramparts to the citadel, others slunk down into the tunnels. Pouring into the alleys, sword in hand, they (the Romans) massacred indiscriminately all whom they met, and burnt the houses with all who had taken refuge within. Often in the course of their raids, on entering the houses for loot, they would find whole families dead and the rooms filled with the victims of the famine... Running everyone through who fell in their way, they choked the alleys with corpses and deluged the whole city with blood, insomuch that many of the fires were extinguished by the gory stream. Towards evening they ceased slaughtering, but when night fell the fire gained the mastery, and the dawn of the eighth day of the month of Gorpiaeus (Elul) broke upon Jerusalem in flames - a city which had suffered such calamities...The Romans now set fire to the outlying quarters of the town and razed the walls to the ground. Thus was Jerusalem taken in the second year of the reign of Vespasian, on the eighth of the month of Gorpiaeus.’ (20 September, 70 CE)” (Josephus, War VI. 8-10) http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Archaeology/Jerusalem.html 1/9/12