#DailyDevotion Jesus Is The Foundation Of The Church & Blessed Are Her Gates
Psalm 87 His foundation is on holy mountains. 2The LORD loves Zion’s gates more than all of Jacob’s dwellings. 3Wonderful things are told about you, O city of God!
The psalmist is praising the city of Jerusalem. Upon these holy mountains the LORD had met with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. There, where Abraham was willing to sacrifice the child of promise the LORD has built His temple. There on those mountains the Father sacrifices His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ for the sin of the world providing salvation for every human being and redeeming all creation.
But the city in which the LORD performed all these things is only a shadow, a model of the Jerusalem which is above, God’s holy Church. Her foundations are not just rocks but the Rock, our LORD Jesus Christ. The gates of this city are loved more than all the places where Jacob dwells because this is where He gathers His people. It is the city He has built and won by the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Wonderful things are told of this city, the New Jerusalem as we see in the last chapters of Revelation. No light of the sun or moon is needed because God is her light. The gates are always open because there are no threats to her. A stream runs through it which waters the tree of life whose leaves are for the healing of the nations and it bears fruit every month. There we meet our God.
4“I will count Egypt and Babylon among those who acknowledge Me. There is Philistia, Tyre, and Ethiopia — each one claims that he was born there.”
Egypt or Rahab and Babylon and all the nations acknowledge the LORD. The He that is born there is not the nations, but the Promised One, our LORD Jesus Christ. There on the hills outside of Jerusalem is Bethlehem where Christ was born. There in Jerusalem where Christ was crucified was Jesus made the first-born of the dead. Isaiah would prophesy that the nations would stream to her, i.e. the Church and indeed they have. The Church is the city they all acknowledge as the dwelling place of the LORD.
5But it will be said of Zion, “Every nation is born in her, and the Most High Himself will make her secure.” 6The LORD will write down in His record of the nations: “This one was born there.” 7There will be singing and dancing, for all will find their home in you.
Several translations translate verse five this way, The DRB and a few others translate it more literally, “Shall not Sion say: This man and that man is born in her? and the Highest himself hath founded her.” The literal translation is better I think. Some think the psalmist is thinking of various men of valor born there. But if we are looking at the Church as Zion, are we all not born in her through the waters of baptism. So we are written down in the Lamb’s book of life, or at least we know we have been written in the Lamb’s book of life when we are baptized into Christ. In all the nations of the world, the LORD is making children for Himself and a nation for Himself in Zion, the city of our God, the Church.
Here in the Church there will be singing and dancing on the Day of the LORD as we are all born out of our graves and ushered into the New Jerusalem, the City of our God. As it is written, like calves springing from the stall shall we be coming out of our graves with rejoicing.
Heavenly Father, continual to give new birth in Your Holy City, Jerusalem, Your Church, through the waters of baptism that we might praise You even as we Your people are being praised by You. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.