“Like your name, O God, your praise reaches to the ends of the earth; your right hand is filled with righteousness.”
~ Psalm 48:11
Hi James and Ellen,
Mount Zion is the most beautiful place to God in all of His creation. Mount Zion is where God’s designated holy city – which is the city of Jerusalem, is located. Mount Zion was where God’s specially chosen guys and gals gathered to worship God in the temple that Solomon had built for Him in the city of Jerusalem. At one point during a period of power and peace, Korah’s sons drafted a matching structured psalm song. Korah’s kids have at least eleven of their psalm songs included among the 150 psalm songs that make up the book of Psalms. Psalm 48 is a celebratory psalm song. Korah’s sons composed this psalm song as an expression of the faith that God’s specially guys and gals were experiencing in their security and hope that their God – as God the Father, was giving them on Mount Zion and in the city of the Great King – which is the city of Jerusalem. Korah’s kids very possibly arranged this symmetrical psalm song for the Levi tribal clan choir to sing on behalf of the assembled guys and gals as they worshipped in the temple of God that was in the city of Jerusalem. The first and last verse of this psalm song frame the remaining twelve verses that make up the rest of this psalm song. Korah’s kids used confession as their core theme to begin and to end this artfully crafted, comforting psalm song. This psalm song is capsulated in the middle by four stanzas that go from three lines to four lines to four lines and then back to three lines. Do you enjoy listening to songs being sung? Do you unconsciously sense the beat in a song as it is being sung? Do you hear the gist of a song’s words as the song is being sung? Your grandpaa is musically challenged. Even though your grandpaa likes to listen to a well written song that is being sung well, your grandpaa’s brain does not seem to have the ability to send signals to his vocal chords to . . . your grandpaa stuttered when he was a kid. When a kid is growing up with a stuttering impediment, the stuttering supposedly will condition or inhibit the kid for the rest of his or her life from being able to naturally and easily articulate what his or her brain is sending to his or her mouth to say. During a scheduled interview several years ago with the ‘Shrink from Link’ from Link Care – which is something that each missionary candidate has to do who has applied to be a missionary with OC International – which is the mission agency that your grandmaa and grandpaa are missionaries with, your grandpaa was told that his mind thinks faster than the words that are coming out of his mouth. This is why it is kind of hard sometimes to understand what your grandpaa is trying to say and why your grandmaa sometimes will end up explaining to another guy, gal or group what your grandpaa is trying to say. Your grandpaa does not know whether or not it is because he stuttered as a kid; but your grandpaa today cannot begin to even sing the first notes of a well-known song such as “Jesus Loves Me”.
Korah’s kids had to have been really musically gifted. Korah’s kids were able to in a very expressive way convey what they wanted to say in a psalm song. Korah’s kids begin this psalm song depicting the city of Zion as being God’s impregnable or unconquerable citadel. Korah’s kids then reflect in their psalm song as to how futile it was for an enemy people group’s army of guys to attempt an attack on the city of Zion. Korah’s kids then expressed in their psalm song the genuine joy that the city of Zion feels towards how God had repeatedly saved their city from guys from enemy people groups’ armies. Korah’s kids repeat in their psalm song how the city of Zion was totally impenetrable to guys from enemy people groups’ armies. Even though Mount of Zion is not the highest or loftiest point on planet Earth, God sees Mount of Zion as being the most secure place anywhere on planet Earth. Korah’s kids used this psalm song to communicate back to God what they were hearing God’s specially chosen guys and gals saying regarding their city and about God’s love and His protection over them. Verse 10 says “Like your name, O God, your praise reaches to the ends of the earth; your right hand is filled with righteousness.”
Your grandmaa and grandpaa this month are to be a mentor couple. (The editing of this missive is taking place seventeen years after it was written.) Three units have been assigned to your grandmaa and grandpaa to mentor during the four weeks of OC International’s internship sessions that have been scheduled to take place this year at InterVarsity’s retreat center called Bear Trap Ranch. Bear Trap Ranch is located at about 9100’ above sea level in a valley behind Cheyenne Mountain. Cheyenne Mountain is a low spur that is located east of Pikes Peak. The top of Cheyenne Mountain is covered with antennas. Cheyenne Mountain has been referred to as being the United States nerve center. Massive, impenetrable rooms were bored out of Cheyenne Mountain in the 1950’s for the purpose of having a communication center that tracks everything that is taking place anywhere and everywhere on planet Earth. Bear Trap Ranch’s setting is among pines and aspens. Steep slopes hem in the cottages and other structures that are on Bear Trap Ranch’s property. Rabbits, chipmunks, turkeys, deer and even an unwelcome bear have been seen on Bear Trap Ranch’s property. Wild flowers can be found along the paths and trails that go in different directions from Bear Trap Ranch. During one of the summers that your grandmaa and grandpaa were mentors for OC International at Bear Trap Ranch, your grandpaa was handed a note that said that his dad had died. As idyllic as Bear Trap Ranch is to your grandmaa and grandpaa and as vitally important as Cheyenne Mountain is to the security of the guys, gals and kids who are living in the United States, Bear Trap Ranch and Cheyenne Mountain cannot begin to be compared to the roles that Mount Zion and the City of Zion have had, are having and will have in God’s unfolding handiwork.
Psalm 48 (622)