“So David paid him 50 pieces of silver for the threshing floor and the oxen” (II Samuel 24:24)
Real estate is hot right now, and it is most definitely a seller’s market. We have friends who have sold their homes in a day or two, some in just a matter of hours. Reid and I were watching a renovation program the other evening. When the remodel was completed and the house went on the market, the owners had 32 offers, and sold it for $200,000.00 over asking price. Unbelievable!
In the Old Testament, King David was looking for a piece of property to build an altar to the Lord on. So, he hired himself a real estate agent who found him some ground that was being used as a threshing floor. A threshing floor was a hard level surface on which grain was trampled or stamped with the feet. It turned out to be just what David was looking for, so he purchased it for 50 pieces of silver, or 60 shekels of gold. The equivalent of about three hundred dollars. Quite a bargain! That real estate transaction became the future sight from which he would reign as king of Israel, as well as the glorious Temple his son Solomon would build. It also became the Holy City of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is the only city on the face of the earth that the bible refers to as “the city of our God.”
Some believe there is a mystery to the ancient city of Jerusalem. A mystery to its’ beauty and glory. However, the real mystery to Jerusalem lies within its’ name. In the Hebrew, its’ real name is Yerushalayim. The name of the city ends in “ayim”. Ayim in the Hebrew is a unique ending that speaks specifically of duality, as in two cities. In other words, Yerushalayim means two Jerusalems. Were you aware that there are two Jerusalems?
The bible specifically speaks of two Jerusalems, not merely one. The Jerusalem that is in Israel, and the Jerusalem that is yet to come. “All who are victorious will become pillars in the Temple of my God, and they will never have to leave it. And I will write on them the name of my God, and they will be citizens in the city of my God – The New Jerusalem that comes down from heaven from my God. (Revelation 3:12). Two Jerusalems. The Jerusalem that is earthly, in the land of Israel, and the Jerusalem that has a heavenly location. The Jerusalem of earthly time and space, and the Jerusalem that is eternal.
Like Jerusalem, our life is also ayim. We have an earthly life that we live within the confines of our human nature. And we have a heavenly life that we live in Christ. It is our heavenly life that points us to our future home in the New Jerusalem.
So, when you think of the city of Jerusalem on the other side of the world, allow your mind to wander farther, higher; to a better Jerusalem that will one day be our eternal home. The significance of David’s real estate purchase was not merely about a piece of property. It was about a future, more eternal home. The city not where David would reign as king, but where our eternal King of Kings, Jesus Christ would reign.
Darlene