A Very Special Puzzle

“Jesus went out as usual to the Mount of Olives” (John 8:1)

The Mount of Olives rests nestled in a mountain ridge two miles east of the Old City of Jerusalem.  It was named for the olive groves that once covered its slopes.  The western side of the mount has been used for a cemetery for over three thousand years, and now holds approximately 150,000 graves.  But this mountain also holds something else.  It holds a very special puzzle.  A puzzle only scripture can unlock.

In ancient times on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the year, the High Priest would stand with the scapegoat, and pronounce the sins of Israel over the goat.  He would then turn to the multitudes and say, “You shall be cleansed” as a priest would lead the goat out of the temple, through the Eastern Gate, and up to the Mount of Olives.  The people would watch their sins ascend the mountain, and then disappear as the goat was led into the wilderness.  The mountain became the vanishing point for the scapegoat as well as the people’s sins.

You have probably heard Jesus Christ referred to as our Scapegoat.  He came and took our sins upon himself, and then, just like the Scapegoat of the Old Testament, He went to the Mount of Olives and there He ascended and vanished.  The ancient scapegoat disappeared into the wilderness, but our Lord disappeared into Heaven.  This is something that should bring us great comfort, for it means that there is no place on the face of the earth, literally, where we can find our sins.  Christ has taken them all completely away from this world.  Therefore, the past sins we want to punish ourselves for are gone into oblivion.  It means that when we load ourselves down with guilt and shame, we are burdening ourselves with something that doesn’t even exist. 

But there’s more good news.  An even greater piece to the puzzle of the Mount of Olives.  We find it in the Old Testament book of Zechariah, chapter 14 verses 4 and 5.  It is the prophecy of a future event that will take place on the Mount of Olives.  It reads this way, “On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives…..Then the Lord my God will come, and all the holy ones with him.”  On the mountain where the scapegoat disappeared with the sins of ancient Israel.  On the mountain where our Savior ascended with our sins.  On that sacred place, that holy peak, our Lord of Lords and Kings of Kings will return in all His glory!  What a great puzzle!  What a mountain!  What an awesome Savior!

                                                                                   Darlene