Holy city

And this is a new heaven and new earth.

It says in Revelations 21, verse 2, I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, look, God's dwelling place is now among the people and he will dwell with them.

They will be his people and God himself will be with them and be their God.

It's interesting that this is what we have to look forward to.

Right.

The new Jerusalem, the new Jerusalem coming down from the heaven, the holy city coming down out of heaven.

Right.

I will answer directly, and you choose a neighborhood that together we are going there and visiting, and I promise, promising you that every request from the local, I will write and I will try to make my best to deal with that exactly like I'm doing to every other residence of this beautiful

holy city.

That is such a beautiful, and it's really a Korban for yourself.

You're making an incredible sacrifice.

Jerusalem is number one in every year of requests of new immigrants, New Orleansers coming from France, from England, from Canada, United States.

from every Western country, the number one place, city that they want to, the priority is Jerusalem.

And this is what I said before, Jerusalem is important to all of us, and they want to live here because this is Jerusalem, not because of the forest of Jerusalem, and not because of anything else, because this is a holy city.

When you are a Jew, this is what you are praying to, this is what you're thinking about, and you want to be here, to be part of it.

Beginning in verse 24, here's what God said to Daniel.

"...seventy weeks are determined upon thy people." and upon thy holy city to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy.

Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks and threescore and two weeks.

The street shall be built again and the wall even in troublous times.

That's the period designated.

NUMBER TWO, LET'S THINK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE PEOPLE DESCRIBED.

TO WHOM DOES THIS PROPHECY APPLY? LOOK AGAIN IN VERSE 24, SEVENTY WEEKS ARE DETERMINED UPON THY PEOPLE AND UPON THY HOLY CITY.

NOW TO WHOM WAS GOD SPEAKING? TO DANIEL.

Why? because during the autumn festivals, crowds of people would travel to Jerusalem and to the surrounding villages.

Bethlehem, just a few kilometers from the Holy City, would have been full of pilgrims setting up tents, celebrating and preparing for the festivities.

Inns were crowded, there was a large flow of travelers, and the weather was mild, an autumn scenario, perfectly fitting but entirely incompatible with winter.

When we gather all the pieces, the picture becomes clear.

According to Second Kings 24:10-11, at that time, the officers of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, advanced on Jerusalem, and the city came under siege.

What happened next was unprecedented in the history of the Holy City.

On the third day of the siege, Jehoiachin made a decision no king of Judah had ever made.

He opened the gates and surrendered voluntarily.

He took away the leaders, the intellectuals, the craftsmen, and the soldiers.

Everyone who knew how to rule, build, or fight was ripped from Jerusalem.

Among them was the prophet Ezekiel, who would later vividly describe the final destruction of the Holy City.

The plan was brilliant in its cruelty, to leave behind only peasants, shepherds, and simple folk, people without the means or knowledge to organize a rebellion.

And the fact that Rome, in one form or another, kept finding ways to survive is instructive for us because we have to keep finding ways to survive, not because... we're wrong but because circumstances outside forces and frankly technology and things like that change the playing field you have to change the game to keep up with the playing field this is the lesson we're talking about civilization here that was surviving and you know we'll get down to well constantinople finally does fall and when it does, all heck breaks loose, right? I mean, and it is even taken over once by the Crusaders from Europe with the Fourth Crusade.

They went through there going to do a crusade in the Holy Lands and free up the Holy Cities, and they decided that once they could get to Constantinople to saw risk, they'd try and sack that too.

And Venice and places like that in Italy that had been working with the Eastern Roman Empire were not as much help.

And so the Eastern Roman capital there in Constantinople got captured by Christian crusaders.

We've been listening to a lot of music through Isaiah.

If you want another masterpiece, this one's called The Holy City.

It was sung at President Hinckley's birthday party years ago.

And it's one that I got to sing with the Jerusalem Center Choir when I was a student studying abroad in Israel 25 years ago.

It's so beautiful as it speaks of the Holy City at three different time periods.

The ancient time period, the time of Christ, And then the final day when old Jerusalem meets new Jerusalem.

And in that verse, speaking of the new Jerusalem as the celestial city, the line says, the light of God was on its streets.

Muslims and Jews intermingled throughout that beautiful room in a city with walls and gates.