I want to talk to you about some mountains.
Genesis 31:23. Mount Gilead, where Jacob separated himself from Laban. You are going to face AT LEAST one Mount Gilead in your life, where you have to separate yourself and make up your mind that you are going on with God.
Exodus 4:27. If you live for God long enough, you will find that Mount of God where you get to find God for yourself. The place where God shows you that He is the I Am, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.
Genesis 8:3-4. Mount Ararat is the place the Ark rested after the Flood. Noah walked out and said, “Everything that I had, other than my family, is gone. But you know what I’m going to do? I’ll build an altar.” Mount Ararat is where your world has been shaken and you make up your mind that you are going to keep praying.
Exodus 9:11,18. You have two classes of people. Mount Sinai separates people. Some don’t want to get too close and stay at the bottom with only a chill bump or a touch. But some people are willing to go up the mountain with a hunger for God and cry “I want to know Him!”
Exodus 33:6. Mount Horeb is the place where we have to lay some stuff down. So many church folks want to hold onto the world with one hand and hold God with the other. But we have to let that stuff go and decide that we want God more than anything.
2 Samuel 15:30. We all have our Mount Olivet experience where our hearts are broken and we weep. But thank God He will comfort us!
2 Kings 4:25. You will have that Mount Carmel experience where you don’t know where else to go, but if you could just get to the presence of God.
1 Chronicles 10:8. Mount Gilboa, where we look back on those who walked away from God, not taking Him seriously, and lose everything.
2 Chronicles 3:1. Mount Moriah. People want something from God, but they don’t want it to cost them anything. If you are going to go all the way with the Lord, it is going to cost you something. Mount Moriah was a place of sacrifice. Solomon built the glorious temple on that mount, but travel back in time before the temple and you will find the ashes of the ram that took the place of Isaac. God likes to build glory on ashes.
Isaiah 24:23. Joel 2:32. Mount Zion represents the church, the presence and the glory of God.
John 8:1-2. Mount Olive is where you learn to pray and rest. It’s where you find refreshing and hope.
Here’s where I want to talk about one of the greatest of these. The hill called Calvary.
There are so many thoughts about why they call it Golgotha (the Place of a Skull). One ancient theory is that it was the dump outside the city for their dead cattle and where they would crucify people and leave them laying for the animals to eat their flesh, leaving their bones. One account says that there were hundreds of skulls on that mountain. Another account says that the mountain was shaped like a skull.
Isaiah 53:9. Jesus did not lay in that grave numb and asleep for three days. When He cried, “It is finished!” His spirit went down into the uttermost depths of Hell and He began to preach to those there. There’s silence in Hell as Jesus walked into that throne room of satan and took back the keys of death. When Jesus arose, He led captivity captive!
Jesus’ friends walked away not even asking for His body! There are so many preachers/ministries that only want a person when they’re breathing and helping the ministry, and paying their tithes. But when that body slips up and messes up, they don’t want them anymore until they start breathing again. But God will always send you a Joseph that will hold your hands up, who will wrap you up and take care of you because they know that God will restore and bring that body back to life again. The presence of God, the anointing of God will return! Everyone wanted that Jesus walking on the water, but only one man bargained for that little body in a mess knowing that He would live again!
The curse on your family/bloodline broke at Calvary. Galatians 3:13.
You are not under a family curse. When you went to that altar and gave your life to the Lord, that curse was broken and broken long ago! You do not have to live in fear of the next doctor’s report. You are under a family blessing. When you got saved, you received new DNA. When the blood of Jesus began to flow through your veins, it overpowered anything passing through your bloodline. You are not under a curse, you are under a blessing!
It’s not enough to be a good person.
There are going to be a lot of just “good” people in Hell. It doesn’t matter how good you are or how kind you are. What matters is the blood of Jesus shed over your life. If you don’t have that blood to wash your heart clean and you aren’t saved, you will go to Hell. You must be born again. And without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. That’s why we have Calvary.
It was a sacrifice only He could make.
It’s just like a person out of debt taking on the debt of everyone else. Jesus said, “Whatever you owe, I will pay it.” That’s how He became sin who knew no sin. Not only feeling the pain of the lashes and beatings, but also the pain of all the sin.
Why I believe He chose to die on Mount Calvary.
Golgotha means the place of a skull. Jesus knows that our roughest, toughest battles will be fought in our mind. God went to the skull. The worst torment you will ever know will be in your mind. Jesus went to the place of a skull and died, now nerves are stilled, bitterness is broken, mind battles are won at Calvary.
Isaiah 53:4-6. Romans 14:9. 1 Thessalonians 4:14. 1 Corinthians 15:21. John 11:25. 1 Corinthians 15:42-46, 52-53.
Lift your voice and thank the Lord for Calvary and don’t ever forget what He did for you there!
–Pastor Anthony Wynn
