Daily Manna · Day 351 · December 17
Mountains Around Jerusalem
“As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the LORD is round about his people from henceforth even for ever.”
Jerusalem sits inside a ring of hills, and much of the ground around it is higher than the city itself.
That geography stands behind this verse, so it is worth getting right. Jerusalem is not perched on a high peak. The Mount of Olives looks down on it from the east, and anyone standing in the city could see high ground on every side. The pilgrims who sang this psalm on the road could see exactly what it was pointing at.
So the picture is about being surrounded completely, more than about being up high. The words "round about" mean all the way around. There is no single guard at the most important gate with every other way in left to chance. There is no gap and no blind side. Then the psalm adds how long this lasts: "from henceforth even for ever." It begins now, and it does not stop.
Read the next verse too, because the psalm is honest about trouble: "For the rod of the wicked shall not rest upon the lot of the righteous." The rod of the wicked means the power of wicked people, and the words "shall not rest" quietly admit that it may come down on God's people for a time. The promise is about how long it stays, and it will not stay.
So the protection around you is not something you build by walking around it, and the psalm never asks you to. The mountains were there before the city was, and the Lord was around His people before they ever asked Him. Hard things may land on that ground for a while, but they do not get to stay there, because the Lord who surrounds you is there for good.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 351 is The Tent Outside (Exodus 33:11).