DAILY DOSE OF HOPE – BLOG – NAIMA LETT
HOLLYWOOD HILLS CRY OUT!
LENT DAY 35 of 40, © NaimaLett.com/blog



© Hollywood Hills


Climbing up Griffith Park Observatory, where you see the HOLLYWOOD sign atop Mount Lee, ain’t no joke!

When Bobby & Teka, our friends and fellow founding members of H0PE IN THE HILLS, invited us to climb Griffith, it was quite the experience. Those hills talk to you. They challenge you. They push you. And by the time you get to the top, you feel like you want to talk back, or rather, yell back “Victory!!!” You have conquered.

Can Hills Really Talk?

According to Jesus, Yes.

In Luke 19: 37-40, Jesus tells the Pharisees who rebuke Him to command His disciples to stop praising Him, “if they (my disciples) keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

Jesus is making His triumphal entry into Jerusalem on the back of a borrowed colt. Throngs of people spread their coats and palm branches along the road. As He descends near the Mount of Olives, all the disciples start shouting and praising and blessing their King.

Public Praise Party

This is no cute hand pump or whatever we’re doing these days. The word used for “cry out” is like screaming or croaking. One scholar describes it as the sound of a woman in labor. Another says that word describes a war cry. This is not composed. It’s full-fledged, all-out hollering.

The Pharisees have had enough of this blasphemy. They tell Rabbi Jesus to stop His disciples from this public praise party. But Jesus is very clear, “If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

Certainly the Pharisees, who knew the Scriptures, would’ve heard a reference to Habakkuk’s prophecy that the very stones and wood of the houses the arrogant Babylonians built off the destruction of others would cry out against them: “Surely the stone will cry out from the wall, and the rafter will answer it from the framework.” (Habakkuk 2:8-11). This idea of God’s creation testifying against God’s created beings runs deep.

And Jesus, Maker of the world, says that if man stops rendering Him praise, what He’s made (stones, rocks, hills) will keep on praising. There is no interruption on the glory that is extolled upon our God. There is a continual chorus going on all around us. Can we get in on it?

It’s Our Turn!

Whether we climb up to Griffith or Mount Everest, when we stand on the mountaintop, we should tell the peaks, “Shhhh, it’s our turn to praise God! You’ve been hollerin’ all day. Give us a chance to get a shout in, please!”

Whether in Hollywood Hills, Beverly Hills, the Grand Canyon or Stone Mountain (shout out to my GA fam!), I hope that every time we pass a mountain, we’ll say, “Hey, it’s our turn!”

Got a praise?!
Let’s tell the stones to hush so we can bless our King.
Naima

RESPOND ON BLOG
Comment below, or
Facebook or
Twitter – @naimalett

© 2013 Naima Lett. All Rights Reserved