The Mountain You Were Never Meant to Climb Alone

In 2018, a group of hikers attempted the summit of Mount Washington in New Hampshire during winter — a peak infamous for its unpredictable, deadly weather. Signs at the trailhead warned them to turn back. The wind chill dropped to negative forty. Ice formed on their eyelashes. One hiker later told reporters, "Every step felt like the mountain was telling us we didn't belong."

That same winter, just three hours south, families gathered at a friend's farmhouse in Vermont for a weekend celebration. A fire crackled in the hearth. Children chased each other through warm rooms. A long table overflowed with food, laughter, and the easy joy of people who belonged to one another.

The writer of Hebrews draws exactly this contrast. Under the old covenant, God's people approached a mountain engulfed in fire and darkness, where even Moses trembled. The message was clear: keep your distance. But through Christ, we have come to something breathtakingly different — Mount Zion, the city of the living God, a joyful assembly of thousands upon thousands.

We have not been summoned to a summit that repels us. We have been invited to a homecoming. The God who shakes heaven and earth has set a place for us at His table. Our only fitting response is gratitude — deep, reverent, awestruck gratitude — for a kingdom that can never be shaken.