The trouble with walls, as the angel says, is that they never can be more than provisional. Fix the walls of Jerusalem and she can never contain the unforeseen multitudes of God’s vision. Fix the walls of your heart or mind and God’s own angels will be left in the cold…
Here’s a statement to shake any walls to their foundation. ‘For your part, you must have these words constantly in your mind: The Son of Man is going to be handed over into the power of men.’ … When he calls himself Son of Man, Jesus evokes the glorious, shining figure Daniel prophesied, coming on the clouds, to claim sovereignty over all peoples in an empire will never to be destroyed. There’s good strong walls for you! But no sooner up than down—this Son of Man is going to be handed over into the power of men. Collapse! He’s not just saying, ‘sorry fellers, I’m going to be a failure’. He builds a wall and casts it down in a single breath. No wonder his disciples can’t follow him, no wonder they are afraid to ask.
And all this is at a time when everyone was full of admiration for all he did.
‘But I – it is the Lord who speaks – I will be a wall of fire for Jerusalem all round her, and I will be her glory in her midst.’
What kind of wall? What kind of glory? And what kind of God?