Reframing the Mustard Seed (Part Two)
Part Two: High Places: The Architecture of Idolatry
The biblical concept of “high places” (Hebrew: bamot) adds another layer to Jesus’ mountain-moving imagery. Throughout Israel’s history, high places were elevated sites like hilltops, ridges, or artificial platforms, where worship occurred. Some were legitimate (Samuel sacrificed at high places before the Temple was built), but most became centres of syncretism and idolatry.
The pattern repeats across the historical books: a king “did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, but the high places were not removed” (1 Kings 15:14; 22:43; 2 Kings 12:3; 14:4; 15:4, 35). Even reforming kings who destroyed Baal worship often left the high places intact. These elevated altars represented divided loyalty - worship of Yahweh mixed with pagan practices, truth contaminated by compromise.
The high places were not merely geographic features; they were monuments to the human impulse to control access to the divine. People built them where they wanted, worshipped how they preferred, and served gods of their own choosing. They represented autonomy masquerading as devotion; self-directed religion rather than God-directed faith.
Josiah’s reform in 2 Kings 23 describes the thoroughness required to truly cleanse the land: “He removed the high places, smashed the sacred stones and cut down the Asherah poles” (2 Kings 23:8, 13–14). The language is violent because the reality was violent-these were not benign alternative worship sites but structural rebellion against God’s sovereignty.
The High Places Within
If the Temple Mount represented the external mountain of institutional corruption, the high places represent the internal mountains of personal idolatry. Every generation erects its own high places-elevated priorities, beloved compromises, sacred untouchables that claim our ultimate loyalty while leaving just enough space for God to maintain respectability.
Modern high places don’t require stone altars. They are whatever we elevate above obedience to God: career ambitions that justify ethical compromise, relationships that demand we stay silent about truth, financial security that determines our generosity, reputations that prevent us from taking risks for the Kingdom. Like Israel’s high places, they often coexist with genuine faith-we worship God sincerely while preserving the high places that serve our interests.
The test Jesus gave remains: “By their fruits you will know them.” High places produce divided fruit-religious activity without transformation, worship without surrender, belief without obedience. They allow us to feel faithful while remaining in control.
Conclusion: The Altars That Remain
High places endure not because they are hidden, but because they are tolerated. Israel’s story reveals a persistent pattern: sincere worship alongside carefully preserved compromises. These elevated sites were not peripheral failures; they were structural expressions of divided loyalty - attempts to retain control while appearing faithful.
Jesus’ language about mountain-moving faith exposes this tension. Before any public system is confronted, the internal architecture of idolatry must be dismantled. Faith that avoids this work remains sentimental, not transformative.
In Part Three, the focus widens again, from the internal high places of the heart to the most powerful religious structure of Jesus’ world. We will examine how Jesus’ words about faith were not abstract theology, but a direct confrontation with the Temple itself, and how that mountain, too, would fall.