“High Places”
“High places” are mentioned dozens of times in the Old Testament. Sometimes “high places” simply refer to geographically high places, like hills and mountains (e.g., Deut. 32:13; 2 Sam. 1:19). More often, though, a “high place” refers to a place of worship. Ancient people usually built their shrines and altars at the most elevated place in the area, whether it was a mountain or just a small hill slightly above the terrain.
As Christians, we know that God is omnipresent, and that a person is not closer to God on a mountain than in a valley. However, God has often revealed himself in elevated places, such as on Mount Sinai and the Mount of Transfiguration. The higher that we are about the earth, the more that we tend to look beyond the earth to things above (transcendent realities). It’s understandable, then, why ancient people preferred to worship at a higher elevation.
Before and After the Temple
God always intended for Israel to have one central worship site—first the tabernacle and then the temple. However, the temple was not built until Solomon’s reign, and the tabernacle was frequently moved and sometimes compromised (e.g, when the ark of the covenant was captured by the Philistines). Therefore, God temporarily allowed for “high places”—local centers of worship—before the temple was constructed. When Saul first met the prophet Samuel, Samuel was on his way to lead Israel in worship and oversee sacrifices at “the high place” (1 Sam. 9:12–14).
In 1 Kings 3:2, we read, “The people were sacrificing at the high places, however, because no house had yet been built for the name of the Lord.” The next two verses, however, condemn Solomon’s long-term commitment to the high places, which continued even after the temple was built: “Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David his father, only he sacrificed and made offerings at the high places. And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for that was the great high place. Solomon used to offer a thousand burnt offerings on that altar.” Solomon should have put an end to all local centers of worship which might compete with the God-ordained center of worship at Jerusalem, but instead he continued to sacrifice at them.
At first, Solomon may only have been sacrificing to Yahweh at these high places. But the high places were breeding grounds of false worship. Without the oversight of the Aaronic priesthood, local shrines were places where Canaanite practices commonly crept in, and “the high places” became associated with idol worship. Sadly, Solomon’s tolerance of the high places ended in apostasy: “Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Molech the abomination of the Ammonites, on the mountain east of Jerusalem. And so he did for all his foreign wives, who made offerings and sacrificed to their gods” (1 Kings 11:7–8).
All the way back in Leviticus 26, God had warned Israel that if they disobeyed him, they would be severely punished, and he specifically anticipated idolatrous “high places”: “I will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars and cast your dead bodies upon the dead bodies of your idols, and my soul will abhor you” (Lev. 26:30). When Israel entered the land, they were specifically instructed to destroy all the “high places” of the Canaanites: “then you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you and destroy all their figured stones and destroy all their metal images and demolish all their high places” (Num. 33:52).
In the Divided Kingdom
After Solomon, the kingdom was divided into Southern Judah and Northern Israel, ruled by Rehoboam and Jeroboam, respectively. Since the center of Israel’s worship was in Judah, Jeroboam feared that the people would journey to Jerusalem to offer sacrifices and return to Rehoboam’s rule. Jeroboam made two golden calves, told the people to worship them as the gods who had brought them out of Egypt (echoing the golden calf incident at Mt. Sinai), made temples at high places in the north, appointed priests over them, and instituted a feast for the people to go up and offer sacrifices. After Jeroboam, high places in Northern Israel became more than local centers of worship that sometimes detracted from Jerusalem temple worship; they represented a complete break from Jerusalem temple worship and a new system of worship in deliberate rebellion against Yahweh.
In 1 Kings, 2 Kings, and 2 Chronicles, the kings of Israel and Judah are often judged by whether or not they tolerated high places. Some kings like Jehoshaphat are praised for walking in the ways of Yahweh, yet their record is blemished on this point: “the high places were not taken away, and the people still sacrificed and made offerings on the high places” (1 Kings 22:42–43).
Worshipping God on His Terms
Since Israel’s kings often tolerated the high places, modern preachers have used “high places” to represent anything in our life that we tolerate even though we know, deep down, that it is not God’s will for us. This is a legitimate application. “High places” are dangerous because they may not destroy our faith right away, but they make us vulnerable to temptation and can become our downfall. God wants us to thoroughly cleanse every area of our lives and obey him completely. We must make a clean break from the world, and make no provision for the flesh (Rom. 13:14).
However, there is a more immediate application. The biblical teaching about high places reminds us, first and foremost, of the need to worship God on his terms—not ours. The Westminster Shorter Catechism teaches us to “receive, observe, and keep pure and entire, all such religious worship and ordinances as God has appointed in his word” (WSC 50). The Protestant reformers were passionate not only about pure doctrine but about pure worship. John Calvin wrote that “the whole substance of Christianity” is comprehended under two things: “a knowledge, first, of the mode in which God is duly worshipped; and, secondly, of the source from which salvation is to be obtained.”
The worship of God’s people no longer centers on the altar at the temple in Jerusalem but on the pulpit and table of the temple of the local Church.
The worship of God’s people no longer centers on the altar at the temple in Jerusalem but on the pulpit and table of the temple of the local Church—a congregation of faithful people where the pure gospel is preached and the sacraments are rightly administered. Christ ordained the Church as an institution, yet there is a growing trend for Christians to dismiss it as “organized religion” and claim that “we don’t have to go to church to worship God.” One lady told me that she and her husband didn’t need to come to church because they watch a television preacher and have church in their living room.
God is zealous for his public and perpetual worship by his gathered covenant people under particular circumstances.
It is obviously true that we can and should worship God anywhere and everywhere, but that was true even in the Old Testament. This truth should not be used to dismiss what is clear in both the Old and New Testament: God is zealous for his public and perpetual worship by his gathered covenant people under particular circumstances. My family worship around the dinner table is precious but it is an extension of—absolutely not a replacement for—corporate worship with the gathered church on the Lord’s Day. If we are not worshipping God in the ways that he has ordained, we may not be worshipping him at all.
Modern “House Churches”
The local Church may gather and assemble anywhere, including in houses. The early church often met in people’s homes (Acts 2:46; Rom. 16:5; 1 Cor. 16:19). There is nothing inherently wrong with a “house church,” but the early Christian churches were not what most modern people think of when they use this term. Their worship had a structure. They had marked similarities to synagogue worship. A liturgy of Word and Lord’s Supper quickly developed. They were overseen by leaders, appointed by those with authority by the laying on of hands. Far from rejecting the institutional, the early Jewish Christians also still attended the temple (Acts 2:46). Their meeting in houses was largely driven by necessity, not because it was inherently superior. Historical evidence suggests that even in these houses, they often had a designated room that was set apart from the rest of the house as sacred space and included liturgical furniture that was kept up through the week (see the article “The House Church Myth: Why the ‘Organic’ Early Church is a Modern Invention”). Very early in church history, Christians constructed church buildings—buildings set apart for the church to gather in regularly.
There is nothing inherently wrong with a “house church,” but the early Christian churches were not what most modern people think of when they use this term.
Today, some Christians meet in their living room without ordained ministers, without rites of initiation and unity, and without a formal system of membership or discipline, sing a few songs and have a Bible study, and then call it “church.” These Christians may not be worshipping idols, but their so-called “churches” are high places in the sense that they are local centers of worship in competition with God’s ordained center of worship. Their worship falls short of biblical, apostolic, and historic norms. Without the oversight of tested, qualified, and ordained ministers (Titus 1:5–16; 1 Tim. 3:1–7), they are breeding grounds for shallow, misleading, or even heretical doctrine.
High places can be found still today wherever people forsake the authority of the visible Church to worship God on their own terms.
Some traditional churches still meet in a set-apart room or building but are moving closer and closer to this “model” of “church” which is supposedly more “organic” and “authentic.” In fact, it’s just unbiblical and ahistorical. We are no longer under the Levitical law with all its rites and ceremonies, but our thrice-holy God never changes and he is just as serious today about his worship as he was in the OT. High places can be found still today wherever people forsake the authority of the visible Church to worship God on their own terms.
