Here the prophecy calls Zion not the mountain on which Jerusalem stands, but its inhabitants who are far away from it. If so, does this not imply that it speaks not only of the particular city of Jerusalem, and not even only of those inhabitants of Judea who remain faithful to the Lord during the Babylonian exile, but of all who belong to the people of God, wherever they may be? For the faithful, the Lord will become an unbreakable wall in every place. Here we remember the Heavenly Jerusalem spoken of in John’s Revelation, the city that many of the saved will enter from every corner of the earth.
The cleansing of the priest’s garments means that the cleansing of the whole people and their return to God begins with the cleansing of the priests and their return to the path of unstained ministry. But the return only begins there, for not only priests but all of us are called, each in our own way, to serve the Lord and fulfill His will.
