David built an altar to the LORD there and sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. Then the LORD answered his prayer in behalf of the land, and the plague on Israel was stopped. – 2 Samuel 24:25

Today's Scripture Reading (November 16, 2025): 2 Samuel 24                                    

Have you ever wondered what might be buried beneath your feet? Or maybe what your neighborhood might have looked like a thousand years ago? If you live in my neighborhood, you might be tempted to say that no one was here a thousand years ago. But that is not true, regardless of where you live. It is the reason that, in my part of the world, we sometimes hold land acknowledgment ceremonies, reminding ourselves that we, as descendants of European pioneers, are not the first to walk in North America. Somebody was here before us.

Some of our most popular buildings are constructed on top of other significant structures or sacred sites. My grandfather used to tell me to invest in land because "they aren't making any more," so maybe it shouldn't surprise us that buildings are sometimes built on top of other buildings. One of those buildings built on top of something else is the Basilica of St. Peter in Vatican City. The Basilica of St Peter was started by Pope Julius II in 1506, but it wasn't completed until 1615, over a hundred years later, under the watchful eye of Pope Paul V. However, St. Peter's Basilica was built on the same spot where Constantine had once built a smaller Basilica during the fourth century. In fact, Pope Julius II intentionally positioned his Basilica over the footprint of the old church. But underneath the fourth-century Basilica lies the Vatican Necropolis, which contains tombs that date back to the time of Jesus, including, many believe, the burial site of St. Peter himself.

David builds an altar on the site of the threshing floor of Araunah. A threshing floor was a place where grain was threshed. Threshing is a process where the grain is gently tossed in the air, and the chaff, or the unproductive part of the grain, is blown away by a breeze, while the heavier seed falls to the ground. As a result, threshing floors tended to be built on high places where the breezes were frequently available. And that is true of this threshing floor belonging to a man named Araunah. The threshing floor was built on a hill in Jerusalem. But the threshing floor wasn't the first thing to be built on this space.

The threshing floor of Araunah, situated on a high place, is believed to have been constructed on Mount Moriah, where Abraham once intended to sacrifice his son, Isaac. It was this same space where Solomon would build his Temple, and it is the space that Zerubbabel would build the second Temple after Judah returned from the Babylonian exile. It is also the same group of hills where Jesus would be crucified in 30 C.E., and it is the same place that today the Jews call Temple Mount; a place where today you will find the Dome on the Rock, which was built in 692 C.E. and is one of the oldest extant Muslim structures in the world. All of this is why Temple Mount is so important to all of the Abrahamic religions today.

You never know what history might have taken place right below your feet.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: 1 Chronicles 28