Zechariah
The Minor Prophets • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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The name
The name
As I often do I’d like to start with the Name of Zechariah it’s two parts Zechar meaning name/mention/remember and iah for YHWH. So it is with Zechariah we know that YHWH remembers. His father Berechiah’s name means YWHW bless/praises and Iddo is to adorn or an ornament.
Now, we gets some dates again early so we can figure out where in history we are. The first verse gets us to October of 520 BC. This is the same year that we just dealt with in Haggai, just two months after the start of his ministry. So this is roughly 18 years after the Jews have been allowed to return to Israel.
In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, son of Iddo, saying,
Here, besides a date we also have our important and often used phrase “the word of the Lord” telling us by what authority this prophet is really speaking, acting, or writing. Like many of the books it comes up at segment dividers.
We get right into the painful past failures of the people.
“The Lord was very angry with your fathers. Therefore say to them, Thus declares the Lord of hosts: Return to me, says the Lord of hosts, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. Do not be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets cried out, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, Return from your evil ways and from your evil deeds.’ But they did not hear or pay attention to me, declares the Lord. Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever? But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not overtake your fathers? So they repented and said, ‘As the Lord of hosts purposed to deal with us for our ways and deeds, so has he dealt with us.’ ”
This echos Isaiah 55:11 “so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” That phrase we tend to use in a very positive happy way today but it went both ways. If you fail to follow the Lord you will be judged accordingly. They’ve now been focused on themselves for 18 years like we saw in the Haggai who two months ago called them out and told them to get to work building the house of the Lord. They responded well to that message. Now he’s pointing them to not just the act of rebuilding but the internal connection of repentance.
We have a play on words which some english translations just translate as different words but return and repent in the Hebrew are the same word from vs 4 and 6. Return from your evil ways and deeds. God says but they didn’t until they were punished then they repented. Because they repented they were able to “RETURN” to the land. The return as in repentance is also supposed to get connected with the physical return they are granted.
In that day the remnant of Israel and the survivors of the house of Jacob will no more lean on him who struck them, but will lean on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. A remnant will return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God. For though your people Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will return. Destruction is decreed, overflowing with righteousness. For the Lord God of hosts will make a full end, as decreed, in the midst of all the earth.
Here Isaiah is talking about the captivity by Assyria but it applies all the way through Babylon as events unfurl. The idea that a remnant will return means that they first have to be taken, many will be lost, they will be mostly destroyed. So the remnant that repents is the remnant that returns. We have to remember that before the destruction of these kingdoms there was this idea that we saw earlier that they were indestructible. They’re God’s chosen people how can they be taken out? How could Jerusalem possibly fall? How could life possibly be bad if God is on your side. It’s the same evil of prosperity gospel teaching now. If you become a real Christian your life can’t get messed up, your spouse won’t ever leave you, a car wreck won’t ever just happen and put you out of a job, your debt won’t overwhelm you… Your sins are already forgiven what does this one more matter? Sin is crouching and ready to devour you…
So these people had a choice and this helped them realized the position they were in. They can repent or they can return… as a remnant generations later…
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