By His Spirit
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Introduction
In 1882, construction began on a church in Barcelona called “La Sagrada Familia.” Francisco de Paula del Villar was the architect initially commissioned to build this church. However, he resigned only a year later, and the renowned architect, Antonio Gaudi, took over the project. Gaudi, known for his extravagant and innovative designs, poured his heart and soul into this project. He even took a whole year to design only one column type. He was so consumed by this work, that when he was hit by a streetcar and died in 1926, no one recognized that it was him for a week. They thought he was a homeless man. Despite his efforts, the cathedral was only a quarter of the way finished at the time of his death in 1926. I have visited this cathedral twice in my lifetime, once as a child, and once in 2009. Today, it is about 70% done and is projected to be finished in 2026, mostly. It will have taken 144 years to complete. When asked why it took so long, Gaudi once responded that his client is not in a hurry (i.e. God). In reality, the project has been delayed so long due to protests, politics, civil wars, and funding issues (despite a $27 million a year budget).
In our passage, the reality is that God is in a hurry to finish His temple. Why? Because He knows how critical it is for His people to worship and to be a light unto the world. You see, the nation of Israel had rebelled against the LORD. The kingdom of the north, Israel, never had a good king, and thus they were exiled by the Assyrians, never to return to the land. The kingdom of the south, Judah, lasted a little longer, because they had some godly kings. But they too ended up being taken away from the land by the Babylonians in 605 BC to 586 BC. According to Jeremiah, however, this was only to be temporary and last only 70 years. So, in 538 BC, King Cyrus of Persia gives the decree that the Israelites can return to their land. The first group of Jews returned to Jerusalem under the governorship of Zerubbabel in 537 BC.
Now, in 536 BC, the people laid the foundations of the house of the LORD, the temple. Imagine after being gone from the land for 70 years, they must have been eager to see the temple rebuilt, but they quickly faced opposition. Therefore, they halted the work of the temple and began to focus on their own houses and buildings. They gave up.
But in August of 520 BC, God stirred the heart of the prophet Haggai to give the people of Israel a message of exhortation. He rebuked them for focusing on themselves instead of God. He even told them that the famine they were in was a result of this. Around October of the very same year, God began to give visions to the prophet Zechariah. There was a total of 8 visions. These visions and oracles were calling the people to repent and return to the LORD. Zechariah brought them a message of encouragement. He was encouraging them in the place they were currently in, a place of rebuilding and hardship, but he was also giving them hope for their future Messiah and the last days. And with the dual message of exhortation and encouragement, the people began to rebuild the Temple of the LORD so that they might worship Him.
The Vision (, )
The Vision
The Menorah
Description
The first thing that Zechariah sees when the angel asks him what he sees is a lampstand made completely of gold with its bowl on top of it and 7 lamps on the menorah. It is very much like the menorah we have here behind me, with 7 branches, 3 on both sides and one in the middle. However, our menorah does not have a bowl on top of it. Where things get interesting as well is that each of the lamps has 7 spouts or conduits coming to them. So, picture a menorah like the one here, with a bowl on top of it, and each lamp having 7 little conduits coming from the bowl to each lamp, for a total of 49. In addition to this, Zechariah sees two olive trees, one on the right side of the menorah, and one on the left side.
History
Before we get into the differences of the menorah Zechariah saw here, let’s talk a bit about where it came from in the first place. The menorah was one of the sacred objects that the LORD commanded Moses to have created for the tabernacle. It was to be beaten out of pure gold and placed in the Holy Place, across from the table of the showbread and near the altar of incense in . The daily worship went on in the Holy Place as the incense was continually burning, the lamps were continuously lit, and the showbread was put there daily. Solomon expanded this and and had 10 large menorah’s, one on each side of the Holy Place (not the Holy of Holies).
After the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, Titus took the menorah back to Rome as a symbol of his victory. The menorah became one of the primary symbols to represent the temple in Jerusalem. We see the menorah inscribed in many synagogues after the destruction of the temple. I saw one on the architrave of the synagogue remains in Capernaum. Even in the time of Zechariah, the menorah would have been representative of the temple.
Interpretation
What do these things represent? Surely God didn’t just make them create all these things and perform these things for nothing. Hebrews agrees and says that all of these things were shadows of what is in the heavenlies. Well, we must first think about what the temple represented and what it was for. You see, when man was created, he walked with God in the cool of the day in the garden of Eden. Everything was whole and good. But man sinned and was separated from God and no longer had His light and presence. God began the plan of redemption through the family of Abraham. And then, one of Abraham’s descendants, Moses, was given instructions on how to build a place where man would once again experience God - His presence and His light. It was a place where Israel could have his sins covered and experience the presence of God. It began with the tabernacle/tent in the wilderness and it was made permanent in Jerusalem under the reign of King Solomon, the son of David. This temple was not only for Israel to experience God, but it was now even open to the foreigner to come and worship YHVH, if he so chose. This is what the temple stood for - the place where man could worship God and experience His holy presence that was lost in the garden.
The temple itself represented heaven, with the ark of the covenant in the Holy of Holies specifically representing the presence of God. The altar of incense represents the prayers of God’s people going up to Him continually, the showbread represented the communion that they now had with God, and the menorah represented the light of the knowledge of God in the world. And when I speak of the knowledge of God, I don’t just mean knowing things about God, but knowing God in every way that we can know Him - mind, heart, soul, and strength. We lost that light when we turned to our sins, and our hearts were darkened.
Israel was supposed to be the people that God used to bring that light back to the world, but they failed. They rebelled against God, and this brought His judgment on them, and they were taken out of the land for 70 years and the temple of Solomon was destroyed. The light was gone.
Now, Zechariah was seeing this vision of the menorah, but the main difference is that it had a contraption which connected it directly to the source of its fuel - the olive trees. You see, the priests had to refill the oil in the lamp in the morning and in the evening so that it would remain lit all day. But this heavenly menorah has no human intervention in the system. It is perpetually lit because it is connected directly to the source and no human is involved in its being lit.
Now,
The light of the knowledge of God would again shine in the world and it would never go out, because God Himself was supplying the fuel. No more would man have to strive to bring the light of God into the world, for He Himself would supply the fuel for that light and it would never go out again! The joy that Zechariah must have felt at this sight!
In other words,
Application
The church, you and I, is now the place where the light of the LORD shines into this dark world. Through Jesus Christ in us, we bring the knowledge of God to a world that is dying. “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” We need do the good works of God that they may see and glorify Him.
The Olive Trees
Description
Let’s take a closer look at the olive trees. Now, there is nothing very out of the ordinary with the olive trees, like there was with the menorah. They seem to be ordinary olive trees, and if you have seen one before, you will have a very clear picture in your mind of what Zechariah was seeing. The difference is that they have a sort of pipe attached to them which the golden oil comes straight out of the tree.
History
Now, if you go to Israel, you will see olive trees all over the place, especially in Jerusalem. They are an abundant tree in the land and are critical for their oil. The oil from the tree was used in everything from cooking, to healing ointments, to perfume mixtures, to incense mixtures, and as fuel (as in this passage). Therefore, the olive tree and its oil came to symbolize blessing from God.
Interpretation
More importantly, the oil came to symbolize the calling of God upon a person’s life for His work, namely the priest and the king. It became a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Why? I believe that it is because the oil is so effective for so many different works that it is a good symbol to use for the Holy Spirit, for it is the Spirit that effects God’s work in and through people.
Now, Zechariah presses the angel in verses 11-13 to find out what the two olive trees symbolize. The angel answers him by telling him that these are the two anointed ones who are standing by the Lord of the whole earth. The literal phrase here is “sons of fresh oil.” The translators don’t write it this way because that phrase doesn’t mean anything to us. But is is not a very difficult concept to understand. You see, 90% of people at this time got their vocation in life from their father...
If your family name was Stradivarius, you became a violin maker. You learned your trade, your vocation, even your identity, from your father. If you were a farmer, you learned from your father when and how to plant, when and how to irrigate, when and how to harvest—not from a nearby agricultural college. If you made violins, you learned from your father what woods to choose, what sizes and ratios each piece had to maintain, what glues to use, and how to make and apply the finish. To put the matter differently, your father determined your identity, your training, your vocation.
So, to be the son of something, like an inanimate object or concept, means that you had all of the identity and characteristics of that thing. That is why the Jews wanted to stone Jesus for calling Himself the Son of God. In this context, the angel is saying that these are two beings who are so filled (anointed) by the Holy Spirit that they take on every characteristic of the Spirit. Where the Spirit moves, they move, where the Spirit leads, they follow.
Carson, D. A.. Jesus the Son of God: A Christological Title Often Overlooked, Sometimes Misunderstood, and Currently Disputed (Kindle Locations 165-169). Crossway. Kindle Edition.
Who are these two? We can’t be 100% sure of who exactly they are, but we actually do see them again later in the Bible. In , we read of the two witnesses who prophesy for 1260 days, and who have the power to cast fire from their mouths, shut up the sky from rain, turn water into blood, and strike the earth with every plague. And says this about them:
4 These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth.
We may not know exactly who they are, but we know that they are two beings that are filled to the T with the Spirit of God.
Application
These beings are so filled with the spirit, with the anointing of the Spirit, that the Bible calls them “sons of fresh oil.” They are led by the Spirit through and through and God works through them to the utmost. Do we allow the Spirit to move so easily in us that we could be called a “son of fresh oil”? Do we take on all of the characteristics of God’s Spirit in us? Can God use us in mighty ways as well? We have His Spirit dwelling within us, don’t we?
The Message ()
The Menorah ()DescriptionHistorySymbolismApplicationThe Olive Trees ()DescriptionHistorySymbolismApplicationThe Message () Not by Might or PowerThe BeginningThe OppositionThe HaltBut by the Spirit
The Result () Conclusion
The Message
The Audience
Now, let’s go back and see how it is that God says that all of this will be accomplished. He has a message to go along with this vision. The vision is not the message, but the message supplements the vision and vice versa. This message is the word of YHVH to Zerubbabel. He is the governor, the leader of His people. He represents them before God and where he leads, they will follow. This is a message to a leader, a person in charge of guiding other people.
Not by Might or Power
YHVH of armies, armed and ready for battle, tells Zerubbabel that it is not by might or power that the temple is going to be built again. Might speaks of the power in numbers. Sure, they didn’t have the number they used to have in Israel, but they had at least 40,000 people there. If even an 1/8th of them were able to work (5,000), it would still be much more than we see on any construction site today. Yet, they were not able to complete it. They faced opposition, and they halted the work of the temple for over a decade.
It was also not by power. Power speaks of the strength of one man. I’m sure that Zerubbabel and Joshua had been speaking up to the people and had been urging them to rebuild. I’m sure that they had tried everything in their power to motivate the people to continue building. But nothing worked. The people turned and focused on their own houses and gave up when things got difficult.
Maybe you’re in one of these places today. You’ve been making plans and maneuvering to get something done, but it just doesn’t seem to work out. You have been urging your son or daughter to get their life right with God. You have tried to introduce them to godly company, but they just do not seem to care. Maybe there is a sin in your life that you have tried with all of your might to defeat, but it just keeps overpowering you. You keep trying to climb this mountain, but you keep sliding to the base every time you start climbing.
But by the Spirit
To these people, to Zerubbabel, the Lord of angel armies says that it is by His Spirit that these things will be accomplished. His Spirit will move people. His Spirit will give wisdom. His Spirit will give knowledge. His Spirit will give correction where correction is due and will encourage where encouragement is needed. His Spirit will speak to the inner heart of a man and cause Him to turn from the darkness unto the light.
However, if you are expecting some grand gesture, you may be looking for the wrong thing. Pastor James always tells us that the Lord often does supernatural things in very natural ways. For example:
On Sunday, I didn’t know that Steve was going to preach on loving Jesus. I had been thinking about the song Jesus We Love you and how I hadn’t played it in a while. Then Jane asked me to fill in for Matt. A lot of times, the move of the Spirit is simply a desire placed in our hearts and we may not even know it at the time, but the result speaks for itself.
The Result
The result when God works by His Spirit is that that mountain which stood in your way has now been leveled. You could probably roll your skateboard across it with one push. Specifically, the mountains of opposition that stood before Zerubbabel in finishing the work of the temple are promised to be flattened. What will this look like? Zerubbabel will lay the finishing stone on the top of the temple with shouts of “Grace, grace to it!”. Moreover, the very hands of Zerubbabel that laid the foundation of the house over a decade before this, will be the hands that finish it. And then all the people will know that this was the work of the LORD. So the people built and finished the temple from 520 BC to 516 BC. The LORD, through His Spirit working in His people will finish the work that was begun. He who started a work will be faithful to complete it in you.
Then, all will know that God was behind the work. Those that despised the day of small things will see this. When the foundations of the temple were laid, there were many who remembered the previous glory of the temple of Solomon and they despised this new temple.
3 ‘Who is left among you who saw this temple in its former glory? And how do you see it now? Does it not seem to you like nothing in comparison?
But great works often begin in small ways. Who would have thought that one old man and his wife would be called out from a pagan country and that through them God would bring a people that was countless. Who would have thought that day that great kings and priests would come from that man and woman and that one day the Redeemer of the world would come through his descendents. Who would have thought that he would become the father of all those who believe? I am speaking, of course, of Abraham. Don’t despise the day of small things, for God will do great things.
The LORD Himself will rejoice when He sees the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. The plumb line is a stone or metal object hung on a string and held up next to a wall. It is one of the final steps in framing a wall to make sure that it was straight. YHVH Himself would rejoice when He saw this instrument in the hand of Zerubbabel, for it means that worship has now been restored, His people have repented, and His work has been accomplished.
Conclusion
What works has God called you to that you have not finished? There are things that God has called all of us to do. Perhaps you began to make amends in a relationship, but you gave up because you didn’t see results. Perhaps you began to fight against a sin in your life, but you gave up because it got too difficult. Are there mountains that you have been trying to scale over and over again only to fall to the base every time? Have your tried over and over to get through to your children who are destroying themselves by their life choices? Well, the problem, many times, is that we have tried too long in our strength. We have come to the place where we have stopped the work because we have nothing left in us. And, yes, we do not have anything left in our own strength or might. But we do have the Spirit of God living within us and He wants us to finish the work that He started. Stop striving in your own strength. Seek God and allow Him to lead you in your endeavors. It may not look any different than what you were doing before, but bringing the Spirit of God before a mountain will make that mountain into a plain before you, and He will finish that work.
Conclusion
Conclusion