The Lord of all the earth and the Lord of hosts: a study in Zechariah chapter 10

  OUT OF THE CHAOS: A study in the book of Zechariah

To view on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/UqPAHmecZd8

The last couple of weeks, the news has been scanty, but enough for us to know that in Shomron and in Gaza, there is conflict between Jewish people and Arabs. People have died, even yesterday, on both sides. When will true and lasting peace come? How will it ever come? 

To answer that, we have to look into the Scriptures. We have seen two names God uses of himself over a couple of months we have been studying this book written about 500 BCE by a young prophet named Zechariah. The names are Lord of all the earth and Lord of hosts. We will see both of those identifiers in today’s episode, chapter 10. By the way, if you haven’t yet… please pause and read, then re-join us. Thanks.

Lord of all the earth means no one is better than anyone else, and it also means God will take care to bring every one of his sheep into his pasture. It’s a picture of inclusion and of his majesty. It also means no other gods are really gods at all; they are fake news! So although it can picture inclusion, it’s definitely a term of exclusivity. If there’s an earth, then there is only one Lord of it, and that’s Yahweh! Lord of all the earth also implies his power to make nature yield to his desires. The earth is the Lord’s (Psalm 24.1) and the fulness of it, so what can stand in his way? The term then can mean provision and power to keep the darkness away from his sheep. That’s a comfort to me, in this season and every season. 

The other name we have zoomed in to notice is Lord of armies or Lord of hosts. A military-sounding name for sure. Powerful, and preventing. That’s what I see and hear in his name. He’s powerful to keep his own and prevent those who want to harm his own sheep and people. God is a strong tower and a mighty fortress that keeps the evil of the enemy away from us. Hallelujah—I count on his faithfulness in this regard.

Now we are going to see both of those attributes, those self-defining by God, in this chapter and the next as we see God’s appeal to us to be his and to call out the Bad Shepherds who are plaguing the Jewish people. I wonder if he were speaking today, if God had a Zechariah today, if the world had a Zechariah today, what he might say about God and about the condition of the flock of God in 2023. Let’s see if this applies to us and let’s learn what God has to say to us as 21^st Century people. 

Let’s jump in.

Verse 1: Ask of the Lord rain in the time of the latter rain. Fairly straightforward, isn’t it? When it’s time to rain, ask of God. It makes great sense in an agrarian culture like Judah. The Temple is probably already built, and the people of Judah are returning from Babylon. They had plenty of rain there; their crops grew, their vineyards were abundant. Now they are back in the land of promise, and they need the rain. We in Australia know this situation well. There are places in our sunburnt country which have been in drought for years. Ask of the Lord rain is a good idea. Unless you believe that idols could help. I know people who would pray to an idol if that would help them get out of problems in our day. Faust is the classic story of selling one’s soul to the devil to make our dreams come true. The Broadway show ‘Damn Yankees’ is one of the renditions of that same story as is The Little Mermaid. Perhaps someone in NSW who won the 100 million dollar Powerball did just that in Australia last night. 

The verse is telling us to enquire of the right God, the only God, the Lord of all the earth. All other gods are not gods, and they have no control over the rains. Ask of the only God and get it right. No matter how long you have to wait. No matter how tempted you are to solicit support and help from (as it says in verse 2) the teraphim. Those are small household gods. I like that imagery. One, because it reminds me of the story of Rachel stealing those from her father Laban and on the Q.T. hiding them in her saddlebag and sitting on it while Laban conducted a massive search. Laban and even Jacob called the teraphim ‘elohav’ which means gods. So when Zechariah chooses to add one more use of teraphim into the Tanach, to me it says “no matter how small you think those gods are, they are still not God.” The Proverbs says, “Trust in the Lord with ALL your heart and do not (even) lean on your own understanding.” (3.5) The little idol is the same as a massive totem or a Tower of Babel. Sin and the sin of idolatry particularly is ruinous. Ask of the Lord, and he will supply.  

The other reason I like Zechariah’s use of teraphim is the obvious contrast with the Lord of all the earth. That little thing? You think that will help? It cannot even cover what a Bunnings sprinkler head would cover in an Aussie backyard. Compare that to verse 1 “storm clouds” and “Showers” The contrast is clear as. God is the Lord of all the earth. 

Verse 2, 

For the teraphim speak iniquity, 

         And the diviners see lying visions 

         And tell false dreams; 

         They comfort in vain. 

         Therefore the people wander like sheep, 

         They are afflicted, because there is no shepherd.

 

Zechariah widens his imagery to include the leaders of the Jewish people. Now it’s not only that the people are leaning into false worship and prayer, but they are simply sheep and they have no shepherd. Then he quickly changes his tune in verse 3, 

³        “My anger is kindled against the shepherds, 

         And I will punish the male goats; 

         For the LORD of hosts has visited His flock, the house of Judah, 

         And will make them like His majestic horse in battle.

 

In other words, it’s not really that there are no shepherds; it’s that the shepherds are bad! And who is going to fix this? Who you gonna call? The Lord of hosts!

You see the role of the shepherd in ancient Israel was twofold: 1) feed the sheep and 2) guard them from wolves and other assailants. Many Christians read John chapter 10 and see Yeshua calling himself the “Good shepherd” and see the classic paintings of an idyllic, pastoral scene. Yeshua is carrying a little lamb, and the other sheep are huddled up against him with gratitude and such. There is no enemy; there is no problem. 

But when Paul is leaving the Ephesian believers (Acts 20) he reminds them of his teaching ministry and then like Moses in his Swan Song, predicts that men will come in to disturb the congregation. 

“For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole purpose of God. Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.” (Acts 20.27-30)

A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. A good shepherd chases the wolves away to protect the sheep. That’s the ministry of the Lord of hosts. 

Verse 3 ends with the sheep becoming like valiant horses ridden in battle. God himself will attend to his people Judah. The bad shepherds, the bad leadership will be subject to God’s discipline; the people will be brought in and brought near. And become like steeds arrayed for and carrying knights of battle. 

That theme of God caring for his people continues through this whole chapter. Listen to these phrases in verse 6, “I will strengthen the house of Judah”, I will save the house of Joseph, I had compassion on them, and I will answer them. These are not even exhaustive. 

Verse 7: Their heart will be glad; their children will see and be glad; their heart will rejoice in the Lord. 

Again more of what God has done in verse 8 “I have redeemed them” and verse 10 “I will bring them back from Egypt and Assyria”

Verse 11 “They will pass through the sea of distress.” 

What I’m saying and what Zechariah is clearly saying without tautology is that God has our back. The implication is that if you are serious with God, he’s on your team. If you keep a few teraphim and follow ridiculous bad shepherds, you are destined for troubles. But if you keep your eyes on God, and trust in the Lord, with all your heart, no matter the condition of the land or the temple, no matter your own situation particularly, if you trust him, God “will strike the waves in the sea so that all the depths of the Nile will dry up.” (v. 11)

That’s the Lord of hosts and that’s the one on whose team we are. He’s got our back. We don’t need to defend him; we don’t need to guard his reputation. He will do it. Isaiah 14.27 “For the LORD of hosts has planned, and who can frustrate it? And as for His stretched-out hand, who can turn it back?”

Barry Webb in his commentary highlights two great results of God’s intervention here. One is the erasure of the problems of the past.  “They will be as though I had not rejected them.” (v. 6) But sometimes we think of the past and ‘all bad.’ And God has to eliminate the whole lot. But the past includes both good and bad. So Webb says that the other great result is that what awaits us eclipses the past. So while we had an Exodus from Egypt a millennium before, now without all the plagues and with God alone acting, we will be delivered from Egypt, and not only from there, but also from Assyria. And we will become abundant. This has echoes both of Creation, a reiteration of the Abrahamic covenant, and the Exodus to be sure. 

Most of the commentators look at chapter 10 as a follow-on from chapter 9. I’m not speaking arithmetically, but rather in the mechanics of the salvation pictures God is painting through the prophet. 

All these things whether the echoes of Abraham or the Exodus, all of them speak of covenant and repair. If you will, using our usual term “salvation.” He even says, “I will save them.” 

So how will this take place and who are the bad shepherds? As I say, most commentators focus on the linkage between chapters 9 and 10. In chapter 9 we found the donkey-rider and he was ‘endowed with salvation.’ (9.9) The answer given by Zechariah is a person down the proverbial road, who rides into Jerusalem on a donkey. That person will save us. That’s the mechanism God will use. No wonder Yeshua called himself the “Good Shepherd” and he came to replace the bad ones. 

At the beginning today I asked the question about peace in the land of Israel and Shomron. The answer is, as you might have expected, the person of Yeshua. It’s when we get in right relationship with him that we get into right relationship with others. Even ‘the other.’

This is the 2^nd horizon, the not yet of Zechariah’s day, and if you will in the 3^rd horizon, the not yet in Jesus’ day. The prophet is announcing replacement, and in some aspects that took place in his day, but sadly the Josiah-type revival didn’t happen. Sin continued. The expansion actually slowed. That means, there was an anticipation in a 2^nd horizon for something more and better. That’s why we New Covenant people get so excited reading this because much of it is fulfilled in Yeshua. 

He rode into town on the donkey and brought salvation. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son so that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.” (John 3.16) A new sheriff is in town, and the old shepherds are replaced. Hallelujah!

But, as we will see in chapter 14, there is still a not-yet in this fulfilment. Yes, God will do great things for his people. But wait, like the late-night infomercial, wait, there’s more.

Verse 11, the sea of distress, in Hebrew Tsara (or in Yiddish ‘tsuris’) which every kvetching zayde well knows, the people of Judah and Israel will cooperate and they will pass through the sea of Tsuris. The Nile will dry up altogether. All enemies of the Jewish people will be diminished. Conquest is assured. Domination. Victory. The Lord of hosts!

Verse 12. I will ‘strengthen’ them. This echoes verse 6, and by the way, is not the usual word for ‘strength.’ It’s Gibor, meaning ‘mighty’. God will make us mighty.  How? “In the Lord.” That is, in our relationship with the Lord. It’s not a contest to see how religious or how strong your faith is. It’s a relationship where God draws us to himself and he gives us his strength. We ask; God supplies. How good is that?

“And in His name they will walk” (v. 12)

This summarised for me this whole chapter.  In God’s name, in his power, in his title “Lord of hosts” and “Lord of all the earth.” His characteristics are ours, if we know him and pray and spend time with him. 

Is that something you want?  

 

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Resource on video 

To see a fun video overview of the book of Zechariah see this from Bible Project:

https://bibleproject.com/explore/video/zechariah/

 

Bibliography:

Ryken, Leland (and others), Dictionary of Biblical Imagery, InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, 1998.

Smith, Ralph, Micah to Malachi: Word Biblical Commentary (Volume 32), Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, 1984.

Stead, Michael, Zechariah: The Lord Returns, Aquila Press, Sydney, 2015.

Webb, Barry, The Message of Zechariah: Your Kingdom Come, Intervarsity Press, Nottingham, 2003.

Wiersbe, Warren, Be Heroic: Demonstrating Bravery by your Walk, David C. Cook Press, Colorado Springs, 1997.

 

ACTUAL TEXT

Zech. 10:1           Ask rain from the LORD at the time of the spring rain — 

         The LORD who makes the storm clouds; 

         And He will give them showers of rain, vegetation in the field to each man.

²        For the teraphim speak iniquity, 

         And the diviners see lying visions 

         And tell false dreams; 

         They comfort in vain. 

         Therefore the people wander like sheep, 

         They are afflicted, because there is no shepherd.

³        “My anger is kindled against the shepherds, 

         And I will punish the male goats; 

         For the LORD of hosts has visited His flock, the house of Judah, 

         And will make them like His majestic horse in battle.

⁴        “From them will come the cornerstone, 

         From ¹them the tent peg, 

         From ¹them the bow of battle, 

         From ¹them every ²ruler, all of them together.

⁵        “They will be as mighty men, 

         Treading down the enemy in the mire of the streets in battle; 

         And they will fight, for the LORD will be with them; 

         And the riders on horses will be put to shame.

⁶        “I will strengthen the house of Judah, 

         And I will save the house of Joseph, 

         And I will bring them back, 

         Because I have had compassion on them; 

         And they will be as though I had not rejected them, 

         For I am the LORD their God and I will answer them.

⁷        “Ephraim will be like a mighty man, 

         And their heart will be glad as if from wine; 

         Indeed, their children will see it and be glad, 

         Their heart will rejoice in the LORD.

⁸        “I will whistle for them to gather them together, 

         For I have redeemed them; 

         And they will be as numerous as they were before.

⁹        “When I scatter them among the peoples, 

         They will remember Me in far countries, 

         And they with their children will live and come back.

¹⁰       “I will bring them back from the land of Egypt 

         And gather them from Assyria; 

         And I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon 

         Until no room can be found for them.

¹¹       “And they will pass through the sea of distress 

         And He will strike the waves in the sea, 

         So that all the depths of the Nile will dry up; 

         And the pride of Assyria will be brought down 

         And the scepter of Egypt will depart.

¹²       “And I will strengthen them in the LORD, 

         And in His name they will walk,” declares the LORD.

How many messiahs are there? (A study in chapter 9 of Zechariah)

 OUT OF THE CHAOS: A study in the book of Zechariah

Chapter 9:  Two Messiahs; One neighbourhood

  To watch this on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/EIciBKhC038

The Jewish world changed because of the 2^nd world war. Obviously the loss of 6 million of any people, even Chinese or Indian people in 2023 when their populations are over a billion would suffer significantly if 6 million were suddenly taken. But when our Jewish global ranks only numbered nearly 17 million in 1939, to lose 1/3 of the nation-- that’s a devastation. The remainder of the Jewish population scattered, not reckoning a return to their homelands would allow them safety, and Jewish migration continued even so far as coming to Australia. In 1901, at Federation, the population of the country here was less than 4 million people, only 15,000 of whom were Jewish. During and after the Holocaust, the Jewish escape took us as far away as possible, and in 2011, our numbers had swelled to over 100,000.^[1] 

But when I say the Jewish world changed, I’m not only referencing population and evacuation. I’m referencing Jewish thinking as well. To be fair, making the point that Jewish thinking is singular is both dismissive and puerile. There have always been thinkers who thought outside the proverbial box in the Jewish world. Einstein, Spinoza, even Moses Mendelssohn are primary examples. So when I say “Jewish thinking”, what I’m referencing is the general mood or majority concept that finds its way into most, certainly the plurality, of the Jewish people in an area or globally. 

For instance, just now, even though there are several major denominations of Jewish people, with representative synagogues and temples, Jewish thinking today is significantly concerned with ‘tikkun olam’ even if less than half the people who are so concerned don’t know the term. The ‘repair of the world’ and ‘making the world a better place’ are global issue #1 in the philosophical mindset of our people. Internal concerns of Jews might also include Jewish maintenance (intermarriage, conversions), but the not-only-us perspective almost always includes tikkun olam. 

Those of you who are messianic, that is, believers in Yeshua as Messiah, would aver that Jewish people are, or at least should be, concerned about the coming of Messiah. Certainly that was 1/13^th of the thinking of Jewish people when Rambam wrote his 13 articles of faith in the 12^th century in Spain.

In 1885, the Jewish world self-edited again and I think a shift away from a personal Messiah significantly began to be noticed. Combine that doctrinal movement and the Shoah and now, we, who are alive in 2023, are the result of such. Most Jewish people today do not believe in a personal Messiah, nor think of Judaism as a religion, rather as a community among all other religious communities, and our main task is to get along with, and bring social justice to, the globe. With that as an overview of our messianic amendments, I want to talk to you today from our chapter, Zechariah 9, and use a personal anecdote to showcase all we can learn from this ancient and sacred text.

The year was 1971. I was a 19-year-old hippie living again in Kansas City. I had returned to my birthplace after dropping out of university and hitchhiking around the south, that region of the US not exactly known for political openness, and certainly in those days, not known for welcome to long-hairs and guitar-toting hitchhikers. Even so, that’s where I found myself when four Southern Baptists surrounded me on the streets of Atlanta, Georgia. They harangued me and announced to me that Jesus was the messiah. I told them I was Jewish. That didn’t seem to move their thinking or their intentions. They had Bibles and biblical answers to anything and everything, even though I wasn’t asking them any questions. These men certainly had messiah on the brain. 

Even though I was a Jew, and still a practising one, and even though I’d heard of messiah; if I had to take an examination on the subject, I would have answered “yes” to the question, “Do you believe in the messiah?”, I still didn’t think about it much. 

Many people in our days, certainly those who survived the Shoah, have split thinking on this. Some, and dare I say most, of our people respond with thoughts like, “If there were a God, and if he really cared about our people, why didn’t he save those 6 million?” Others will say, “If a messiah were coming, he should have come long before Auschwitz!” To be fair, there are many who continue to hold onto the historical Jewish thought of Rambam that “though he (messiah) tarry, yet will I wait for him.”

Today I will tell you of an episode later in that year 1971 that forever shaped my thinking personally and maybe it will help you as well in considering this issue.

Also, I’m not the focus of the author of this chapter, Zechariah, and I want you to see the plan of God clearly as he announced, so that whoever you are, believer or not-yet-a-believer, you will draw comfort from God’s eyes across the world. Let’s dive in.

1.     God’s plan for some nations: The coming of the warrior (.1-.8)

Verse 1. This is extremely difficult in the Hebrew. There is no verb. The term for oracle is not always used. We don’t know the subject and the object, but otherwise, the sentence is fairly clear. Basically the section is introducing us to the complex considerations of God in relation to the nations around the Jewish people. What nations are those? It starts up north with Syria, moves south to Phoenecia (namely Tyre and Sidon) which is in Lebanon today and finally lands us in Philistia with the Gaza towns mentioned. 

The translation of the verse is all over the place, but it is probably best to retain the difficult reading “eve of man” and understand it as a subjective genitive, “belong to Yahweh,” i.e. “the eyes of Gentiles and all the tribes of Israel should be on Yahweh.”

Let’s deal with the geography. Each of the three areas will experience different outcomes. First is Syria. We read, “Even as far as Hamath.” This is beyond the scope of the land of Judah and even Israel in the days of Zechariah, and certainly beyond today’s boundaries, but it indicates that in the Messianic Age the government of the Lord of the whole earth will extend way up north into Assyrian territory. Way north of Damascus. And the point is that this territory will be godly! As verse one says, “unto the Lord”

כִּ֤י לַֽיהוָה֙

The next settled territories are not so fortunate, however. 

Verses 2-4: Tyre and Sidon, self-endowed and self-strengthened, are gathering stuff and their accumulation even of wisdom. Their wisdom, wealth and weaponry are not enough to prevent God’s judgment to fall on them.  Verse 4 says God will dispossess her. Note the verb is singular and yet Tyre and Sidon (Tsor and Tsidon) are two, but in their dismissal of God they are as one. 

The third is Gaza today, and back then Philistia. 

Verses 5-8 lists 4 of the 5 cities along the coast from Ashdod south, the usual 5 towns, but one is missing. The sound of judgment actually produces something good here. 

We read: “Ashkelon will see it and be afraid. Gaza too will writhe in great pain; also Ekron, for her expectation has been confounded. Moreover, the king will perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon will not be inhabited. And a mongrel (mamzer: bastard) race will dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines. And I will remove their blood from their mouth and their detestable things from between their teeth. 

Then they also will be a remnant for our God, and be like a clan in Judah, and Ekron like a Jebusite.

But I will camp around My house because of an army, because of him who passes by and returns; and no oppressor will pass over them anymore, for now I have seen with My eyes.” (.5-.8)

 

The removal of penalty and the inclusion into the house of God is staggering. Ekron becoming a Jebusite!??? That’s Jerusalem. Verse 8: My house and God encamping there and God’s eyes are there. Wow, this stanza is making Philistia into a community that is welcomed and formerly detestable, formerly bastardized, now with pride removed and blood removed from their mouths. This is a picture of godliness.  Verse 7, like a clan is in Hebrew, K’alef, like a chief. This is seriously what we might call ‘inclusion.’  For years I read this as judgment on all three geographical areas, but now I see this portion of Zechariah 9 as a hint of what is coming, that the Lord of all the earth, whose kingdom is coming, whose king is coming, has the intention of bringing in the foreginers and they will also be his. 

2.     Shiloh on a donkey: The coming of the king (.9-10)

Verse 9. This is where the story zooms in on a particular, on the method of bringing salvation to the territories, and dare I say, to Judah as well. I’m not sure that salvation was in the mind of our father Jacob when he prophesied (Genesis 49.11) about Judah and pre-broadcast this scene. He uses very similar language as here in verse 9, but I read the Genesis account as talking about abundance and prosperity.  Remember, there we read this of Jacob’s prophecy to his 4^th son: “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes, and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples. He ties his foal to the vine, and his donkey’s colt to the choice vine; He washes his garments in wine, and his robes in the blood of grapes.” (Gen 49.10-11) 

Shiloh, later we know this to be Messiah, but for Jacob, just read this as a prediction on the first horizon. When Shiloh comes, the abundance of produce will be so great that you can tie your donkey to a grapevine, and the vine will be strong enough to function as a hitching post. Your donkey is safe; your investments will be safe. That’s how the people of Jacob’s time, his sons and larger family, would have heard the prediction. 

In a few minutes I will finish the story of my encounter with a rabbi in 1971 that shaped my thinking about this passage to this day.

Who is this humble donkey-rider? Jewish interpreters love to highlight the effectiveness of this donkey-rider. He will make things happen which sections one and three advance. Verse 10, speaking peace to the nations is obviously an admission of control and repair in the military and political troubles of the past. His dominion will be far reaching from sea to sea, or if you are an American, from sea to shining sea. And that phrase which persists in Zechariah “to the ends of the earth”  (Ad afsei aretz)

עַד־אַפְסֵי־אָֽרֶץ

Is not only a description of geography, but to the nations, the peoples. Again I’m thinking of Jacob’s prophecy to Judah, that “to Shiloh, to him shall the gathering and the obedience and the tribute of the peoples be.” These are taxes and pledges of loyalty. To the ends of the earth and from the ends of the earth they will come. 

Verse 9 says, “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation, Humble, and mounted on a donkey, Even on a colt, the foal of a donkey.”

But now, the long-awaited story. The year was 1971. I was 19 and change. In May that year I was found by Messiah and came to believe that Yeshua was our Messiah. I quickly told my family (not advised) and within hours I was asked by my parents to exit their home. I booked and moved into a new apartment. It was a traumatic time, but a most significant one. 

A couple of months later, and I’m not sure of the circumstances. Did he invite me? Did I invite myself to the rabbi’s study? I don’t remember. But that summer of 1971, I remember being with Rabbi MD Solomon in the office of the Kehilath Israel Synagogue on Meyer and Rockhill in Kansas City. We had a lively albeit frank and confrontational conversation about my recent change of faith, as he said, and he wanted me to return to Judaism. We traded Bibles. My King James Version for his Hebrew/English. Both hardback. We traded Bible quotes. I was way out of my league, to be sure, in this Gospel witness. 

At one point, the rabbi admitted with words like these, “Look, we know that there are two pictures of messiah in Tenach. Messiah the son of Joseph and Messiah the son of David. Both in one chapter of the Scriptures. Zechariah perek tet (Chapter 9) says that he will come into Jerusalem on a donkey or he will come on the clouds. Two clear pictures. Two very different actions by the messiah. That means, he explained, we as Jews, as the prophet has been warning us for chapter after chapter, have a choice. We can welcome him on a donkey or on the clouds. What causes him to come in either of those methods? Our sinfulness.” 

He went on. “If all Israel lives sinfully, messiah will come on a donkey and deliver us. If all Israel lives faithfully, if we observe the mitzvot and keep Torah as Orthodox Jews, messiah will come on the clouds.” 

I processed it for only a moment, but I’ve processed it again and again for the next 52 years. What I said then, I would still say today. “Rabbi, I think you have just convinced me that Jesus is our messiah.”

My explanation was probably weak then, but it boiled down to this. Where in Tenach do we read of Israel’s faithfulness? Where in the prophets, or even Moses’ Swan Song do we hear of God bragging about our keeping Torah? Most of the time God is calling us back to faithfulness BECAUSE we have failed him. If Rabbi Solomon’s thesis is right, then messiah has to come on the donkey and save us. But listen, he’s only half right. The two pictures, the two messiahs are actually one messiah coming twice. 

Yes, we lived sinfully and Messiah had to come on the donkey.  (Matt. 21.7, John 12.15)

Then at the end of days, which God knows, he will send Messiah yet again, we who are the redeemed, who keep his love and commands for all people, he will come in the clouds of glory as Daniel predicted, as Zechariah says here, as John the Revelator says in chapter one of Revelation. 

I’m sure we shook hands. We kept our traded books. It’s right here for me. Rabbi Solomon made Aliyah and died in Israel many years later. If he was honestly seeking God, the Lord would surely have made my words clear to the rabbi. We shall see in due course, you know?

Verse 10 says, “And He will speak peace to the nations;” Again the hint is becoming louder like Bolero’s earliest themes continuing in the rest of the orchestral piece by Ravel. 

Nations will come to the Lord. Nations CAN be included in God’s economy. There is a place for Gentiles along with Jews in God’s eyes. The hint is increasing. The Lord is Lord over all the earth. 

3.     Summary blessings to the victorious cloud-rider: Sharing in the victory (.11-.17)

The third section of today’s class is found in verses 11 to the end.  Bishop Stead broke this down into four separate outline units. Verse 11 is the release. “I will free your prisoners from the waterless pit.”  Look at Isaiah 42.22 “This is a people plundered and looted, all of them trapped in pits or hidden away in prisons.” Or Jeremiah’s prophecy about the sin of Judah being trusting in the ‘cisterns which hold no water.” (2.13) It could also be the empty pit of Joseph, sold by his brothers to the travelling nomads that got him to Egypt and covenant blessings, even there. 

Emptiness, and yet going to the well, what a waste, what a pretence. Release from falsehood, that’s how I want to define this verse. That’s so huge in our mechanical understanding and deployment of religious activity. Matthew West sang, “I don’t want to go through the motions…without your all-consuming passion inside of me …what if I had given everything instead of going through the motions?” Religion and its commensurate hypocrisy—God says he will release Judah from this prison!

And how is this release possible? Verse 11 tells us, “the blood of the covenant” which will free us! 

The next verse, 12 is a second promise of Restoration. The hint of ‘double’ blessing is clarified in this verse. That sounds like a change from the double problem of Isaiah 40 which Jeremiah 16.18 also told us. The punishment for our sin, even double there, could be countermanded by the grace of the Lord and the Word of his testimony. Blood and covenant, again applied to the people of God. Without both, we are left in pain and emptiness and suffering. But here, due to the donkey-riding messiah, we can be restored to hope. Note the phrase in .12 about prisoners of hope. Note in verses 11 and 12 the use of ‘asirei’ or prisoners. We were held in chains and now the result of the blood, the covenant, and the Word of God make us prisoners of hope. 

This is not only hope for Temple restoration, but peoplehood! When we are broken, without hope, we need the Almighty to give us hope, by relating to and being in relationship with him. Note the Psalms (18.2, 46.5-7) that call us to hope in God, my refuge, my shield the horn of my salvation and my stronghold. Hope is personal and springs eternal, for those whose hope is in the living God and not in man’s solutions or treaties or self-capacity. 

Verses 13-15, Bp Stead said, is about Victory itself. Who are the weapons? Judah and Efraim, the southern and northern kingdoms, now functioning as a unit. How did that happen? By the blood of the covenant. And wait, it’s not only the people of God who are weapons (arrows, bows and swords), but now God himself joins the armies. We have called him Adonai Ts’vaot throughout this prophecy, Lord of the armies, and now he takes the battlefield himself! Verse 15 has that title trumpeting ahead of the armies of Israel and Judah. 

Verse 14 is the one that Rabbi Solomon cited. The Lord will appear “over them.” And go “forth like lightning.” That’s heavenly; that’s from above. The rabbis have taught us that messiah will fight for us, win the battles against our enemies, and here victory is won by God and by God’s people. 

One more note on verse 15^[2] showcases making noise as in a boisterous banquet.

Then finally, the fourth section of the last of chapter 9 is “Salvation.” Look at verses 16 and 17. For those who have read ahead, the shepherd of verse 16 will feature again, certainly in contrast to the false shepherds next week and the one who will suffer and be stricken later. Hold those thoughts. What is great about this final thought in chapter 9 is the tender care of a shepherd. He was a warrior a moment ago, and now he will ‘save …the flock.’ That’s tender. It’s also the result of a warrior-shepherd which makes sense in context, but don’t miss it. Yeshua, the gentle shepherd of the flock of God’s people will go to war on our behalf, for the “weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God for the tearing down of strongholds and every lofty thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Messiah.” (2 Cor. 10:4-5)

The scenes of chapter 9 make this one of the most compelling chapters in the Bible, especially for us who know the suffering one, who rides in Triumphal Entry (ha, what a misnomer!) into Jerusalem a few days before Passover nearly 2,000 years ago. Yeshua is hailed as king, and it’s so close you can almost taste the victory. But his kingdom is a now and not yet kingdom. He’s riding on the donkey, not the clouds, to bring suffering, sinful Israel back into covenant relationship with God. How? By his shed blood. By dying for us on the cross in a few days after this event recorded in all four gospels. He rode into Jerusalem as king, not on a white horse with military trumpets and accolades, but with humility and suffering in the forecast.  The people got it wrong; the Romans got it wrong; we all get it wrong until we meet the one who is the Suffering One, the donkey-rider who brings salvation in his own manner. 

Don’t miss it; you who don’t yet know Messiah, today could be your day. Find salvation in the donkey-rider, the messiah Jesus. He’s your life and your hope. Without him, we are doubly in trouble; with him we are doubly blessed. 

How, what do you do now? Pray a simple prayer and ask him to be your salvation and your messiah. He wants to forgive you your sins and make you born again to a living hope. Not a dead one. 

Sample prayer. 

Then write me and tell me what you’ve done… we’ll support you, etc. Shabbat shalom!

 

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Remember, you who are watching today, if you are not yet a follower of Yeshua, and see his love for you, his kindness extended, his offer of forgiveness available, right where you are, submit to him, to his lordship, to his care, and your life will take on new meaning, new substance, and you will have mates on this call, and in your neighbourhood and wherever you travel… the Kingdom is advancing under the King. Chaos is subjugated, life is available.

Would you like that? Pray with me just now. (Prayer Sample)

Shabbat shalom!

 

Resource on video 

To see a fun video overview of the book of Zechariah see this from Bible Project:

https://bibleproject.com/explore/video/zechariah/

 

Bibliography:

Ryken, Leland (and others), Dictionary of Biblical Imagery, InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, 1998.

Smith, Ralph, Micah to Malachi: Word Biblical Commentary (Volume 32), Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, 1984.

Stead, Michael, Zechariah: The Lord Returns, Aquila Press, Sydney, 2015.

Webb, Barry, The Message of Zechariah: Your Kingdom Come, Intervarsity Press, Nottingham, 2003.

Wiersbe, Warren, Be Heroic: Demonstrating Bravery by your Walk, David C. Cook Press, Colorado Springs, 1997.

 

ACTUAL TEXT

Zech. 9:1   The burden of the word of the LORD is against the land of Hadrach, with Damascus as its resting place (for the eyes of men, especially of all the tribes of Israel, are toward the LORD),² and Hamath also, which borders on it; Tyre and Sidon, though they are very wise. ³ For Tyre built herself a fortress and piled up silver like dust, and gold like the mire of the streets. ⁴ Behold, the Lord will dispossess her and cast her wealth into the sea; and she will be consumed with fire. ⁵ Ashkelon will see it and be afraid. Gaza too will writhe in great pain; also Ekron, for her expectation has been confounded. Moreover, the king will perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon will not be inhabited. ⁶ And a mongrel race will dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines. ⁷ And I will remove their blood from their mouth and their detestable things from between their teeth. Then they also will be a remnant for our God, and be like a clan in Judah, and Ekron like a Jebusite. ⁸ But I will camp around My house because of an army, because of him who passes by and returns; and no oppressor will pass over them anymore, for now I have seen with My eyes.

 

⁹ Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; He is just and endowed with salvation, humble, and mounted on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey. ¹⁰ I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim 

and the horse from Jerusalem; and the bow of war will be cut off.  And He will speak peace to the nations; and His dominion will be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.

 

11 As for you also, because of the blood of My covenant with you, I have set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. ¹² Return to the stronghold, O prisoners who have the hope; this very day I am declaring that I will restore double to you. ¹³ For I will bend Judah as My bow, I will fill the bow with Ephraim.  And I will stir up your sons, O Zion, against your sons, O Greece; and I will make you like a warrior’s sword. ¹⁴ Then the LORD will appear over them, and His arrow will go forth like lightning; and the Lord GOD will blow the trumpet, and will march in the storm winds of the south. ¹⁵ The LORD of hosts will defend them. And they will devour and trample on the sling stones; and they will drink and be boisterous as with wine; and they will be filled like a sacrificial basin, drenched like the corners of the altar.

 

¹⁶ And the LORD their God will save them in that day as the flock of His people; for they are as the stones of a crown, sparkling in His land. ¹⁷ For what comeliness and beauty will be theirs! Grain will make the young men flourish, and new wine the virgins.

^[1] By 1920, intermarriage, mainly on the part of Jewish men, was leading some observers to question the long-term viability of the Jewish community in Australia. But the mass arrival of Jews from Eastern Europe from the 1920s onwards, combined with refugees from Central Europe, ensured a vibrant future. Over 5000 "thirty-niners" arrived as refugees just before or at the outbreak of World War II.  Between 1946 and 1954, 17,000 Jews, mostly Holocaust survivors, arrived from Europe and Shanghai. A significant number came after the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, a further 10,000 arrived by 1961.  The Suez Crisis of that same year precipitated an exodus of Jews from Nasser's Egypt. Jews from Middle Eastern countries, even Sephardim of comparatively light complexion, were effectively barred by the White Australia policy, enshrined in the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901 and not repealed until 1972, but an easing of this barrier following representations to government facilitated the entry of several hundred refugees from Egypt. Australian Jewry doubled in size from 23,000 in 1933 to 60,000 in 1966. With the arrival of substantial numbers of Jews from South Africa and the former Soviet Union, there were about 84,000 Jews according to the 2001 Census, with communal leaders believing the actual number to be around 110,000.  The Census of 2011 indicated about 112,000 Jews in Australia. (From Suzanne Rutland, Australia: 1788 to the Present

by Suzanne Rutland, updated by Hilary L. Rubinstein
Last updated June 23, 2021

 

^[2] Literally it reads “and they shall drink and make noise like wine.” Some scholars follow LXX and read ‏דמם‎ “their blood” for ‏המוּ‎ “they make noise.” It is better to maintain the MT text and consider ‏המוּ‎ a 3rd com pl qal pf ‏המה “to make noise.” The idea of a boisterous banquet is being presented.