Zechariah 8
RileyZechariah 8:1-23
FASTING TURNED INTO Zechariah 7:1 to Zechariah 10:12. “IN the fourth year of king Darius * * in the fourth day of the ninth month” * * Zechariah received another Word from the Lord. It was in consequence of a visit of representative men from the captivity. Sherezer, prefect of the treasury, and Regemmelech, the king’s official, and associates, came “to pray before the Lord, and to speak unto the priests which were in the House of the Lord of Hosts, and to the Prophets, saying, (for Israel) Should I weep in the fifth month, separating myself, as I have done these so many years”? You will remember that back in Deuteronomy 17:9 it is made the business of the priests and Levites to determine matters of law,—the sentence being —“And thou shalt come unto the priests the Levites, and unto the judge that shall he in those days, and enquire; and they shall shew thee the sentence of judgment: “And thou shalt do according to the sentence, which they of that place which the Lord shall choose shall shew thee; and thou shalt observe to do according to all that they inform thee” (Deuteronomy 17:9-10). The letter of the Law was known to these men, and proceeding according to its suggestion they raised this question of the fasts.The tenth day of the fifth month was kept a fast in memory of the destruction of Jerusalem. Jeremiah says,—“Now in the fifth month, in the tenth day of the month, which was the nineteenth year of Nebuchadneezar king of Babylon, came Nebuzar-adan, captain of the guard, which served the king of Babylon, into Jerusalem, “And burned the House of the Lord, and the king’s house; and all the houses of Jerusalem, and all the houses of the great men, burned he with fire: “And all the army of the Chaldeans, that were with the captain of the guard, brake down all the walls of Jerusalem round about. “Then Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard carried away captive certain of the poor of the people, and the residue of the people that remained in the city, and those that fell away, that fell to the king of Babylon, and the rest of the multitude” (Jeremiah 32:12-15). But the Temple is now being restored. In view of this blessing from above, they wonder whether the fast which had commemorated the sad event should be continued. The greater portion of the seventh and eighth chapters of Zechariah are in answer to this question.But let me speak a word before giving ourselves to further study. Be it understood that there are fasts and fasts: fasts that are meaningless; and fasts that are full of meaning: fasts that deny the body but infill the Spirit; and fasts that profit neither body nor spirit. If one is to take a large view of the subject of fasts, he must collate the Scriptures relating to it, and then he will find that there is a fast appointed of God, associated with prayer, and from which blessing always comes; from the experience of which men have always received power. Jesus fasted and prayed.
Jesus declared with reference to the disposition of the boy at the foot of the mount of transfiguration, that His disciples had failed because they were not living in the atmosphere of fasting and prayer,—the atmosphere of power. Days set apart by direction of a ruler for fasting and prayer, or days that came in commemoration of some sad event, are almost sure, in the process of time, to descend into a mere ceremony. But when the individual is led by the Spirit of God to do the same, or when the Church finds itself ready for ten days in the upper room; or a nation, realizing its doom, sits in sackcloth and ashes, as did Nineveh, then God will visit that man, the Holy Spirit will descend upon that church, and the Eternal One will repent the evil He thought to do that nation, and judgment will give place to mercy.But the question of this committee involves—THE FORMAL FAST Hear what God has to say concerning it. First of all He affirms:—It was selfishly rendered!“Speak unto all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month, even those seventy years, did ye at all fast unto Me, even to Me? “And when ye did eat, and when ye did drink, did not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves”‘? (Zechariah 7:5-6). One can hardly read these words of Zechariah without being reminded of the way Lenten season is kept by certain of our own country. Church members, who are also society leaders, are often heard to express their pleasure in its near approach. It will give them a chance to rest awhile from the dance, the theater, the card-table, and so far recuperate themselves, body and mind, that when the season is over they can enter upon it all again with increased zest; and yet they call their Lenten-behavior Christianity.Dr. Herrick, in his volume “Some Heretics of Yesterday” speaks of Savonarola’s time as a period in which “Art achieved its more brilliant triumphs and religion fell into its dreariest formalisms.” But as to the formalism, the fifteenth century-professors of religion find kith and kin in twentieth century ceremonialists.This fast was also associated with commercial sins. Evidently from verses nine and ten they had come to regard fast-keeping as in lieu of true judgment, kindness, compassion. As far back as Isaiah’s time God had found this to be true, and by the mouth of that Prophet He makes His apostate people to say,“Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and Thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and Thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours. “Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high. “Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down His head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this a fast, and cm acceptable day to the Lord? “Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? “Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? “Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy rereward. “Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer; thou shalt cry, and He shall say, Here I am. If thou take away from the midst of thee the yoke, the putting forth of the finger, and speaking vanity: “And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall thy light rise in obscurity, and thy darkness be as the noon day: “And the Lord shall guide thee continually” (Isaiah 58:3-11). Recently one of our religious newspapers reported an instance of a well-to-do deacon in Connecticut, whose pastor said, “Poor widow Green’s wood is out; can you take her a cord?” “Yes,” answered the deacon, “but who will pay me for it?” “I will pay you for it,” said the pastor, “on condition you will read the first three verses of the forty-first Psalm before you retire tonight.”The deacon consented, delivered the wood, and at night opened the Word of God and read,“Blessed is he that considereth the poor: the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble. “The Lord will preserve him, and keep him alive; and he shall be blessed upon the earth: and Thou wilt not deliver him unto the will of his enemies. “The Lord will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing: Thou wilt make all his bed in his sickness?” (Psalms 41:1-3). When, afterwards, the pastor asked him for his bill, the deacon replied, “No bill for you. I can’t afford to part with those promises. I didn’t know they were there.”So it would seem the people of Zechariah’s time had forgotten the promises God had associated with true judgment, kindness, compassion, and had also forgotten the curse against them that oppress the widow, the fatherless, the sojourner, the poor, or devise evil in the heart against one’s brother.Their fasts did not save them from unfaithfulness.“But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear. “Yea, they made their Hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the Law, and the Words which the Lord of Hosts hath sent in His Spirit by the former Prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of Hosts” (Zechariah 7:11-12). A dull ear, a shrinking shoulder, a heart of stone; what a picture of apostasy! You will remember that when Stephen had addressed the Jews concerning Jesus they were cut to the heart. They cried out, with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and rushed upon him with one accord. Their fathers before them had stopped their ears and, with one accord, rushed away from God. They had withdrawn their shoulders from His service as the untamed ox draws away from yoke and bow. They had made their hearts as hard as the stones with which their successors slew Stephen.A dull ear, an unwilling shoulder, a hard heart; how often these go together!
How surely up-to-date is this description! How shall we be saved from this awful estate? A dull ear, an unwilling shoulder, a hard heart; who of us has not found himself cursed with one, or all of these? How shall he correct it?Mark Guy Pearse found a man who talked to him on the subject of holiness, saying, “I do wish I could find it.” “Find it!” Pearse replied. “You mean find Him. When you have Jesus you will have holiness.” Ah, yes, and when we find Him we find our hearing. When we find Him we find willing shoulders.
When we find Him we find hearts of flesh! If we are to overcome we must open the heart and let the King come in, that He may convert the barren place into a paradise,— beautiful and fruitful.THE TEMPLE The Prophet passes from the subject of Fasts to the finishing of the Temple. God declares His jealousy for Zion; His purpose to return unto her and dwell in the midst of Jerusalem.The Temple is God’s dwelling-place. In Solomon’s day the Lord said of the Temple built with hands, “I have hallowed this House, which thou hast built, to put My Name there for ever; and Mine eyes and Mine heart shall be there perpetually” (1 Kings 9:3). And when Jesus came and preached the great truth that God was to be worshiped wherever man sought Him in spirit, He did not abolish temple-residence; for now believers are the temple of the Most High. When God came into that ancient Temple made with hands His presence was manifested, and it was a glorious day for Israel when the Shekinah glory was seen above the Ark of the Covenant. When that Presence was taken from them, Zion was desolate indeed.
It is impossible for the Gentile convert to know what it means to hear the promise, “I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem”. And yet, it meant much the same to Israel that the re-visitation of God’s Spirit is to a soul which has long been out of communion, or to a Church, long barren.We have prayed the prayer of David,—“Restore unto [us] the joy of Thy salvation; and uphold [us] with Thy free spirit”, and watched with eagerness for God’s answer, but not more eagerly than these ancient people watched for the re-appearance of the Shekinah glory.
To get their House erected and have Jehovah come into it, that indeed was among their highest hopes. Should it not be so with us? Jesus went into one house where a sick woman lay and took her by the hand and lifted her up, and in health she entered upon service. Jesus went into another house where one was palsied, and lo, at His word, the powers came again. Jesus went into the house of Jairus, and a little daughter lay dead, but when Jesus came she revived, and bereavement took wings. Oh, beloved, our palaces, and our peasant cottages, alike, are finished temples when there the Divine Presence is revealed, and God,—our God—dwells in the midst!It is a pledge of a contented people also.“Thus saith the Lord of Hosts; There shall yet old men and old women dwell in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for very age. “And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof” (Zechariah 8:4-5). What a picture that! To the Jew, long captive and oppressed, it seemed impossible of realization. It sounded like idealization. The first commandment, with promise, was “Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee” (Exodus 20:12).How much they appreciated that promise is shown by their punctilious keeping of the command. No people ever regarded the multiplication of merry children as did this ancient folk. In the days of their captivity oppression had cut them short in the midst of their years, and so far discouraged marriage that children seemed few, and the very loneliness of their national life was strikingly presented in that fact.
When their city had been over-run by the hordes from Babylon they had seen “the sucklings slain in the streets” and those of better growth go to untimely graves. And in the memory of it was both barrenness and anguish.Pusey tells us,—“In the dreadful Irish famine of 1847, the absence of the children from the streets of Galway was one of its dreariest features.” And yet the Irish never loved their children as deeply as did the Jew, nor lost them so completely.
No wonder they thought it too marvelous to be true when God’s Prophet drew for them a picture of old men, in very multitudes, leaning upon their staffs, and little children in crowds making the streets to ring with merry laughter. And they could not understand it until God promised,—“I will save My people from the east country, and from the west country; and I will bring them, and they shall dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and they shall be My people, and I will be their God”.Truly, as George Adam Smith said, “That oracle had its motive in Zechariah’s day.” But what an oracle for these times of ours! “Whether in the large cities of the Old World where so few of the workers may hope for a quiet old age, sitting in the sun, and the children’s days of play are shortened by a premature toil and knowledge of evil; or in the newest fringes of the Western World where men’s hardness and coarseness are, in the struggle for gold, unawed by reverence for age, and unsoftened by the fellowship of childhood,—Zechariah’s great promise is equally needed. Even there shall it be fulfilled if men will remember the conditions, —that truth and whole-hearted justice abound in the gates, with love and loyalty in every heart towards every other.”Again, this finished Temple wasA promise of prosperity. According to Zechariah, when there was no Temple, “There was no hire for man, nor any hire for beast; neither was there any peace to him that went out or came in because of the affliction: for I set all men every one against his neighbour” (Zechariah 8:10).That is what it is to be without a Temple. Show me a people who have no temple of worship, no altar at which the family bows, no house in which the church gathers, to worship Jehovah, and I will show you a people stricken with poverty, as in China; oppressed by the adversary, as in India; and set every one against his neighbor, as in Africa; but when the temple comes, how changed! “For the seed shall be prosperous; the vine shall give her fruit, and the ground shall give her increase, and the heavens shall give their dew” (Zechariah 8:12).Christianity has accentuated commerce and increased riches as no other force ever could have accomplished these things. Wherever the Temple of God has gone there the vine has yielded its fruit and the ground its increase; “Godliness is profitable * * [for] the life that now is”.Poor Silverberg, the accomplished Minneapolis crook, who has robbed, gambled and stolen fortune upon fortune, confesses now, as he lies on his hard couch in prison cell, had he behaved himself righteously and worked as hard to build up the business his father left him as he has in devising new methods of rascality he would be worth millions.
No one doubts it! Put this over against his pitiful plea for the small amount of money that would release him from the cell and remember that he pleads for this small sum in vain, and learn that “godliness is profitable” in the individual life.Yes, and the nation finds the same to be true.
Why is it that America is so blessed? Fifty years ago we had but seven billion dollars in this country; today we are worth conservatively, a few hundred billion; then our per capita wealth was $307.00; in 1900 it was $1235.00;—more than four times as much. Now, in spite of the depression, it is larger still. If you ask me “What is the secret of this?” I cannot agree with him who says, “The stretch of our territory and the richness of our soil.” The Temple of God answers this question. Take Christianity out of America and you will pauperize her. The continent does not exist that is wide enough, the soil has not yet been discovered upon which an apostate, and utterly wicked population, can prosper. Give your temples such prominence that the Blind Pig and its accursed associates in sin,—the low theater, the brothel, the gambling den, the corporate devices for fortune-stealing and fortune-destruction are abolished, and you will bring in a period of such material prosperity as Isaiah describes in Isaiah 35:1—“The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose”.Ah, men; let us never begrudge what we give to the erection and maintenance of the temple of God; for, as we give to it there shall be given unto us, good measure shaken together, heaped up, running over.THE FATHER’S FEASTS There remains, however, another portion of this Scripture which completes the subject suggested by this study, namely, The Captive’s Fast Changed to the Conqueror’s Feasts.“Thus saith the Lord of Hosts; The fast of the fourth month, and the fast of the fifth and the fast of the Seventh, and the fast of the tenth, shall be to the House of Judah joy and gladness, and cheerful feasts; therefore love the truth and peace” (Zechariah 8:19). In other words, the anniversary of the taking of Jerusalem, the anniversary of the burning of the Temple, the anniversary of the murder of Gedeliah and his friends; all these dark hours of their past were to become, through the touch of God, shining stars by which to direct their feet.He, by His own presence, would convert the fasts into feasts. Why did the siege against Jerusalem succeed? Why did the walls of Jerusalem fall? Why was the Temple in Jerusalem burned? Why were God’s people carried away captive? Because they had put God away from them; and when their day of battle came they were without Him who had always been their defense.
They understood all of this. It was to symbolize it all that they kept their fasts; and now, if He is to return, of course those fasts must become feasts!Do you not recall how, when Jesus was asked,“Why do the disciples of John fast often, and make prayers, and likewise the disciples of the Pharisees; but Thine eat and drink?” He answered,“Can ye make the children of the bridechamber fast, while the Bridegroom is with them? “But the days will come, when the Bridegroom shall be taken away from them, and then shall they fast in those days” (Luke 5:33-35). The time for fasting is when God’s face is hid; but when it is seen, what a feast is on! Then one will appreciate that his joy is greater because of the sorrow which he has endured; his strength is more mighty because of the weakness with which he contrasts it; his sky is clearer because of the awful darkness of the night now passed.F. B. Meyer, commenting on this promise of the coming feast, born out of the sad fast, says, “Dare to anticipate the far-off interest of tears; dare to live in the day which is after tomorrow; as Dante said, ‘In God’s will is our peace’, He loves us infinitely. No good thing will He withhold; He must lay deep in tears the foundation that shall upbear our eternal weight of glory.”“Thus hath He done, and shall we not adore Him? This shall He do, and can we still despair? Come, let us quickly fling ourselves before Him— Cast at His feet the burden of our care.” The favor of such a Father will be sought by nations from afar.“Thus saith the Lord of Hosts; It shall yet come to pass, that there shall come people, and the inhabitants of many cities: “And the inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord, and to seek the Lord of Hosts: I will go also. “Yea, many people and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of Hosts in Jerusalem, and to pray before the Lord” (Zechariah 8:20-22). There is an earnest of the fulfillment of this prophecy in the New Testament Church. God’s people were never evangelists until Jesus ascended up on high, and the Holy Spirit descended upon His disciples; then, suddenly, within the short limits of a single century they swept the world in the Name of the Lord.Within eighty years after Pentecost, Clement of Alexandria remarked concerning Christianity,— “The Word of our Teacher abode not in Judea alone, as philosophy in Greece, but was poured out throughout the whole world, persuading Greeks and Barbarians in their several nations and villages, and in every city whole houses, and each hearer individually; and having brought over to the truth no few, even of the very philosophers.”Tertullian, before the second century closes, writes, “We are a people of yesterday, and yet we have filled every place belonging to you,—cities, islands, castles, towns, assemblies, your very camp, your tribes, companies, palace, senate, forum; we leave you your temples only. We can count your armies; our numbers in a single province will be greater.”And yet, beloved, this prophecy is only partially fulfilled. There is a day coming when nations that knew not God shall run unto Him because of the Holy One of Israel.Then shall His favored people find popularity.“In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you” (Zechariah 8:23). The tenth chapter of this Book is a declaration of the same precious truth. Jehovah has promised rain for the latter times. When once His people have been won back from the teraphim, the false diviners and dreamers, and their evil shepherds have been punished, then we read in Zechariah 10:3-4 :—“For the Lord of Hosts hath visited His flock the House of Judah, and hath made them as His goodly horse in the battle. “Out of him came forth the corner, out of him the nail, out of him the battle bow, out of him every oppressor together”. That corner stone is Christ, to be born in Judah’s line; He is also “the nail in the sure place,” Conqueror and Ruler. The people of whom He is born shall be as mighty men, treading down their enemies in the mire of the streets because Jehovah is with them. His promise is,—“And I will strengthen the Home of Judah, and I will save the House of Joseph, and I will bring them again to place them; for I have mercy upon them: and they shall be as though I had not cast them off: for I am the Lord their God, and will hear them. “And they of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man, and their heart shall rejoice as through wine: yea, their children shall see it, and be glad; their Heart shall rejoice in the Lord” (Zechariah 10:6-7). The world is full of Jew-baiting now; the world will be full of Jew-bidding then. God had a plan of the ages! He has not made the Jew a perpetual miracle without occasion. He has not preserved this nation intact for forty centuries for nothing. He has not scattered them among all people without a final purpose.Some writer has said, “Empires are cast away as a shadow, leaving behind them only their names. They have perished and their places know them no more.
But the Jews are still there, standing apart from all other races, as in the days of Jesus Christ, one distinct and unique family, in the midst of the confusion of all others,—rich, though a thousand times despoiled; increasing in numbers, and more united than ever, though scattered by a tempest of eighteen centuries.”The Jew is everywhere! He is all over China; he is all over India; he is in the heart of Africa; he is in the far south-land of Abyssinia; he treads the cold snows of Siberia; not a city without his colonies; and scarce a village but knows the individual. What does God mean? He tells us,—“I will hiss for them, and gather them; for I have redeemed them: and they shall increase as they have increased. “And I will sow them among the people: and they shall remember Me in far countries; and they shall live with their children, and turn again. “I will bring them again also out of the land of Egypt, and gather them out of Assyria; and I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon; and place shall not be found for them” (Zechariah 10:8-10). Zechariah beholds the day when these people, who once rejected Jesus, shall learn their mistake and shall look on Him whom they have pierced, and shall mourn because of Him. And Zechariah beholds the day when they, being saved by turning to their Messiah, shall flash forth as Evangelists of the Gospel of the Son of God. Then the world will receive ten thousand times ten thousand such men as were Peter—the Jew, John—the Jew, and Paul— the Jew, as preachers of the Gospel of the Son of God. These Evangelists will, every man of them bring up his tens from the ends of the earth to the acknowledgment of Christ the King, for they will be strengthened in Jehovah and will walk up and down in His Name. “O then that I Might live, and see the olive bear Her proper branches, which now lie Scattered each were, And without root and sap decay, Cast by the husbandman away, And sure it is not far!”