The Decree of Yahweh

I've been studying The book of Zechariah off and on for over fifty years I remember having an assignment at Moody Bible Institute to look at the prophetic passages in the book of Zechariah And I still have that paper that I wrote so many years ago So through the years, I've just had a fascination with this little book Uh Zechariah I published a book on that A few years ago I think it's my best book because it's basically about the Bible And so today we're going to be doing an introduction and overview of Zechariah Oh, how about that All right, introduction and overview of Zeachariah That sounds kind of dry. We will be dealing with the text a little bit, but for the most part, we'll be dealing with introductory issues, the authorship, the date The purpose of the book, how do we interpret the book Things that I think are essential as we move into the text. In future sermons, Um We'll be dealing with that today and to me, it's fascinating. I don't know if you'll find it fascinating, but You know,, I believe that every word of God is inspired every book of the Bible, every paragraph, every comma is inspired by God and is profitable for doctrine, reprove correction and instruction and righteousness. And I certainly believe that that's true Little book of Zechariah Now in order to keep you alert as we go through all of this technical stuff We will be having a review quiz at the end of our sermon today and there will be a prize to the best pupil So pay attention is you never know what's going to end up on the quiz All right The purpose of these u Sermmons is threefold First is to demonstrate that Zechi is not a diminutative book. That is it's not a small book.' It's not an unimportant book Sometimes we tend to relegate the minor prophets since they're the last twelve books in the Bible. they're You know, they they're tucked in after all these big gigantic books like Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel And Daniel, then we have these twelve minor profits at the end and there's a tendency to think, well, those are just kind of the leftovers This is a small potato stuff But I certainly do not believe that is true of any of the minor profits, particularly The book of Zechariah It's not small, it's small in length compared to some of the others fourteen chapters but certainly not small in importance. In fact Zechariah is one of the most important Old Testament books on the subject of Christology, the person and work of Christ, and eschatology So it's really packed with a lot of information. So it's not diminutive. the second reason for this series is to demonstrate that Zechari is not difficult to interpret. Sometimes there's a tendency among belieelievers Hopefully not in This fellowship to kind of shy away from Bible prophecy Because you know, people think it's so difficult, it's so speculative. Everybody has their own views on things and teendnds to get a little bit wild Um, But um I don't believe that Zechari is difficult to interpret If we use the right kind of methods of interpretation, what we call hermeneutics For what we called it Moody Bible Institute, Herman's New trricks So we're going to be looking at Herman's new tricks today and trying to figure out The best method of interpreting prophetic book. And if we do that, I think we'll notot shy away from it. It will be challenging. There is some symbolism in the book, particularly the night Visions of chapters one through six. But the context will help us to understand their meaning. So Zechari is not difficult to interpret. The third thing is it's not a discouraging book Again, sometimes we shy away from certain Prophetic books because there's all this judgment and death Mhem and we think, o man, I just I get enough of that on the news You know, I don't want this So we tend to be sometimes discouraged and yes, sometimes There is some information in Zecharah that has to do with Suffering and judgment, even God's people In chapter fourteen, we see some suffering there. But the overall tone and purpose of the book is encouragement And I think we all need that As I was looking at the The news real before the the startarted the service today It's like Anybody who doesn't believe that we are approaching the end times, that we're in the end times and that the tribulation is about to andh Otake the world, obbviously, I believe that Christ is going to rapture us, deliver us before that. But anyone who doesn't believe that is not really paying attention Anyone who thinks that the world is getting better and better and that Golden Age is about to be ushered in Uh You're probably smoking something that's not legal is a As Paul says, times are getting waxing Waxing worse and worse. Not better and better So if you're looking forward to the Golden Age, you need to be looking beyond the age in which we live And I could talk about that for a long time. So we are in the midst of birth pangs Jesus in the Oliveate discourse says that these are the beginnings of sorrows. And he talked about wars, rumors of wars He talked about persecution, he talked about deception. He talked about alienation On and on So we're in the midst of the birth pangs. And for any of you ladies who've experienced birth pangs, you know they don't get better until the baby is born. And then because of the joy of that, you tend to forget the birth banks I think that will be the case when Jesus comes And when he establishes his kingdom will hardly think about or remember the difficult days before that. But we are in those birth pangs and we all need encouragement. And I believe that Zechariah can give us a hearty dose of encouragement rememind us that we're not only on the right side of history, but we're also on the winning side of history If we take a long view of things, Okay In addition to that, two reasons Why Christians should be interested in Zechariah in terms of content One is because of the prophecies concerning Jesus Christ's personal ministry that were fulfilled in the New Testament. The Messianic prophecies in the book of Zechariah are second only to those in Isaiah. Now think about that. Isaiah has what? sixty six chapters. And Zechari only has fourteen And yet Zechari is comes in second When it comes to the amount of Messianic prophecies That means it's pretty dense It there's a pretty good percentage of the book of Zechariah that has to do with Messianic prophecies. Now, of course, we know that there are two categories. There are the fulfilled prophecies concerning Christ first comoming And we'll see some of those in Zechariah But second, there are prophecies concerning the end times relate to Israel The city of Jerusalem, the second coming of Christ and worship in the kingdom So we'll see all of that first. Fulfilled prophecies first comoming, unfulfilled prophecies. Second coming. A Zechariah is the longest of the minor prophets, but is also the most frequently quoted of the miner prophets in the New Testament So it must be pretty important Okay. so in the next question, now we get into Hermann's new tricks Does the book of Zechariah aid us in developing an eschatological herermeneutic or method of interpretation I'm sure most of you went to bed last night wondering about that How do we interpret Bible prophecy And can Zechari help us in developing that Eschatological, which means last things, eschatology, last the doctrine of last thingsings And the Hermeneutic means basically method of interpretation A question for those in academic circles is when we come to Bible prophecy, do we do we toss out our normal method of interpretation For example, When we look at Matthew five through seven U Jesus' serermmon on the mount We have very straightforward Teaching In regard to that, sometimes they'll use symbolism, etcetera But it's pretty straightforward So when it comes to the didactic or the teaching passages in the Bible, We're pretty secure But then when we get to the prophetic passage, it seems like there's all kinds of ideas and all kinds of theories in terms of how to interpret Bible prophecy. and it leads to entire systems of thought. I'll give you some of the main names. We'll ash those out, there's the om millenial view That is that Bible prophecy cannot be interpreted literally that it basically we're in the millennium right now It's the realized millennium and that these passassages that deal with end times really are just focused on what's going on in the world today And then there's the postmillennial view is that the church is bringing in the millennium and that the tribulation actually took place in eightD sixty eight through seventy with the seieedge of Jerusalem So what we see in the book of Revelation really is kind of an expanded version of what happened. Almost two thousand years ago So that's a different view And I could give other variations as well So When it comes to interpreting a Bible prophecy There's all kinds of views, all kinds of views And so The Zechariah help us in developing that And it relates to the question is should Bible prophecy be interpreted in a different way than the historical or Dedactic we're teaching passages And I think that the book of Zechariah gives us some help in terms of developing that kind of a hermeneutic or method of interpretation, because it has a mixture of fulfilled and unfulfilled prophecy In my view is that as we look at the fulfilled prophecies in the book of Zechariah, which we will and see how those prophecies were fulfilled, it gives us a clue as to the manner in which unfulfilled prophecies will be fulfilled as well I think maybe there's a certain logic to that So, um, Let me, uh, give some examples of how different Eschatological positions interpret The book of Zechariah And so we'll just kind of try them on for size I'm getting some help in the bag. Okay, thank you All right, this is a quote from Walter L. Wellell Who as you know is the general editor of the Eangelical Dictionary of Theology I'm sure you keep that by your bedside every night for devotions But anyway, Walter Elwell Who is a millennial in his position interpret Zechariah this way According to this outlook There will be a continuous development of good and evil in the world until the second coming of Christ Then the dead shall be raised and the judgment conducted All millennialists believe that the kingdom of God is now present in the world And the victorious Christ rules hisis church through the Word and the Spirit They feel that the future glorious and perfect kingdom refers to a new birth and a new L in heaven So to the all millennialists, which by the way was created by Augustine, Stain. Augustine in the fourth century, was never caaught, by the way, in the patristic or church father era.' not It's not the historic position of the church. but our millennialists believe that we are now in what they called a realized millennium and that Christ is ruling the world through the church Now isn't that a dismal thought I mean, I was in church ministry full time for thirty years And I'm telling you, if we really believe that Chrisist is ruling the world through the church, we're in trouble folks. Okay. But the all millennials believe that somehow Christ is ruling the world through the church The kingdom is being expressed in that way And I would say this, if we believe that we are in the millennium right now, I'd hate to live in the tribulation You know, this is this is not the millennium that is described. In the Bible, Revelation chapter twenty, twenty one, twenty two But that's the all millennial position that Christ is now ruling. The world through the church and um So that's one expression of millennialism Thank you Another millennialist, a gentleman named Martin Woodstraw says this in regard to Zechariah fourteen. which is probably my favorite chapter in my favorite book, Zecharary fourteen That's been really Things come to a climax in a good way So Woodstress says this, from the mixed character of the imagery employed Referring now to cataclysmic upheavals, now to regular pilgrimages Pilgrimages to Jerusalem. It seems to this writer that no such literal interpretation of the passage is intended. This prophecy has in view the aspects of the gospel age with particular emphasis on its conclusions. So Again, Woodstrra being a faithful am millennious. He says this Zechari fourteen really has to do with the current age. The church age and a particular emphasis on his conclusion So Zechariah refers to the church age As opposed to the tribulation, the second coming and the millennium whichich to a dumb literalist like me, it seems to be talking about the second coming tribulation and the millennium. I guess all millennials have greater insights Now we move to another famous A millennialist. Maybe you've heard of this one this gentleman, Martin Luther PhD in theology Before he got converted, he was teaching theology to Catholic. Priest Of course after He came to understand the truth of the gospel, that J to lived by faith and got gloriously converted and led the Protestant Reformation. But this is what he said about Zechariah. Here in this chapter I give up I'm not sure what the prophet is talking about. So here we have an honest m millennialist who I don't have a clue as to what this is about. See, it didn't fit in with his eschatological system He did not allow the Bible to create the system Instead, he had a system that he tried to impose upon the text And he honestly says, I don't have a clue. as to what Zechari fourteen is about I just don't have a clue So if he didn't have a clue with his background in his training, If we adopt the same system, how can we have a clue? How can we have an understanding as to what God has said Um Now let me say something about church history here Um We of course know that Martin Luther broke with the Roman Catholic Church over the issues as such as indulgences, the corruption in the Catholic church in the sixteenth century, as well as the sacramental system that corrupted the gospel So his issues primarily had to do with salvation in church life. Not eschatology. He didn't have the luxury of dealing with last things because he was dealing with The current things And you remember the thirty years war between Protestants and Catholics, a very intense time A lot of people died over the issues pertaining to the Reformation But they were not eschatological issues. They didn't have the luxury of taking a second look prophetic passages and say no, what What is the Bible teaching That was true of other reformers as well, such as John Calvin They were allmillennialous And the churches they founded, denominations that they founded such as Lutheran and Episcopal churches continue to be on millennial today because that's what their founders. believed and that's what they inherited from their background with Roman Catholicism It was not until the nineteenth century that Protestant scholars had the breathing room and the opportunity to revise their views on eschatology. People such as John Nelson Darby C. I. Schcofield, Lewis Burry Chafer And other Protestant scholars in the eighteen hundreds and the nineteen hundreds began to take a second look at Bible prophecy and began to revise their views more along literal lines. And out of that, there was a resurgent resurgence in pre millennial and eventually pre tribulational doctrine. Now those who say, well, those are just recent doctrines. No, they're biblical doctrines. They go back to the apostles and the prophets In the course of church history, sometimes doctrines get lost Just like during the Middle Ages, the doctrine of justification by faith. got lost in the midst of Roman Catholic superstition and sacramentalism That was recovered Protestant Reformation. In the same way, pre millennialism and pre tribulational doctrine was recovered in the eighteenth and nineteenth century It's not to The same as saying it was invented It was recovered in recent times. And so U So we have a renewal now I was the literal, um, understanding of Bible prophecy that has Unearthed, you might say pre millennial and pre tribulational trruth Now let me go to another one. Another position That is the predterous position Pterist, by the way, are post millennials who believe that the tribulation took place in the past. Pist means past And what was that past? The past was the siege of Jerusalem. and fall to Jerusalem at eighty sixty eight through seventy So predorists look at Tribulation events, things that are described in the book of Revelation, chapter four through nineteen or the Oliveid Dcourse, as things which happened Almost two thousand years ago In eighty sixty eight, the siege in the fall of Jerusalem. So this author, preterist author says the preredist view of Zechari is that Zechari is a symbolic assortment. prophecies describing the destruction of Jerusalem at AD seventy togetherogether with the spread of the gospel through the church age thereafter. In other words, prophecies concerning the secondcond coming of Christ have been fulfilled in the past Now we can talk a lot about Credorism or post millennialism It tends to wax or wane, depending on how things are going in the world. During the Gilded Age before World War O, there was a kind of a rise in postmillennial thought because we thought that with the scientific age that The millennium was about to burst forth The church was about to kindind of conquer the evil in the world Then after World War I, The word End all Wars, it went into decline. because we again saw the evil of men During the nineteen eighties, during the Reagan Revolution At least in the United States, we saw a resurgence of postmillennialism because we thought, o, everything is getting better, the year of the Bible and that kind of thing and A lot of post millennial conferences and books and that kind of thing. Now you don't hear too much about it because things aren't going very well in the United States or around the world. So It's a It's a theology that tends to wax or wane depending on how things are going in the world. It's not solidly rooted in scripture And I will tell you Very simply, as you look at sccripture Honestly to think that The book of Revelation four through nineteen and all of its detail. is some kind of a symbolic expression or depiction of the siege and fall of Jerusalem I don't think you're being honest with the text Now that was a terrible time and over a million Jews died Terrible time. Josephus talks about it. But you cannot those events and expand them out. into anything similar to Revelation four through nineteen or the Olivid Discourse Just my personal opinion Okay, so having talked about some of the alternative views I guess it's only R that I should talk about my view how I interpret, um Bible prophecy and the Bible in general My view is that Zechari is to be interpreted according to the literal grammatical historical method Literal means that we take the words for what they mean in their normal and plain sense Grammatical means that we follow the normal grammatical rules of interpreting. Literature this Third part of that It's historical It means that we seek with diligence to determine the historical background and context before rendering and interpretation Now let me unpack this before all of our eyes gllaze over By the way, if you're in a Bible college, you can take an entire course called Hermeneutics where you have to wade through this for an entire semester So I'm giving you a semester's worth of material in like three minutes So So u Let me first say that how we interpret Bible prophecy is very important Because about twenty seven percent of the Bible has predictive material in them. Somebody with too much time on their hands, counted eight thousand three hundred and fifty two verses that has prophetic material in it. So roughly one third of the Bible prophetic or predictive in nature and that it has material in it that that applies to the future Now much of that has been fulfilled already but is still considered prophetic. And these verses, these prophetic verses deal with seven hundred and thirty seven separate prophetic topics Can you imagine? So it's a it's a major part of sccripture Bible prophecy So let me unpack these words quickly before all of this goes to sleep Literal is defined as the sense in which the human author intended and which his words convey. In other words, the human author, though he might not have understood exactly how his prophecy would be fulfilled When he used words, he under There was a sense that he intended these words to be used and there was a meaning that he intended it to convey It was not some kind of a psychedelic vision that he himself did not Understand. And although prophecy uses more figurative language, including symbols, figures of speech, allegories and parables more than the narrative or didactic prose That is not to say that the words used are any less literal So prophecy should be taken in its natural, straightforward literal sense Now how do we know that We know that because of fulfilled prophecy How have prophecies that have already been fulfilled. been fulfilled. In what sense? let me give an example In Z Zechariah nine, verse nine, we read Saout, O daughter of Jerusalem Behold, thy king, Coming unto thee He is just in having salvation Lowly and riding upon an ass and upon a colt, the foal of an ass. What do you think Zechariah nine, verse nine is about Anybody have a clue? Whatnce out The triumphant entry Jesus came into Jerusalem On Palm Sunday, week before the resurrection Sunday on a donkey pereriod That's what it meant. There's no room for subjectivity in interpreting it. Fulfilled prophecy demonstrates that it was fulfilled literally Now does it mean that Zechariah understood all of it where he would get the donkey that he got it in Bethany The exact day that this would take place No, he didn't need to know that because he was inspired by God The point is Fulfilled prophecies are fulfilled literally and specifically, not subjectively So if that is true of fulfilled prophecy, should not we expect that unfulfilled prophecy will likewise be fulfilled literally? And definitely Not subjectively. I don't know, mayaybe I'm just stupid enough to believe it that way I don't know So That's what I mean by a literal understanding thenen grammatical, we just allow the The grammar of the text to express itself, we don't apply any special Subjective. view of that Then we have the word historical means that we seek to determine the historical background and the context by rendering an interpretation. So when we get to difficult passages like the The eight night visions of Chapter one and through six, which we'll be getting to eventually Not today. but eventually has a lot of symbolism How do we understand it? We look at the context. We look at what the author is intending. We look at his purpose And then in the context of that, We interpret what he's saying Do doesn't mean that it's easy But it is attainable So that's the u mini course on Hermeneutics, literal, grammatical, and historical is how conservative or evangelicals interpret the Bible. All of the Bible. including the prophetic sections. Now let's get back to the text. We're going to talk now about a very important decree that took place that became the springboard for everything in the book of Zechariah And that is the decree of Cyrus You may have heard of Cyrus. He was a Persian king They conquered Babylon in five hundred and thirty nine BC. and allowed the remnant of Judah to return. usherhinging in what we call the postilic period. But when was Cyrus predicted, King Cyrus? He was predicted in seventy seven hundred BC by Isaiah Isaiah forty four twenty eight, we read And That saith of Cyrus, He is my shhepherd Interesting, He is my shepherd, Pagan king He is my shhepherd and shall perform all my pleasure Even saying to Jerusalem, thou shalt be built and to the temple, thy for thy foundation shall be laid. So here Isaiah inspired by the Holy Spirit And seven hundred BC predicted that somebody named Cyrus would come along and would decree that Jerusalem would be rebuilt and that the temple's foundation would be laid. Now why is that important to the book of Isaiah? The whole historical context of Zechari is in the post exilic period. What does that mean Judah because of its sin was taken into Babylonian captivity. As Jeremiah predicted, seventy years of captivity But we also have at the same time, Isaiah's prediction that they would be delivered from captivity by this man named Cyrus So the whole historical context of Zechariah in the post exilic period is predicated on the decree of this Persian King Cyrus Whse decree enabled the remnant of Judah? You remember there were about fifty thousand that were enabled that were allowed by this decree of Cyrus to return to Judah after the Babylon in captivity, which was from six hundred six to five thirty six BC. That's seventy years. So it's predicted in seven hundred BC It was fulfilled In five thirty eight. BC That's what? approximately one hundred and forty years Okay, we're going to the fulfillment five thirty eight BC Here we go This is from Ezra chapter one verses one through three, which is also post exilic book Now in the first year of Cyrus, King of Persia The Wd of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, King of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and put it also in writing. That's key to remember, he put it also in writing. saying, Thus saith Cyrus, king of Persia The Lord God of heaven have given me all the kingdoms of the earth And he hath charged me to build H and house at Jerusalem, which is in Jah which is in Judah Who is there among You of all his people His God be with him and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah. and buildild the house of the Lord God of Israel. He is the God which is in Jerusalem E her one One through three Now Ezra by the way, was contemporary. wasZeari, He helps to fill in some of the historical features of the post exilic period So We have Ezra unpacking The fact that This Persian king would be basically l of the Lord to issue a decree which would allow the remnant. to return And it says in this quote that he wrote it down Well, it's Talk about that In the nineteenth century, can we back up one If we have one to back up Okay, well, I'm missing a slide, but I can read it to you. In the nineteenth century The archaeologist's discovery of the Cyrus cylinder confirms the historicity of the decree of Cyrus This cylinder inscribed in Babylonian cuneiform in the name of King Cyrus the Great. was found in eighteen seventy nine in present day Iraq by Mr. Hahammouud Rasam. at Babylon And it dates back to the sixth century This senator describes not only the capture of Babylon, but also Cyrus permission for the people captured by the Babylonians to return to their homelands You remember in Ezz chapter one it says that he wrote it down. Well, where did he write it down? He wrote it down in the cylinder. This is a It looks like a corn cob to me, but I think it's a little bit bigger than that And this cylinder was discovered by this u Archaeologists back in the eighteen hundreds of Babylon And apparently it has some kind of ins inscription that denotes that this was written by Cyrus Hence its name Cyrus Cylinder It's housed in the London Museum It's written in the Babylonian angu language. Let me quote a little bit from this cylinder We read from Aser and from Susa, a God. Asuna, Zomban materna der As far as the region of Gutium, I return the images of the gods. which resided there, i. e., in Babylon, to their places I gathered all their inhabitants and returned to them their dwellings. I underline that because that's key to this So here in the Cyrus cylinder, we have the written historical record that Cyrus returned the inhabitants, those had been taken captive in Babylon to their original lands He released them from their captivity Now Judah is not specifically mentioned in this cylinder, but it is implied in that there was a general dispersion of all who'd been taken captive in Babylon. So here we have a written record uncovered in these last days that indeed Cyrus the Great recorded the fact that he allowed the dispersion of Jews back to Judah after he captured Babylon I think that's very veryer significant Again, as we move forward in time and archaeology moves forward, we uncover and corroborate that which the Bible has stated Now let's move on to the author. of Zechariah He was multi talented. He was a young man when he wrote began writing Zechariah He was not only a prophet, but he was a priest He was born in Babylon, of course, during the sevententy year Captivity and was among those who returned to Judah in five hundred thirty eight and five nine five thirty seven BC The first wave of those returning The prophet's name itself has theological signignificance. It means Yahweh Rembers. Yahweh remembers Now in the context of the book of Zechari, it denotes that Yahweh remembers his covenant promises. to Israel, H he acts to fulfill them. So what a perfect name for a prophet to, um unpacked how Yahweh has remembered his covenant, promises to Israel, and he's acting to fulfill them in this post exilic. Period Now Zechari was not the only prophet at this time. He had a contemporary named Hagi Hagy I also has a book in the mininor prophets He continued his ministry long after Hagy eye He's Zechariah is referred to as a young man in Zechariah two verse four So it's possible that Zechari continued his ministry into the reign of our Xerkses and four hundred and sixty five BC So we have in Zechariah Yahweh remembers, we have God's promised deliverance from Babylonian captivity leading to a functioning temple. a spiritually restored peopleople This portends an even grander fulfillment of prophecies of salvation and restoration that would come through the Messiah So we have in Zechariah not only a prophet, we know he's a prophet. we have his book but also a priest Now that takes us to the divine offices. I'm sure all of you know that, but just by way of review, there were prophets, priests and kings in the Old Testament in God's economy to hisis people. prophets, the Hebrew word Nebaim Prophets would speak for God to the people That's what Zechariah is doing. Then they were priests, Kohanim They speak to God for the people. They represent Uh The people before God and they intercede for the people. Then we have the kings, the Melachim They stand before the people ideally as God's representatives and before God accountable. Now We we know the disciine dismal history of kings in Israel's history We won't go into great detail, but of course, we know after the divided kingdom, place we have Israel, the ten Northern tribes, and how many good kings did they have? Can anybody name? numberum of the good kings Do we have an example? No, there were' not. Not a single one Of Israel's kings were good kings in the Northern kingdom Then we have the Southern kingdom of Judah, two tribes. They were mostly bad By my count, there were like eight good kings in a period of three hundred years. So out of forty Kings and both northern and southern Israel. there were aboutbout eight twenty percent O their leaders were good K like Congress Okay. kindind of like Congress. anyyway We'll get off of that All right, so we have prophets, priests and kings, and of course Zechariah was a prophet and a priest. Now the date of the writing began with the resumption of the building of Zerubel's temple and five hundred twenty BC. Now I said the resumption The building was actually begun in five hundred thirty six BC Sortly after the first wave of immmigrants came back into Judah But because of external opposition, they halted the construction. whichich of course, was a problem for Zechariah and Hagi. They prompted the people to resume construction But for about sixteen years between five thirty six and five twenty After the foundation was laid, they stopped work They resumed work in five twenty BC And the work was completed in five nineteen BC and the building dedicated in five sixteen So we have u Zechari's work began in writing hadad to do with the resumption of the building, five hundred twenty Then the beginning of Zechariah's preaching which also took place in five hundred and twenty BC. Then we have Zechariiz eight. Night visions Eight visions in one night. It was a long night He didn't sleep much recorded in Zecharat One through six followed by Joshua's crowning as Judahas highigh priest in Zechariah chapter six as well. So five hundred twenty and five nineteen BC, there was a lot of activity And a lot of u Witing Then we have the urging of repentance, the promise of blessing from Zechariah eight and nine whichich was in five hundred and eighteen BC The dedication of the temple In five sixteen, BC, by the way, it was known as Z Rubel's Temple. Because he was the first governor of Judah and served in my opinion as the the general contractor for this temple. so it was known from that time forward as Zubel's temple until a man named Herod in the first century BC made some embellishments. And that became known at that point as Herod's temple. That was the temple of Jesus Day But it began as a kind of a humble temple compared to Solomon's and it was known as Zurubabel's temple. Then we have Zechari's final prophecy In chapters nine through fourteen. which is about four eighty BC So Zechariah had a long and fruitful ministry, at least forty years from five twenty BC until around four eighty BC. Now let's talk about the structure of the book. Chapter one, one through six is the intntroduction and the call to repentance Then we have the eight night visions The balance of chapter one through chapter six, verse eight. Then the symbolic crowning of Joshua as the highigh priest Chap seven and eight, questions about fasting We don't talk about that at church Then we have chapters nine through fourteen, which are the two prophetic oracles, chapters nine through eleven is the first of those. And then chapters twelve through fourteen. Now this last section, chapters nine through fourteen is where we have the bulk of Messianic prophecy both first comoming and second coming prophecy. So we'll be spending a lot of time in chapters nine through fourteen Now the theme of the book The central theme of Zechari is encouragement Remember I said that Zechi is not a discouraging book. It's an encouraging book primarily Zechariiz task was to encourage the completion of the rebuilding of the temple which he did And then various means are used to accomplish this end and these function as sub themes. For example, great stress is laid on the coming of the Messiah and his overthrow of all the anti kingdom forces so that Christ's millennial kingdom can finally and fully be established on the Eth. So Zechari' prophecies were near term and long term The near term, let's get this temple done. let's restore the temple worship. Let's get our lives straightened out. to become the people that God wants And if you do that in the long run Jesus, God will send His Messiah and establish his millennial kingdom So the purpose of the book is to encourage saints of all ages including ours of Christ's eventual victory over all the forces of darkness that are arred against us So it's not just a book to be gathering dust. It's applicable today. In fact, it's probably even more applicable today. as the day in which he was written because some of these things are happening around us or the shadows of those things are happening around this. Okay, now I promised a quiz We have a little bit of time. So here's how it's going to work Okay, I'm going to read the question and then I'm going to go through the answers. Now if you think the first answer is correct, you just raise your hand There'll be no embarrassment Okay, just raise your hand And then After I do that, I'll tell you what the correct answer is and then we go to the next one. Keep track of your answers And there will be a special prize for the one who gets the most answers right Okay, prettyre simple There's only four questions. When was the decree of Cyrus prophesied Prophesied seven fifty BC seven hundred Oh, seven fifty BC. how many Seven fifty. Okay. All right I feel like an auction here seeven hundred BC. How many think? seven hundred BC. Okay? six hundred fifty BC six hundred BC The correct answer seven hundred BC. How many got that right? Okay, we have a few. All right We got it astute class here Very attentive. All right, the next question When was the decree of Cyrus pronounced prronounced six hundred six BC. Any takers fiveive eighty six BC Okay, five hundred eighty six BC Five, three, eight, BC or five sixteen BC The correct answer is five hundred and thirty eight BC That's when Cyrus made the decree And the Jews started heading back to Judah, five thirty eight BC. All right, they get harder No they don't. They get easier. All right, what does the name Zechariah mean? Yahweh cares Yahweh remembers Yahweh loves Yahweh delivers I think we all got that, right? Yahweh remembers Okay. And then our last Our final question What is the second temple called in the sixth century Ezraith's temple Cyrus' temple. Herod's temple Zarubel's temple I think we all got that one, right? Zer Reubel's temple Okay, now How many of you got all of them right Okay. I knew that there would be many All right. How many So I'm going to have to distinguish because I don't have enough to give to everybody. What I'm going to do is I'm going to give this to the youngest person in our congregation They got them all right Do we have any like People under twenty They got them all right. I see I see a hand over here Okay And how old are you, young man Eleven was Look Sorry, you have to forfeit it. You're eleven Anybody here that got him all right that is younger than eleven Okay, young man, you can come on up. So you get a copy of the book And I have a DVD inside of it that has all the Messianic prophecy since Zechariah. All right, give him another hand Okay, we're not done. I have one more slide. We talked about the decree of Cyrus Very important decree, but there's an even more important decree that we find in the book of Zechariah, and I call it the decree of Yahweh. And it's right in the introduction to the book, and it's very important as a foundation for what we'll be studying The decree of Yahweh Therefore, this is what God says to Zechariah Therefore say unto them, Thus sayith the Lord of hosts Turn ye unto me, saith the Lord of hosts And I will turn unto you, saith the Lord of hosts Everything that would follow is based upon this Deree He's basically saying to these people in Judah who's just gone through seventy years of captivity Well deserved captivity because of their sin, their rebellion. They They were following idols. They weren't respecting the Sabbath year rest for the land. so they were taken out of the land for seventy years Because for four hundred and ninety years, they didn't give the land rest So God took him out for seventy years They were idolatrous, rebellious people. God warned them over and over again through Isaiah, through Jeremiah. that if you don't stop, I'm going to send the cruel Babylonians and they're going to take you out of the land for seventy years and you'll experience All kinds of deprivation temple was destroyed. Solomon's temple was destroyed. It It was ransacked. So after seventy years, he says, okay, I'm giving you another chance. And these are the terms You turn into me, I'll turn into you. You turn against me? I'll turn against you It's the timeless command of repentance It's not just to the Jews It's always God's terms. Jesus said, I tell you nay, but accept you repent You shall also likewise perish. That's one of the terms of the gospel You have to repent. You have to turn from sin and turn to me If you do that God says, I'll turn to you. I'll be merciful to you The first move is yours. Turn to me and I will turn to you. That's the decree of Yahweh And that's the decree of Yahweh today The gospel includes repentance except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. Turn to me and I will turn to you And so that that's the foundation for this book. I think it's going to be a practical book And I think this is a reminder for us Latter day saints, not in the Mormon sense But in the biblical sense that we have to turn to Christ We're not going to make it through this any other way is my friend L.A. Marzuli says, there's no way out but up We're not going to turn this thing around No matter how hard we try and we should. We should be faithful witnesses We should occupy until Jesus comes We're not going to turn it around. There's no way out but up. And there's no way to get through withithout turning to him, turning to God, turning to Christ So let's pray Lord, we thank you for this book of Zechariah What a wonderful book that you have inspired and preserved all these many years, twenty five hundred years now. And Lord, there's a message here for each one of us A message of encouragement, a message of assurance you have you know the end from the beginning. Everything is laid out in your divine plan And we just need to trust you and follow you every step of the way I thank you for this congregation for each one Lord, they love you, they love your word. they desire to know your words so that they might live in Uh Have a light in dark places And we are truly in a dark place We are in the birth pangs of the second Coming And so Lord, we need as much light as we possibly can And so Lord, help us to continue to be seekers of you Seekers after your truth confident that your Wd is truth and light So we thank you for your presence with us. We thank you for your Holy Spirit's teaching Guide us throughout this day. We pray for Pastor Matt that youd give him greatreat vacation, may he return refresh to continue to serve you and serve the body of Christ here We pray this in Jesus' name Amen