10.2 Zechariah 12-14

Franco Vosloo

10.2.2020

Zechariah 12-14

Summarize what you read in one paragraph:

The book of Zechariah ends with these chapters of prophecy. SO MUCH prophecy! Both for the immediate context of the people at the time and for all future generations as we see some of the most amazing prophecies about Jesus as the messiah highlighted in these chapters. 

What is one key verse?

Zechariah 13:9

“…I will put into the fire; I will refine them like silver and test them like gold. They will call on my name and I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are my people,’ and they will say, ‘The LORD is our God.’”

How does what you read change your vision of God?

Chapter 12 starts out with a prophecy wherein God is described as the One who “stretches out the heavens” and “lays the foundation of the earth”. And in the same breath is also described as having formed the human spirit within a person. God wants us to know these things about Him, before He even gets into the prophecy for His people: His greatness in orchestrating the macro on a huge scale beyond our scope of ability to understand AND the micro – that He created each individual human spirit within each person; that He is both great in His greatness and nearer to us than we are to ourselves. And I do really think that last part is true of us: God is nearer to us than we are ourselves. My heart is convicted to be more aware of my own spirit -because honestly most of the time we are caught up in what’s going on with other people’s spirits rather than focusing on our own, and I know I’m guilty of this. Whether in making hasty judgments about people, protecting my pride at the detriment of someone else’s or thinking less of others and elevating myself in my own eyes – it’s very easy to lose clarity of how my own spirit is doing when I fool myself into thinking I’m in a position to evaluate someone else’s human spirit in this fallen world. 

I’m not in that position, but God is. As I read through the rest of these chapters, I see how God works personally on behalf of His people, whose hearts (human spirit) are known by Him. He does not want US to seek revenge – that’s reserved for Him, He will repay evil with just judgment.  

Just take a look at this, how the wording of this scripture portrays the personal way in which God is at work on behalf of His people, to save His people who love Him and are called according to His name:

“I will strike every horse with panic…I will keep a watchful eye over Judah….The LORD will save…The LORD will shield…I will set out to destroy…And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him…On that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and impurity…on that day living water will flow out from Jerusalem…The LORD will be king over the whole earth. On that day there will be one LORD and his name the only name”

As I read this, I think about my pride being set aside to die and that it feels very much like me being thrown in the fire – that all of the (WRONG!) opinions floating around in the world that seem to be frenzied up into overdrive mode are just poised and ready for me to respond, fix and correct – but instead me being the fix for the world, I am commanded to step aside and allow God’s supremacy, that He will set all things right. That He is the fix. And it cost Him everything – that God gave His only Son, which my (and your) sin pierced on the cross and He became for us Living Water and the only Way to receive the grace of God. 

And our role, now, is to receive. And our role right now, for as long as there is breath in our lungs, is to be refined by the fires that God places us in (ie burn that pride away). The fires being the trials of life (which in 2020 has been literal fires among other things). So that we come to the end of ourselves and, having nothing left, call on His name. When we call, He answers. Every time. This is what it means to be the people of God, who are intimately known by Him, even down to our individual spirits in each individual person.