Zechariah 4: By My Spirit

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Intro:

Today we are turning to Chapter 4 and the second of the two central visions that make up the night visions of Zechariah. In our last time together we saw the High Priest, Joshua provided with clean garments and made ready to again bring the blood of the sacrifice on the Day of Atonement into the Holy of Holies and make atonement for the people bringing a return to the ceremonial cleanliness that had not been available to them from the day that the 1st temple had been destroyed.
We also saw that this return of a holy priesthood was to signify that there was also coming with it a return to the promises of hope offered through the Davidic line and the covenant of a perpetual kingship that had been made with David. We saw that this reestablished priesthood in its entirety, Joshua and his friends, ie the 24 heads of the priestly households, served as a sign or a pledge that the servant of the Lord, the Branch would come and in one day remove the iniquity of the people and restore to Israel the blessing and prosperity that belong to the people of God as their inheritance in Him.
Well now in chapter 4 we are going to turn to the other half of the symbolic coin. We are going to focus in now on Zerubbable, the descendant of David who has providentially come to be a governor of the people that they might be reminded that God’s purposes in establishing His covenant with the line of David had not dried up.
Zerubbable is an interesting figure because there is a weight of promise laid on him that his historic record doesn't seem to bear up. We need to keep this in mind at the start of the message today because it clearly points us to where we are going to wind up at the end.
I believe that he was raised up by God in this moment in time to remind God’s people, as we will see today, that all of His covenants still stand. however, God did not intend to , in this post exilic period, bring a return to the Davidic monarchy as it had existed in the days before the exile. No, God intended the people to be looking for more that that, however His chose to bring this man to leadership in Israel for this time that they might be reminded that these promises that had been given still held sway and that they were to be accomplished through a member of Davids line and ultimately that when they see this child born in Bethlehem from this line of promise that something might click in their minds as it did for Simeon and Anna and they they might realize that now at last their King had come.
God’s promises to Zerubbable didn't fail, rather they were fulfilled when at long last THE heir to Davids throne was born.
Now as far as the central message of this text goes it is to be found in verse 6, the word of the Lord of Armies to Zerubbable, a passage much loved by many Christians:

6 Then he said to me, “This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts.

“Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord of Armies”
We will see that this is the central message of this passage but I hope that we will also learn better how we ought to understand and apply this text and it is a way that I don't think many Christians are prone to see and understand because we have not learned how to read and understand these typological images and figures that we find in the OT.
Now though we need to take a moment to do a survey of the imagery and symbols that we find here in this vision before we will be able to rightly understand and apply the messages that they symbols are meant to convey.

2 Primary Symbols

In this text we see two primary symbols. We see a lamp and we see two olive trees.
The first of these is the lamp and it is an interesting lamp:

And the angel who talked with me came again and woke me, like a man who is awakened out of his sleep. 2 And he said to me, “What do you see?” I said, “I see, and behold, a lampstand all of gold, with a bowl on the top of it, and seven lamps on it, with seven lips on each of the lamps that are on the top of it.

The lamp is reminiscent of the lamp from the temple. Just as we were drawn into the temple via the Day of Atonement and the priesthood in chapter 3 so here the imagery is also meant to draw us to the Temple.
Now the lamp is interesting. We ought not picture a menorah, the seven branched light of Hanukkah as we read about this lamp, rather we ought to picture something more akin to what is on the screen here. A large bowl atop a pillar of gold and branching off of this bow are seven lamp nodes and on each of these lamp nodes we find 7 lips which are where the wicks would have been laid.
Now it is almost certain that as we consider this imagery that the lampstand is representative of the people of God. This is nearly always the meaning we have in scripture when we find the image of a lamp, the lamp signifies the people’s purpose in shining forth the glory of God. Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:14-16
Matthew 5:14–16 ESV
“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
And notably in Revelation 1 we find that each of the 7 churches is represented in the heavenly vision as a lampstand.
Now, as we noted this is an interesting lamp because it actually has 7 lamps and seven wicks per lamp all fed by this main large reservoir of oil. Numbers as we have learned from Jake are very often important, especially in this type of literature and so what we see here is seven multiplied by 7, 7 X 7. Seven is as we have seen else ware the number of divine perfection and so we see here a symbolized multiplication of the pure and perfect witness of God’s people to God’s glory.
We also see two olive trees. Now there were not trees growing there in the temple beside the lamp but the vision that Zechariah sees is not intended to show them how to build the temple but rather the realities at play in this Temple building task, and so we see that there are growing beside this lamp two olive trees and then later in the vision we see that these trees have branches or clusters full of olives.

And there are two olive trees by it, one on the right of the bowl and the other on its left.”

verse 11:

11 Then I said to him, “What are these two olive trees on the right and the left of the lampstand?” 12 And a second time I answered and said to him, “What are these two branches of the olive trees, which are beside the two golden pipes from which the golden oil is poured out?”

The translation work is difficult here as I understand from the commentators but likely what we see here are two trees that unlike typical olive trees on which produce olives kind of like apples this olive tree has giant clusters of olives like grapes that are in turn feeding this large bowl of oil to which the lamps are connected.
Now there is no agreement amongst commentators but I will make the case that these trees represent our two key figures from these visions, Joshua and Zerubbable and their offices as Priest and King. We will get there in a moment though.

The Message

Now we need to turn to the message of the visions.
In short the message is that God is going to work through Zerubbable to bring to completion the work of the Temple. We also see how that work is to be accomplished and what the results of that accomplished work will be.
So lets take a look at the message.
We cant tell exactly how much of this vision makes sense to Zechariah. The images are certainly ones with which he would have been familiar and so as he asks the questions that we read we shouldn't assume that he doesn't understand any of it but rather that he is seeking to understand what the images mean in relation to the vision and the message that he is to proclaim to the people. And so the Lord answers his first round of questions with the central message of the vision:

4 And I said to the angel who talked with me, “What are these, my lord?” 5 Then the angel who talked with me answered and said to me, “Do you not know what these are?” I said, “No, my lord.” 6 Then he said to me, “This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts. 7 Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of ‘Grace, grace to it!’ ”

Firstly we see that the vision in part for Zerubbable as the leader of the people.

Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts.

The work that Zerubbable has been tasked with is not going to be completed by might or power, rather it is through the working of the Spirit that it will be accomplished!.
Ezra 5 and 6 likely give us the backdrop for this promise. and the description of its outworking in the next verses. The people are being opposed and they have written a letter to king Darius to try and frustrate the work and make them stop. Darius is not the king who had originally gave them permission to build, he is a different king and is not even a direct successor of Cyrus. He has no need then to uphold any past edicts. However we find in these chapters that he searches the records and finds that Cyrus had indeed commissioned the work and declares that it is to be completed and not just that but that these governors who are in opposition are to provide the needed resources and funds for its completion.
Ezra 6:13–15 ESV
Then, according to the word sent by Darius the king, Tattenai, the governor of the province Beyond the River, Shethar-bozenai, and their associates did with all diligence what Darius the king had ordered. And the elders of the Jews built and prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. They finished their building by decree of the God of Israel and by decree of Cyrus and Darius and Artaxerxes king of Persia; and this house was finished on the third day of the month of Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of Darius the king.
The people of Israel did not prosper in this building through might or power, indeed they had none, rather they simply trusted in God and through the working of His Spirit in the hearts of even wicked rulers the work as brought to completion.
This is the meaning of:

Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of ‘Grace, grace to it!’ ”

The great mountain is the opposition by these nations and peoples more powerful than Israel and rulers more powerful than Zerubbable and yet they are laid flat and the purposes of God succeed. The final stone is laid and the Temple is completed amidst the God glorifying shouts of praise from His people.
This is a very victorious passage!
We see this message doubly reinforced in the following verses as well:

Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 9 “The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house; his hands shall also complete it. Then you will know that the LORD of hosts has sent me to you. 10 For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice, and shall see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel.

Zerubbable we read has started the house and he will complete it. Verse 10 is interesting and Ill just note in passing that this reference to the plumbline is likely not the intent of the original reading. The language does speak of a rock and there is a history of seeing it as the rock at the end of a line but the specific language doesn't really speak to that type of a rock. Rather we ought to take this as some rock that would have marked the completion of the temple. It could be a capstone on the top, it could be a keystone above a door, or it could even as we saw briefly last time represent the foundation stone that was placed in the Holy of Holies in lieu of the Ark of the Covenant. In any rate when this stone is set by Zerubbable (doesn't even have to be him who physically lays it, as the leader of the people it is through his efforts that it is laid even if by another craftsman) when this stone is set the work is finished and it will be Zerubbable that does this.
We also see in here another familiar line:

For whoever has despised the day of small things

This verse is pregnant with meaning and could be a message all to itself and we will come back to in in application in a bit if we have time but this is referencing the attitude we saw exhibited by the people when they saw the fledgling efforts to rebuild and realized that what was taking shape would be nothing like the Temple that Solomon had built.
More than that, you'll remember that the last vision had included a call to return to Jerusalem to the people who had remained in Babylon. These people had likely heard of the meager conditions present in the promised land and despised that in light of the relative prosperity that they had found in exile. They saw the small beginnings of the work of reentering the land and chose not to move at all.
Now again we will come back to this because there is some amazing application in this for us today for sure.
However we need to see how it is that verses 11-14 inform this central message. There Zechariah continues to ask about the trees and more specifically why they have these clusters of olives when that was not how an olive tree typically grew.

11 Then I said to him, “What are these two olive trees on the right and the left of the lampstand?” 12 And a second time I answered and said to him, “What are these two branches of the olive trees, which are beside the two golden pipes from which the golden oil is poured out?” 13 He said to me, “Do you not know what these are?” I said, “No, my lord.” 14 Then he said, “These are the two anointed ones who stand by the Lord of the whole earth.”

So we see here that Zechariah again presses for an understanding of the two trees likely because they didn't look like an olive tree typically would. Now we have already said that I believe these trees are representative of the two figures who feature prominently in these central visions. Joshua and Zerubbable and their offices of priest and king. I think that they are figured more like grape vines here because God intends for Zechariah to see abundance, clusters of olives pouring forth oil abundantly for the lamps in the center of the vision.
As God restores these two men and their offices we are to understand that as a result of a rightly functioning governmental leadership and spiritual leadership these people are to prosper and their light and glory is to burn before the world to a magnitude of 7 times 7, abundantly in perfection. This is the reason for the clusters of olives rather than the typical solitary fruit. God’s anointed ones when they are acting in holiness will bring blessing and abundance to the people of God and God’s glory will shine forth from his covenant people as they gather to worship Him rightly in His holy temple!
This is the meaning of the vision, and it ought to have been of great encouragement to the people and we understand that it must have been because as we read in Ezra 6:

14 And the elders of the Jews built and prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. They finished their building by decree of the God of Israel and by decree of Cyrus and Darius and Artaxerxes king of Persia; 15 and this house was finished on the third day of the month of Adar, in the sixth year of the reign of Darius the king.

Christ

Now though we need to take these things and draw them forward and see how it is that this man and his divinely directed mission provides us such a wonderful typological picture of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Firstly we need to turn back to the admonition:

Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD

We tend to grab those verse and apply it direcly tous but it is really important that we see the wonderful way that it applies first and foremost to Christ.
It is truly amazing to see that when Christ came into the world as the God man that He came and did just this, He still, all throughout His ministry and still now as He completes his work in the world does so through the power of the Spirit.
We read in Mathew 3 about his baptism:

And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17

Describing his ministry to the people at the Synagogue in Nazareth in Matthew 4 Jesus read from the prophet Isaiah:

18  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

because he has anointed me

to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives

and recovering of sight to the blind,

to set at liberty those who are oppressed,

19  to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

20 And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

In Romans 1 we read that He was:

was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,

and then as the Apostle Paul describes the work of Christ now in the letter to the Ephesians to do just as Zerubbable had done and build the Temple of God he tells us:

In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Just as Zerubbable had been called to rely on the power of the Spirit to complete the building of the Temple so also when Christ came, though He is co-eternal as the Son of God in the triunity of God, He chose, that these types and shadows might be fulfilled in Him that it would be through the Spirit that He would fulfill His ministry here in this world and it is through the Spirit still today that He is working currently to build us up together into the Living Temple of God!
When we see this we can then turn to ourselves and apply this to our lives and understand that as Christ is the builder of this thing we ought not apply a tool in the work that He has not chosen for this purpose and the only tools that we ought to be using are the tools that are provided to us through the work of the Spirit! This ought to bring a substantial amount of clarity to both our efforts to evangelize the lost and to be united together and built up as the church of God. In a day when personal preference and pragmatism rule the day in the selection of strategies for witness and church grown we are called to return to the foundations of the Spiritual means provided for this work for us in the pages of God’s word. We must be ever careful not to go beyond this, not to seek to become more creative in these endeavors than God’s word gives us license for and we must above all else trust in the power of the means that He has supplied.
We must also be careful that we do not place our hopes in the means of gaining more political power and influence as the meas by which we seek to see God’s glory shine throughout our lands.
When we trust in the Spirit we will find that the mountains of opposition that face us will be made a plane and we will find that if we persist in the work we will be granted the glory and privilege of taking part in the joyous celebrations upon its completion. This is Christ; work, the work of the King and He accomplishes it through the Spirit!

Two trees made one

The next thing that we need to see is just how the two olive trees speak into all of this. We understand that the blessings for Israel were only realized when the priesthood and the throne of David were each working as they ought, and were able to be described as “anointed ones standing by the Lord of the whole earth.” We know that there were plenty of times when this was not he case and Israel failed in those times to shine as they should. We also see in the early days of Solomon and the latter part of David’s reign a time when this was the case and Israel truly stood for a time as a CITY on a hill.
Now there are postmillennialists that take this to mean that for the church to have its full effect and to shine its light across the world so that the Glory of the Lord fills the earth as the waters cover the sea which, is a great parallel imagery to the 7x brightness of the lamp, that for this to happen both the church and the state must bow the knee to Christ as Lord of all. That only when these two entities have been fully Christianized will these promises be realized.
However, this is a failure to understand how it is that this imagery is brought to the full in Christ. We understand that Christ has come both as the great High Priest of Vision 4 and also now as the Ruler of Vision 5. There is no need for the governments of the earth to bend the knee to Christ to make way for the fulfilment of these things because though they rebel against Him with all their might Christ has been installed above all rule and authority and reigns even now on the throne of God in heaven!
Now I am not saying that we shouldn't desire to see the governments of the world, our government, be guided and submit to God’s law and declare that Jesus Christ is Lord. That would be an immensely wonderful thing. I am saying that it is a mistake however to not understand that because Christ has united in Himself these two trees of Zechariah 4 and as Christ is fully able to execute these offices with perfection that even now the Spirit pours forth into our lamps that the central joy of this vision might be realized, that through right worship God would be gloried and His glory burn brightly across the land!

Small things

As we close I want to talk briefly about the despising of small things. I think that this attitude is all to common in the church today. We tend to look for the big thing the massive movement of God, the suddenly changed life apart from the hard day to day wrestling with sanctification. We tend to miss the many small ways that God comes to us and works in our lives to accomplish his purposes. So many people come towards faith but then fall away because they haven't seen the massive blessings that they thought would be theirs when they joined a church.
When Israel came back to the land God moved in many small ways to begin the rebuilding process. Remember a few weeks ago we made the point that we don't often consider the time frame in which God thinks and moves and therefore we miss the many small but utterly significant ways that He is moving to accomplish His purposes in the world.
Worship itself and the gathering of the people of God to worship Him as He has directed us to is a small thing and yet it is one of the most massive parts of the redemptive plan of God to spread His glory across the whole earth. These two prophets Haggai and Zechariah have pointed us toward this reality.
Don’t be like the people of Zechariahs day, don't despise the small every day ordinary movements of God in your life, don't miss their beauty because you are only looking and longing for the big things.
What hit me most as I thought about this was that the primary way we despise the small things is to just not do them! Its not despise as in scrunching our faces and turning our noses up at them and looking with distain, no to despise the small things is to just not seek to do them at all!
We must not skimp on the pursuit of regular, every day ordinary faithfulness in reading His word, seeking Him in prayer, showing love and hospitality to others, especially those of the household of faith, gathering regularly to worship with other believers even in those times when it is hard and not the most convenient or comfortable thing to do. Pursue these every day ordinary means of grace and do not despise them because it is through these that God will indeed, just as sure as Christ is seated on His throne, that God will accomplish the end of these things and bring about the perfection and completion of His people built together into this radiant living temple full of glory, this beautiful bride adorned for her husband, God will do this amidst the shouts of Grace, grace to it from His people.
Ill give Hudson Taylor who we learned about on Thursday night a few weeks ago, the founder of the China Inland Mission and a man whos life was characterized by an immense faithfulness and trust in the pursuit of these small things. He said:
“A little thing is a little thing,” he said, “but faithfulness in a little thing is a big thing!”
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