Zechariah 9: Behold Your King is Coming

Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented
0 ratings
· 3 views
Notes
Transcript

Intro:

Well, today we start into the back half of the book of Zechariah, I am not sure how long it will take us to get through these last chapters but it may not be as long as it seems. There is some difficult content here for sure and we will have to spend some time puzzling things out but there is one clear factor that will be the decisive driver of how it is that we approach this text and I think we will find that, similar to the Book of Revelation, when we have a clear idea of the overall purpose or intent of the book, why it is that God chose to reveal these things, His purpose for the text, then we will find that even in the difficult texts we have basic driving assumptions that will make it a bit easier to puzzle through what specifically is being communicated.
John’s Apocalypse, for example, became so much more clear to me when I came to the realization that it was primarily about the movement in redemptive history from the people of God located in Israel, worshiping in the Temple, governed by the Old Covenant, and anticipating the coming of the Messiah to the people of God universal spreading out across the nations in every tribe and tongue and language, being built up themselves into the Temple, the dwelling pace of God among man where He is worshiped rightly and living under the inaugurated rule of the now enthroned Messiah. The transition from the old covenant that was passing away and the arrival of the long anticipated new covenant that will result in the making new of all things at the second coming of our Lord. God’s decisive dealing with faithless Israel and His revealing once and for all time the true Israel of God. There are still difficult things but seeing that overall story arch helps to make puzzling those difficult things out somewhat easier and makes lots of things that at one time seemed difficult make a whole lot more sense.
The same is true for these last chapters of Zechariah. When we understand what the overarching message is that is purposing this revelation to the prophet we have a much better starting point for seeking to understand the difficult texts we will find here.
Now, just in case you are new or we haven't made it entirely clear yet, the purpose of the book of Zechariah is to stand as a marque sign pointing directly to the coming messiah the coming of the One who would bring to fulfilment all of the promises made to God’s people throughout the entirety of the Old Testament. He is coming Zechariah says, get ready for Him, live in anticipation of what it is that God has promised He will do and what that is going to mean both for the children of Israel and for the world! The Exile is over and God’s promises still stand and they are on the way!
Now one of the most sure signs that this is the case is that Zechariah is one of the most widely referenced prophets in the Gospels! From this chapter and its kingly donkey ride to the 30 pieces of silver to the piercing of the Savior and others, there is an undeniable connection between this prophet and the Gospel writers as they clearly intended for the people of Israel to see Christ as the One to whom Zechariah had directed their gaze.

Structure

Now before we read this chapter again here I want to note that we can divide it up into three sections as pointed out by commentator Anthony Petterson.
In verses 1-8 we see the restored land or kingdom of Israel.
Then in verses 9-10 or 13 depending on how you ant to draw the line we see the restored king of Israel and finally in verses 11 or 14 to 17 we see the restored people of God. A restored land, a restored King, and a restored people. These are the promises held out to us in this chapter and they will all drive us forward to that One who would bring about the accomplishment of all these things.
Lets read the text through again and then we will take a closer look at these three promised aspects of the Messiah’s coming kingdom.
READ

Restored Land

In this first section from 1-8 we see a lot of places and names but the overall thrust of the text is relatively easy to ascertain when you see the flow and extent of the places as pictured on a map.
In essence what we see here is a picture, first of all, of the restoration of the Davidic extent of the kingdom. We start in the far north with the Land of Hadrach and Damascus this had been the northern extent of the reach of Davids dominion. We read in 2 Samuel 8 verse 6 that David had places garrisons in Damascus. Damascus had been the capital of the Aremean or Syrian kingdom and David’s military forays had brought them for a time into submission to the kingdom of Israel thus David's placing of garrisons there.
Thus this conquest and recovery of the Kingdom that had been David’s at the height of His power and the majesty of Isreal begins there in the north and then sweeps down through well known places like Tyre and Sidon and the strongholds of the Philistines.
Now many people have tried to fit the places named here into the history of post exilic conquests in the region by various groups including the Greeks under Alexander the Great and there is a good chance that the conquest of Tyre by the Greeks is foreshadowed here in these verses. However, it is nearly impossible to line everything thing here up neatly with those military campaigns and it is also important to note that at this point in history the places named here didn't really pose any direct threat to the people of Israel as they had done in the past.
Because of this is is better to understand that what is really happening here is a picturing of a return or restoration of the Kingdom of Israel to the highest of the heights of majesty and power that it had experienced. In other words what is coming will be able to be likened to the days of David and the dominion that God had granted him over the nation states that surrounded them.
This is why we said that the central promise of this section is that of a restored land.
Now we see that this restoration will involve the judgement of the nations for their reliance on worldly wisdom and material might and possessions as well as their rampant idolatry. The expansion of the Kingdom of God always involves the judgement of idolatrous nations.
However, we also see that as this Kingdom expands that those nations that are being judged will also find that some of their members are being accounted as a remnant for God. (v7)
We see that the Philistines, Israel’s enemies, enemies especially important in the day of David, will be included and also the Jebusites who had been the inhabitants of Jerusalem when David conquered it but who had obviously not been utterly destroyed because we read of them later on in the life of David. These people had assimilated into the people of God and so now in this coming Kingdom there will be enemies of God’s people that will be manifest as a remnant of people that God chooses to join to Himself and give a place amongst His chosen people. They shall be like a clan in Judah!
This is a well known theme in the messianic promises and one that we have seen already in Zechariah, that God will accomplish a work that enables His enemies and the enemies of His people to become one with His people even to the point of being called His own people. As we consider the transition from the Old Testament and its promises it is imperative that we see that this is one of the primary features that shows us that there is no pause or failure of the Kingdom to come after Christ ascended to the Father, indeed the very thing that took place, the sending of the Gospel out among the gentiles and the making of enemies into beloved sons and daughters through the grace of God and the blood of Christ is the very promise that is held front and center in the messianic hopes!
Now we need to understand that this promise of restoration does not mean that the Kingdom of the Messiah is going to have the same geographical dimensions as the Davidic kingdom at its height! No, this imagery is drawn upon by the prophet to express a reality of the coming kingdom in a picture that these people could understand and to underscore that this Kingdom with be the extension and fulfilment of that which had begun and been promised under David. It is not that we aren't taking this literally, it is that we are understanding how this imagery is being used by the prophet to convey a message of hope and promise that these people could understand and rejoice in. That the Kingdom of the Messiah has expanded far beyond the bounds drawn here is no cause to doubt the text but rather to glory in the grandeur and greatness of what this Son of David has accomplished!

Restored King

And now we come to what may well be the most well known of all the verses in Zechariah, those that describe the triumphal and yet humble entry of the restored King.

9  Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion!

Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem!

Behold, your king is coming to you;

righteous and having salvation is he,

humble and mounted on a donkey,

on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

There is no way to date these last two oracles that comprise the book of Zechariah but it seems as though Zerubbable, by the time that this oracle is delivered has moved out of the scene. If you remember just a few chapters ago it was this man, the governor of the province of Yhuda that God had raised up to show that the promises to David would hold fast and this man would complete the Temple just as the coming King that would come from his lineage would also complete the work on the Temple that God would send Him to accomplish.
Verse 8 might actually point to the Temple being now complete but at any rate Zerubbable does not feature in these prophesies any longer and if indeed he has died there was not another in his line that was raised up to take the lead in the province and so it would seem that he has served his purpose of providing a type of Christ in His work and of reminding the people that God’s promises to the line of David still held fast.
And so we see now this promised messianic king pictured riding into the city of Jerusalem on a colt of a donkey.
We see that this king is first off righteous. This is an utterly important aspect of who this king is to be. We need not make a distinction between this king ruling righteously and his living a righteous life. Both of these are essential for a truly good King and the promise is that this one to come is going to posses this righteousness.
It is the righteousness of Christ that allows Paul to say in 2 Corinthians 5 that we are to:

be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

And in 1 Corinthians 1:

30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption,

Now these people could not have understood the full extent of what the perfect righteousness of this King would mean for God’s people but even in the OT in prophets like Isaiah there are strong hints to the nature of what God’s coming servant would do to redeem His people and essential to these is that this servant be a righteous one.
We also read that this King, as the ESV translates it, “having salvation is he.”
Now this is a hard verse to translate but it is important for us to understand that the Hebrew here doesn't first and foremost mean that this King is bringing salvation for someone else but rather that He has salvation from the Lord for Himself.
This could well be hearkening back to Psalm 16:10
Psalm 16:10 ESV
For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption.
In other words this King is trusting in the Lord for His salvation and He is certain of His possession of it. This is part of what is symbolized by the riding in on a young donkey. This humility means that this King is not seeking the victory for Himself but rather he rides on a donkey, not a war horse, because He is trusting that the Lord would bring about the victory.
This is directly connected to Christ of course! It is interesting to consider that when Christ fulfilled this prophecy as He rode into Jerusalem his suffering and agony of the cross yet lay before Him and yet He so trusted in the Salvation of His Father that it could rightly be said of Him that salvation was with him!
This is a great point of application for us to consider as well. Those of us who are in Christ can make the same claim. As we enter each day we have salvation with us, our salvation has been accomplished for us and yet there still remains before us a great deal of suffering and hardship in this world. Christ has told us that this is so and yet we enter into that suffering just as Christ did, trusting humbly in the salvation that is ours in Christ, trusting that He is able to bring us through these circumstances to His glory and for our good.
Man there is so much good stuff here!
We see that this messiah is going to change the way that God’s people do battle. We can see that because verse 10 tells us that:

10  I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim

and the war horse from Jerusalem;

and the battle bow shall be cut off,

and he shall speak peace to the nations;

But yet in verse 13 we read:

13  For I have bent Judah as my bow;

I have made Ephraim its arrow.

and:

and wield you like a warrior’s sword.

No longer are God’s people going to fight for God’s kingdom with the weapons of the world, horses and chariots, they were never to do this but they had, rather the conquest of the world will take place even as God speaks peace to the nations through the wielding of His people as His weapons of conquest.
Now there may be some allusion here to the actual battles that took place between the Jews and the Greeks in the days of Alexander the Great and following but I think that as you can see there is a far greater fulfilment that takes place as we now, in this expanding Kingdom of the messiah, no longer wage war as the world does but as Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 10:

For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. 4 For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 5 We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, 6 being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete.

We also see the expanse of the kingdom, showing us that this thing isn't going to be confined to the original regions of Davids conquest as the kingdom of the Messiah is going to:

his rule shall be from sea to sea,

and from the River to the ends of the earth.

I am reminded of our song Jesus Shall Reign:

Jesus shall reign where’er the sun

Doth his successive journeys run:

His kingdom stretch from shore to shore,

Till moons shall wax and wane no more.

Waterless Pit

Verse 11 is interesting and I want to spend just a bit of time here to help us see what is going on, what is this waterless pit.
First we see that this is an oracle of salvation and this is based on the blood of the covenant. This is significant because it seems best to see this as a connection to Exodus 24:8 where we read of the confirming of the covenant of Sinai with the people of Israel, we see nearly the same language:

8 And Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

And so God remembers His covenant and promises to save His people as a result of that remembering. However it gets odd because it is hard to place this idea of the waterless pit.
Most commentators relate this to the story of Joseph. Remember he was cast down into a pit by his brothers before they sold him into slavery in Egypt. This is an apt picture then of the exile and what had happened to God’s people and He now promises to save them and not only that but we see this promise of a double return or blessing. This is also reminiscent of Joseph who as a result of what had happened to him literally recieved a double blessing through his sons who were both included as tribes in Israel and so Joseph becomes not one but two tribes, a double blessing.
We ought also see then a connection to Jesus words at the last supper, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all record Jesus as saying “this cup is the new covenant in my blood” the blood of the covenant. It is as the result of the blood of a covenant, the blood of out Lord in the new covenant that we receive a multiplied blessing of eternal life and the forgiveness of sins and being reconciled to God and welcomed into His family and made heirs of the Kingdom with Christ.

Restored People

The division between these last two sections is not as clear as the first and so we see that the restored King and the restored people overlap each other and it makes sense because what takes place to restore the people is as a result of the restored King. However by the time we get to verse 14 we have clearly move into the territory of our last blessing, that of the promise of a restored people.
Time is quickly growing short on us here today and I would like to get us out on time but lets consider a few aspects of this restoration of the people that we find will accompany the messiah.
We see starting in verse 14 imagery of the Lord God going out to both conquer and to protect his people. He is marching forth with arrows flashing in the sky like lightning, this is language of going forth to conquer and it is likely why it starts from the south, from Egypt in other words, this was where God had originally set out with His people to conquer the promised land.
But we also see the language of protection. Verse 15:

The LORD of hosts will protect them,

This protection is actually part of the conquering. We see that in their devouring of the sling stones, that sounds weird because it is another hard text to translate but it likely signifies the devouring of those who did battle with sling and stone, formidable foes as the Jews could attest.
Their victory leads to an abundant celebration.

and they shall drink and roar as if drunk with wine,

and be full like a bowl,

drenched like the corners of the altar.

The blessing concludes:

On that day the LORD their God will save them,

as the flock of his people;

for like the jewels of a crown

they shall shine on his land.

17  For how great is his goodness, and how great his beauty!

Grain shall make the young men flourish,

and new wine the young women.

We see a ton of imagery here that carries over into what the NT writers describe as the results of the inauguration of the Kingdom of God.
Salvation is primary among them, on that day God will save them! It is permissible here by the nature of this test to cram into that verb everything that we know about the saving work of Christ as the messiah in both saving us from our sins and the final eschatological deliverance of our lives from this world of sin and death and those who hate us for bearing His name in this world. God will save His people!
We are his flock, countless references to Jesus Christ as the good shepherd come to mind.
Like Jews in His crown! I am reminded of the texts that Jake is working through even now in Revelation that describe the beauty and wonder of the Bride of Christ as He John sees her there described as a beautiful City adorned with fine gold and jewels!
As a result of the magnitude of these blessings we have this line of worship from the prophet:

17  For how great is his goodness, and how great his beauty!

And lastly we see a promise:

Grain shall make the young men flourish,

and new wine the young women.

Similar to Jake's message last week we ought to see this not as only related to the eschatological fulfilment of these things but realize that in a very real spiritual sense the abundance of this promised life is made readily available to us here in this life as a result of the finished work of this Messiah! While these verses do cause us to long for the days when all that is broken and sinful in this world including out own body of flesh will be stripped away and all things made new we must not miss the fact that these realities are already very much present and available to us in Christ if we would but open our eyes and live in them by faith.
I am reminded of Paul's words in 2 Corinthians 7 where he says:

16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself

Closing

As we ponder then the magnitude of the blessings brought to us through the arrival of the messiah and His finished work that brings into the world the realities of these long told promises lets us all the more be reminded to cry out with hearts filled to the brim with worship:

For how great is his goodness, and how great his beauty!

​
​
​
​
​
Related Media
See more
Related Sermons
See more
Copyright 2024 Logos Bible SoftwareFeatures|Pricing|Privacy|Terms of Use|Support