Conquest of Israel's Enemy
Zechariah 1:18-21
Turn in your at Psalm 2. I want to just read you the first three verses of the second Psalm as a setting for our look at text in Zechariah. Psalm 2, "Why do the nations rage or in an uproar and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves and the rules take counsel together against the Lord and against His Anointed saying, "Let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us."
Psalmist introduces us to something of the turmoil and the unrest and the anti God feeling in the world in those verses and we know that the world is in a constant state of rebellion against God. And no clearer demonstration of this rebellion can be seen in the way that the world has constantly treated the nation Israel, which is God's people.
Now this becomes the subject of the book of Zechariah. Now if you will turn with me to Zechariah. The nations who have raged against God have showed that anti God rage in their attitude toward Israel. Israel has suffered at the hands of the nations by the time Zechariah writes and will suffer continuously and far beyond the writing of this man's prophecy. And this is the subject with which Zechariah deals. He comforts Israel in the midst of the time of trial and tribulation and suffering at the hands of nations who rage against God and against God's people.
Now we saw that Zechariah comforts his people and he does it in a series of visions that he receives from God. God grants to him visions of comfort to give to the people of Israel to sooth them with the confidence that God is going to move in their behalf ultimately.
Now last time we discussed the first vision in Chapter 1, verses 7 to 17, the vision of the rider on the red horse among the myrtle trees. And we noted that the picture was the myrtle bushes literally in the hollow place or the place of humiliation and degradation, outside the city of Jerusalem. And the picture is of Israel, not yet able to ascend to prominence in its own land. The city is broken down. They've come back from captivity in Babylon, but the wall has not been rebuilt, the temple has not been rebuilt, they've not really re-instituted their national identity and they're in a situation of humiliation and degradation in a valley, in a hollow, in a low place outside and there as it were pleading with God to take them into the city, to take it back and to be again God's people in the place of prominence. And all of a sudden amidst the myrtle bushes there appears a rider on a red horse and we see him defined as the angel of the Lord, which is the Old Testament name for whom, Christ, and Christ appears in the midst of the myrtle buses and the picture is one of coming judgment. There are red horses speaking of blood and there are white horses speaking of victory and so it is that the angel of the Lord is about to lead the children of Israel from the place of humiliation to the place of victory.
And we saw that it wasn't long after that vision, only four years, until things began to be rebuilt and the temple was built and eighty years later the walls were built and the prophecy came to pass. The rider on the red horse, the angel of the Lord, the defender protector of Israel moved in and in spite of the opposition and in spite of the nations surrounding reestablished Israel in the land. So we saw that God was comforting His people with the knowledge that they would be in the place of victory again, that they would be back as a nation with their temple and with their city and with their wall.
But also we noted that there was a far future fulfillment of that very prophecy, that while it had an immediate identity it also had a future significance. That there was coming a day when the great angel of the Lord, none other than the Lord Jesus Christ, would come and once and for all finally establish Israel in the land in the great millennium kingdom, and at that point they would come back to prominence. At that point they would reign and Christ would sit on the throne of David on Mount Zion. The times of the Gentiles would be over and God would rule the world again through His nation Israel. And so we saw an immediate historic fulfillment and a future fulfillment prophetically in that first vision.
What basically God was saying there is summed up in verse 15. "I am very much displeased with the nations that are at ease, for I was a little displeased and they helped forward the affliction." God says I was much displeased and I'm going to do something about it. God is going to move against the oppressors of His people, the persecutors of His people, the enemies of His people. And you might remember that hatred of God's people is basically identified in the Bible as hatred of God Himself. That's why anti-Semitism is so despicable to God. For example in Psalm 44:22 the Bible says, "Yes," now note this, "For Thy sake," for God's sake, "Are we killed all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter." In other words when the world is killing us it is really God that they have in mind. They are really antagonistic to Him.
Didn't we see that same thing in the New Testament? When the world persecutes the church, who is it they're really persecuting? The Lord Jesus Christ and the apostle Paul said, "I fill up in my flesh the afflictions meant for Christ," Colossians 1:24. But he said, "That's all right for I am willing to suffer the blows meant for Him who suffered the blows meant for me."
And so there is an inseparable identification between God's people and God and to persecute God's people is to persecute God. To persecute the church is to persecute Christ and when Paul, for example, was persecuting the church Jesus really said to him on the Damascus Road, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou, what, Me?" God is inseparably beautifully and forever identified with His people.
And so people have been reacting, the nations have been raging in turmoil and unrest against God and they have manifested it in a hatred against His people. It's true of the church in this age and it's been true of Israel throughout history and believe me God righteously reacts against the enemy of His people, and that is the question in Zechariah's time. The people are saying, "Look, you brought us back from captivity, but here we are in the hollow place outside and we haven't rebuilt the city and it's so discouraging and how long will the enemy nations reign around us? How long will everything go well?" You'll notice in verse 15 that the nations were at ease. Everything was great with them, but it wasn't so great with Israel.
And you remember the God squadron that appeared in verse 11, said, "We've been through the earth and the earth sits still and is at rest." There's peace everywhere, but what about us, they're saying, God, what about us? And it's at that point that He shows him the picture of the red horse rider and he's about to move and shed blood and win victory and reestablish Israel, and as we said it had an immediate fulfillment within four years, but it has a greater fulfillment when He comes to set the kingdom for His people again and Israel will reign as God's special people in the millennium.
Now as we come to the second vision we find basically the same thing dealt with only in a tremendous scope. Now remember that God has just said to them, "I'm going to come in judgment and I'm going to deal with those nations that have treated you wrongly." O, he said in verse 15, "I was a little displeased with you and I chose the nations to be a chastening nation against you, but I never wanted them to push it this far, and because they pushed it too far I'm going to come in judge them." And if you look at the long rang of that that still really hasn't happened. And you might say, if you were a Jew today and you were looking up at God, you might say, "God, it's been a long time, it's been a long time of oppression. We're small and we're weak, and we wonder if we ever hope for deliverance from the powers of our aggressors."
But you know Jesus said in Luke 21:24, that, "Jerusalem would be trodden down by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles was fulfilled." And what He meant by Jerusalem was broader than just the city. The city is representative of all the land that God gave them in the covenant promise, all the way from the Euphrates to the Mediterranean and all the north and south area as well. And all that will never belong to them until the times of the Gentiles is ended, Luke 21:24. Jerusalem will be trodden down in some way, shape, or form until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. And so that's why I say the ultimate comfort that Zechariah is giving them is yet distant in the future.
And so they're saying, "How long will the aggressor mercilessly ground the Jew in the dust?" How long will this go on? And the answer comes in the second vision because here you find out just how long, and it takes you all the way to the second coming of Jesus Christ, and then it's going to end.
Now we're looking at the times of the Gentiles as we saw last time. We're seeing how far it's going to stretch. Now I want to clarify that term for just a minute so you won't be confused. The times of the Gentiles is the period of time, said Jesus, in which Jerusalem was trodden down by Gentile power, in which Jerusalem was ruled or lorded over by Gentile nations. It is a period of time that began about 600 B.C. It began when Nebuchadnezzar came in and Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians and the Jews were carried captive into Babylon. I think the first group were taken captive in about 604, and the major element in 586 B.C. for about a twenty year period this captivity was going on. They were being taken in and, of course, they were there for 70 years. And so from that time Jerusalem, for the first time since the land of Canaan was given to them, for the first time that land was dominated by Gentile power, the Babylonians. And that began the times of the Gentiles. And Jerusalem will continue to be trodden down until the times of the Gentiles is ended, and it hasn't ended yet. It's still trodden down.
But you say they took back the old city. Yes they have part of it, but there are all kinds of political elements all over the land that God originally gave to them. They haven't begun to touch as far east as the Euphrates, and the south, and even the north. They are just isolated in one little area and Jerusalem is anything but totally free. And all the land that God promised is not yet theirs. And so we're still living in the times of the Gentiles when Israel knows aggressors and overlords from Gentile lines.
Now the whole picture of the times, and I want you to mark this, the whole picture of the times of the Gentiles comes to a great climax under the rule of what is commonly called the anti-Christ. That's not a biblical term for him because the Bible says there are many anti-Christ's. He's the beast, he's the little horn, he's the willful king, he's the prince of the people to come; he's got all kinds of terms. If you like to use the anti-Christ it's all right if you understand what you mean. But rule of the anti-Christ will consummate the times of the Gentiles and at the peak of his rule Jesus returns and the times of the Gentiles comes to a halt and Christ sets up His kingdom, re-establishes Israel in the land and He reigns on the throne of His father, David, II Samuel Chapter 7, and the promise of the Davidic throne is fulfilled. But until that time we are seeing the times of the Gentiles.
Now I don't believe that anybody at all with any system of philosophy or any system of theology, which attempts to arrive at the meaning of history, can ignore that tremendous analysis of history. The theatre of history is Israel and you can't ignore this concept. The nations may foolishly rage against God, the nations may persecute His people, but nevertheless the Bible says that God will triumphly place His Son on the throne in Zion, that's the rest of Psalm 2. "The Lord shall laugh and hold them in derision," and he says, "I will set My King on My holy hill," in spite of the nations. History is the story of God taking back His land for His people.
Now as we come to Zechariah, the times of the Gentiles are already in operation, but God gives the people a vision through Zechariah that shows them that it won't always be this way, and their enemies will be dealt with before them. And the message of the vision is very straightforward. Let me read it to you beginning in verse 18. "Then lifted up mine eyes and saw and behold four horns. And I said to the angel who talked with me," that interpreter angel, "What are these? And He answered me these are the horns which have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem. And the Lord showed me four hammerers," is the best term four hammerers, "and I said, 'What come these to do?' And he spoke saying, 'These are the horns which have scattered Judah so that no man did lift up his head, but these are come to terrify them, to cast out the horns of the nations, which lifted up their horn over the land of Judah to scatter it.'"
Now you say, that isn't really too thrilling at first reading. Not exactly sure what's going on, horns and hammers, so what? Well let's find out so what. This is a very comforting vision. Verse 18; let's start. Two elements in the vision, four horns, four hammers. Isn't that a great outline? That won't win any homiletical prizes, but that's what he's talking about. Four horns, four hammers. All right here we go with four horns, verse 18. "I lifted up my eyes and saw behold four horns." It's kind of interesting to note this, and just so we don't bypass anything here that might be edifying to us, "Then lifted up mine eyes." It's interesting to me that all these visions happen on one night. That night is noted for us in Chapter 1 verse 7, the four and twentieth day of the eleventh month, the month Sebat, and all these visions came in succession on the same night when the prophet was awake, because a vision is not a dream, it's something that comes when he's awake. "And he lifted up his eyes," and this goes on like this. Look at verse 1 of Chapter 2, "I lifted up my eyes again." Chapter 5, verse 1, "I turned and lifted up my eyes." Verse 5, "Lift thine eyes," said interpreter angel. Chapter 6, verse 1, "I turned and lifted up my eyes."
Now, you say, "Why does he have to do that all the time?" Because it seems to him the most normal response after he sees one of these visions to bow his how in meditation and prayer and interpreter angel has to come along and poke him to look up again for the next one. He is so overwhelmed by each of them that he falls and bows in meditation. He sinks, as it were, in an attitude and response of thankfulness. And the interpreter angel nudges him a little with a supernatural poke and he pops up again and he sees the