SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/3/2016 11:05 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-1God Removes Lawlessness
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Zechariah 5:1-4
Message of the verses: “1 Then I lifted up my eyes again and
looked, and behold, there was a flying scroll. 2 And he said to me, "What
do you see?" And I answered, "I see a flying scroll; its length is
twenty cubits and its width ten cubits." 3 Then he said to me, "This
is the curse that is going forth over the face of the whole land; surely
everyone who steals will be purged away according to the writing on one side,
and everyone who swears will be purged away according to the writing on the
other side. 4 "I will make it go
forth," declares the LORD of hosts, "and it will enter the house of
the thief and the house of the one who swears falsely by My name; and it will
spend the night within that house and consume it with its timber and stones.’”
We
will be looking at the first sub-point under the first main point which Dr.
Wiersbe entitles “The Cleansing of the Land.”
I first want to look at an endnote that has to do with what we read in
the third verse and has to do with how the translators translated the phrase “over
the face of the whole land,” as seen in the NASB95 version: “The Hebrew word eretz can mean either ‘land’
or ‘earth’ depending on the context, and sometimes it isn’t easy to determine
which is meant. In Zechariah 4:14, eretz
is obviously ‘earth,’ for our God is ‘lord of the whole earth.’ The NIV translates eretz ‘land’ in 5:3 and 6,
meaning the land of Israel; while the KJV and NKJV use ‘earth,’ meaning the
whole world. I prefer the NIV
translation since these visions deal especially with the sins of the Jewish
nation against the Law of God.”
Zechariah
begins by saying that he sees another vision, a vision of a flying scroll and
there is once again a conversation between Zechariah and the interpreter angel. The flying scroll is very large, fifteen feet
by thirty feet and there is writing on both sides of it. One side has the third commandment from
Exodus 20:7 on it “"You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in
vain, for the LORD will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.” And on the other side we see the eighth
commandment “"You shall not steal (Ex. 20:15).
This
scroll represents the Law of God and when one breaks the Law of God a curse is
then given to them “For as many as are of the works of the Law are under a
curse; for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO DOES NOT ABIDE BY ALL
THINGS WRITTEN IN THE BOOK OF THE LAW, TO PERFORM THEM’ 11 Now that no one is
justified by the Law before God is evident; for, "THE RIGHTEOUS MAN SHALL
LIVE BY FAITH." 12 However, the Law is not of faith; on the contrary,
"HE WHO PRACTICES THEM SHALL LIVE BY THEM’ (Gal. 3:10-12).” Now we know that no one can completely keep
the Law of God, and thank God for His grace and for His mercy and for sending
His Son to perfectly keep the Law and die in our place so when we accept His
forgiveness God no longer sees our sinfulness, but sees the righteousness of His
Son who died for us. The Law was not
given to save us, but to show us God’s righteousness.
We
probably wonder why it is that the Lord only chose two of the Ten Commandments
to put on this large flying scroll.
Perhaps the remnant that Zechariah is a part of had problems keeping
these two commandments. Both Haggai and Malachi
write of the problems of sin that the remnant had. See Haggai 1:1-11 and also Malachi
3:7-15. Dr. Wiersbe writes “But there is
another reason. The third commandment is
the central commandment on the first table of the Law, and the eight
commandment is the central commandment on the second table of the law, so these
two commandments represent the whole law.
‘But whoever shall keep the whole law, yet offend in one point, he is
guilty of all’ (James 2:10).”
We
will continue looking at this part of the vision in our next SD.
6/3/2016 11:34 PM
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