SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/17/2016 8:44 PM
My Worship Time Focus: Rejection of the True Shepherd PT-2
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Zechariah 11:4-6
Message of
the verses: I will have to admit that our last SD
from this section was actually a introduction to verses 4-14 and also I have to
believe that it will take a few more Spiritual Diaries to finish looking at
these verses.
“4 Thus
says the LORD my God, "Pasture the flock doomed to slaughter (Zech. 11:4).” In the KJV we see that the word that is
translated in the NASB is “feed” and in the Hebrew the word means to tend and
so the NASB has used a better English word to translate the Hebrew word. Zechariah is saying that the True Shepherd is
to teach the flock, now we know that the rest of that verse says “doomed to
slaughter” but that makes no difference, He still is to feed them. I want to look at several verses from the
last part of the 12th chapter of the book of John which is a quote
from the book of Isaiah to show that even though that most of the people whom
came in contact with Jesus Christ while on earth did not listen to Him. “37 But though He had performed so many signs
before them, yet they were
not believing in Him. 38 This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet which he spoke:
"LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT? AND TO WHOM HAS THE ARM OF THE LORD
BEEN REVEALED?" 39 For
this reason they could not believe, for Isaiah said again, 40 “HE HAS
BLINDED THEIR EYES AND HE HARDENED THEIR HEART, SO THAT THEY WOULD NOT SEE WITH
THEIR EYES AND PERCEIVE WITH THEIR HEART, AND BE CONVERTED AND I HEAL
THEM." 41 These things Isaiah said because he saw His glory, and he spoke
of Him (John 12:37-41).” Zechariah was
saying some similar things that would happen to the Messiah as Isaiah has.
John
MacArthur comments on the later part of verse four by saying that this means “Feed
the flock intended for butchering…because that’s exactly what it means.” He goes on to say “Look, Israel has rejected
the shepherd…and we’ll see that as we go thought the chapter, I’m assuming that
at this point…Israel’s rejected the shepherd, they are then therefore
designated as the flock for butchering.
But I’m going to give them a chance.
I’m going to feed them, I’m going to try to feed them and see if they’ll
eat.” Now as to what part of the
ministry of Jesus Christ this pertains to is not known, but I think that we
could say that it may be talking about the last half of His ministry, say in
the 13th chapter of the book of Matthew when Jesus gives up on them
and begins to talk in parables because the spiritual leaders of the Jews began
to say that His miracles were being done in the power of Satan. Now remember what we learned in the first
three verses of this chapter that shows us what was going to happen in AD 70
when the Romans would come in and start in the North and move to Jerusalem and
destroy everything in their path even the city of Jerusalem along with the
temple.
“5 “Those
who buy them slay them and go unpunished, and each of those who sell them says,
’Blessed be the LORD, for I have become rich!’ And their own shepherds have no
pity on them. 6 "For I will no
longer have pity on the inhabitants of the land," declares the LORD;
"but behold, I will cause the men to fall, each into another’s power and into the power of his king;
and they will strike the land, and I will not deliver them from their
power." (Zech. 11:5-6).”
MacArthur explains these verses and then we will be done with our SD for this evening: “Now 5 and 6 is a little parenthesis. This really gets tough, so hang in there now. You're going to learn the deep truths tonight. What are these possessors? Now watch. The possessors who slay them are the foreigners, the foreign oppressors, the nations. And though it is true that God's sovereignty handed Israel over to the nations for judgment, it is still true that the nations are responsible for their cruelty, that's clear in the Scripture in many places. God may have designed Israel for judgment, but that doesn't mean when the nations superseded reasonable judgment and acted cruelly that they are without guilt.
“In fact, in Jeremiah 50 verse 17, it says,
"Israel is a scattered sheep, the lions have driven them away. First the
king of Assyria devoured him and last this Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has
broken his bones. Therefore says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, I'll
punish the king of Babylon and his land as I have punished the king of
Assyria." In other words, God had ordained the king of Assyria and the
king of Babylon to judge Israel, but that made them no less guilty for the sins
of cruelty that they perpetrated. Now that's something you just have to leave
with God.
“So, he says, "Look, they're going to be
slaughtered and I want to feed them once more before the slaughter comes. And
it's going to come from the nations that are going to slay them. And these
nations are going to hold themselves not guilty. There going to sense no guilt
at all. They'll just slay them and they won't feel a thing." And in fact
that's exactly the way the Assyrians and the Babylonians felt centuries before
70 A.D. when they slaughtered Israel. They didn't feel anything. In fact, in
the same chapter, Jeremiah 50, he says, "All that found them have devoured
them and their adversaries say, We offend not because they sinned against the
Lord." They deserve it, they're a sinful people so we just went in and
whacked them, see.
“Isn't it amazing that the nations could take just
enough Bible to justify what they want to do? Somewhere along the line, the
Romans must have determined that what they were doing was a wonderful act of
judgment. And they go further even, it says, "They say, Blessed be the
Lord for I am rich." In other words, they made money on the spoils of the
people they've slaughtered. And they actually say bless the Lord, mockingly.
“So, first of all, the slaughter is going to come,
verse 5 says, at the hands of Gentile nations. Now in 70 A.D. it was a Gentile
nation, the world empire of Rome that came to slaughter.
“But verse 6 adds another dimension, a most
interesting dimension. Pardon me, the end of verse 5. It says, "And their
own shepherds pity them not." It wasn't bad enough that the Gentile
nations came in and slaughtered, and notice also in verse 5 that the Gentile
nations sold them and made money. And that's true. They sold literally tens of
thousands of Jews after 70 A.D., they sold them into slavery. Read Josephus, he
outlines that. So they came, they slaughtered, they sold them. And if that
isn't bad enough, their own shepherds didn't show them any pity.
“In other words, the very leaders of Israel
themselves didn't do anything to defend their people. The leaders of Israel
themselves never did anything to prevent judgment. They never did anything to
stop them from being butchered. They never taught them any spiritual truth.
They never gave them the message of God. The priests and the elders and the
scribes were so corrupted that they were guilty of lording it over the people.
They were guilty of ripping off the people. They were guilty of becoming fat
and rich at the expense of the populace.
“And then verse 6 says, and this is the ultimate,
"For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith the Lord. But
lo, I will deliver the men, every one into his neighbor's hand and into the
hand of his king and they shall smite the land and out of their hand I will not
deliver them."
“You know something? It's sad when foreigners make merchandise of Israel. It's even sadder when their own leaders show them not enough pity and mercy to teach them the truth of God and to care for them. But you want to know something? The saddest thing of all is when God Himself says I don't pity them anymore either. That's when Ichabod has been written. God turns His back. And you know why God did that? Because they rejected the Messiah. God says, "I will no more pity them, I will deliver the men...watch this...every one into his neighbor's hand." And the historians tells us that they themselves while in the city because of the confusion, because of the famine, and because of the fights and the arguments among the divisions within the people slaughtered more people among themselves in civil strife than the Romans killed.
“And He says, notice this, "And then I will
deliver them...watch this, this is fantastic...I will deliver them into the hand of his king
and they shall smite the land and out of their hand I will not deliver
them." Who is their
king? Well, at 70 A.D. who was the king of Israel? They didn't have any.
They didn't have any. You say, "Well, what...this prophecy couldn't come
to pass." Listen to this. Judah chose a king; they chose a king right at
the time Jesus was there. They had the king, Jesus, the King of Kings. They
mocked Him, they spit on Him, they said, "We will not have this man to...what?
to reign over us." They didn't want that king. Then they turned around and
said, "We have no king but Caesar," isn't that interesting? So by the
choice of the Jews, who was their king at that time of history? Caesar. Look at
this, "I will deliver the men, every one into his neighbor's hand and into
the hand of his king." And who was it that came to destroy the nation?
Caesar. See an accurate to
the very designation of Caesar.
“On the fateful eve of Passover, Pilate brought Jesus out before the Jews and mocking said, "Behold your king. And they screamed, away with Him, crucify Him. And Pilate said, Shall I crucify your king? And the chief priests who were the leaders answered, we have no king but Caesar." And they made their awful choice and just what Zechariah said came true, they put themselves in Caesar's hand and Caesar devoured them.
“You see, they decided to kill the true King to
avoid a Roman takeover. Remember in John 11 they were saying, "Boy, if we
don't get rid of Jesus, the Romans are going to come in here and take us over.
We've got to get rid of this trouble maker." So they killed the real King
to avoid a Roman takeover. And the very thing they feared and killed their
Messiah to avoid was the sentence of God that took place on their nation; destruction
by Rome.”
9/17/2016 9:19 PM
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