SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/24/2016 10:30 PM
My Worship Time Focus: The False Shepherd PT-1
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Zechariah 11:15-17
Message of the verses: “15 The LORD said to me, "Take again for
yourself the equipment of a foolish
shepherd. 16 "For behold, I am going to raise up a shepherd in the
land who will not care for the perishing, seek the scattered, heal the broken,
or sustain the one standing, but will devour the flesh of the fat sheep and
tear off their hoofs. 17 “Woe to the worthless shepherd Who leaves the flock! A sword will be on his
arm And on his right eye! His arm will be totally withered And his right eye
will be blind.’”
Just a
reminder of what we have already gone over in this 11th chapter of
Zechariah, as we looked at shepherds, something we have mentioned in our last
SD. Now as we looked at this chapter we
see that the time period jumps around which is not that difficult to understand
when reading the OT prophets for they did not know what time period they were
preaching or writing about. The first
three verses were the wailing shepherds which took place in 70 AD, and then the
rejection of the True Shepherd we saw in verses 4-14 which took place during
the time when the Messiah, Jesus Christ was on the earth, and there were also
some verses that spoke about what would also happen in 70 AD. And now we look at verses 15-17 which jumps
all the way to the tribulation period when antichrist the false and wicked
shepherd will rule the earth and the sad part of it is that the nation of
Israel will fall for his false promises and sign a treaty with him that will
last for seven years.
We also
remember that this is what is called by Dr. Wiersbe and also John MacArthur an
action sermon and now Zechariah is to act out the part of the foolish shepherd,
as all of these names we are using speak of the antichrist. We don’t really know how Zechariah really
played this part, but he did play the part of when the Jewish people will
accept the antichrist which is seen in Daniel 9:27 “"And he will make a
firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will
put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations
will come one who makes desolate, even until a complete destruction, one that
is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.’” Now we understand the “one week” means seven
years as it is a week of years as we have explained when we studied the books
of Daniel and also Revelation.
MacArthur
gives us a preview of what these three verses will tell us about the
antichrist. Verse 15 talks about his
character, and verse 16 talks about his work, and then verse seventeen deals
with his punishment.
We will
briefly look at verse fifteen in this SD:
“15 The LORD said to me, "Take again for yourself the equipment of
a foolish shepherd.” Zechariah has already played the part of the
true shepherd, and now he gets to play the part of the antichrist. What is the equipment of the foolish shepherd? Perhaps his staff is broken or maybe he has a
big metal club that he will beat the sheep with, I really don’t know. Now in the sixth chapter of the book of
Revelation when Jesus opens up the seven seals as this is the first part of the
title deed to the earth we see that the first seal represents the antichrist as
we read the following “I looked, and behold, a white horse, and he who sat on
it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to
conquer.” Not sure if this has anything
to do with the equipment of the foolish shepherd but we see that the antichrist
is riding a while horse and has a bow but does not have any arrows, but he
still goes out and conquers, so we have to assume that he does it by negotiations,
so perhaps this is a part of the equipment of the foolish shepherd, but the
foolish ones are the ones who believe his lies.
John MacArthur states that the OT word for “foolish” is synonymous with
the word wicked and this man will be the wickedest man ever to live. Let us look at Proverbs 5:22-23 “His own
iniquities will capture the wicked, And he will be held with the cords of his
sin. He will die for lack of instruction, And in the greatness of his folly he
will go astray.” We see in this verse
and others too that we will not look at that foolishness and the iniquity are
co-equal.
Now like I
said this man, the antichrist will conquer the whole world, and the ones who
fall under his “spell” are really the foolish ones, as he is the wicked one.
9/24/2016 10:57 PM
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