SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 10/13/2016 9:49 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-1The Siege of Israel
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Zechariah 12:1-3
Message of the verses: “1 The burden of the word of the LORD
concerning Israel. Thus declares the LORD who stretches out the heavens, lays
the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him, 2 "Behold, I am going to make Jerusalem a
cup that causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is
against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah. 3 “It will come about in that day that I will make
Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lift it will be severely
injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it.”
I can
remember the first time that I heard someone preach on this section of
Zechariah, as it was the very first Founders Week at the Moody Bible Institute
that my wife and I attended in Chicago and the theme of the conference was the
second coming of Jesus Christ. I think
that it was in 1978 and I really do not remember much about the sermon but that
the speaker kept saying that Jerusalem was going to be a cup that causes
trembling as the KJV say. Yes Jerusalem
is God’s city and as we watch what is going on in Jerusalem in our time we can
see that God is moving towards what we are going to be studying in these last
three chapters of the book of Zechariah.
The verses
we are looking at today show us that God is going to make Jerusalem a cup that
causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem,
it will also be against Judah.” Notice
that we see in this verse that God is going to cause this to happen. Now as far as the word siege it means it will
be attacked and it will be attacked by the Gentile nations, and later on we see
the words “in that day” as it is seen some sixteen times in these last three
chapters and that day is what we call “The Day of the Lord.”
Another
thing we see here is that Judah and Jerusalem are both mentioned, not just
Jerusalem.
In verse
one we see the word “burden” and we have both saw this word before and have
talked about it before when it was used in chapter nine. MacArthur writes “It is used to signify a
prophecy of grief something that really burdens down the prophet, something
that creates anxiety and grief. And
before there can ever be a conversion in Israel and before there can ever be
repentance in Israel and before there will ever be salvation in Israel and
before God will ever set up His Kingdom, there’s going to be grief.” We have learned before that suffering will
come before glory as seen in the sufferings of Jesus Christ on the cross, which
was followed by His burial, and then His glorious resurrection, so what
Zechariah is talking about here as far as when it will happen is not something
new.
Let us talk
some more about verse one, the last parts of it where we read “Thus declares
the LORD who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and
forms the spirit of man within him.”
MacArthur writes of this “Now the point here is beautifully made. What he’s really saying is this, it is the
God who made it all who will end it all.
And with the same power that God could make it begin, God will draw it
to an end. He is the alpha and the omega
in terms of history. This is a solid
basis for faith in the ultimate destiny of history because you go back to the
one who made it to start with, who created.
We will continue
to look at this section in our next SD.
10/13/2016 10:13 PM
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