Prophecies Fulfilled in Zechariah II

Multiple fulfillments of prophecy (chapters 6-8)

Fred R. Coulter—December 9, 2023

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I first want to cover some news and a letter:

How much do you know about Herbert W. Armstrong's 'prayer rock?

Well, we know this much: he (Gerald Flurry) went up to Eugene, Oregon, and he found a rock, which was where Herbert Armstrong prayed. So, if you pray at that rock you'll have better answers to your prayer. So, he went to the expense of digging it up and having it shipped to Oklahoma where it is right now at their church center. It's in front of Gerald Flurry's office in Edmond, OK.

Recently our son visited us with his family and there are all still with Flurry. We learned that he has a plan to move the rock to Jerusalem…

Think about that! Does Jerusalem need any more rocks?

• What is that going to do?
• What is the rock going to do?
• Nothing!

…and put it on the Mount of Olives at Jesus' second coming!

Really? A little later we're going to read about how Jesus comes to the Mount of Olives and what happens to the Mount of Olives. What Flurry is planning to do will be worthless!

They say that they are the only ones who are the very elect of God. There are several Churches of God that say that 'they are the only true Church of God!

• Are you God?
• Do you know that that is a fact?

We need to understand that God scattered the Church because of the sins! Those who are faithful—wherever they are, whatever name they are under—as long as they're faithful to God the Father and Jesus Christ, love God and keep His commandments, every single one is a part of the Body of Christ, His Church!

Not one single offshoot from Worldwide can make the claim that they are the only true Church of God!

All the Churches of God must have the fruit of the Spirit! All the Churches of God must be doing what they need to do to preach the Gospel. Along that line, I'd like to make a couple of announcements and explain what we had happen this past week:

About five months ago, looking at the financial things concerning America, China, the world, the BRICS, all the problems going on in the world. I got to realizing that there's coming a time when there's going to be clashes between China and America so great that we won't be able to get anything done in China.

Also, that in inflation may escalate at such a rate that we won't be able to do much of anything, because there will not be enough money to do it. We've had warnings that we could have runaway inflation and we always need to remember what happen to the Weimar Republic in Germany, which gave rise to Hitler.

In order to buy one loaf of bread, they had to have a wheelbarrow of billions of marks. And all production came to a screeching halt. The Great Depression took place, and Hitler moved in and filled the vacuum, and that started his rise to power.

So, looking at the things that are taking place in the world, and as I'm talking with Steve before services about how in the modern nations of Israel and also other nations, that there are a great amount of homeless people. Now here in America, especially with the 10-million illegal immigrants having come through the open border of Biden, everybody's trying to slow that down or stop it, but they don't know the cause!

What is the cause of all the immigrants coming? Because this nation, which was dedicated to preaching the Gospel of Christ, has turned its back on God! Now there are many different levels of belief in God, all the way from recognizing that there's a Creator:

• to believing that we need to have moral standards that come from the Bible
• to believing that we need to come to God
• to believing that we need to repent and receive the Holy Spirit of God so that we can fulfill our purpose in life

All of those are degrees of belief in God!

This nation now is giving itself over to satanism, abortion, corrupt politics on a scale not even imagined a year ago, the prophecy that God gave 'that the stranger will rise up high above you within your gates and you shall come down very low'…

I don't know how all of that's going to work, but just last night or the night before I was watching on the news, they did an interview of a young Chinese man.

Now note this: the majority of those who have come through this open border on the South have come from nearly every country of the world now, and the majority of them are young men of military age. The army within is greater than a million, but they have not yet been activated to do their dirty work.

In this interview, the news reporter was able to interview a young Chinese man from China who went to Japan, then to Mexico, then across the border. He said that he was given $10,000 to come.

Why? Think of that prophecy: 'And the stranger within shall get above you very high and you shall be brought down very low.'

That's the cause and the reason they are coming is because no one wants anything to do with God. Also, remember:

• 1.where the modern children of Israel are in the world today
• 2. God is judging all nations all the time.
• 3. God is fulfilling His prophecies so that everything that is in the Bible that has been prophesied will happen

The reason that people do not understand it is because of the way that we talked last time about how God has injected in different places many aspects of prophecies that represent the current state of affairs when it was written.

• things to happen shortly after that
• things that are in the future
• things that are in the Kingdom of God
• things about the coming of Christ
• things about the New Testament Church

All of f those are in the Bible, and written in such a way and when we get to Zechariah we will see that it's all kind of like scrambled eggs!

Unless you know the Sabbath, the Passover, and the Holy Days of God and their meaning, you can't make sense of it all.

Like Lyall just brought out, that in this world they are given over to the inner workings of Satan!

{Note message: Christ in You, the Hope of Glory by Lyall Johnston}

Look at that every year with the holidays, which God says in Isa. 1 and in Amos 5, He hates! Yet, Satan has come and glorified them with color, with music, with beautiful things, with presents and gifts, and everybody's hunky-dory! You go into a store and the music is all Christmas carols and you can't get away from it.

Well, only those who love God with all their heart, mind, soul and being and are dedicated to growing and overcoming with grace and knowledge will be the only ones who will understand. Even then, our understanding is not as complete as God's understanding.

So,  in the light of all of this and all of the potential things happening. I was led to decide to print the Bible. We have a fairly good supply already on hand. But:

• What if we couldn't get any printed in the future? What if there wasn't the money to do it?
• What do we do with the funds and money, tithes and offerings of the brethren?

When we have enough to do the things we need to do, we need to use it to preach the Gospel, to supply the need of books and everything that we need. So, we made the decision to order 6,000 more Bibles printed in China. Those are all available now.

Now, let me tell you about this. as well. When that decision was made, all nearly all of our storage units were pretty well full of books because we like to keep a good supply of everything on hand. Where are you going to put another 6,000 Bibles? That takes up a lot of room. Well, we prayed about it.

And Terry, one of the women who works for us—has been with us for 20 years—her husband Max found a place where we could put all the Bibles. A big, empty warehouse located at Bertuccio's Farms, which is right close here in Hollister. Those came in this last week. So, now we have a good supply of Bibles.

We have the paperback version, which come 8 in a box. We also still have a good supply of the calfskin Bible, about 4,000 of those. Then we have another 4,000 printed of the Bible in vinyl leatherette. There are a few changes which update a couple of places, but you won't miss anything if you have the calfskin Bible. We have these Bibles all ready to go.

Now then, we have something else, which is also of special importance, which is I've been working for seven years on developing an interlinear, a Greek-English Interlinear.

Now, the standard size of the Greek-English Interlinear, which is by George Ricker Berry, is this size: small print, hard to read, and with the King James on the margin here.

I also had them print 2,500 of the George Ricker Berry Greek-English New Testament. We put it in large, bold print for the Greek, and the marginal reference on the side is the faithful version.

To give you a picture of how it looks with the pages open, here it is right here. (shown on the video).
 Now, there it is. That's quite a thing, and easy to read. With that said, all right, none of you know Greek. Well, this coming elders conference we're going to have on the 17th  I'm going to cover some Greek things for all of the elders.

But let me give you one book, which is a key, because in the back of this new version of the George Ricker Berry Greek-English Interlinear, we also have organized it according to the original manuscript order. Now, in the back of it, George Ricker Berry has a Greek lexicon.
 
That's important because it tells you the important nouns, the important verbs, and that helps you a great deal. However, you need one other thing that you need to order. It called A Parsing Guide to the Greek New Testament by Nathan E. Han.

This is important because every verb and participle that you see in print in the Greek text does not show the base verb. But Han has taken every verb and every participle and has given the base verb so that with the Lexicon in the back of the Interlinear, you can see how it's used. This will help you in understanding the Bible even more, even if you don't know the Greek.

Now, I'm going to cover some basic things for the elders a week from Sunday, and we'll record that and make that available so it will be an aid for you for those who get these.

Now, the thing that's important is this, and then we'll take a break. If all of our church members would order enough Bibles and we'll give them to you at no cost that you could give to other brethren in other Churches of God. We already have some people, some of the brethren who have ordered a good number of Bibles and have already given them to those in other Churches of God. This will be the best thing that we can do to help the Churches of God is to let them have a copy of The Holy Bible in Its Original Order, A Faithful Version!

We named it A Faithful Version because there's no politics involved. We're going by the Word of God, by the Truth of God, what He inspired it to be and put together. Michael Heiss translated the Old Testament, and I translated the New Testament.

What's contained in the Bible? The Gospel! If we give this to these brethren, that will help them a great deal. We're not trying to proselyte them, but to help them grow in grace and knowledge. So, we have plenty of Bibles.

• the vinyl Bible comes 6 in a box
• the calfskin Bibles come 8 in a box
• Interlinears come four in a box

Now, this Interlinear is not made to be a vest pocket Bible you take to Church. I'm sure you can see by the size of it. Perhaps if Goliath were still alive, that might be possible, but he's not.

The Interlinear is meant for you to have on your study desk that you can use anytime you want to, and to help you have a deeper understanding of what God has inspired. So that's the special announcement. The other details will be coming in the December letter. But you can write in to request whatever number of Bibles you need,.

You can give them to the brethren with our love, with our help. We're not trying to proselyte them. We're not trying to disturb them. We're trying to help them and encourage them so all of us together can grow in grace and knowledge and attain to the Kingdom of God, which is Christ in us, the hope of glory, as Lyall said.

*****

Zechariah Prophecies #2

As we will see, and it's very interesting, as I mentioned earlier, the prophecies in Zech. and also other prophecies in other books of the Prophets.

• there are the contemporary prophecies
• prophecies that were to be fulfilled in the near future
• prophecies way out in the future
• prophecies concerning Christ
• prophecies concerning the Kingdom of God

I need to make a correction from last week, because I said last week that Malachi was the last book of the Old Testament. Well, that's not true when the books are in their original order. In the original order, 2-Chron. is the last book of the Old Testament, which goes back-to-back to Matthew, the first book of the New Testament. It has a coordinating genealogies all the way through from 1-Chron. all the way through, and then in Matt. it  picks up again with Abraham. Then the genealogy down to Christ.

Sidebar, remember this, the genealogy in Luke, the third chapter, is actually the genealogy of Mary's father, Eli that went all the way back to Adam.

When it comes down to David, as you go through the genealogies, and this is important, in Matt. 1, the genealogy comes down through David and then to Solomon. In Luke 3, the genealogy comes down to David and then to Nathan, one of the other sons of David.

So, it's very interesting indeed that in the actual descent of the genealogies down to Christ, that Solomon is excluded.

Zech. 6—here we're going to see some very interesting things, and we can tie this in with other prophecies.

Zechariah 6:1: "And I turned and lifted up my eyes and looked. And behold! Four chariots were coming from between two mountains. And the mountains were mountains of bronze."

Now that must have been pretty spectacular to see. These horses, as we found before, are not the same as the four horsemen of Rev. 6, because all of these horses are to bring peace to the north, to the south, to the east, to the west of the area of Judea.

As we saw with the book of Esther, that after Haman the Agagite was captured and killed, that a lot of the Gentiles converted to Judaism.

During the time that they came back to the Holy Land and built the second temple, there were a lot of Gentiles that converted to Judaism as well, because God even prophesied of that.

There was a space of time of 500 years between that time and Christ, a little more, and they had over 200 years of relative peace. So, we see that these horses were all there to bring peace.

Verse 2: "The first chariot had red horses… [plural; in Rev. 6, each one of the horses is singular] …and the second chariot had black horses; And in the third chariot had white horses; and in the fourth chariot had dappled horses and strong ones" (vs 2-3).

Verse 4: "And I answered and said to the angel who talked with me, 'What are these, my lord?' And the angel answered and said to me, 'These are the four spirits of the heavens…'" (vs 4-5).

In the form of horses, but yet they do things that we would expect someone in the personage of a person or an angel looking like a person would do.

"…who go forth from standing before the Lord of all the earth. The black horses in it go forth into the north country; and the white go forth after them; and the dappled go forth to a south country" (vs 5-6).

Verse 7: "And the strong ones went forth and were anxious to go, so that they might walk to and fro through the earth. And he said, 'Go! Walk to and fro through the earth.' So, they walked to and fro through the earth."

To what? To bring peace in the area!

Verse 8: "And He cried to me and spoke to me, saying, 'Behold, these who go toward the north country have caused My Spirit to rest in the north country.'"

And that's the whole area of Persia on over toward Turkey and Syria as we have it today, and then coming on down to the Holy Land. God was making peace north, east, south, and west. That's the blessing that He said He would bring to them.

Zechariah 9:9: "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold, your King comes to you." This is a prophecy of Christ:

• His first coming in the flesh
• His second coming at the end of the age

"…He is triumphant and victorious, yet meek and riding on a donkey, even on a colt, the foal of a donkey" (v 9). We find that fulfilled in the New Testament.

Just before the Passover, He sent His disciples out, 'And go to a certain place, and you will find a donkey, and it's foal, and bring it to Me.' Then He had the triumphal entry into Jerusalem with all the disciples throwing their garments down on the road, paving the way for Him coming from the Mount of Olives down on the descent toward the temple, and shouting, 'Hosanna, the King!' So, there's that prophecy right there.

Verse 10: "And I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem. And the battle bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace to the nations; and His dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth."

What does that mean? That is the Euphrates going east to the ends of the earth! What's at the ends of the earth going east? China!

Now we see other references to that a little bit later. Let's look at some other prophecies concerning that. Isn't this interesting that all through the Bible you have prophecies scattered here and there about:

• the present
• the near future
• the first coming of Christ in the flesh
• the New Testament Church
• the second coming of Christ
• setting up of the Kingdom of God

Let's finish off Zech. 6 and we'll go to Psa. 80.

Zechariah 6:10-12: "Take from Heldai, Tobijah, and Jedaiah, from the exiles who have come from Babylon; and in that same day you go and enter the house of Josiah the son of Zephaniah. And take silver and gold, and make crowns, and set them on the head of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest. And speak to him, saying, "Thus speaks the LORD of hosts, saying, 'Behold the Man whose name is The BRANCH!…. [Christ] …And He shall grow up out of His place, and He shall build the Temple of the LORD" (vs 6-12).

Who was directing the Temple of the Lord to be built? Joshua the son of Josadak the high priest and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, both of them. But here's a prophecy of Christ.

The next verse we also have the prophecy of Christ and He shall build the Temple of the Lord; so there's a duality. Actually, what is the spiritual temple of Christ? All of the saints together! As Paul writes, into a Holy Temple.

Verse 13: "Even He shall build the Temple of the LORD and He shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon His Throne. And He shall be a priest upon His Throne; and the counsel of peace shall be between them both…. [between Joshua the son of Josadak and Zerubbabel] …And the crowns shall be for a memorial in the Temple of the LORD to Helem and to Tobijah and to Jedaiah, and to Hen the son of Zephaniah. And the ones who are far off shall come and build in the Temple of the LORD.'…." (vs 13-15).

To get the temple done and the city and the walls finished, it took a combination of 49 years to get all of that done. So, this is a prophecy of it.

Now God likens that area to a vineyard. He plants it. What did Jesus say about Himself? He said, 'I am the vine and you are the branch.' The branch referring directly to Christ we will see in just a little bit. All of that all fits together.
 
Psalm 80:15: "And the vineyard which Your right hand has planted, and the Branch that You make strong for Yourself." Now that's referring again to Christ!

Isa. 11 this is to show how that all through the Old Testament in the Prophets all of the various prophecies can be understood when we realize the Plan of God through the Sabbath, Passover and Holy Days. We know that the Kingdom of God is coming at the end of the age. We have a prophecy of it again here:

Isaiah 11:1: "And there shall come forth a shoot out from the stump of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots. And the Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD. And His delight shall be in the fear of the LORD. And He shall not judge according to the sight of His eyes, nor after the hearing of His ears. But with righteousness He shall judge the poor, and shall reprove with equity for the meek of the earth. And He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked. And righteousness shall be the girdle of His loins, and faithfulness the girdle of His reins" (vs 1-5.

Then it talks about the Kingdom of God, how peaceful that is going to be. That's quite a thing when we see that.

Here's the vineyard (Isa. 5). Note Matt. 21 because Jesus talks about the vineyard and how He sent laborers into the vineyard. He also talked about the vineyard in relationship to the religious leaders of His time:

• who rejected the Lord of the vineyard
• who rejected the Son of the Lord of the vineyard
• rejected all of the servants

That comes right back here to:

Isaiah 5:1: "Now, I will sing to my Beloved [Christ] a song of my Beloved concerning His vineyard. My Beloved has a vineyard in a very fruitful hill. And He dug it up, and cleared it of stones, and planted it with choice vines, and built a tower in its midst, and hewed out a wine vat in it; and He looked for it to produce grapes. But it produced worthless fruits" (vs 1-2).

So, there it is. Notice v 3, because it talks about exactly what Jesus said in Matt. 21.

Verse 3: "And now, O people of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, I ask you to judge between Me and My vineyard. What more could have been done to My vineyard that I have not done in it? Who knows? I looked for it to yield grapes, but it yielded wild grapes" (vs 3-4).

Then He goes on showing that He's going to have to correct it there.

Isaiah 28:14—this is interesting because Isaiah gave the prophecies in the 800s. Zephaniah gave his prophecies 300 years later, but they all tie together.

Isaiah 28:14: "Therefore, hear the Word of the LORD, you scornful men who rule this people in Jerusalem. Because you have said, 'We have made a covenant with death, and we have made an agreement with the grave; when the overwhelming rod shall pass through it shall not come to us…'" (vs 14-15).

In other words, they are going to bring about their own way to try and do the will of God. That never works! So, this is what he's showing here.

"…for we have made lies our refuge, and we have hidden ourselves under falsehood" (v 15).

Does that not tell us the same thing of what is happening today with Protestantism, Catholicism and Judaism all the way down through time? This is how all these prophecies come together.

Now let's come back here to Zech. 7. Notice how quickly that these prophecies came. Remember that Haggai was in the first year and the second year of Darius, and here we have in the fourth year. So, this puts it at 535B.C.

Zechariah 7:1: "And it came to pass in the fourth year of King Darius, the Word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, in Chislev. And Sherezer and Regem-Melech and his men had been sent to the house of God, to pray before the LORD, and to speak to the priests who were in the house of the LORD of hosts, and to the prophets, saying, 'Should I weep in the fifth month and fast, separating myself, as I have done these many years?'" (vs 1-3).

In other words, all during the time that they were in Babylon, they had their own feasts, they had their own mourning, not coming to God the way that they should, but doing it their way.

That's how religious works of men do. They try and get their own works to replace the works of God which He wants us to do.

Verse 4: "And came the Word of the LORD of hosts to me, saying, 'Speak to all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, "When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months, even those seventy years, did you truly fast to Me, even to Me?…. [No! They were doing it to themselves] …And when you ate, and when you drank, did you not eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?"'" (vs 4-5).

All the self-works of men won't work. What do we have in the New Testament? We have what are called works of law, the traditions of men!

Here they're asking, 'Well, what about the tradition that we had in Babylon of fasting in these months? Should we still do it?'

Verse 7: "'Are not these the words which the LORD proclaimed by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and prosperous, and her cities all around her, and the south and the plain were inhabited?' And the Word of the LORD came to Zechariah, saying, 'Thus speaks the LORD of hosts, saying, "Judge true judgment…"'" (vs 7-9).

I want you to see how that throughout the whole Bible God is consistent:

• with His laws
• with His judgments
• with His precepts
• with what He expects

We'll see that here. He wanted them to reform, judge true judgment, not judgment according to

• your own eyes
• your own thoughts

"…and show mercy and compassion every man to his brother" (v 9).

Doesn't that sound like New Testament doctrine right there? Yes! In a way, even though this is instruction to them directly from Zechariah speaking to them, this is also a prophecy in the future of what Christ would speak in the New Testament.

• Is this not what He taught in the Law of Moses? Judge righteous judgment!
• Didn't Jesus say to the Pharisees in John 7 'Judge righteous judgment?' Yes!

Verse 10: "And do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the stranger or the poor. And do not imagine evil in your heart, against your brother." All the scheming that people do!

What God is saying, 'You went into exile because of all of these things. now when you come back here, and I bring you back:

• you're going to have to repent
• you're going to have to change

Because 'I want to do some great things for you here when you're back in the land.'

Verse 11: "But they refused to hearken, and turned a stubborn shoulder, and made heavy their ears against hearing.… [you can read that in Jeremiah and Ezekiel how they did that] …And they made their hearts adamant stone…" (vs 11-12)—instead of a heart of compassion!

You can see that with Matt. 18. There you have 'judge righteous judgment' with mercy, compassion and forgiveness.' Remember the man who owed $10,000 to his lord, the steward? And the lord said, 'Pay all that you have or I'm going to throw you in prison with your family and everybody else.'

He pleaded with him and then the lord said, 'I forgive you everything.' So instead of being thankful, that man went out and found someone who owed him 100 pence and said, 'Pay me or I'm going to put you in prison.' He didn't learn by the mercy of God!

So, the same thing here. He's telling them, 'Now you're coming back into the land. Do what you did to cause you to be exiled out of the land.'

Verse 12: "And they made their hearts adamant stone against hearing the law and the words, which the LORD of hosts has sent through His Spirit…"

Remember this: whatever the Word of God is spoken in Truth, it has a spiritual significance.

"…by the former prophets. And, therefore, great wrath came from the LORD of hosts. And it will be, as He called, and they did not hear, so when they called, and I did not hear,' says the LORD of hosts. 'But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they did not know…." (vs 12-14).

Now this is a prophecy not only of that time, but every time that the Jews came against God and didn't obey God and:

• look at it in the New Testament time
• look at the priests
• look at the Pharisees
• look at the Sadducees against Christ

They wanted to kill Him!

Here's a prophecy of the same thing. Don't do those things.

Verse 14: "But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they did not know."

Even today the Jews don't understand why all of this has come upon them. They look upon the enemies as the cause of the problem rather than looking upon their own behavior and their own traditions that are causing the problem, which they need to repent of and really come to God. Same thing!

Verse 14: "But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they did not know. And thus the land has been desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate."

What causes environmental change, if I can put it that way? Sin! Here's this beautiful land. Now it's a desolation because of sin. God said that the land would enjoy its Sabbath for 70 years.

Zech. 8—this is quite a thing! This is a prophecy, which applies more directly to everything that God was going to do in the next 250 years plus; taking it from 515B.C. with the completion of the temple, taking it down to 169B.C. with the desecration again of the temple by Antiochus Epiphanes because of sin.

But in that period of time they had a lot of prosperity. They had a lot of everything pleasant and nice. As we saw with those horses that are spirits bringing peace, they brought peace to the whole area. Here's what God says:

Zechariah 8:1: "And the Word of the LORD of hosts came to me, saying, 'Thus says the LORD of hosts, "I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I was jealous for her with great fury."' Thus says the LORD, 'I have returned to Zion…'" (vs 1-3).

When God sets His hand to do good, He will do it! That's why the warnings in Zech. 7, don't live like you used to live, because that sent you into captivity.

"…'I have returned to Zion and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a City of Truth…'" (v 3).

Multiple applications of that, because Jerusalem is going to be the world capital of the Kingdom of God! It's going to be a city of Truth:

• the Truth of God
• the Truth of the saints
• the Truth of the patriarchs

So, here is a verse that has multiple fulfillments, which many in the Old Testament do.

"…and Jerusalem shall be called a City of Truth, and the mountain of the LORD of hosts, the Holy mountain" (v 3).'

Now, then it comes back to the fulfillment of that time of what He was going to do for the Jews coming back to the Holy Land.

Verse 4: "Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'There shall yet be old men and old women sitting in the streets of Jerusalem, and each man with his staff in his hand because of their great age. And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in its streets'" (vs 4-5).

Now, that applies to the physical Jerusalem. When Christ comes, Jerusalem is going to be spirit and all the spirit beings will be there. There won't be little boys and girls playing in the streets. So, this applies to that:

Verse 6: "Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'If it is marvelous in the eyes of the remnant of this people in those days, will it not also be marvelous in My eyes?' says the LORD of hosts. Thus says the LORD of hosts, 'Behold, I will save My people from the east country, and from the west country. And I will bring them, and they shall dwell in the midst of Jerusalem. And they shall be My people, and I will be their God, in Truth and in Righteousness'" (vs 6-8).

They did stick to the Truth! Ezra formed The Great Synagogue or the great assembly of 120 priests. And they made the Word of God, brought it all up to date, canonized it, and sent it out to all of the synagogues within the land and wherever the Jews were scattered who didn't come back to Jerusalem at this time. God was doing a great thing!

Many times we look at the prophecies because we live in the end of the age and we see the things that are happening and why Christ needs to return. We don't look at what God did at this particular time.

Here's a period of about 200 plus years that were filled with peace, that were filled with people seeking the Word of God, wanting to do what is right, and as I'll bring out in the next one, they even translated in Alexandria the Old Testament into Greek. So, this was really quite a great time in the history of the Middle East.

Verse 11: "But now I will not be to the remnant of this people as in the former days,' says the LORD of hosts, 'For they shall sow in peace; the vine shall give its fruit, and the ground shall give its increase, and the heavens shall give their dew; and I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these things. And it shall come to pass, that as you were a curse among the nations, O house of Judah and house of Israel, so I will save you, and you shall be a blessing. Do not fear, but let your hands be strong'" (vs 11-13).

We'll go ahead and end there. This last verse can also apply to how the nations of Israel in these last 500 years have been a blessing to the whole world.
And it will apply to how spiritual Israel as well as physical Israel during the Millennium will be a blessing to the whole world.

The Kingdom of God ruled by Christ and we see the type of it with Josiah the high priest and he has the crown as the king and that's a foretype of Christ coming as Lord of lords and King of kings and setting up the Kingdom of God on earth.

So here in what are called the minor prophets, we find an awful lot of fulfillment of God's Truth in everything that He does. This helps us to understand the Word of God even more.

Scriptural References:

• Matthew 6:1-8
• Matthew 9:9-10
• Psalm 80:15
• Isaiah 11:1-5
• Isaiah 5:1-4
• Isaiah 28:14-15
• Zechariah 7:1-14
• Zechariah 8:1-8, 11-13

Scriptures referenced, not quoted:

• Matthew 1
• Luke 3
• Revelation 6
• Matthew 21; 18

Also referenced:

Message: Christ in You, the Hope of Glory by Lyall Johnston

Books:

• Greek-English Interlinear by George Ricker Berry (revised and updated)
• A Parsing Guide to the Greek New Testament by Nathan E. Han

FRC:bo/po
Transcribed: 12/13/23

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