Wednesday, Aug. 29

Wednesday

 In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, the son of Iddo: “The LORD was very angry with your forefathers.  Therefore tell the people: This is what the LORD Almighty says:  ‘Return to me,’ declares the LORD Almighty,  ‘and I will return to you,’ says the LORD Almighty.  Do not be like your forefathers, to whom the earlier prophets proclaimed: This is what the LORD Almighty says:  ‘Turn from your evil ways and your evil practices.’ But they would not listen or pay attention to me, declares the LORD.  Where are your forefathers now? And the prophets, do they live forever?  But did not my words and my decrees, which I commanded my servants the prophets, overtake your forefathers?  “Then they repented and said,  ‘The LORD Almighty has done to us what our ways and practices deserve, just as he determined to do.’”   - Zechariah 1:1-6

In the introduction (1:1-6), Zechariah answers a basic, crucial question: How can we experience God’s blessing? Remember, this was written to people who knew God and were in the process of rebuilding His temple.  Zechariah did not offer a new or different message.  But since we do not always apply what we already know, he starts with a fundamental principle of the life of faith:  

We must continually return to the Lord!

Dr. Charles Feinberg notes, “This call to return dare not be passed over lightly, for it is the basic and fundamental plea of God throughout the Bible to all sinful men”.  The Hebrew word for “return” is the word teshuvah, and it comes from the Hebrew root shuv, which means to turn around.  This is what the Bible means when it speaks about repentance.  We first come to God in repentance and faith, but it is not a one-time thing.  A walk with God is marked by continual repentance or returning to Him because we are, as the hymn says “prone to wander”.  Zechariah’s audience had returned to the physical land.  God wants them to return to Him not just physically, but with their hearts.  They were rebuilding the temple, doing the Lord’s work, they may have thought, “Why do we need to return to God?”  Zechariah answers that question.

It may seem odd that Zechariah would begin a message of hope and encouragement by talking about God’s fierce anger to- ward sinners!  The Hebrew expression is very strong. There are three interesting grammatical devices used here to emphasize the intensity of God’s anger.  First, the verb, “to be angry,” is placed first in the sentence for emphasis. Second, the Hebrew uses what is called the cognate accusative, “he was angry with anger,” which means, “God was really ticked off!”  Third, the Hebrew word itself means to be full of wrath (see 2 Kings 5:11; Esther 1:12).

Does the picture of God being very angry against sinners fit with your view of Him?  We live in a time that emphasizes God’s love to the neglect of His holy wrath against sin and against sinners.  We glibly say, “God hates the sin, but, loves the sinner” as if somehow the sinner will never experience God’s wrath against him, but just against his sin (as separate from him)!

Certainly, God is full of love and mercy to every sinner who repents.  But in His holiness, God cannot and does not wink at our sin, turn a blind eye, or treat it lightly.  His terrible wrath against all unrepentant sinners, should cause us to fear sinning because we fear God!

But how is this message about God’s anger a word of encouragement or hope for these remnant Jews, or for us for that matter?  The warning of divine wrath is a prerequisite to the acceptance of divine grace.  In other words, you must sense the serious danger that you are in before you gratefully accept the offer of being rescued from that danger.  Frederich Buechner puts it this way, “before the gospel can possibly be good news, it must first be bad news.” 

Notice the order of the Apostle Paul’s famous words...

Romans 3:23 - For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,  3:24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 

Concerning his own salvation experience, the great Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon wrote; “It is only when sinners realize that they are under the fierce, eternal wrath of God that they will cry out, “What must I do to be saved?...Only he who has stood before his God, convicted and condemned, with the rope about his neck, is the man to weep for joy when he is pardoned, to hate the evil which has been forgiven him, and to live to the honour of the Redeemer by whose blood he has been cleansed” (C. H. Spurgeon, Autobiography).

Jeff Frazier