If You Build It, I Will Come

The people were small, the task was great, and the enemies were many. Zechariah and Haggai were prophets in the same time period, just after the decree by the King of Persia releasing all Israelites to return to Judah. After 70 years in Babylonian captivity, God moved the heart of King Cyrus (after all, He holds the heart of the king in His hand) to release the captive people. We read in Ezra that about 50,000 Jews returned, a mere fraction of the mass numbers that used to live in the land. And, on top of that, they found the city and the temple in ruins! Solomon's great temple had been destroyed by the Babylonians and nothing was left but rubble (2 Chron 36:19). The prophets proclaimed that the people were to rebuild the temple, but the enemies in the surrounding lands were none to happy about this and made the efforts difficult. God wanted to dwell among them again, and the temple had to be restored.

For a minute, I thought I was in Revelation! The first several chapters of this book are full of visions, eight to my count. The visionary Zechariah was a young prophet, called into the ministry officially, just after Haggai. If Haggai's message was to "Get up and Get to Work", then Zechariah's message was "God will be your Strength!". Over and over again, Zechariah reminded the people that God was for them. "Turn to Me, and I will turn to You" (1:3), "The Lord will again comfort Zion" (1:17), "Shout Zion, for I am coming!" (2:10), and my personal favorite "Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit" (4:6).....OH!!! those are shouting words, sister! God was for them, and not against them. Don't you need to know that when the Lord asks you to complete a task, that it's not by your own power, but HIS??! If they had set out to do it on their own, they would fail. Praise the Lord, the people had repented for the sins of their fathers, their own unfaithful hearts, and were working to honor God again (1:6).

Two Prophets, One Message: The message was to rebuild the temple that had been destroyed, so that God could come and live among them once again. Haggai's message was short and sweet, he said things like, "build the house" and "be strong." His commands were given to the people with no frills, as somewhat evidenced by the length of the book itself. Zechariah had much the same message, but delivered it in a different fashion. He was given visions and parables, or metaphors. God speaks to us, in our language. Some people are gifted visionaries and some are very practical, short, sweet, and to the point kind of people. Like Mrs. Barbara said yesterday, God uses us both. We each have a place, and a message to share in our own way.

Indeed, these prophets had more in common than I ever realized. The people worked, and eventually finished the temple once again. This temple, built during Zerrubabel's reign was no where near the former splendor of Solomon's great temple, but the work was completed. Haggai spoke in chapter two of the temple yet to come....the Kingdom Temple. And Zechariah spoke of the Messiah who would first come as a suffering servant, and then come again as King of the all the earth! In the mean time, God wants to live among us still!!! He wants to dwell in the lives of each of us, and in order to do that we must repent of our sin and come to Him. Matthew Henry paraphrases Zech 1:2 this way, "Turn you to me in a way of faith and repentance, duty and obedience, and I will turn to you in a way of favour and mercy, peace and reconciliation." This is the essence of true repentance, change your course....turn from your old ways and do a new thing. He gave His life, what more could He give?? Oh how He loves you. Oh, how He loves me. Oh how He loves you and me!