The Book of
Hosea
INTRODUCTION
Beginning with Hosea and concluding with Malachi, there are twelve short prophecies designated as the Minor Prophets, while Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel are called the Major Prophets. The Minor Prophets are so called because of the size of the books, not because of their content. However, even that criterion for division is not completely accurate since Hosea is a longer book than Daniel. Actually, the so-called Minor Prophets are not minor. Each of them batted in the major league and was a star in the message that he brought.
The Minor Prophets were exceedingly nationalistic, but they were not isolationists. They dealt with the fact that God’s people had broken the law of God, the Ten Commandments. This necessarily puts an emphasis on works, good works. For this reason the liberals and the promoters of the social gospel have used the Minor Prophets a great deal. Unfortunately, they have missed the main message of these prophets. We will see some of that when we get into the prophecy of Hosea. The Minor Prophets warned against godless alliances with other nations. They were extremely patriotic and denounced political and moral corruption. They warned Israel against an isolationism from God.
Hosea lived during the time of the divided kingdom. He was a prophet to the northern kingdom which is called the kingdom of Israel, distinguished from the southern kingdom known as the kingdom of Judah. “The word of the Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel” (Hos. 1:1).
Hosea mentions the four kings of Judah first, and then he mentions the king of Israel, the northern kingdom. Because they were all contemporary with Hosea, he mentions them all. He was a prophet to the northern kingdom of Israel, as the content of the book reveals.
Hosea was a contemporary of Amos, another prophet to Israel. He was also a contemporary of Micah and Isaiah, prophets to Judah. His ministry extended over half a century, and he lived to see the fulfillment of his prophecy in the captivity of Israel.
He can be compared to Jeremiah in the southern kingdom. Jeremiah warned his people of the southern kingdom that they would go into captivity, and he lived to see it. Hosea warned the northern kingdom that they would be going into Assyrian captivity, and he lived to see it. Jeremiah and Hosea have a great many things in common.
The theme of this book is a plea to return unto the Lord. I have a message entitled, “The Greatest Sin in All the World,” which emphasizes the great theme of this book. I shall let it serve as the introduction to this marvelous prophecy of Hosea.
The accusation is often made that the present-day pulpit is weak and uncertain. Furthermore, it is charged that instead of being a “… voice … in the wilderness …” (John 1:23), the modern pulpit has settled down comfortably to become a sounding board for the whims and wishes of an indifferent people with itching ears. If the charge is true (and in many cases it is), it is because the pulpit is reluctant to grapple with the great issues of life. This hesitancy is born of a desire to escape criticism and a dread of becoming offensive to the finer sensibilities. More often it is due to a cowardly fear of facing the raw realities of life and wrestling with the leviathan of living issues. The pulpit quotes poetry and sprinkles rose water. It lives in a land of make-believe instead of saying, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved …” (Acts 16:31).
The theater, the monthly magazine, and other agencies of communication deal with life stripped of its niceties. These instruments for reaching and teaching the masses take the gloves off and grapple with the problems that we face daily.
Not so the pulpit. The pulpit has avoided these issues. As we come to this prophecy of Hosea, we cannot avoid dealing with the problems and issues of life, for that is the story that is behind the headlines in the prophecy of Hosea. It is not a pretty story, but we must understand it if we are to understand the message of Hosea.
The story behind the prophecy of Hosea is the tragedy of a broken home. The personal experience of Hosea is the background of his message. He walks out of a broken home to speak to the nation from a heart that is breaking. He knew exactly how God felt, because he felt the same way.
The home is the rock foundation of society and has been that for all peoples. God has given the home to mankind. He gave it to man at the very beginning. It is the most important unit in the social structure. It is to society what the atom is to the physical universe. The little atom has been called the building block of the universe. Well, the home is the building block of society. The character and color of a building is determined by the individual bricks that go into it. No nation is any stronger than the homes that populate it, for the home determines the color and complexion of society. The home is the chain of a nation that holds it together, and every individual link is important.
Home is where we live and move and have our being. It is in the home where we are ourselves. We dress up physically and psychologically when we go out. We put up quite a front when we go through our front door and move out upon the street. But it is within the walls of the home that we take off our masks and are really ourselves.
Because of the strategic position of the home, God has thrown about it certain safeguards to protect it. He has surrounded it with certain bulwarks because of its importance. One of these is marriage. God has given more attention to the institution of marriage than He has to any other institution in this world. Society did not make marriage; society found marriage. It is God who made marriage, and He gave it to mankind. Marriage rests upon His direct Word, “… What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” (Matt. 19:6). God performed the first marriage ceremony. He gave the first bride away. He blessed the first couple. Marriage is more than a legal contract, more than an economic arrangement, more than a union of those with mutual love; it is an act of God. It rests upon His fiat command. Many folk think that all they need in order to get married is a license and a preacher. My friend, if you are going to have a successful marriage, you have to have God. If God does not make the marriage, it will go on the rocks.
God has given a drive to the race to reproduce within the framework of marriage. That is what makes the home. The “… twain shall be one flesh …” (Mark 10:8). Before man walked out of the Garden of Eden, God gave him this institution. Besides the skins that Adam and Eve wore, the only thing they had was a marriage certificate from God. That is all. That is the only institution that came out of the Garden of Eden.
Marriage is a sacred relationship; it is a holy union. The New Testament sums up the mind of God on this when it says, “Marriage is honourable in all …” (Heb. 13:4). Therefore, my beloved, marriage cannot be broken by a little legal act. It cannot be broken by a fit of temper. It cannot be broken by self-will. I personally believe there are only two acts that break a marriage—I mean a real marriage.
The first act is death, of course, which automatically severs the relationship.
The second act is unfaithfulness-unfaithfulness on the part of either the husband or the wife. That rips a relationship in two. In the Old Testament, the one guilty of adultery was to be dealt with in the harshest manner imaginable. For example, notice the importance God attached to the act: “And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death” (Lev. 20:10). For an unmarried girl accused of adultery the Law said, “But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father’s house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father’s house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you” (Deut. 22:20–21).
There are a few words I think we should say here by way of explanation. There are some zealous Christians who use Romans 7:2–3 as the basis for the extreme viewpoint that a divorced person who has a living mate can never remarry. Verse 2 says, “For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.” They forget that under the Law the married person who was guilty of fornication was stoned to death and the innocent party under the Law did not have a living partner. The guilty person was pushing up daisies through the rock pile. If that were enforced in Southern California today, we wouldn’t have freeways because we wouldn’t be able to get around all the rock piles.
I am not sure but what Paul includes desertion under the heading of unfaithfulness in I Corinthians 7:15: “But if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases: but God hath called us to peace.”
Another item concerning the Law which needs amplification is the reference in Deuteronomy which seems to preclude the man from any charge of guilt. You may wonder why the woman is picked on—isn’t the man guilty? Yes, but there are two things you need to bear in mind: one is that the word used is always the generic term, anthropos, meaning “mankind.” We have the same distinction in legal terminology. I notice that some contracts read, “The party of the first part, if he …” when the person is really a she. The term is used for either one. Also we must remember that marriage is a picture of Christ and the church, and He is never guilty, but the church is guilty. The Scriptures do not teach a double standard, but I do think they teach a different standard.
Personally, I think that God has made woman finer than man. For this reason, when she goes bad, she goes farther down than a man goes. It is not that sin in one is worse than in another, but the results are far more detrimental. In my limited ministry, I have seen children overcome the handicap of a ne’er-do-well father, but I have never seen children turn out right when the mother has been bad. A sorry father is a serious handicap for a child, but a good mother more than compensates. Mother is the center of the home. Some time ago I heard of a woman who was asked to accept an office in a church organization. She refused the office and gave as her reason, “I am a missionary to the nursery. There are three pairs of eyes watching me, and I want to direct them to God.” God has placed a mother in a home and made her all-important in that place.
Every woman was once a little girl very much like the description composed by Alan Beck, and which he has entitled “What is a Girl?”
Little girls are the nicest things that happen to people. They are born with a little bit of angel-shine about them and though it wears thin sometimes, there is always enough left to lasso your heart—even when they are sitting in the mud, or crying temperamental tears, or parading up the street in mother’s best clothes.
A little girl can be sweeter (and badder) oftener than anyone else in the world. She can jitter around, and stomp, and make funny noises and frazzle your nerves, yet just when you open your mouth, she stands there demure with that special look in her eyes. A girl is Innocence playing in the mud, Beauty standing on its head, and Motherhood dragging a doll by the foot.
God borrows from many creatures to make a little girl. He uses the song of a bird, the squeal of a pig, the stubbornness of a mule, the antics of a monkey, the spryness of a grasshopper, the curiosity of a cat, the slyness of a fox, the softness of a kitten. And to top it off, He adds the mysterious mind of a woman.
A little girl likes new shoes, party dresses, small animals, dolls, make-believe, ice cream, make-up, going visiting, tea parties, and one boy. She doesn’t care so much for visitors, boys in general, large dogs, hand-me-downs, straight chairs, vegetables, snow suits, or staying in the front yard. She is loudest when you are thinking, prettiest when she has provoked you, busiest at bedtime, quietest when you want to show her off, and most flirtatious when she absolutely must not get the best of you again.
She can muss up your home, your hair, and your dignity—spend your money, your time, and your temper—then just when your patience is ready to crack, her sunshine peeks through and you’ve lost again.
Yes, she is a nerve-racking nuisance, just a noisy bundle of mischief But when your dreams tumble down and the world is a mess, when it seems you are pretty much of a fool after all, she can make you a king when she climbs on your knee and whispers, “I love you best of all!”
God shapes that little-girl charm into a fine and delicate instrument, a woman. But when a woman goes wrong, the tragedy is immeasurable.
The background of the prophecy of Hosea is the story of a fallen woman and a broken home. It is a story of that which must be contrasted to God’s ideal of marriage and of womanhood. God uses this to tell His own story.
In the hill country of Ephraim, in one of the many little towns not on the maps of the world, lived two young people. One was a boy by the name of Hosea, the other was a girl by the name of Gomer. They fell in love—it is the same story which has been repeated millions of times but never grows old. I don’t think it is stretching the imagination to say that they fell madly in love with each other. Then for some unaccountable reason, Gomer went bad. She resorted to the oldest profession known to mankind. Hosea was brokenhearted, and shame filled his soul. He must have thought about his recourse to the Mosaic Law. He could have brought her before the elders of the town and demanded the law be enforced. In that case she would have been stoned, for she had betrayed him. He would have been justified.
Does this remind you of another story that took place some seven hundred years later in that same hill country when a man by the name of Joseph was engaged to a girl by the name of Mary? The principal difference is that Joseph’s information was wrong, and an angel came from heaven to correct it; but Hosea’s information was right, for Gomer was guilty.
At this particular juncture the Book of Hosea opens. “The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord” (Hos. 1:2). There are expositors who take the position that this is nothing but an allegory, that it did not really happen. Such trifling with the Word of God waters it down to a harmless solution which is more sickening than stimulating. Let’s face it—God commanded Hosea to break the Mosaic Law. The Law said to stone her, but God said to marry her. The thing God commanded Hosea to do must have caused him to revolt in every fiber of his being, but Hosea did not demur—he obeyed explicitly. He took Gomer in holy wedlock, and he gave her his name. She came into his home as his wife. Listen to the apostle Paul as he speaks of such a relationship: “What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh” (1 Cor. 6:16).
My friend, you may be sure that the tempo of gossip really picked up in that little town. Hosea’s home became a desert island in a sea of criticism. It was the isolation ward in local society. A case of leprosy in the home would not have broken off contact with the outside world more effectively. Poor Hosea!
Children were born in this home. There were three—two boys and one girl. Their names, in their meanings, tell the awful story. And there is the larger meaning and message for the nation Israel.
Jezreel was the oldest. His name means “God will scatter, and God will avenge.” The reference, God told Hosea, was directly to the house of Jehu. Although Jehu had carried out God’s instructions to destroy the house of Ahab, he had done it with hatred and great personal vengeance. For this, God says, “I’ll judge. I’ll scatter Israel, but there will be mercy in My judgment.”
The second child was Lo-ruhamah, which means that she never knew a father’s pity. It was not that she was an orphan, but she did not know who her father was. What a scandal in the home of Hosea! God is saying through this circumstance to the people of the northern kingdom who had gone into idolatry, “You will not know My pity, for I am not your Father.”
The third child was Lo-ammi—which means “not my people.” If you put this in the singular, it would mean “not my child.” What a message that was to Hosea’s day! And what a message it is to our own day when liberal theology claims that everyone is a child of God. God says they are wrong. He has no illegitimate children. God says, “I know who My children are. Do you think that My children are the offspring of a man-made union? Absolutely not! A person becomes My child only through faith in Jesus Christ.” And the Lord Jesus said to the men in His day who claimed to be the sons of Abraham, “Ye are of your father the devil …” (John 8:44, italics mine). They could make no claim of being God’s children.
My friend, are you Lo-ammi? Are you God’s child, or are you an illegitimate child? Let me assure you that you can become a child of God—“But as many as received him, to them gave he power [the right, the authority] to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name” (John 1:12).
The story of Hosea’s home is a sad one, and the story continues. Gomer left home. She returned to her former profession and became a common prostitute. Certainly God is going to say to this man, “Hosea, you have done all that you can. You tried to reform the woman, but it didn’t do any good. Let her go.” But no, God says, “Go get her and bring her back to your home.” Hosea went after her. She refused to come back. He sent the children to plead with their mother. Still she would not return. Then, as women of this sort did in those days, she sold herself into slavery. Hosea went to her and bought her and brought her back to the home.
Oh, my friend, what a picture this is of our Savior. He created us and we belong to Him. Then we were guilty of going from Him and giving our love, our affection, our time, to the things of the world. And while we were yet sinners, He came down to this earth and bought us in our ugly condition that He might make us His legitimate children. What love!
After this experience, did Gomer become a faithful wife? The record does not tell us. But we see Hosea, stepping out of a home scarred by shame and going before a nation with a heart that is breaking. His sorrow is intolerable; with scalding tears coursing down his cheeks, he denounces the nation Israel, saying, “You have been faithless to God! I know how God feels, because I feel the same way. You have broken the heart of God.” What a picture!
Hosea denounced the nation. He declared a verdict of guilty for the crime of all crimes. He said simply but specifically that their sin was as black as it could be and they could expect God’s punishment. This people who had known God, whom He had redeemed out of Egypt, to whom He had said, “Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself” (Exod. 19:4), turned their backs on God and made a golden calf! And still in Hosea’s day they had not learned their lesson, for at that moment in the northern kingdom there stood two golden calves. The people had turned from the living and true God back to calf worship! Israel was playing the harlot. Their sin was the greatest sin in the world.
You may be saying, “I thought unbelief was the greatest sin.” In one sense unbelief is the greatest sin, but it is not an act, it is a state. We all are born in rebellion against God. But, thank God, Christ’s death paid the penalty for our sin, and if you and I exercise faith in Jesus Christ, He will save us. It is true that unbelief is a terrible sin for which there is but one remedy—the remedy is to trust Christ. When you continue in unbelief, you reject the remedy.
There is another sin which you may consider the greatest in the world: it is sin against light. To have the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ and reject it is sinning against light. Frankly, I would rather stand before God’s throne of judgment as an idolater from the darkest jungle of Africa, than as a church member who has repeatedly heard the gospel and rejected it. But this is not the greatest sin.
The greatest sin in all the world is sin against love. This is worse than all others, and this is the message of Hosea. Gomer was not only guilty of breaking the marriage vow, which was bad enough, but she sinned against the one who loved her. That is sin at its worst. My friend, to sin against God and the Savior who loves you is worse than the animism and animalism of the heathen world. The sin of paganism is nothing compared to the sin of those who reject God’s love. It is deeper and darker than the immorality of the underworld and the demonism of the overworld.
Hosea knew what sin was, and he knew what love was. Sin against love makes the sin more heinous.
Israel knew the love of God as no other nation knew it. She knew His deliverance, His redemption, His protection, His forgiveness, His revelation, and His love. Yet Israel turned to dumb idols and gave herself to them. This is sin at its worst.
However, God would not give her up. Love will triumph. Let me lift out just three verses from Hosea’s prophecy which will tell God’s story:
First, here is the charge: “Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone” (Hos. 4:17). The name Ephraim is synonymous with the name Israel, and He charges Israel with spiritual adultery.
Then notice the great pulsating passion of the infinite God: “How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together” (Hos. 11:8). God is saying that He can’t give Israel up; He loves her too much. This is His reason for sending Hosea back to get Gomer a second and a third time. He wanted Hosea to know how He felt about Israel.
Finally, here is the victory: “Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? I have heard him, and observed him: I am like a green fir tree. From me is thy fruit found” (Hos. 14:8). There is a day coming when Israel will turn back to God. This leads us to believe that Gomer finally did change and become a good wife and mother. We cannot be sure of this, but we can be sure that Israel will one day return to God with her whole heart.
Is there an application for you and me here? Does this shocking description of spiritual adultery fit the believer in our day? Yes, the church is described as the bride of Christ— ”… I have espoused you … that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ” (2 Cor. 11:2). And to the church at Ephesus the Lord Jesus said, “I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil…. Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love” (Rev. 2:2, 4).
My friend, it is not enough to be correct in your doctrine and be active in your service for Christ. These are important and have their place, but the essential thing is love. Have you left your first love? Do you love Him today?
The name Hosea means “salvation” it is another form of Joshua, which is the Hebrew name of the Greek form Jesus. The church is the bride of the New Testament Hosea, but our Hosea is joined to a spiritual harlot!
In Revelation, chapter 17, is the most frightful picture in the Bible. It personifies the church and calls her the great harlot, Mystery Babylon. This is the trend which the organized church is following in our day. Oh, how many believers are covering up their frustration and their lack of reality in their spiritual experience by just being busy. It is nothing in the world but nervous agitation. Down underneath they cannot honestly say, “I love Him. I am true to Him.” With hot tears our Lord accuses the church of being lukewarm. God pity the man who is married to a lukewarm woman. God pity our Savior who is joined to a church that is only lukewarm. He says, “Oh, how I wish that you were either hot or cold!”
Let me be very personal and ask about your relationship with Christ. Has any cloud come between your soul and your Savior? An incident is told of Spurgeon who suddenly stopped in the middle of the street he was crossing and prayed. When he reached the other side, his companion asked him, “Why did you stop to pray in the middle of the street?” Spurgeon’s reply was something like this, “A cloud came between my soul and Christ, and I could not let it remain there even long enough to reach the other side of the street.” Before the Lord Jesus put Simon Peter in harness, He asked the heart-searching question, “… Lovest thou me? …” (John 21:17). This is just as poignant and pertinent now as it was that early dawn by the Sea of Galilee.
My friend, when you turn your back on the one who so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, you are not only doing something bad, you are not merely turning away in unbelief, you are committing the greatest sin of all. You are turning away from a God who loves you and died for you. There is no other sin equal to that.
OUTLINE
I. Personal—The Prophet and His Faithless Wife, Gomer, Chapters 1–3
A. Marriage of Hosea and Gomer, the Harlot, Chapter 1
B. Gomer Proves Faithless; Israel Proves Faithless; God Proves Faithful, Chapter 2
C. Hosea Commanded to Take Gomer Again, Chapter 3
II. Prophetic—The Lord and the Faithless Nation Israel, Chapters 4–14
A. Israel Plays the Harlot, Chapters 4–5
1. Israel Guilty of Lawlessness, Immorality, Ignorance of God’s Word, and Idolatry, Chapter 4
2. Israel Turns from God; God Turns from Israel; Deterioration within Follows, Chapter 5
B. Israel (Ephraim) Will Return in the Last Days; Presently to Be Judged for Current Sins, Chapter 6
C. Israel (Ephraim) Could Escape Judgment by Turning to God Who Loves Her (Key: 11:8), Chapters 7–12
1. Israel (Silly Dove) Turns to Egypt and Assyria, Chapter 7
2. Israel Turns to Golden Calves and Altars of Sin, Chapter 8
3. Israel (Backsliding Heifer) Turns to Land Productivity; Will Be Driven from Land, Chapters 9–10
4. Israel Turns from God—Must Be Judged; God Will Not Give up on Her, Chapters 11–12
D. Israel (Ephraim) Will Turn from Idols to God in Last Days, Chapters 13–14
1. Israel Will Be Judged in the Present, Chapter 13
2. Israel Will Be Saved in the Future, Chapter 14
CHAPTER 1
Theme: The marriage of Hosea and Gomer, the harlot
When we come to the prophecy of Hosea, we are coming to one of the great books of the Bible and to a man who was a remarkable prophet. I personally do not like the classification of the prophets as Major and Minor. Every one of these men, whether they wrote a long prophecy or not, was an outstanding man. You wouldn’t call Elijah a minor prophet simply because he never wrote a prophecy, would you? And John the Baptist, the last of the prophets, never wrote anything; yet he was a prophet of God and announced the coming of the Savior.
The prophets were not grouped as Major and Minor in the Hebrew Bible. They were arranged as we have them by the church around the third century. If I could have had my way in the arrangement of the books of the Bible, I would have placed each prophet with the historical book to which it corresponds. You will notice that the messages of nearly all the writing prophets belong to the period of the divided kingdom. When the kings failed, God then raised up prophets to speak to the nation.
Chronologically, therefore, the prophecy of Hosea belongs before Jeremiah. Hosea was contemporary with Isaiah, Micah, and his compatriot, Amos, in the northern kingdom. Hosea and Amos were prophets in the northern kingdom, Isaiah and Micah in the southern kingdom.
Hosea compares in many respects to Jeremiah. Jeremiah was the last prophet before the southern kingdom went into captivity; but more than a hundred years before that, Hosea was a Prophet in the northern kingdom. He, like Jeremiah, warned the nation of its impending captivity. Both men spoke out of a heartbreaking personal experience, although Jeremiah’s was more public. Hosea’s experience was in the home while Jeremiah’s was in the nation. Jeremiah loved his nation, and it broke his heart to give them such a harsh message, but God chose a very tenderhearted man for the job. Perhaps Hosea was not as tenderhearted as Jeremiah, but we will see that he came from the experience of a broken home with a broken heart. His wife was unfaithful to him and became a harlot. He loved her so much that he went back and took her again. And again she played the harlot. Coming from this experience, this man walked out before the nation Israel, with hot tears streaming down his cheeks, and said, “I want to tell you how God feels about you, because I feel the same way. I have had a personal experience in my own home.” Because this man’s heart had been broken, he could speak God’s message to his nation.
In the first three chapters of Hosea we have that which is personal, the story of the prophet and his faithless wife, Gomer. We have here the scandal of his home and the gossip of the town.
THE MARRIAGE OF HOSEA AND GOMER, THE HARLOT
The word of the Lord that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel [Hos. 1:1].
“Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah”—these were the kings in the south at this particular time.
“Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel”—there couldn’t have been a worse king than this king of the northern kingdom.
The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord [Hos. 1:2].
What the Lord says to the prophet is a rather startling thing, and many interpreters do not take Him literally. I highly recommend The Scofield Reference Bible, and I use the older edition a great deal. Some folk feel that those of us who recommend this Bible believe its notes are inspired. I do not believe they are inspired, and the first note given for this verse in The New Scofield Reference Bible is one that I totally disagree with. It reads: “God did not command Hosea to take an immoral wife but permitted him to carry out his desire to marry Gomer, warning him that she would be unfaithful, and using the prophet’s sad experience as a basis for the presentation of lessons about God’s relation to Israel.” I consider this a very nice way to get God off the hook, but you do not have to get Him off the hook—He takes full responsibility for this.
The way that I understand this verse is that God said to Hosea, “Go.” When my parents said that to me as a boy—“Go to the store,” or “Go to school”—I always interpreted that as a command. When God said to Hosea, “Go,” He was not just granting him permission to marry Gomer; it was a command to do so. Hosea probably was a young man, probably living in the Ephraim country of the northern kingdom. He met this beautiful girl and fell madly in love with her, and then she played the harlot. Naturally he wanted to put her aside. He might have wanted to marry her, but he wouldn’t dare do that in a little town—and the Mosaic Law said to stone her. What is he going to do? God said, “Go and marry her.” God is actually asking him to break the Mosaic Law. Someone will say, “That’s terrible.” Not when God tells you to do it, my friend. God said to him, “Hosea, you were in love with her, and now you want to put her aside. I don’t want you to put her aside; I want you to marry her. She is a wife of harlotry and child of harlotry.” Apparently there was a record of unfaithfulness in her family.
Here at the very beginning, the Lord makes clear to Hosea how He is going to use this experience in the prophet’s life. He said, “For the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord.” He is comparing that which is physical harlotry or adultery to that which is spiritual harlotry or adultery.
This is applicable to the believer today. You can play fast and loose with God, and you are nothing in the world but a harlot, a spiritual harlot, in His sight. That is exactly the language He uses here, and God uses pretty plain language. I wish the pulpit today were a little stronger than it is. We all are trying to be very nice and, as a result, we sometimes do not speak as strongly as the Word of God does.
So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which conceived, and bare him a son.
And the Lord said unto him, Call his name Jezreel; for yet a little while, and I will avenge the blood of Jezreel upon the house of Jehu, and will cause to cease the kingdom of the house of Israel.
And it shall come to pass at that day, that I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel [Hos. 1:3–5].
Not only the marriage but also the children are going to present a real spiritual lesson for the nation Israel. (Remember that Isaiah’s children also had a spiritual message for the nation.) Jezreel is the name of the son; it means “God will scatter.” God says, “I will avenge the blood of Jezreel.” Jezreel is the name of a city and also of a famous plain, the plain of Armageddon, or the Valley of Esdraelon. It has a long, bloody history and will have a similar future as the place where the last war will end. God is saying here that He is going to scatter the northern kingdom.
And she conceived again, and bare a daughter. And God said unto him, Call her name Lo-ruhamah: for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away [Hos. 1:6].
God named her Lo-ruhamah, which means that she “never knew a father’s pity.” As I indicated previously, it was not that she was an orphan, but she did not know who her father was. This reveals the scandal in the home of Hosea! God is saying through this circumstance to the people of the northern kingdom who had gone into idolatry, “You will not know My pity, for I am not your Father.”
There has always been the question as to the possibility of a person stepping over a line—that is, sinking so low in sin that the grace of God cannot reach him. While I do not believe that you could ever get to a place where God by His grace could not save you, I do believe that if you persist in rejecting God’s grace and mercy, the day will come when you will step over that line. This does not mean the grace of God cannot reach you, but it does mean that there will be nothing in you that the grace of God can lay hold of.
Let me illustrate this with the story of a man I met when I first came to Pasadena, California, as a pastor in 1940. His wife wanted me to visit him in his home because he was sick and dying. She asked me to present the gospel to him, and I did. He was a very polite man, and he listened to me. Then he said, “I would say, ‘Yes, I will accept Christ as my Savior’—in fact, I am going to do it. But I want to tell you this: I have played and trifled with God all my life. I have been down to an altar twenty-five times. I have made promises to Him and then turned from Him, and I have never been sincere. Honestly, I cannot tell you right now whether I am sincere or not.” All I could do at his funeral as I looked down at him was to say under my breath, “Oh, God, I hope he was sincere. I hope he really meant it. I hope Your grace reached down and touched him.”
You can trifle with God too long. The nation Israel did, and the day came when God said, “I will no longer have mercy on you.”
But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by the Lord their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen [Hos. 1:7].
“However,” God said, “I am not ready yet to judge the house of Judah.” Why will He spare Judah and not Israel? For the sake of David. God had said that for the sake of David He would not divide the kingdom under the rule of Solomon. Again and again He said that for the sake of David He would save the southern kingdom. Someone may want to criticize this and say that it is not fair. I don’t know whether it is fair or not, but I thank God that He showed mercy to me, that He was patient and continued to show mercy. And He continues to do so even today.
“And will save them by the Lord their God, and will not save them by bow, nor by sword, nor by battle, by horses, nor by horsemen.” In effect, God says, “I am not going to save them by the fact that they have phantom jets and atom bombs. I am not going to save them by the means of arms.” If you read 2 Kings 19 and Isaiah 37, you will learn how God miraculously delivered the people of the southern kingdom at this time. But He did not deliver the northern kingdom.
Now when she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she conceived, and bare a son [Hos. 1:8].
In that country they take about two to three years to wean a child. When Lo-ruhamah was weaned, Gomer had another son.
Then said God, Call his name Lo-ammi: for ye are not my people, and I will not be your God [Hos. 1:9].
The third child was Lo-ammi, which means “not my people.” If you put this in the singular, it would mean “not my child.” There was a question about the second child; there is no question about this one. And God is saying to the nation Israel, “Ye are not my people, and I will not be your God.” If this were the only verse in the Bible, I would have to agree with the amillennialists who say that God is through dealing with the nation Israel. All of us—including many of my premillennial brethren—need to be very careful not to reach into the Bible and pull out a verse here or there and say that it is being fulfilled. If the entire prophecy of Hosea is read, no one can convincingly argue that God is through with the nation Israel. The next verse makes this very clear—
Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God [Hos. 1:10].
“Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered.” The Hebrew people have been decimated again and again by persecution—think of what Hitler did! Yet here is a marvelous prophecy that God is going to increase their number.
“And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God.” In that day there will be a great turning to God. God is not through with Israel—that is clear when you read the entire Word of God.
Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head, and they shall come up out of the land: for great shall be the day of Jezreel [Hos. 1:11].
“Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together.” The nation shall come together. There are no “ten lost tribes of Israel,” by the way.
“And appoint themselves one head.” They don’t have that today—they are not all in agreement with their leadership. The “one head” referred to in Hosea’s prophecy is the Messiah, of course.
“And they shall come up out of the land: for great shall be the day of Jezreel”—what a wonderful prophecy this is. However, I disagree with the viewpoint that the present return to Israel is a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. We shall deal with that in greater detail as we go through the Book of Hosea.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Gomer proves faithless; Israel proves faithless; God proves faithful
This chapter opens with the fifth very remarkable prophecy concerning the nation Israel. In the last two verses of the preceding chapter we saw that (1) Israel will experience a great increase in population; (2) in the nation there will be a great turning to God; (3) the northern and southern kingdoms will reunite so that the twelve tribes will again form a single nation; (4) they will appoint themselves one head, who will be the Messiah; and (5)—
Say ye unto your brethren, Ammi; and to your sisters, Ruhamah [Hos. 2:1].
Ammi means “my people,” and Ruhamah means “pitied.” God is saying to the nation that the day is coming when He is going to say, “You are My people.” My friend, God is not through with the nation Israel, as we will see in chapter 3. This is very important to understand. Those who teach that God is through with Israel either spiritualize or discount a great deal of the Old Testament. If you can strip the Old Testament of its literal meaning, that gives you the liberty to do the same to the New Testament. Do you want to rob the Epistle of Romans and even John 3:16 of their literal meaning? You cannot do that with the New Testament, and I don’t believe you can do it with the Old Testament either.
Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts [Hos. 2:2].
“Plead” carries the thought of a great contention, because Israel like Gomer was unfaithful and went back to practicing prostitution. God is applying Gomer’s sin to the nation. Hosea married a girl who had become a harlot, and, even after they had been married for some time and had three children, she went back to prostitution again. And all the while this man Hosea loved her! The greatest sin in all the world is not murder or theft or lying or possibly, under certain circumstances, adultery. But judging from what Scripture teaches, the worst sin one can commit is to become unfaithful to one who loves you.
Applying this to our own lives, what is the greatest sin a Christian can commit? Many people feel that it is murder or lying or even coveting, but the greatest sin is unfaithfulness to God who has redeemed you and who loves you. There is no sin greater than that, my friend.
God says, “Go to your mother and contend with her. Tell her to come back to Me. Tell her to turn away from her idolatries.”
Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst [Hos. 2:3].
If she does not repent, God will judge her.
Regarding Hosea, the implication is that he was not quite as tenderhearted as the prophet Jeremiah was. I imagine he said, “I intend to have her stoned if she continues this kind of life—I have no alternative.”
And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms [Hos. 2:4].
“And I will not have mercy upon her children.” God is applying the sin of the nation to the individuals who compose the nation. They are illegitimate children, and God will judge them. At this time in Israel’s history apparently the entire nation had turned to idolatry. God says that He will not have mercy on the children of Israel, for they are the children of harlotry.
For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink [Hos. 2:5].
She is doing it for money! There is money in prostitution—it is one of the big rackets in our day also. This may imply that Hosea was not a wealthy man and was not able to provide the luxuries which Gomer wanted; so she practiced harlotry on the side.
Israel’s sin was the same: she had turned to idols, which was spiritual adultery. The people of Israel were giving the idols credit for providing for them. “I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water”—those are the necessities; “my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink”—those are the luxuries. And all the while it was her loving God who was providing all these things for her.
Oh, the ingratitude of the human race—and especially professing Christians—for all that God has provided! I hear a great deal of complaining about rising prices today. If you are one of those who are complaining, let me ask you something: You had at least one good meal today, didn’t you? You have clothing in your closet, haven’t you? Perhaps you even have some luxuries. Who do you think provided these? “Well,” you may say, “I am an intelligent, hard-working person; I provided them for myself.” I have news for you: God has provided all of those material things for you. He is the one who gave you intelligence. He is the one who gave you a measure of health and strength, and He is the one who provided the job for you. In fact, He is the one who created this earth with a well-stocked pantry and with clean air and clean water and sunshine. And yet you are ungrateful. You can’t sin much worse than that, my friend. It is true that we live in a day when terrible crimes are being committed—stealing, lying, murdering—but the worst sins are being committed by the children of God who are ungrateful. I realize this is not a popular thing to say, but here in the Book of Hosea, this is His charge against Israel.
Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths [Hos. 2:6].
And it is my opinion that it was God who sent the depression to my country, then the “dust bowl.” I think He was speaking to us in judgment. If we had repented and had heard God at that time, we would never have had to fight World War II. We would not have been involved in warfare in Korea and then in Vietnam. If we had been sending our boys over there as missionaries to give those people the gospel, we would not have had to send our boys over there to die or to suffer in the prison camps. Back of all our problems is the big problem that we are not recognizing God.
And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them: then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now [Hos. 2:7].
There comes a day when that girl who has become a harlot is no longer beautiful and her lovers lose interest in her. She finds herself being put out. This was exactly what was happening to the nation Israel. The people were saying, “Now we will go back to God.”
For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal.
Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given to cover her nakedness [Hos. 2:8–9].
God says that He will judge Israel. I think we can apply the same thing to our own nation. We entered into difficult times beginning in World War I because we thought we were such a sophisticated nation. We have become so sophisticated that we think homosexuality should be considered normal in our society. We don’t like to punish murderers anymore; we would rather accept them into our society. God calls murder and homosexuality sin, and He says that, when these things become prevalent in a nation, it is a sign that the nation is going down the tube. We have too many judges who know a great deal about the law but know nothing about how God overrules even the laws of a nation, especially when the laws are wrong and the wrong men sit on the benches of our judicial system.
And now will I discover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of mine hand.
I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, her new moons, and her sabbaths, and all her solemn feasts.
And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me: and I will make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them.
And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them, and she decked herself with her earrings and her jewels, and she went after her lovers, and forgat me, saith the Lord [Hos. 2:10–13].
The greatest sin in all the world is to forget God.
Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her.
And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt [Hos. 2:14–15].
The valley of Achor literally means “the valley of trouble.” It refers to the incident recorded in Joshua 7. You will recall that when the children of Israel entered the Promised Land, they faced three major enemies in the center of that land who had to be conquered first so that Joshua could divide the enemy and then concentrate on taking one section at a time. The first enemy was Jericho; Jericho represents the world, and God got the victory for them at Jericho. Next they made an attack upon Ai, and they thought it would be an easy victory because Ai was a small city. Ai represents the flesh, and a great many people think they can live the Christian life in their own strength; that is, by means of the flesh—which always means defeat. Joshua was defeated at Ai, but a great lesson was learned there. God had instructed the men not to take any of the unclean things at the destruction of Jericho, but one man disobeyed. As a result, the army suffered a great defeat at Ai.
Joshua went down upon his face and cried out to God. He was as pious as I have been at times, complaining to the Lord. The Lord said to him, “Get up off your face. Israel has sinned. You must deal with the sin before you can have a victory.” So they had to ferret out the one who had sinned and finally found him to be Achan. Achan and his property were taken to the Valley of Achor where they were destroyed and buried. From then on it was victory for Israel under General Joshua. And, friend, when you and I deal with the sins of the flesh, we will have victory in the Christian life.
“And the valley of Achor for a door of hope.” In effect, God is saying, “I’ll judge your sin, and after I have judged your sin, there will be a glorious, wonderful hope for you in the future.”
“And she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.” My friend, even today in the land of Israel, you don’t find it quite like this. Although Israel is back in her land, this particular area is up near Shechem—near the place where Joseph is buried—an area characterized by Arab/Israeli conflict and not by singing. The fulfillment of this promise is still future. The day is going to come when God will bless them there.
And it shall be at that day, saith the Lord, that thou shalt call me Ishi; and shalt call me no more Baali [Hos. 2:16].
This is interesting, and the meaning of it is quite lovely. Ishi means “my husband,” and Baali is connected with Baal and means “my lord or my master.” You see, the people of Israel were placing the true God on the level of Baal and were trying to worship both. Of course, it is impossible to do that, and God says to them that the day is coming when Israel will call Him, “my husband.”
Now let’s think about this for a moment. The husband relationship implies that which is intimate and personal and is based on love. It is the highest relationship in the human family. The loveliest expression of it is found in the Song of Solomon where the bride says, “I am my beloved’s, and my beloved is mine …” (Song 6:3).
When you have that relationship in a marriage, you have a happy home. You won’t have to attend seminars that instruct you on how to live as man and wife. The secret is love; when you don’t have that, you don’t have anything. But if you have love, you have everything. You can work out your financial problems; you can adjust your personality conflicts; you can work together in dealing with your children if you love each other. However, if you don’t love each other, you can’t work out anything.
My friend, it is wonderful to have that kind of relationship with God. We can go to the Lord Jesus and say, “I love You. I belong to You.” When that kind of relationship exists, Paul says, “… For all things are yours; Whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; And ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s” (1 Cor. 3:21–23). Can you call Christ yours? Do you belong to Him, and does He belong to you? If He does, then you have something good going. There is no relationship equal to that. And one day Israel will say to God, “You are my husband.”
“And shalt call me no more Baali.” As we have seen, Baali is connected with the hideous idol Baal, and means “my lord”—that is all it means. Remember that the Lord Jesus said, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matt. 7:21–23). Oh, my friend, the all-important thing is a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ—it is not to mouth platitudes about His being your Lord and claim to be doing great things for Him. It narrows down to the thing He said to Simon Peter by the Sea of Galilee, “Lovest thou me?” Do you love Him?
For I will take away the names of Baalim out of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered by their name [Hos. 2:17].
Even the name of Baal will be forgotten. They will turn from idolatry.
And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely [Hos. 2:18].
In that land, as in our own land, there is a danger of many species of animals becoming extinct—some already have. God created the animals and placed them here. They have a right to this world, and in that future day He will make a covenant with them. In that day, which we designate as the Millennium, the lion and the lamb will lie down together. In our day when they lie down together, the lamb is always inside the lion, but in the Millennium they will lie down together in peace. As I am writing, there is a new interest in ecology and in the preservation of animal life. Have you ever noticed that all through the Bible God has considered the animals? Also He has considered the land itself and speaks of blessing the land. It is man who is the polluter. Man is a sinner on the inside, and he is also a sinner on the outside. He contaminates everything he touches. I recall a drive home from the Mojave Desert when the rays of the setting sun were hitting the road at an angle, and lining both sides of the road were beams and flashes of light. I have never seen anything like it. Do you know what it was? It was the broken beer bottles and whiskey bottles and perhaps a few soft drink bottles reflecting those rays of the sun! Man is a polluter everywhere he goes. Well, God says that He is going to take care of this earth. I thank God for that, because I don’t think man will be able to do it.
And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies.
I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the Lord [Hos. 2:19–20].
We are seeing something very wonderful here. The word betrothed means literally to “woo a virgin”; it means to court a girl. If you are a married man, you can remember when your wife was a girl, and how pretty she was and how you courted her. You said a lot of sweet things then. One evening some time ago my wife and I were sitting out on the patio. I was recuperating from surgery, and we were just talking about the fact that we are getting old. I took a look at her, and I would have to say that she is getting old like I am, but I can remember that girl I first saw down in Texas with her hair as black as a raven’s wing and those flashing brown eyes. She had a sultry look, let me tell you, because her complexion is dark. As we remembered those wonderful days, we got just a little sentimental. We talked about the times when we used to drive up to Fort Worth to eat in a restaurant there. We ordered steaks and do you know what we paid for a steak in that day? It was fifty cents apiece! She was a school teacher, and I was a poor preacher; so I made her pay for her own—even at fifty cents! I’ve tried to make up for that through the years since then, I can assure you. To woo a virgin is a wonderful experience. That is what God said He would do to Israel. What a beautiful, lovely picture this is. God says, “I intend to win you for Myself”
How is God going to do this? He says, “I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies.” You see, there was mercy under the Mosaic system, too. You will find that there was love in law just as there is law in love. You cannot completely segregate one from the other.
This is another reason why I do not think the present return of Israel to their land is a fulfillment of prophecy. It certainly does not fulfill this one. God says that when He woos Israel and brings her back into the land it will be in righteousness and in justice and in lovingkindness and in mercies. Today Israel is just like any other nation. Some think they are unnecessarily brutal, but they are on the defensive and their survival depends on a strong defense system. They are not back in the land of Israel in fulfillment of prophecy. Although they have returned to the land, they have not returned to the Lord. When they do return to the Lord, there will be blessing.
“I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness.” They never were faithful in the past. In fact, they are very much like the apostate church in our day.
“And thou shalt know the Lord.” They certainly do not know Him today.
And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith the Lord, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth [Hos. 2:21].
“In that day” is a technical expression which refers to the last days as they pertain to the nation Israel, the Great Tribulation Period, and the coming of Christ to set up His kingdom on earth.
“I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth”—heaven and earth will be in tune.
And the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel [Hos. 2:22].
“Jezreel” means that God will scatter or sow them, but in that future day God will regather them.
And I will sow her unto me in the earth; and I will have mercy upon her that had not obtained mercy; and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my God [Hos. 2:23].
These final two verses are a play upon the names of Gomer’s children. Not only will God regather them, but they will no longer be Lo-ruhamah, like the unpitied daughter of harlotry. God will have mercy upon them. In our day Israel is Lo-ammi—“not my people,” but in that future day God will say, “You are My people,” and they will say, “You are my God.” My friend, they are not saying that today; they are not turning to God. This is a prophecy for the Millennium.
CHAPTER 3
Theme: Hosea commanded to take Gomer again
Although Hosea finds out that his wife has proved unfaithful, he is commanded to go and take Gomer again.
Then said the Lord unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine [Hos. 3:1].
“Go yet, love a woman”—that is, love your wife; she is your woman. “Beloved of her friend”—Hosea loved her although she had been unfaithful.
“Yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine.” “Flagons of wine” should actually be translated as “cakes of raisins.” This is a reference to the cakes of raisins which were used in the sacrificial feasts of the Canaanites. They were a part of the heathen worship of idols, which the children of Israel had adopted. You see that God is making an application here. In effect He says to Hosea, “Now you know how I feel. I want you to go and take Gomer again. She’s been unfaithful to you, but you are to love her and take her back. That is what I am going to do with My people. Israel has been unfaithful to Me, and I am going to punish her, but some day I will bring her back to Myself.”
So I bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and for an homer of barley, and an half homer of barley [Hos. 3:2].
Perhaps Gomer had sold herself to some group of racketeers who were running brothels in that land. Hosea had to go buy her back. “So I bought her to me.”
Do you know that you and I have been redeemed? The picture here is not very pretty—that is the reason it is not being preached more today. We hear a great deal in conservative circles about dedication, about commitment, and about turning your life over to the Lord. But, my friend, the first thing you need to do is to come as a sinner to God—He has to redeem you. Just as Hosea bought this harlot, that is the way God redeemed us. Until you and I see that, we can know nothing of real commitment to God.
“So I bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and for an homer of barley, and an half homer of barley.” Gomer wasn’t worth it, and we are not worth the redemption price which was paid for us. “Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold hellip; But with the precious blood of Christ …” (1 Pet. 1:18–19). He had to shed His blood; He had to suffer and die that you and I might be redeemed. Why? Because we were lost sinners, sold under sin.
I have a friend who is a great preacher, but he has gotten to the place where he no longer mentions the gospel. He does not mention the fact that a man must come to God as a sinner. Oh, he tells people, “You ought to love Jesus. You ought to serve God and obey Him,” and all that sort of thing. But, my friend, that is not where you begin. You might as well go out to a graveyard and say, “Listen, fellas and girls, let’s all start doing better. Let’s all start committing our lives to the Lord.” Why, everybody out there is dead! They can’t do anything. And until we have come to God for salvation, you and I are dead in trespasses and sins. We have no life to commit to Him. Until the sin issue is settled—until we are born again and have received a new nature—we can do nothing that is pleasing to God.
And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be for another man: so will I also be for thee [Hos. 3:3].
A man told me the sad story not long ago of how he had found out that his wife was unfaithful to him. He had actually had her followed by a detective to establish the facts. Imagine the feeling of that man! Oh, what a heartbreak it was to find out that she was unfaithful to him. I cannot think of anything worse than that. And God says to His people, “That is what you have been doing. You’ve been playing the harlot. Oh, you call Me, ‘Lord,’ but you have gone after other gods, you have turned from Me and no longer serve Me.”
The Lord Jesus also said in Matthew 7:22–23, “Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you ….” Now I am going to say perhaps the strongest thing you have ever heard: If a so-called church has a man in the pulpit who denies the Word of God, denies the deity of Christ, and denies that He died for sinners, it is not a church. It is a brothel—a spiritual brothel! I didn’t say that; God says that right here. This is the strongest language you can imagine, and you can understand why Hosea was not elected “Man of the Year” in Israel at that particular time. He didn’t win any popularity contest in his hometown, you can be sure. He is telling his people, “You have become a brothel as a nation. You’ve turned to idolatry and have turned from the living and true God.”
Verses 4–5 of this chapter are probably two of the most important prophetic verses which supply an answer to those students of prophecy who have begun to set dates for the coming of the Lord. Although this is a brief chapter, having only five verses, it is one of the great prophetic passages in the Word of God. Dr. Charles Feinberg, a Jewish believer and an outstanding Hebrew scholar, says of this chapter, “It rightfully takes its place among the greatest prophetic pronouncements in the whole revelation of God.”
In connection with this passage, you ought to read chapters 9–11 of the Epistle to the Romans. I consider those chapters to be the dispensational section of the epistle which concerns the nation Israel. In chapter 9 you have the past dealings of God with Israel, in chapter 10 His present dealings with Israel, and in chapter 11 His future dealings with them.
Now concerning Israel, Hosea writes—
For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim [Hos. 3:4].
“For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king.” You will notice that He does not give a specific number of days. This is unusual because the children of Israel were told three times that they were to be put out of their land and they would be returned three times. Each time God put them out of that land, He told them how long they would be out—except the last time. The first time, God told Abraham, “I am going to give you this land—it’s yours, but I am going to put your children out of this land for 430 years. They will be down in the land of Egypt, and after 430 years, I will bring them back.” They did come back—that prophecy was literally fulfilled. A second time, God said through Jeremiah, “Because of your sins, you are going to be sent into captivity in Babylon. You are going to be down there for seventy years.” Again, that was fulfilled literally. Now, here Hosea is speaking to the northern kingdom (which never actually returned to the land), and he says, “Israel shall abide many days without a king.”
How long is “many days”? Right now we have some folk who are saying that the Lord Jesus is going to come again by a.d. 2000. I do not know where they find that in Scripture! They sound as if they have a private line into heaven! And at least one other to whom I have listened says that the generation living today is the one that is going to see the coming of Christ. May I say, that sounds good to a lot of untaught Christians, but you cannot find such teaching in the Word of God. Nowhere does Scripture tell us how long the time will be until His return. We have a lot of sensational prophecy-mongers about today.
Why did the Lord say “many days” and not give us the specific number? It is because in the interval between the time Israel left the land in a.d. 70 and the time at which they will return, He has been calling out a people to His name from among the Gentiles and has been building His church. I want to say first of all that I believe we are living in the last days. Someone will say, “Do you mean then that the Lord will be coming soon?” Well, I do not know how soon because we have been in the “last days” for more than nineteen hundred years. The Lord Jesus said, “Behold, I come quickly …” (Rev. 3:11; 22:7), and that was nineteen hundred years ago. Therefore I am not prepared to say He will come tomorrow or next week or next year or even in this century. I just don’t happen to know that. But I do believe we are seeing the setting of the stage, and the action will begin when the church is removed from this earth.
The reason the date is not given here in Hosea is that in Scripture the church is nameless and dateless. We who belong to the true church are a heavenly people, having no name. I suppose some of you folk thought the name of the church was Baptist or Presbyterian or Methodist or Christian or even Independent. I have news for you: the church has no name; Scripture has never given it a name. The Greek word ecclesia simply means “a called-out body.” He is calling out a body today which is going to be His bride. I could make a suggestion today for a name for the church. In the parable of the pearl of great price (see Matt. 13:45–46), the pearl represents the church which the merchantman, Jesus, came and bought. He paid a big price for the church, you know. The word for pearl is margarites. If the church is to have any name at all, I think it should be Margaret. Have you ever heard of the Margaret Church? One time I told a fellow that I went to the Margaret Church; he thought I was kidding, but I really was serious about it.
The church is nameless, and it is also dateless. If you had met Simon Peter an hour before the Holy Spirit came on the Day of Pentecost and you had asked him, “Do you know what’s going to happen here in a little while?” he would have said, “No. What’s going to happen?” He didn’t know, because the birth of the church had been announced, but no date had been given. And we are not given the date of the Rapture, the time when the church will be removed from this earth. For that reason we are told “the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king”—no specific time period is given to us.
Israel is going to abide many days “without a king.” There are those in that land today who claim that they can tell you the tribe to which they belong. I have serious doubts about that, but they make that claim. However, there is no Israelite living today who can say, “I am in the line of David, and I have a right to the throne of David.” The only One who can claim that is this moment sitting at God’s right hand. He is the Lord Jesus, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Israel has rejected their King.
“Without a prince”—they have no one to succeed to the throne. If the Lord Jesus Christ is not their Messiah, they have none and have no prospect for one.
“Without a sacrifice.” Luke 21:24 tells us that “… Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.” Therefore, many people argue that we must be to the end of the “times of the Gentiles” because Israel now has Jerusalem. Do they really have Jerusalem today? All of the holy places in old Jerusalem are in the hands of either the Moslems, the Russian Catholics, the Greek Catholics, the Armenian Church, or the Roman Catholics. And all of them have built cathedrals or churches over these spots. Israel does not possess these sacred spots, and they dare not touch them. I said once to a Jewish guide with whom I had become acquainted, “You have Jerusalem now. Why don’t you go and tear down that Mosque of Omar and put up your own temple?” He said, “What do you want us to do—start World War III?” That would surely start it, my friend—you can be sure of that. Israel does not possess that temple area, and they do not have a sacrifice today. The only holy place they have is the Wailing Wall—they are still at the Wailing Wall. They have no sacrifice except the one which you and I have—Jesus. He died nineteen hundred years ago outside the city, was raised from the dead, and is today at God’s right hand.
“Without an image.” God did not give Israel any images. He had said to them, “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing …” (Exod. 20:4). But He had given them many things; for instance, “an ephod” and “a teraphim.” The ephod was the sacred garment worn by the high priest. Teraphim were small objects which they carried around like good luck charms and which they began to worship. God says here that they are going to get away from idolatry, that they will not have any images. That is one thing that you can say about Israel today—they are not in idolatry. Although they have not turned to God, they certainly have turned away from idolatry.
Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days [Hos. 3:5].
“Afterward shall the children of Israel return.” Afterward does not mean in the year a.d. 2000. I do not know when it will be, but they are going to return to the land according to God’s timetable.
When they do return, this is the way they will return: they shall “seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days.” I am going to say something that may be very startling to you. They have returned to that land, and it is remarkable what has happened over there, but it is not the fulfillment of this prophecy. The prophecy says that when they return, they will return to God, and there is no real turning to God in that land. It is the belief of at least two outstanding prophetic students whom I know, that Israel may be put out of that land again before we have the real fulfillment of this prophecy. When they return to the land, they will also return to God.
There is much evidence that Israel has not turned to the Lord. When they celebrated their twentieth anniversary as a nation some years ago, they displayed a large motto which read, “Science will bring peace to this land.” The Scriptures say it is the Messiah who is going to bring peace. They are not turning to the Messiah but to science. They are looking to prosperity and depending upon economics. Some time ago they had a large economic conference which was attended by one of the Rockefellers and one of the Fords. There were a hundred outstanding men there who each put up a million dollars to invest in that land. They are building over there like I have never seen anywhere else.
A very reputable missionary in Israel was specifically asked this question: “How many true Christians are there in this land today?” This missionary is an intelligent man who speaks several languages. He was a professor who became a Christian and is doing missionary work there. He gave this reply: “Today in Israel there are fewer than three hundred Israelites who are real believers in Christ.” I know that that statement may cause a great deal of discussion and disagreement because there are those who are saying that hundreds are turning to Christ in that land. That just does not happen to be true. There are actually more Arab Christians in Israel than Jewish Christians. Missionary work in Israel is really a tough job, and there are very few missionaries in that land. Israel has not returned to God.
I know when I insist that this present return to the land is not the fulfillment of the Word of God, it is contrary to what you hear so often today. However, this prophecy is evidence of that fact; and, when we consider the whole of the Word of God and not just a verse here and there, we must face up to the fact that this return is not a fulfillment of prophecy.
Many ridiculous things result when people take a verse here or there and say that what is happening in Israel is a fulfillment of prophecy. We heard some time ago that they were shipping Indiana stone over to Israel to build the temple. If you have been to Jerusalem, you know that one thing they do not need is stone! Jerusalem is located on a rocky place and every hill around it, including the Mount of Olives, is loaded with rocks. Now, if Indiana wants to buy some stone, I could tell them where to get it: Israel would be glad to export some of her stone.
Another example of so-called fulfilled prophecy is the argument that the growing of oranges in Israel is a fulfillment of the “strange slips” which Isaiah said would grow in that land (see Isa. 17:10). However, in the Song of Solomon where it speaks of the apples and the apple tree, that is actually the orange tree. Oranges grow in that land, and it is the belief of some that oranges were taken from there to Spain and then to Florida and California. Israel is the land that grows oranges, and they are not a “strange slip.” How ridiculous these things can become! We need to stay close to the Word of God and not become one of these prophetic fanatics who are abroad today.
“And shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days.” “The latter days” are yet in the future. They refer to the nation Israel and to the time beginning with the Great Tribulation and going through the second coming of Christ and on into the Millennium.
CHAPTER 4
Theme: Israel guilty before God
From this point on in the Book of Hosea we will not be seeing much about the private and personal life of the prophet. Beginning actually with the two closing verses of the previous chapter, the private life of Hosea fades into the background, and the emphasis is now upon the Lord and the faithless nation of Israel which has been playing the harlot. We have left that section of the book which is personal, and in chapters 4–14 we will be dealing with that which is prophetic.
ISRAEL GUILTY BEFORE GOD
Out of the heartbreaking experience in his own home, Hosea now comes to speak to the nation—and he knows how God feels about them. Everything that has been said up to this point has been in the way of generalization. God has said, “They have sinned. They have played the harlot and been unfaithful to Me.” Now God is going to bring them into court, spell out certain charges against them, and prove those charges. The message of chapter 4 is that Israel is guilty of lawlessness, immorality, ignorance of God’s Word, and idolatry. We can compare this chapter with the first chapter of Isaiah in which Isaiah speaks to the southern kingdom, spelling out God’s charge against that nation.
I believe that you could interchange these same sins of Israel with the sins of our own nation. It is true that the nation Israel was God’s chosen people, and He gave the Mosaic Law to them. However, we need to understand this: the law is His pattern for any nation which wants to be blessed. Therefore, I think that our nation is guilty of the same sins that Israel was guilty of when God judged them and sent them into captivity. Someone will disagree with me and say, “Well, we’re not idolaters.” My friend, covetousness is idolatry, and I do not know of a nation that is more greedy and worships the almighty dollar more than this nation of ours today. We might read the Book of Hosea and point our finger at Israel and say, “It is a shame how they turned from God,” but we need to look around and see if the same thing is not true of us.
In the first verse of this chapter, the Lord confronts Israel with the fact that they have no knowledge of Him—
Hear the word of the Lord, ye children of Israel: for the Lord hath a controversy with the inhabitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land [Hos. 4:1].
He says three things here: there is no mercy; there is no truth; and there is no knowledge of God in the land. These people had become brainwashed through their idolatry. Although God had instructed them to be merciful, they were no longer showing mercy. The Lord had told them in Leviticus 19:10, “And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger: I am the Lord your God.” In other words, He said, “This is the way I take care of the poor, and you are to do this also.” Why? “Because I am the Lord your God, and I am a holy God.” The people had forgotten this—there was no knowledge of God in the land—and they were no longer being merciful. Oh, there was a great deal of religion, but no real knowledge of God.
Notice that they were breaking the Ten Commandments:
By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood [Hos. 4:2].
In each of these sins they were breaking the Ten Commandments. Read them in the twentieth chapter of Exodus: “Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness …” (Exod. 20:13–16). And all of this that they were doing was happening even among relatives—“blood toucheth blood.”
I want to say something very carefully, and I want you to follow me very carefully. God gave the Ten Commandments, which were only a part of the Mosaic system, to the nation Israel, but in them God expressed His will.
The church today is not under the Ten Commandments as the way of salvation or the way to live the Christian life, but that does not mean that we can break the commandments; it simply means that He has called us to a higher plane of living and has enabled us so to live by the power of the Holy Spirit.
However, since through the Ten Commandments God expresses His will, they are a pattern for the laws of every nation. The nation Israel, which He chose and dealt with, furnishes a pattern to the other nations of the world. We have a so-called Christian civilization in Europe today. It has never really been Christian but has had the semblance of Christianity because its laws were patterned after the Ten Commandments. These laws are the laws for all nations.
God has said, “Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery,” and there are other things which He has condemned in Scripture. God has condemned drunkenness, and He has condemned homosexuality. He uses the strongest language in speaking of homosexuality. God says that when a people or an individual indulges in that, He will give them up. God gave Israel up to captivity because they were guilty of indulging in these sins.
We in the United States today are guilty of the same thing: there is no knowledge of God in this land. Oh, I know that there seems to be a church on every corner and on Sunday mornings you can hear church bells everywhere, but a very small percentage of the population actually attends church, and very few are really being reached with the Word of God. There is a Gideon Bible in every hotel or motel room in which I stay, but I do not know how much they are being read. The Gideons report that they receive many letters telling of conversions—and I thank God for that—but I am afraid that many of the Bibles are never opened. My point is that, although we have the Bible freely available, we are actually a nation of Bible ignoramuses. We do not know the Word of God today in this land. For example, a political leader some time ago made the statement on television that the four Gospels contradict one another; he not only misquoted Scripture, he also misinterpreted it. I would have liked to demand equal time to answer him that there is no contradiction in the four Gospels. When a man makes a statement like that, he reveals a woeful ignorance of the Word of God.
The consumption of alcohol is another area in which our land is in the same condition as Israel was in that day. We were told a few years ago that there were 128 cocktail parties every day in Washington, D.C. With the trend as it is, I am sure that number has increased greatly. Whatever the actual statistics, we know that there is a great deal of drinking going on in our nation’s capital. Like Israel, we too are being brainwashed by liberal propaganda. A local newspaper in one large city in Southern California dared to publish an article a number of years ago with the following headline: “Alcoholics Cost Area Businesses Ten Million Dollars.” People cry out about the high cost of living, the high cost of war, and the high cost of government—all of which is true—but who is crying out against liquor today? We are told that millions of American workers are alcoholics. What do you suppose that has to do with the cost of what we buy at the store today? Someone may say, “Preacher, this is none of your business.” My friend, the pulpit has become extremely silent on these issues, but I must insist that our government and our nation are engaged in gross immorality and are breaking the Ten Commandments. And we will not get by with it as a nation. An alarming percentage of the deaths on U.S. highways and streets is the result of alcohol drinking. We have had much protest about the killing in war, but I have found no one leading a protest in front of a brewery or a cocktail lounge.
It is argued in our day that alcoholism is a disease and not a sin. That has been answered by a medical doctor, who writes:
Alcoholism, a disease? If so:
It is the only disease contracted by an act of will.
It is the only disease that is habit forming.
It is the only disease that comes in a bottle.
It is the only disease causing hundreds of thousands of family disruptions.
It is the only disease promoting crime and brutality.
It is the only disease contributing to hundreds of thousands of automobile accidents.
It is the only disease playing a major part in over 50 percent of the more than 50,000 annual highway deaths.
It is the only disease which is sold by license.
It is the only disease that is bought in grocery stores, drug stores, and well-marked retail outlets.
It is the only disease that is taxed by the government ….
Our eyes have been shut to all these facts because the liquor interests have tremendous control in our country, and we have been brainwashed by them. As a result, our nation sinks lower and lower.
We have what we call the “new morality” today, but it isn’t new at all. Israel was practicing it way back yonder in 700 b.c. They were breaking all the commandments, and God condemned them for it. It wasn’t even the “new” morality in their day, for homosexuality was practiced as far back as the day of Sodom and Gomorrah, cities which were judged by God and destroyed because of it. Today we have legislatures which are filled with men who are ignorant of the Word of God and ignorant of the commandments which have been basic for this nation, and they are passing legislation which condones the life style of sexual perverts.
The liberal church argues that homosexuals are not sinners, but may I say to you, Jesus Christ says to homosexuals, “You must be born again” (see John 3:7). He can deliver you from it. When homosexuality is treated for what it really is—sin—then God can deal with it.
We as a nation are doomed as much as Israel was condemned and sent into captivity. After all, they were God’s chosen people and we are not—by no stretch of the imagination can we make that claim. However, we have here in Hosea the basis on which God judges nations, and the United States stands condemned as did Israel. The pulpits in this country are strangely silent in this connection, and one reason for that is that they seldom if ever study the Book of Hosea; he is one of the forgotten prophets.
Therefore shall the land mourn, and every one that dwelleth therein shall languish, with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven; yea, the fishes of the sea also shall be taken away [Hos. 4:3].
“Therefore shall the land mourn.” Suddenly we have found in this country that we are polluting everything around us. But when I was a boy in southern Oklahoma, we used to go swimming in old Phillips Creek, and the water was so clear you could see twenty-five feet to the bottom of that creek. Today it smells to high heaven. We’ve polluted the land, and the land is mourning today.
Another interesting thing is that a few years ago there was plenty of everything—the granaries were filled with grain—but today we often hear about the scarcity of this or that. You see, when God judges a nation, the land itself is involved and even the beasts and fowls suffer because of the sin of man.
Yet let no man strive, nor reprove another: for thy people are as they that strive with the priest [Hos. 4:4].
The priest in that day was not doing his duty; he was not warning the people. Therefore, God raised up the prophets.
Therefore shalt thou fall in the day, and the prophet also shall fall with thee in the night, and I will destroy thy mother [Hos. 4:5].
“And I will destroy thy mother”—that is, God will destroy the nation. There were false prophets in Israel—even as we have false prophets today—telling the people, “Everything is going to be all right. We live in a new age. The Bible is an outmoded book, and the Ten Commandments belong to our grandfathers and grandmothers. We have learned to be broad-minded and tolerant.” My friend, the truth is that we are a dirty lot, and we have sunk very low as a nation and as a people.
Verse 6 is perhaps the most familiar verse in the Book of Hosea—
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children [Hos. 4:6].
“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” The background of their sin was a lack of knowledge of the Word of God. My friend, if you are a Christian, the minute you get away from the Word of God, you are doomed to failure in the Christian life. Regardless of the number of conferences or seminars you attend that tell you how to be a success in your home, in your business, and in your social life, you will be a failure. This book makes it crystal-clear that we do not live the Christian life by these little gimmicks and methods, but by a personal knowledge of the Word of God. This is the reason I am concerned with teaching the Word of God—and the reason I teach even the Book of Hosea. People are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
“Because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me.” God intended that the whole nation of Israel be priests unto Him; in the Millennium they will be that. But at this time, God says, “You are not even going to have priests.”
“Seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.” God says to the people of this nation, “I will forget you, because you have forgotten Me.” Because they have gone through a long, sordid history of departing from the Lord, they have now come to the time of judgment. God has proved His case against these people; in the beginning of the chapter He enumerated their sins—they have broken the Ten Commandments. Therefore He hands down His decision that He is going to judge them.
As they were increased, so they sinned against me: therefore will I change their glory into shame [Hos. 4:7].
God had promised Abraham to bless the nation by multiplying them, and the nation did increase, but all that it did was bring more sinners into the world. After all, that is what happened when I was born—another sinner came into the world. But, thank God, the grace of God reached down, and someone gave me the Word of God, and I was able to trust Christ as my Savior. However, these people were ignorant and had no knowledge of the Word of God.
“Therefore will I change their glory into shame.” Now the “glory” of Israel was the temple with the Shekinah glory upon it—His visible presence with the nation and His definite leading of them, and their witness of monotheism to the world of polytheism of their day as they worshiped the living and true God. That was their glory, and it brought the Queen of Sheba from the ends of the earth.
God is saying through Hosea, “I will remove My glory from you. I’ll remove My blessing from you, and I will judge you by letting the enemy come upon you and take you into captivity.”
Of course the enemy is going to be able to say, “Look, they said they were God’s chosen people, but look what is happening to them! Apparently their God is not a very strong God.” My friend, we are seeing today in this land of ours something very similar to that. God is judging many churches, and He is closing many doors. We are inclined to say, “Isn’t it a shame to see a decline in a certain church.” Well, maybe God is closing the door. We need to recognize that God can afford to judge His own people, and this is what He is doing.
They eat up the sin of my people, and they set their heart on their iniquity [Hos. 4:8].
The people not only sinned, but they liked to brag about it. As a young fellow I ran with a pretty fast crowd from the bank where I worked. Especially on Monday mornings we liked to brag about what we had done on our weekend, and the blacker the sin was, the more we enjoyed bragging about it. That is what these people were doing—“they set their heart on their iniquity.”
And there shall be, like people, like priest: and I will punish them for their ways, and reward them their doings [Hos. 4:9].
The unfortunate thing was that the priesthood in Israel had sunk down to the level of the congregation. When I started out in the ministry, I wore a Prince Albert coat and a wing collar (a friend of mine told me that I looked like a mule looking over a whitewashed fence!), but I soon gave that up and began to dress just like the man sitting out there in the pew. Although I’m no different from the man in the pew, I do want to give out the Word of God in the pulpit and not sink to the level of the man of the world when I’m out of the pulpit. There are many ministers who seek to be “good guys.” One man boasting of his pastor said, “You know, my preacher comes out to our golf club and plays golf with us.” That much sounds good. I think it is great to mix with folk like that. Then he added, “And after the game he goes into the barroom and has a drink with us. He is just one of the fellows. I sure do like him.” Well, I wonder what God thinks of him—“Like people, like priest: and I will punish them for their ways, and reward them their doings.”
For they shall eat, and not have enough: they shall commit whoredom, and shall not increase: because they have left off to take heed to the Lord [Hos. 4:10].
“For they shall eat, and not have enough”—in other words, famine is coming to the land. Who would have believed that we would ever hear anything about scarcities in this country—that there would ever be times when we could not buy meat or bread in the market—yet we have learned in recent years that such circumstances are a real possibility. Again may I say that I believe God judged this nation in the years of the depression and the “dust bowl,” but no one listened to Him. Then we had to fight World War II, and still we didn’t come back to God. We have had very little peace and a whole lot of troubles since then.
“They shall commit whoredom, and shall not increase.” I know what I am saying when I tell you that you can never, never enjoy the sexual relationship in the way in which God really wants you to enjoy it unless it is within the bonds of marriage. When you can put your arms around a woman whom you have been loving and can say to her, “I love you above everything else in the world,” then it is wonderful and there will be an increase. Otherwise, there is really no satisfaction in it; it is just a temporary sort of release, and you hate yourself afterward. I know that some of you know that, and God knows that—He is spelling that out for us here.
Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart [Hos. 4:11].
Part of our problems in Washington, D.C., today are caused by these two sins—harlotry or adultery and liquor. They are responsible for men lying and doing any number of crooked things. This is not confined to just one political party or group; the whole crowd is guilty. One writer said that in Washington you do not know whom to trust—what a sad commentary on our nation! Do not tell me that the “new” morality is working today. Itdidn’t work for Israel either when they got away from the Word of God and decided to try something new. In the northern kingdom they had sin galore. They put up two golden calves to replace God and practiced Baal worship which involved the grossest form of immorality.
My people ask counsel at their stocks, and their staff declareth unto them: for the spirit of whoredoms hath caused them to err, and they have gone awhoring from under their God [Hos. 4:12].
He is speaking here of the harlotry, the spiritual adultery, which is turning from God—they went to inquire of idols. Today we find people running after the gurus of India. One of the gurus who came to this country said very candidly that he had come for the money and that it was nothing in the world but a religious racket as far as he was concerned—yet people went after him! People are going off into all types of things today, including the worship of Satan. I have a newspaper clipping which reports that a group of Satan cultists tortured and beat a seventeen-year-old youth to death, believing he was an undercover narcotics agent. The worship of Satan today is certainly not helping the morality of our country. And in Israel, idolatry simply led them into gross immorality and finally to God’s judgment.
They sacrifice upon the tops of the mountains, and burn incense upon the hills, under oaks and poplars and elms, because the shadow thereof is good: therefore your daughters shall commit whoredom, and your spouses shall commit adultery [Hos. 4:13].
They put their idols on top of a hill under a grove of trees. The center of this idolatrous worship was in these groves; it was cool there and a nice place to go.
“Therefore your daughters shall commit whoredom, and your spouses shall commit adultery.” Our idolatry in this country today is covetousness and greed, and it has caused many a family to try to get on in the world. They want to move to a better neighborhood, to have a swimming pool, and to have a boat. They say they are doing it for the children—but all of a sudden the children leave the home. There are thousands and thousands of young people wandering up and down this country and all over the world. I have seen them in the Hawaiian Islands, and I talked to three of them in Constitution Square in Athens some time ago. There were two young men and a young lady, and I am sure they were not beyond their teens—one of them could have been twenty. I tried to talk with them as they sat there under the influence of drugs. They told me, “We’re nobody. We don’t count. We’ve dropped out.” What has happened to them? The problem is back there in the home. Their parents are idolatrous, worshiping the almighty dollar. We have forgotten God. We’ve turned away from the living and true God, and we no longer worship Him. We need to turn to the Savior who can redeem us and help us.
I will not punish your daughters when they commit whoredom, nor your spouses when they commit adultery: for themselves are separated with whores, and they sacrifice with harlots: therefore the people that doth not understand shall fall [Hos. 4:14].
God says that ignorance of the law excuses no one. He is saying, “Although these people have gone off into sin, I am not going to judge them for the sin they are committing right now. I am going to judge them because they have turned from the living and true God and from His way.” I made this point to a man on the golf course who joined with my two preacher friends and myself to make a foursome. He said he guessed he was a sinner going to hell because of the various sins he had committed. I said to him, “You know, you’re not going to hell because you commit those sins.” He said, “What do you mean I’m not going to hell? I thought that’s what you preachers say.” I told him, “This preacher never said that. You’re going to hell because you have rejected Jesus Christ.” Israel was not judged because they had become harlots, but because they had turned from the living and true God.
Though thou, Israel, play the harlot, yet let not Judah offend; and come not ye unto Gilgal, neither go ye up to Beth-aven, nor swear, The Lord liveth [Hos. 4:15].
God is saying, “I am going to hold Judah back. I will not judge Judah yet. And Judah, don’t you come up and worship these calves which Israel has put up here.”
For Israel slideth back as a backsliding heifer: now the Lord will feed them as a lamb in a large place [Hos. 4:16].
I want to look at what backsliding really is. A great many people think that backsliding is when you have become a Christian, have joined the church, and then drop back into sin. That is not backsliding in the way it is used here—God illustrates it so that you cannot miss its meaning: “For Israel slideth back as a backsliding heifer.” In the little town in which I lived in southern Oklahoma as a boy, there lived next door to us a rancher who had a big cattle ranch and two boys who were about my age. We three played together. We enjoyed riding heifers out in the lot. We would tie a rope around them—as we said in that day, a bellyband—and we would hold on to that until the heifer bucked us off. Every now and then that rancher would need to load up some of those heifers into his wagon to take them to market. He had a runway constructed out of boards which he would put at the back end of the wagon, and then he would try to run the heifers up that. He put a rope around the heifer to lead her up and then would have someone push her from the rear. The heifer would go up part of the way, and then she would stiffen those front feet of hers. You know what would happen? You couldn’t push her, and you couldn’t pull her. She would simply start sliding backwards. My friend, that’s what backsliding is—“a backsliding heifer.” Israel was stiffening her front feet, and instead of being led of God, she was slipping backward all the time. My friend, you are backsliding when you turn your back on God, stiffen that little neck of yours and that little mind of yours, and you say, “I don’t have to obey God’s Word.” When you refuse to go the way God wants to lead you, then you are backsliding. God called Israel a backsliding heifer.
The word backsliding is used three times in this book. It is used in Scripture only by Jeremiah and Hosea, both of whom spoke to a nation ready to go into captivity. Israel and Judah were guilty of backsliding, guilty of refusing to be led of God and refusing to come to God.
Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone [Hos. 4:17].
“Ephraim” occurs thirty six times in this book. God has picked out the name of one of the ten tribes in the north and applied it to all ten of the tribes. I used to wonder just how God used this term: was it a term of endearment or a term of ridicule? I have come to the conclusion that it was a term of endearment, actually His pet name for the northern kingdom. These ten tribes had revolted, and Israel in the north actually had no name as a nation; it was Judah in the south who was really the nation. I think God gave this to them as a pet name—Ephraim. It is used throughout this Book of Hosea.
“Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone.” God says this in a longing sort of way but with a note of finality. If a man continues in a backslidden condition, refusing to listen to God, there will come a day when God can no longer speak to that man.
Their drink is sour: they have committed whoredom continually: her rulers with shame do love, Give ye [Hos. 4:18].
“Their drink is sour”—You will become an alcoholic if you keep drinking, my friend. And it is not a disease; it is sin.
“They have committed whoredom continually: her rulers with shame do love.” The sad thing is that men high in our government, instead of using language that is clean and chaste, love to curse and to drink. They love shame more than glory.
The wind hath bound her up in her wings, and they shall be ashamed because of their sacrifices [Hos. 4:19].
People are carried away by every wind of doctrine, and God says that they are going to be made ashamed before it is over.
CHAPTER 5
Theme: Israel turns from God and God turns from Israel
This chapter continues to deal with the sin of the northern kingdom and the fact that judgment is coming upon them; therefore it is not a very happy or pleasant section of the Word of God.
We must keep in mind the personal background of the prophet Hosea. As a young man he fell in love with a very lovely, beautiful young lady who became a prostitute. I imagine that she was attracted to prostitution by the money, by the fact that she would be able to get the luxuries that she otherwise could not have had. God sent Hosea to marry her in spite of this. He loved her and married her. After she had borne three children, again she played the harlot. And again Hosea went after her—he bought her and brought her back to himself. Hosea had a broken heart and a broken home. With that background, he said to the northern kingdom of Israel, “God says that you are playing the harlot, that you have been unfaithful to Him. I know exactly how He feels. He loves you and will never let you go, but He is going to judge you because of your sin.”
ISRAEL TURNS FROM GOD AND GOD TURNS FROM ISRAEL
God begins by condemning the leadership in the nation—the priests and the king.
Hear ye this, O priests; and hearken, ye house of Israel; and give ye ear, O house of the king; for judgment is toward you, because ye have been a snare on Mizpah, and a net spread upon Tabor [Hos. 5:1].
“Mizpah” was in the southwest section of the kingdom, and “Tabor” is Mount Tabor which was way up in the northeast section of the kingdom. In other words, the people were worshiping idols under every green tree they could find—there were idols all over the land.
He speaks to the priests and to the king as representing the leadership of the nation. We saw in chapter 4 that God said, “Like people, like priest.” The priests who should have been setting an example were unable to rise above the level of the lowest man in society; that was true of the king also.
Unfortunately, we are living in a day in which our spiritual and political leadership is certainly not worthy of emulation. Liberalism is predominant in theology; liberalism is predominant in politics; and our news media are altogether liberal. Spiritual deterioration and decline in a nation will eventually bring it to destruction. That is what happened to Israel, and that nation furnishes a pattern for what can happen to us today.
And the revolters are profound to make slaughter, though I have been a rebuker of them all [Hos. 5:2].
God rebuked Israel for their brutality—there was murder, there was violence, and there was warfare. It is my conviction that the United States is today feeling the effects of God’s judgment upon us. In Vietnam we fought perhaps the most disgraceful war that was ever fought, and we did so against the warnings of generals who said that we should never fight a land war in Asia. We made a terrible blunder by getting involved in that, and what has happened in that land is tragic. Did we help them? I think not, and the judgment of God is upon us and, actually, upon the white man. This has been called “the white man’s day,” and it certainly has been that. Earlier in history it was the sons of Ham who headed up the great pagan civilizations of Egypt, Babylon, and Assyria. However, it is the sons of Japheth, the white man, who has made the greatest blunder of all, and that is this: We have had the Word of God, the Bible, and we have not sent missionaries as we should have done. We did too little in getting the Word of God out to China, and God closed the door—I say God, not communism, closed the door. We did not send Bibles to Vietnam; we sent bullets and bombs over there. Because we did not send men to give out the Word of God, we had to send boys to die on the battlefield. We ought to wake up today to the fact that we cannot take God to the end of His universe and dismiss Him and tell Him we do not need Him anymore. We are feeling the effects of His judgment upon us, just as Israel did.
I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hid from me: for now, O Ephraim, thou committest whoredom, and Israel is defiled.
They will not frame their doings to turn unto their God: for the spirit of whoredoms is in the midst of them, and they have not known the Lord [Hos. 5:3–4].
I have said previously that I think “Ephraim” is a pet name that God chose for the nation Israel. Although it was the name of just one of the tribes, He used it to represent all ten of the northern tribes. But I think there is a second reason that God chose Ephraim to represent all of the northern kingdom: Ephraim was the very center of idolatry in Israel. The first golden calf was set up by Jeroboam in Beth-el; later on, a second one was set up in Samaria. Both of these places were in the tribe of Ephraim—Beth-el was probably in the tribe of Benjamin, but that area revolted with Ephraim and the rest of the northern kingdom. Ephraim was the very heart of idolatry, and idolatry was the great sin of the nation Israel.
“I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hid from me: for now, O Ephraim, thou committest whoredom, and Israel is defiled.” God knows what He is talking about. Although the calf worship, or the worship of Baal, had been set up in the tribe of Ephraim, it had defiled all ten of the tribes and even had had its effect upon the southern kingdom. Their sin was the sin of a people who had the Word of God and who knew God but had turned from Him and no longer knew Him or worshiped Him. As a result, gross immorality and deterioration set in throughout every part of the nation, affecting even the ecology of the nation. God said that even the land and the animals were affected, and I think the curse of God is still upon that land today. What little irrigation has been done has not yet made the “… desert … blossom as the rose” (Isa. 35:1).
And the pride of Israel doth testify to his face: therefore shall Israel and Ephraim fall in their iniquity; Judah also shall fall with them [Hos. 5:5].
God is saying that all ten tribes will be conquered, and “Judah also shall fall with them,” but He does not say, “at the same time.” However, Judah was finally brought down, and both of these kingdoms were carried away into captivity. The northern kingdom was carried into captivity by Assyria; about a century later, the southern kingdom was taken to Babylon. From that captivity there has never actually been the return to the land which the Word of God speaks about. This Book of Hosea makes it abundantly clear that when God brings them back, the world will know it, and there will be peace in the land.
They shall go with their flocks and with their herds to seek the Lord; but they shall not find him; he hath withdrawn himself from them [Hos. 5:6].
In other words, the people have deserted God, but when trouble comes upon them and after they have tried every other resource, they will turn to God. God is their last resource, but they will not find Him because He has withdrawn Himself from them.
For many people, turning to God is the last resort. There is told the story of a ship which was crossing the Atlantic years ago, and the ship hit an iceberg. The captain sent out the order all over the ship, “To prayers, to prayers!” One woman on board the ship came rushing up to the captain and said, “Captain, has it come to this?” She was implying that if they were going to pray, they had come to the last resort. That is the way many people treat God. To them He is like a spare tire which they have on hand but are always hoping they won’t have to use. Or He is like a life insurance policy or a fire extinguisher—you hope you never have to use them but they are there just in case the emergency arises.
They have dealt treacherously against the Lord: for they have begotten strange children: now shall a month devour them with their portions [Hos. 5:7].
“For they have begotten strange children”—that is, they are strange to God. The people did not bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Back in the Book of Deuteronomy God told His people that they were to be continually teaching His Word to their children. They were to put it on the doorposts and teach it as they sat in their homes and as they walked together and even when they were going to bed at night. But now He says, “You have begotten strange children—they don’t even know Me.”
Blow ye the cornet in Gibeah, and the trumpet in Ramah: cry aloud at Bethaven, after thee, O Benjamin [Hos. 5:8].
“Beth-aven” is Beth-el. That part of the tribe of Benjamin had apparently revolted with the northern kingdom. God is saying here that the word of warning is to go out over all the land and to all the people.
Ephraim shall be desolate in the day of rebuke: among the tribes of Israel have I made known that which shall surely be [Hos. 5:9].
In other words, God had not failed to warn the people. He had warned them, He had rebuked them, and they still would not hear.
The princes of Judah were like them that remove the bound: therefore I will pour out my wrath upon them like water [Hos. 5:10].
The southern kingdom had apparently attempted to move its boundaries as far north as it possibly could, and there evidently was a real division caused by the fact that the two nations could not agree on the boundary. God had a message through Hosea for the southern kingdom as well, although he primarily was a prophet to the northern kingdom.
Ephraim is oppressed and broken in judgment, because he willingly walked after the commandment [Hos. 5:11].
Ephraim willingly followed the idols and the worship of idols—he went with the crowd.
Therefore will I be unto Ephraim as a moth, and to the house of Judah as rottenness [Hos. 5:12].
The prophets use figures of speech which are quite interesting. There is great profit in studying the prophets, if I may make a play on words, because they reach out into nature and use certain figures of speech which are helpful to us in understanding the Word of God. “Therefore will I be unto Ephraim as a moth.” What does a moth do? A moth can get into your closet, and if you do not have mothballs in there, it can ruin a suit of clothes. The story is told about the man who had bought some mothballs at a drugstore but brought them back, saying they didn’t work. When the druggist asked him what he meant, the man said, “I stayed up half the night throwing these balls at the moths, but I never hit one of them!” My friend, moths are something you do not want in your closet, because in just one night they can ruin a very valuable wool garment. God says, “I am going to be to Ephraim like a moth; I will judge him in a hurry.”
“And to the house of Judah as rottenness.” It takes a wooden board or a wooden foundation of a house a long time to become rotten. God has said to Ephraim, the northern kingdom, “I’m going to judge you now. However, in the southern kingdom rottenness is also setting in, and, finally, it will collapse—but it will take longer for that to take place.”
Our foundations are being removed in every way imaginable in our nation today, and rottenness has already begun in that which is left. It may take a while, my friend, but we cannot continue in sin like we are and expect to escape God’s judgment. The situation is enough to make us weep today.
When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah saw his wound, then went Ephraim to the Assyrian, and sent to king Jareb: yet could he not heal you, nor cure you of your wound [Hos. 5:13].
“When Ephraim saw his sickness”—Ephraim was sick, sick nigh unto death. “And Judah saw his wound”—Judah was hurt at this time also, because Assyria had come against them but did not take them into captivity.
“Then went Ephraim to the Assyrian, and sent to king Jareb: yet could he not heal you, nor cure you of your wound.” Ephraim went to a quack doctor. They thought that the king of Assyria would help them, but he is the one who took them into captivity—they appealed for help to the wrong one.
For I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the house of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him [Hos. 5:14].
Here is another marvelous figure of speech. God says, “To Ephraim I am going to be as a lion, but to the southern kingdom I am going to be a young lion, a lion cub.” The other evening I was watching on television a nature picture about lions. It showed how the mother lion protects her cubs. One of those little fellows looked just like a great big roly-poly cat—I wished I could have one as a pet. But that mother lion was vicious, especially when another animal would come near her cubs. She would really go after that animal, and the little cubs would just keep on playing. God said to the northern kingdom that He was going to be a lion—He intended to destroy them. To the southern kingdom He was going to be just a lion cub. But what happens to a lion cub? He grows up and some day is just as vicious as his mama. This was a warning to the southern kingdom that some day judgment was coming to them also.
“I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him.” God was going to let Ephraim go into captivity, and they could whine and cry all they wanted to, but He would not rescue them. God judged their sin.
God judges sin even today—no one is really getting by with it. We have failed our young people today. Venereal disease is in epidemic stages, and we say, “What in the world is happening?” I’ll tell you what is happening: God says you do not get by with sin—He is judging sin, and He will continue to judge sin, my friend.
I will go and return to my place, till they acknowledge their offence, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early [Hos. 5:15].
Although this has been a doleful chapter entirely about judgment, it closes here with a note of hope. The time will come when Israel will again seek God, but He will not deliver them until they turn to Him.
CHAPTER 6
Theme: Israel will return in the last days; Israel presently to be judged for current sins
ISRAEL WILL RETURN IN THE LAST DAYS
Come, and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up [Hos. 6:1].
This is God’s last call to the northern kingdom in that day, but it also looks to the future of that nation when God will heal them; although He has torn them, He intends to bind them up. This should be a warning that God will judge the sin of any nation that makes a profession of being a Christian nation and which has had the benefit of the Word of God.
After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight [Hos. 6:2].
“In the third day he will raise us up”—this is very interesting in light of the fact that the resurrection of Christ was on the third day. He was raised for the justification of both Jew and Gentile. This will also be applicable in that future day when God will bring Israel back into that land and bring them to Himself. In Ezekiel 37 God speaks of that day as a resurrection, and that resurrection will be based on the One who was raised on the third day; for in Christ’s resurrection there is provided, for any man who will accept it, a redemption and a justification which will bring him into a right relationship with Almighty God.
The apostle Paul develops the subject of the future of Israel in Romans 11. In our day, God’s purpose in building His church is to draw to Himself both Jew and Gentile, people out of every tongue and tribe and nation, who are going to come before Him to worship. When God completes His purpose in the church and takes it out of the world, He will again turn to the nation Israel and will raise her up. Every prophet who wrote in Scripture—and even some who didn’t write—spoke of God’s future purpose for the nation Israel. Even before the children of Israel could get into the land, Moses began to talk about the coming day when God would restore them back to the land for the third time. The third time—on the third day, so to speak—the restoration to the land would be a permanent restoration. There is a correlation between this restoration and Christ’s being raised from the dead on the third day.
Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord: his going forth is prepared as the morning; and he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth [Hos. 6:3].
“And he shall come unto us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth.” The former rains were the heavy rains which fell toward the end of October, and the latter rains were the heavy showers of March and April which came right before the harvest. There are folk who say that the latter rain has returned to that land, but I do not think you can say that either the former or latter rain has returned. The rainfall in Israel is much less than we have in Southern California, and here it is not the rain which makes this area a so-called Garden of Eden (despite its smog and traffic); it is irrigation that makes the land productive. But in Israel there is not enough water to irrigate all the land, and we are not seeing the fulfillment of the promised return of the rains to that land. When these people again turn to God, however, the blessing will come not only to the people, but also to the land and the animal world.
“Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord.” That is the very secret of the solution to the problems of life—to know the Lord. The apostle Paul, even when he had come to the end of his life, had this ambition: “That I may know him [that is, the Lord Jesus Christ], and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death” (Phil. 3:10). There is no way for improvement in this life apart from a knowledge of God. The Word of God is very emphatic about that, and either it is right or it is wrong. Over thousands of years the Word of God has been proven right, and I do not think the present generation is upsetting it by any means.
ISRAEL PRESENTLY TO BE JUDGED FOR CURRENT SINS
O Ephraim, what shall I do unto thee? O Judah, what shall I do unto thee? for your goodness is as a morning cloud, and as the early dew it goeth away [Hos. 6:4].
God sounds as if He is just a little bit frustrated here. In effect, He is saying, “What am I going to do with you? I love you, but you continue on in sin and I am going to have to judge you!” This puts God on the horns of a dilemma. Judgment is the strange work of God—He wants to save, not judge. But when people keep turning away from God, then the day comes when He has to judge them.
The people of Israel were religious, but they had no knowledge of God and were far from Him. We today have a lot of religion, and I am opposed to it. Let me illustrate my point with a letter which a man wrote to the editor of a newspaper:
In today’s society, religion has outlasted its usefulness. Man at long last has outgrown the necessity for this opiate. No longer does he have to explain the unknown with folktales and the worship of a superior being. In a complex society such as ours, religion can only mute and cloud the mind. Religion blurs and distorts important details and information, interferes with important decisions, and promotes bigotry and prejudice. Now is the time for humanity to discard this mental blindfold.
This may startle you, but I agree with what that man wrote; I wish that we could get rid of religion. Someone answered this letter, and his reply was also published. He expressed it so much better than I could:
In response to the April 26 letter entitled “Religion Termed Mental Blindfold,” I agree with Mr. __________ about the effects of religion, for religion is man’s attempt to reach God through his own efforts. I have never been a religious man, but about four years ago, something happened that has really changed my life. I invited Jesus Christ to take control of my life and accepted the fact that I cannot reach God by myself, but that He has made a relationship with Him possible through His Son Jesus Christ. Since that commitment, I have grown increasingly aware of my social responsibility and have grown to love and accept myself and other people regardless of age, race, creed, or color.
Today many are saying, “Out with religion,” and I say, fine, let’s sweep it out the back door, and let’s invite Jesus Christ, the Light of the world, to come in.
The Israelites were religious, but their goodness was like “a morning cloud”—just form and ritual and ceremony. “As the early dew it goeth away”—that is all their religion amounted to. Many people wear religion like you would wear a loose—fitting garment; it is something they can put on or off at any time. God condemned these people because they were religious, but they did not know Him, and they had never had a transforming, life-changing, experience with Him.
Therefore have I hewed them by the prophets; I have slain them by the words of my mouth: and thy judgments are as the light that goeth forth [Hos. 6:5].
In other words, God says, “I skinned them alive by the prophets.” I appreciate the many letters I receive that commend us for giving out the Word of God as it is, for hewing to the line and letting the chips fall where they may. I have always tried to do that throughout the years of my ministry, and I have found that the folk who sincerely want to hear the Word of God will appreciate it. Others will oppose it, and I expect to hear their criticism also. God says to His people here, “I’ve skinned you alive by the prophets—they have been faithful in telling it like it is—but you have not listened to them.” And in our day, although there is a great interest in and turning to the Word of God, we wonder how much of it has really transformed the hearts and lives of those who hear.
“I have slain them by the words of my mouth: and thy judgments are as the light that goeth forth.” They were not sinning because of ignorance—there was no lack of information. God had sent the prophets to them, but they had turned their backs on God and His Word.
For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings [Hos. 6:6].
The people were merely going through a form. My friend, you can go to church on Sunday and be as fundamental as you can be. You may criticize the preacher, criticize the choir, criticize everybody—maybe they deserve it, I don’t know—but God’s desire is that you put His Word into shoe leather, that you allow it to get down where the rubber meets the road, and that there be an evidence of mercy in your own heart and life. Don’t think that going to a church banquet is somehow a substitute for truly eating the Bread of Life or of enjoying a big porterhouse steak from the Word of God. No church function is a substitute for really studying the Word of God.
But they like men have transgressed the covenant: there have they dealt treacherously against me [Hos. 6:7].
“The covenant”—that is, the covenant which God had made with this nation.
Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood [Hos. 6:8].
The city of Gilead is best known to us for the “… balm in Gilead …” (Jer. 8:22, italics mine), which was an aromatic gum or resin used for medical purposes. However, in Hosea’s day only iniquity came out of Gilead.
And as troops of robbers wait for a man, so the company of priests murder in the way by consent: for they commit lewdness [Hos. 6:9].
In other words, the priests in refusing to give the people the Water of Life and the Bread of Life were actually committing murder. To be honest with you, I think that a minister who stands in the pulpit and does not give out the Word of God is guilty just as it is stated right here. I did not think that up—it is the Word of God which says that.
I have seen an horrible thing in the house of Israel: there is the whoredom of Ephraim, Israel is defiled.
Also, O Judah, he hath set an harvest for thee, when I returned the captivity of my people [Hos. 6:10–11].
This is a warning to Judah that their day of judgment is also coming. “When I returned the captivity of my people”—there is a future day when God will bring the people back to the land, but at that time He had to judge them for their sin.
CHAPTER 7
Theme: Israel turns to Egypt and Assyria
Chapters 7–12 deal with the fact that Israel could escape judgment by turning to God who loves her. God is dealing with Israel in a harsh way; yet in tenderness He is attempting to call the people back to Himself before judgment comes.
Israel turns to Egypt and Assyria instead of turning to God.
ISRAEL TURNS TO EGYPT AND ASSYRIA
When I would have healed Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim was discovered, and the wickedness of Samaria: for they commit falsehood; and the thief cometh in, and the troop of robbers spoileth without [Hos. 7:1].
Samaria was the capital of the northern kingdom—that is, Omri made it the capital, and then Ahab and Jezebel built a palace there.
On our recent trips to Israel I insisted that Samaria be included in the tour. I wanted the folk to go to that hill of Samaria and see the fulfillment of prophecy. The judgment of God is on what is probably one of the most beautiful spots in the world. It would be a lovely spot for a palace, or for that matter, for a home. From the top of the hill there is a view of the entire area. To the west is the Mediterranean Sea, to the east the Jordan Valley, to the north Mount Hermon and Megiddo, to the south the city of Jerusalem. It is a choice spot with nothing to obstruct the view in any direction. But today it is a desolate waste. Indeed the judgment of God is upon it.
What was happening in Israel during Hosea’s day was that the sin which had been covered was being uncovered. That which they had been doing secretly they were now doing openly. There was no shame, no conviction, no conscience relative to their sin. The Lord would forgive their iniquity if they would repent and turn to Him. Instead, they persisted in their wickedness and went farther and farther into it.
It is one thing to sin in secret—that is bad enough—but it is even worse to bring your sin out in the open and flaunt it before the world. To do that is to sink to the very bottom. This is the reason that I believe Hosea has a message for my own nation as well as all other nations. Since the people of Israel were God’s chosen people, and yet God sent them into captivity when they persisted in sinning against Him, does it seem likely that any other nation could get by with the same type of sin?
For example, when I was growing up in Nashville, Tennessee, the few homosexuals who lived there kept their homosexuality under cover. They operated rather secretly and concealed their sin. However, now across the country they are very open about their perversion and are demanding acceptance and protection of their activity. The fact is being uncovered that there are not only call girls but call boys and that homosexuals are numbered in the thousands. What was formerly done in secret is now brought out into the open, and this is characteristic of other sins as well.
Someone said to me just recently, “Dr. McGee, in our day people sinned just as they do today.”
“Yes, they did,” I agreed. “Before I was saved, I was with that crowd, and I know.”
“Well, then, what’s the difference?”
“I’ll tell you the difference. In my day we kept it under cover. There was still some shame connected with sin. Today sin is brought out in the open and is flaunted before the world.” It is called a new morality, and actually a sort of halo is put around sin today. The sinner is commanded for doing something new and daring and courageous. The other day I heard a girl complimented as being honest and courageous because she was living with a man to whom she was not married and had an illegitimate child. Well, I am a square, I know (as someone said, being a square keeps me from going around in circles), but we must face the fact that God’s Word has not changed. The openness of sin is not a mark of advancement, but it indicates that we are losing the civilization which formerly carried some semblance of Christian culture.
And they consider not in their hearts that I remember all their wickedness: now their own doings have beset them about; they are before my face [Hos. 7:2].
God is saying, “I knew about their sins before, but now they have taken a further step away from Me and are doing their sinning out in the open.” In other words, they have now reached the lowest depths of immorality.
They make the king glad with their wickedness, and the princes with their lies [Hos. 7:3].
The king and the princes applauded this sort of behavior. In our day it is tragic when the leadership in any field—education, science, politics, or the church—give themselves over to foul and blasphemous language, as they are now doing. That is something else that is out in the open. A foulmouthed leader is applauded as being a he-man. Well, it also indicates that he has a very poor vocabulary and is not able to express himself. Unfortunately, this verse is applicable to our nation, and history tells us that it has been applicable to great nations in the past that have now passed off the stage of human events and lie in rubble, covered by the dust of the centuries.
They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, who ceaseth from raising after he hath kneaded the dough, until it be leavened [Hos. 7:4].
This figure of speech is tremendous. The baker had his oven ready but didn’t bring up the heat until the dough was kneaded and ready to bake. Here God is not talking about spiritual adultery but about gross immorality. They had formerly kept their sin under cover, but now they are like an open oven, hot with passion. In our day I get the impression that men are trying to prove that they are virile and women are trying to prove that they are sexually alert. In modern America there is a tremendous open obsession with sex.
In the day of our king the princes have made him sick with bottles of wine; he stretched out his hand with scorners [Hos. 7:5].
The king has become an alcoholic, and he is making a fool of himself. We have mentioned this before, but it is so important that we will keep repeating it. What was it that brought down the northern kingdom? It was idolatry, a turning away from God. That will always manifest itself in gross immorality. Wine and women, the bottle and the brothel, sauce and sex are the things that occupied the attention of the northern kingdom.
Now if you think I am a square or unfair or a bigot, will you let me ask you a fair question? As you look about you today, what is the chief occupation of men and women in all walks of life? Isn’t it an occupation with liquor and with sex? Haven’t these two become the prominent things in this civilization of ours? Isn’t it true that it is being brought out in the open today as never before in our country? When these sins were brought out in the open in Israel, God said that He would have to move and judge them.
For they have made ready their heart like an oven, whiles they lie in wait: their baker sleepeth all the night; in the morning it burneth as a flaming fire [Hos. 7:6].
Everything is done to stir up the passions of men and women. In our day we hear this so-called sophisticated argument about pornography: “We are adults and should have the right to choose what we want to see and what we want to hear.” Well, there isn’t much freedom to choose what we want to see and what we want to hear when we are bombarded with filth everywhere we turn. I don’t have the liberty to choose what is presented on television or the radio or the advertising media. I think there are a great many people who would like to see better things and hear better things than are presented to us today, but that freedom is denied us in order that the other crowd can have their freedom to give themselves over to sin.
They are all hot as an oven, and have devoured their judges; all their kings are fallen: there is none among them that calleth unto me [Hos. 7:7].
“All their kings are fallen.” The northern kingdom did not have one good king. If you were to look back in the historical books and go through the list of the kings of Israel and Judah, you would note that Judah had a few good kings—in fact, five kings of Judah led in revivals—but the northern kingdom didn’t have a good king in the lot. Every king was as wicked as he could be. Ahab and Jezebel reached the bottom of the list, but some of the others would run them a close second.
Many of the kings in the northern kingdom were assassinated. They made nine different changes of dynasty in their short history. The kings in the northern kingdom started off with Jeroboam, but you don’t get very far into the story until someone gets in and murders his line. Another line of kings starts out, and it doesn’t go very far until someone else is murdered. Several of the kings had a short reign, and their sons didn’t even make it to the throne. That was a judgment of God upon them. You see, God had chosen and promised to bless the line of David; He made no such promise to the kings of the divided kingdom in the north.
Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the people; Ephraim is a cake not turned [Hos. 7:8].
“Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the people.” God never goes in for mixtures. Have you noted that? He seems to want His children to stay in their own crowd.
“Ephraim is a cake not turned.” Here we go again with another good, homely illustration, and Hosea has many of them. What does he mean? In that day they cooked on the top of a stove and made little cakes like our pancakes. They still make those kind of cakes there today. Now you know that a pancake that is not turned can be burned on the one side and raw on the other side. That is the picture of Ephraim. The nation was hot on one side but raw on the other side.
They blew hot and cold toward God. There is a whimsical little story told of a man who had been wandering through the woods and came up to a cottage. The man who lived in the cottage invited him into his home. As the man came in out of the cold, he began to blow on his hands. “Why do you blow on your hands?” asked the host. “To make them warm,” answered the wanderer. Then the host offered the visitor a bowl of hot soup. The man began to blow on the soup. “Why do you blow on the soup?” asked the host. “To make it cool,” answered the guest. So the host jumped up and ran out of his own house, saying, “I don’t like anybody who can blow hot and cold!” Well, my friend, that is the way a great many people are as far as Christianity is concerned. With one crowd they blow hot and with another crowd they blow cold. They are like Ephraim—a cake (a pancake) not turned.
Strangers have devoured his strength, and he knoweth it not: yea, gray hairs are here and there upon him, yet he knoweth not.
And the pride of Israel testifieth to his face: and they do not return to the Lord their God, nor seek him for all this.
Ephraim also is like a silly dove without heart: they call to Egypt, they go to Assyria [Hos. 7:9–11].
This is another interesting illustration. If you have ever been dove hunting, you know that if a dove has a nest with eggs or little ones in it she will act as if she has a broken wing and actually let you get very close to her. She tries to lure you away from her nest. Actually, that is not a very smart move on the part of the dove for two reasons. When a dove lets you get that close to her, you know there is a nest nearby. Secondly, she endangers her own life.
Now here was Ephraim. She refused to run to God for help. So first she ran down to Egypt for help. When Egypt wouldn’t give her the help she wanted, she went up to Assyria and asked for help. She went back and forth like a silly dove. What a picture!
When they shall go, I will spread my net upon them; I will bring them down as the fowls of the heaven; I will chastise them, as their congregation hath heard [Hos. 7:12].
I can remember as a boy that we would get a big box, prop up one end, and put corn under it. We would have the corn lead right under the box. We would hide in the barn, and the doves would come to eat the corn. They would follow the corn right under the box. Then we would pull a string, and the box would come down on them. Silly doves. That is what God says here. He will spread His net upon them. They will be caught.
Woe unto them! for they have fled from me: destruction unto them! because they have transgressed against me: though I have redeemed them, yet they have spoken lies against me [Hos. 7:13].
God had a redemption for them, and yet these people were continuing to turn from the living and true God.
And they have not cried unto me with their heart, when they howled upon their beds: they assemble themselves for corn and wine, and they rebel against me [Hos. 7:14].
They didn’t realize that the famine they were having was a judgment of God upon them. They were crying about having no food.
Though I have bound and strengthened their arms, yet do they imagine mischief against me.
They return, but not to the most High: they are like a deceitful bow: their princes shall fall by the sword for the rage of their tongue: this shall he their derision in the land of Egypt [Hos. 7:15–16].
“They are like a deceitful bow.” You put an arrow in it to shoot at something and the string breaks. It is a deceitful bow—you can’t depend upon it.
“This shall be their derision in the land of Egypt.” He is saying that Egypt will begin to mock them and ridicule them for the way they are acting.
You can see that this is a very severe section of the Word of God. Hosea was not the most popular prophet in his day. He wouldn’t be a popular prophet today, either. However, he still has a message for us, and we do well to listen.
CHAPTER 8
Theme: Israel turns to golden calves and altars of sin
All of the prophets had not only a local message but also one that reaches into the future even beyond us today. However, their message does have an application for us. There are no prophecies more applicable to us than those of Hosea and Jeremiah. Each of these prophets prophesied right at the time of the downfall of this nation. Their messages ought to alarm us as a nation today, but I do not have the faith that they will. I am afraid that we may have stepped over the line and that judgment is inevitable, just as it was for Israel.
ISRAEL TURNS TO GOLDEN CALVES AND ALTARS OF SIN
As Israel turned from God, they looked to their king and their wealth to deliver them—
Set the trumpet to thy mouth. He shall come as an eagle against the house of the Lord, because they have transgressed my covenant, and trespassed against my law.
Israel shall cry unto me, My God, we know thee.
Israel hath cast off the thing that is good: the enemy shall pursue him.
They have set up kings, but not by me: they have made princes, and I knew it not: of their silver and their gold have they made them idols, that they may be cut off [Hos. 8:1–4].
“Because they have transgressed my covenant, and trespassed against my law”—God is explaining why He is going to send them into captivity. Previously He spelled out their sins and showed that they had broken His commandments, but their sins had also resulted in their breaking the covenant which God had made with them. God had made a covenant with Abraham which was applicable to them, and He had made a covenant with Moses which was applicable to them, especially as it pertained to that land and how He would bless them in the land; but if they did not serve Him He would put them out of the land. And then God also made a covenant with David. Now the people had broken these covenants, but God will never break them. The covenant which God made with Abraham and the covenant which He made with David were both unconditional (the Mosaic covenant was conditional). The people could transgress the covenant, and when they did they were judged. They were put out of the land, but that has never altered the fact that God will give them that land for an eternal possession. It simply means that that generation was put out of the land, but another generation will be brought back. That is what happened when they came out of Egypt. Since the people would not enter the land because of their unbelief, God said they would never enter the land but that their children would inhabit it.
“They have set up kings, but not by me.” God had said that the line of David was to rule over Israel. Jeroboam led a rebellion, and the line of kings which he set up did not include men who turned to the living God. These kings never attempted in any way to bring the people into the worship of God. Instead, they all went into idolatry. Jeroboam, at the very beginning, put up those two golden calves—one in Samaria and one in Beth-el—and he did that to keep the people from returning to Jerusalem in the south to worship in the temple. God judged them because they had set up kings of whom He did not approve.
Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off; mine anger is kindled against them: how long will it be ere they attain to innocency? [Hos. 8:5].
“How long will it be ere they attain to innocency?” They were guilty, they were sinful, they were not innocent at all.
“Thy calf, O Samaria.” Samaria had become the capital of Israel under Omri, the father of Ahab. Ahab married Jezebel whose father was a priest in Sidon among the Phoenicians, worshipers of Baal. Jezebel had transported to Israel several hundred prophets of Baal, and many Israelites became worshipers of Baal.
“Mine anger is kindled against them”—God intended to judge them. Samaria is a desolate place even today. I insisted on taking our tour group to see it. Though it is a beautiful spot, the desolation there is appalling; you cannot help but be overwhelmed by it. But there were once palaces of ivory in Samaria. The archaeologists say that they have found very lovely ivory perfume bottles and all kinds of beautiful ivory bric-a-brac in the ruins there. I noticed that the people on our tour were depressed after viewing the ruins, and rightly so. God has judged Samaria. It was a beautiful spot with lovely buildings, but God’s judgment came upon it because the people had turned from Him and were worshiping the calf there.
For from Israel was it also: the workman made it; therefore it is not God: but the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces [Hos. 8:6].
I do not know where you would find that golden calf today. The archaeologists certainly have not found any piece of it there. It was probably taken somewhere and broken to pieces, maybe even melted down. God says to these people, “You have turned from Me to worship this, but it is not God and it is not able to help you.”
For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk: the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up [Hos. 8:7].
This verse speaks of the judgment both of famine and of the enemy who was to come into that land.
Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure [Hos. 8:8].
“Israel is swallowed up.” Do you know where the ten tribes are today? So many people have the idea that the United States is the tribe of Ephraim—I cannot think of anything more absurd. If you think that is true, read these chapters here about God’s judgment on Ephraim; nothing but judgment is mentioned of Ephraim.
“Now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure.” We are not able to locate or identify the tribes of Israel today. I am confident that the people of Israel mixed with the tribe of Judah when they returned to the land after their captivity, and there has been no way to separate them since that time. They are scattered throughout the world today. Actually, there are more Jews in New York City than there are in the whole nation of Israel; there are at least four times as many outside of the land than are in Israel today.
For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild ass alone by himself: Ephraim hath hired lovers [Hos. 8:9].
Here is another specific action which brought God’s judgment upon Israel. What a condemnation this is! They are like one of these long-eared donkeys. Israel went up to Assyria for help and tried to buy off Assyria—“Ephraim hath hired lovers.”
However, they found they could not buy off Assyria. Instead God would use Assyria to judge them—
Yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them, and they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the king of princes.
Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin [Hos. 8:10–11].
An altar is a place of worship, and God had given Israel an altar. We see in the Book of Hebrews that the church has a heavenly altar; the throne of God is today a throne of grace to us, and the Lord Jesus is our Great High Priest at that altar making intercession for us. An altar is to be a place of worship, but here God says, “Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin.” Israel had turned to religion, to the worship of idols. It did not help them and only brought judgment upon them.
My friend, religion has been the most damning thing this world has ever experienced. Religion has damned the world. Look at India today where they cannot eat steak because the cows are sacred; there are multitudes starving to death, and yet they will not use cattle for food. Look at the condition of China today or at our ancestors yonder in the wildernesses of England. Throughout history religion has not helped us but has crippled and damned the human race. Only the Lord Jesus can deliver us.
I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing [Hos. 8:12].
“But they were counted as a strange thing”—that is, the people did not know anything about God’s law. I say this often because there are so few who are saying it at all. God is saying here, “I have given them my written Word, and to them it is a strange thing—they are ignorant of it.” That was the condemnation of Israel and, my friend, that is the condemnation of our nation today. We try to pass as a civilized, Christian nation, and we are anything but that. The ignorance of the Word of God is to me one of the most amazing things in this land. That is the reason we are committed to teaching the Bible. The most important business the church has is to get out the Word of God. I do not think your pastor is to be a business administrator. I do not think he is called to be a social lion who mixes and mingles with people. The important thing is whether he gives out the Word of God when he stands in that pulpit. If he does, then you should stand behind him. But I do not ask you to support a man who is playing around and riding the fence in liberalism. Across this land there are many men who are teaching the Word of God, and they are the ones who are getting a hearing today. However, their ministries and the ministry of a Bible teaching radio program like ours are just a drop in the bucket—this nation is ignorant of the Word of God.
They sacrifice flesh for the sacrifices of mine offerings, and eat it; but the Lord accepteth them not; now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins: they shall return to Egypt [Hos. 8:13].
They go through the ceremony, they’ve got the ritual, and they know the vocabulary, but that is all it is. The Lord knows them and He doesn’t accept them. I discovered as a pastor that you have a few people who learn the vocabulary of fundamentalism; they know when to say, “Praise the Lord” and “the Lord bless you.” Those are wonderful expressions, but in the mouths of some people they are meaningless. “The Lord accepteth them not.”
“Now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins: they shall return to Egypt.” It is evident that when Babylon destroyed Assyria, many from the ten tribes joined with the ones who were taken into Babylonian captivity from Judah and returned to the land. Also, we know from the Book of Jeremiah that at the time of the Babylonian captivity many of the people went into Egypt. I believe that that is what Hosea is speaking of here, but there are many fine Bible expositors who would not agree with me.
For Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples; and Judah hath multiplied fenced cities: but I will send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof [Hos. 8:14].
“For Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples.” They had tried to build substitutes for the temple in Jerusalem. It was in that temple and in that temple only that God had said sacrifices were to be made to Him. “And Judah hath multiplied fenced cities”—Judah had sinned also, and God will judge them later. The thing that is going to happen first is that these temples in Israel are to be destroyed. It is interesting that the northern section of Israel seems to be more desolate than any other section of that land. Way down in the Negeb where they don’t get any rain, you expect it to be that way, but up in the northern section—especially in the valley of Esdraelon, which is one of the richest valleys in the world—you do not expect the desolation which is there. Yet all around, even to this day, you see evidences of the judgment of God which came upon that land.
CHAPTER 9
Theme: Israel turns to land productivity
At this time Israel was beginning to look to prosperity as the indication that everything was all right in the nation. In other words, they were trying to increase the value of their money, and they were attempting to increase the production of the land. But God said that they were nothing but a backsliding heifer. He had blessed them with prosperity, and that had blinded them to the reality of their spiritual condition. In fact, they are right on the verge of captivity, which was the judgment of God.
Rejoice not, O Israel, for joy, as other people: for thou hast gone a-whoring from thy God, thou hast loved a reward upon every cornfloor [Hos. 9:1].
“Rejoice not, O Israel, for joy, as other people”—they were sinning more and enjoying it less.
“For thou hast gone a-whoring from thy God.” God says, “You have played the harlot.”
“Thou hast loved a reward upon every cornfloor.” In other words, Israel was trying to increase their production, but instead it became a judgment upon them. The stock market was up, and there was abundance. The shelves of the supermarket were groaning with food; there was plenty of liquor to be bought, plenty of wine, all of which deceived Israel.
Our nation today has also been deceived by prosperity. We are finding out that these great big combines, these large corporations, are probably not the blessing that we thought at one time they would be. Even farming is often done by large corporations. However, the important thing today is the stock market. Certainly the stock market is more important to our nation than are the Scriptures. That was what was happening in Israel—there was a false prosperity in the land, and they were far from dependent upon God.
I believe that one of the methods God has used to judge the United States is that He has judged us with prosperity. After World War II, I predicted that we were going to have to suffer as the other nations had suffered during the war. We did not have any bombing as did England, France, Germany, and Japan. We escaped all that, but I felt at the time that God would judge us somehow. After the war we became the most prosperous nation in the world, and it seemed a contradiction of the statements I was making. It took me about ten years to see what God was doing. God judged us with prosperity, and that is what He did to Israel. He said, “I have provided everything for you, and you’re giving credit to your own ingenuity and your own ability. You’re a proud people, and you’re not looking to Me nor giving Me credit at all.” That is the picture of Israel and, my friend, that just happens to be a picture of my nation since World War II.
The floor and the winepress shall not feed them, and the new wine shall fail in her [Hos. 9:2].
In other words, there is going to be scarcity rather than abundance.
They shall not dwell in the Lord’s land; but Ephraim shall return to Egypt, and they shall eat unclean things in Assyria [Hos. 9:3].
“They shall not dwell in the Lord’s land.” God makes it clear that He is going to put them out of the land. Although He said He would never forget His covenants with Abraham, Moses, and David, Israel’s tenure in the land always depended on their obedience to God. Now He is going to put them out of the land.
“And they shall eat unclean things in Assyria.” The people had been turning from God and breaking His law. Now God says, “I’m really going to give you a diet of unclean things.” They are not going to have any more fun—they were sinning more, but enjoying it less. I am of the opinion that that is true of a great many people today. I talked once with a man in some meetings in the East, who said to me, “The reason I came tonight, Dr. McGee, is that I’ve tried everything in this world, and I am so sick of sin, just sick of it.” He was sinning more, but enjoying it less, and that was what finally brought that man to Christ.
They shall not offer wine offerings to the Lord, neither shall they be pleasing unto him: their sacrifices shall be unto them as the bread of mourners; all that eat thereof shall be polluted: for their bread for their soul shall not come into the house of the Lord.
What will ye do in the solemn day, and in the day of the feast of the Lord?
For, lo, they are gone because of destruction: Egypt shall gather them up, Memphis shall bury them: the pleasant places for their silver, nettles shall possess them: thorns shall be in their tabernacles [Hos. 9:4–6].
Many of them went down into the land of Egypt following the captivity. Out of the land, they could not worship God as He intended them to.
The days of visitation are come, the days of recompence are come; Israel shall know it: the prophet is a fool, the spiritual man is mad, for the multitude of thine iniquity, and the great hatred [Hos. 9:7].
Israel had lost its way spiritually. Why? Because of the leadership.
When I started out to study for the ministry, the big debate in the church in this country was between what was then known as fundamentalism and modernism. Modernism espoused the social gospel. They were the dogooders, and they claimed they had a high ethical standard. Frankly, I was inclined to agree with them because I found that many fundamentalists didn’t operate on high ethics. It disturbed me a great deal to think that the liberals had one strike on us in that connection. But I watched them carefully and found that they didn’t really have a high ethical standard. Hosea said it, and you can blame it on him; he said, “The prophet is a fool.”
For example, there was a young man who attended Yale and had there an outstanding liberal preacher who taught ethics. This preacher taught young men to burn their draft cards—and that’s against the law. In certain protest meetings he taught and espoused that there is a higher law than the law of the land. The young man heard these things and thought, Well, if that’s ethics, then I will follow that. He was led into very serious trouble because of such teaching.
May I say to you, liberalism has lost even its moral standard today. I was in Portland, Oregon, at the time it was discovered through the testimony of a policewoman that the place where the young people were getting narcotics was run by the liberal churches. Hosea said, “The prophet is a fool”—he has led the nation astray.
Liberalism is also responsible for the policy this nation followed after World War II, and the trouble we are in today is a trouble that has been produced by liberalism. I will say this, fundamentalism may act fanatically at times, but the fact of the matter is that fundamentalism did not lead this country into the trouble we are in today. Before I even entered seminary I listened to men like Dr. Harry Ironside, Dr. Harry Rimmer, and Dr. Arthur Brown, and I heard my liberal professors and preachers call them fanatics. But what those men said and preached is true today, and the things I was taught by those liberal professors are not true at all—it just didn’t work out the way they said.
Israel had turned their backs on God, and judgment was coming because of it. They had no spiritual discernment. It is the ignorance of the Word of God that disturbs me about our nation today. We receive many letters from people who are coming out of various cults and “isms”—and we rejoice in that—but how did they get trapped in all of these groups? There is only one explanation: ignorance of the Word of God and lack of spiritual discernment. God said that He intended to judge Israel, and that should be an illustration to any nation which makes a pretense of being a Christian nation.
The watchman of Ephraim was with my God: but the prophet is a snare of a fowler in all his ways, and hatred in the house of his God [Hos. 9:8].
“The watchman of Ephraim was with my God”—evidently there were a few fanatical fundamentalists around in that day warning the people of the coming judgment.
“But the prophet is a snare of a fowler.” That is harsh language, and I would never use that kind of language to speak of the liberal today. However, I do believe that liberalism is in control in my day, especially over the news media. They have sacred cows known freedom of the press and freedom of speech, but they allow the fundamentalists very little freedom, I can assure you of that. Liberalism—whether it is in politics, the news media, or in the pulpit—is a snare; it is like a trap, and it brainwashes people. As a result, this nation has been in trouble ever since World War II. It is time someone made the diagnosis and gave the prognosis of the case: the problem is that we have turned from God as a nation. God has become a big swear word in Washington, D.C. His name is often used in the form of blasphemy but seldom in the form of prayer or in worship of Him.
They have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah: therefore he will remember their iniquity, he will visit their sins [Hos. 9:9].
There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it—God intends to judge sin. Maybe you don’t like it, but that is what He says: He intends to judge sin.
I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness; I saw your fathers as the first-ripe in the fig tree at her first time: but they went to Baal-peor, and separated themselves unto that shame; and their abominations were according as they loved [Hos. 9:10].
The vine and the fig tree are symbols of the nation Israel which are used throughout the Word of God.
Israel not only established calf worship in both Samaria and Beth-el, but, under Ahab and Jezebel, they also brought in the prophets of Baal.
As for Ephraim, their glory shall fly away like a bird, from the birth, and from the womb, and from the conception [Hos. 9:11].
Have you ever been duck hunting and spent the cold hours of the morning in a duck trap or in a boat out on the lake? Then right before the sun comes up and you can finally start shooting, someone else out there fires a gun, and every duck on the lake and anywhere nearby takes off! You just sit there and watch them fly away. That is the picture of the glory of Ephraim—it was departing. This nation had made a tremendous impact upon the ancient world, but its glory was flying away like a bird.
Though they bring up their children, yet will I bereave them, that there shall not be a man left: yea, woe also to them when I depart from them! [Hos. 9:12].
This is another judgment which God was going to bring upon them. God had promise Abraham not only to give him the land but also to multiply his seed. God had said that Abraham’s seed would be like the sand on the seashore and like the stars in the heavens. God made good that promise, but now the people have sinned and He says, “You’re going to have a real decline in your birthrate as part of My judgment upon you.”
“Not be a man left” is not a declaration that God would completely wipe out the population, but that there would be no man left who would stand for God.
Ephraim, as I saw Tyrus, is planted in a pleasant place: but Ephraim shall bring forth his children to the murderer [Hos. 9:13].
“Tyrus” is Tyre. God had not yet judged Tyre, and it was at that time a great commercial center. Its prosperity was like a fever, and it had caught on in the northern kingdom which also became a commercial center. There was a false prosperity in the land, and the people were deceived by it.
Give them, O Lord: what wilt thou give? give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts [Hos. 9:14].
Their women were barren. It was the judgment of God upon them.
All their wickedness is in Gilgal: for there I hated them: for the wickedness of their doings I will drive them out of mine house, I will love them no more: all their princes are revolters [Hos. 9:15].
In other words, God says to them, “Their sin in Gilgal brought My judgment upon them, although I loved them. This should be a warning to you. I will judge you again, and you will come to the conclusion that I do not love you anymore.”
Ephraim is smitten, their root is dried up, they shall bear no fruit: yea, though they bring forth, yet will I slay even the beloved fruit of their womb [Hos. 9:16].
God’s judgment was to come not only upon the fruit of the ground, but also on the birth of children.
My God will cast them away, because they did not hearken unto him: and they shall be wanderers among the nations [Hos. 9:17].
God says that He intends to cast them out and that they would be “wanderers among the nations.” The ten tribes as such did not return after the captivity. It is true that they came back with Judah as a mixture, and they spread throughout the land. In fact, we find Joseph and Mary who were members of the tribe of Judah living way up in Galilee. There was a tremendous scattering even in the land when they returned after the Babylonian captivity, so that today most Jews could not tell you to which tribe they belong.
CHAPTER 10
Theme: Israel will become an empty vine
We are in a section in which God pronounces His judgment upon Israel. In this chapter we discover something else that Israel was doing which would bring God’s judgment upon her.
ISRAEL WILL BECOME AN EMPTY VINE
Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars; according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images [Hos. 10:1].
He was not saying that Israel was a vine which was not producing fruit, because during this period Israel was very prosperous. God was still being good to them, although He was warning them of coming judgment. “He bringeth forth fruit unto himself” means that he was a vine that was emptying itself of its fruit—just pouring out fruit upon the people. You see, although God had made Israel prosperous, He was not given credit for it. Their urban areas were growing, they were putting up apartments and condominiums, and as a result, they thought everything was all right. Their prosperity was blinding them to their true condition.
It is my belief that this same thing has happened to my own country. As a nation, God blinded us with prosperity and with power at the end of World War II, while other nations suffered. We became the big brother to the world. Well, we have been eager to send bombs, but we have not sent what we should have sent: Bibles. I am weary of protestations decrying the fact that we used our bombs on other nations but never telling us what we should have sent instead of bombs. My friend, it is the Bible which has made our nation great, and we are pitifully ignorant of it today. The logical, rational conclusion, judging from history, is that God will judge our nation. There is many a great nation lying in rubble and ruin, which reveals God’s judgment upon them.
“According to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars.” As the population increased, the images increased. In other words, their sin increased as the population increased.
This figure of the vine reminds us of what the Lord Jesus said in John 15 to His Jewish disciples. He said, “I am the true [genuine] vine …” (John 15:1, italics mine). He was saying that until then they had felt that their identification with the nation gave them access to God and a relationship to Him. Now this was no longer true. The Lord Jesus was beginning to call out a people to His name. He would be the Head, and the church which He would be forming would be His body. When He said, “I am the genuine vine,” He meant that no longer would His people worship through the temple, but they would come through Him to the living God.
Their heart is divided; now shall they be found faulty: he shall break down their altars, he shall spoil their images [Hos. 10:2].
“Their heart is divided.” Actually they did worship God—we can’t say that they didn’t. Many of them went down to Jerusalem for the feast days as they had done in former years and joined in the worship of God. However, they would come right back up to the golden calves that had been set up, and they would also worship Baal. Their hearts were divided—one day they would worship God; the next day they would worship Baal.
This is the condition which James mentions in his epistle. “A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways” (James 1:8). I believe this is the reason we find so much inconsistency in the lives of men in public office today. They talk out of one side of their mouths saying one thing; then they talk out of the other side of their mouths saying the opposite thing. I understand that the language of some of our leaders is absolutely the foulest speech one can imagine. Then some of those same people can appear on television and quote a Bible verse so that you would think they were sprouting wings under their coats! That is having a divided heart.
My friend, you cannot go to church on Sunday and sing, “Praise God from whom all blessings flow,” then walk out, and on Monday morning go to your work and take His name in vain—lose your temper and use His precious name to damn everything that irritates you. That kind of divided living is exactly the same kind of divided heart that brought judgment upon Israel.
For now they shall say, We have no king, because we feared not the Lord; what then should a king do to us? [Hos. 10:3].
They were saying, “Go down and look at the southern kingdom, and you will see that their king is not helping them very much.” Their basic problem was not that they had godless kings (they never had one good king in the northern kingdom), but their own hearts were not right with God. My friend, it is easy for you and for me to blame our government for our problems today when the basic problem is in our own hearts—yours and mine.
They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant: thus judgment springeth up as hemlock in the furrows of the field [Hos. 10:4].
The last days of the northern kingdom must have been parallel to our times. “They have spoken words.” They were very loquacious, great talkers. I believe that in our day radio and television and the printed page have made our generation the most talkative people on earth. Man is a pretty talkative “animal”—there is no monkey in a tree that does more chattering than man does. Talk, talk, talk, talk, reams and reams of printed material, and about 99.44 percent of all of it is not worth listening to. It would be better if most of it had never been said. Yet people are being paid fortunes for what they say and for what they write. Out of it all you hear practically nothing said about bringing people back to God, about a return to God and to the Word of God, about looking to Christ as the Savior.
“They have spoken words, swearing falsely in making a covenant.” They just talk, talk, talk, and you can believe almost nothing they say. I hear some Christian people say today that it is terrible that we don’t ask people to put their hand on the Bible anymore when they swear to tell the truth in a courtroom. Frankly, I’m glad the Bible is being left out of it. If they are going to lie anyway, all an oath on the Bible would do is blaspheme the Book. If the Bible means nothing to people, why in the world should it be used? I resent seeing someone put his hand on the Bible and swear to tell the truth and then hear him lie!
How many Christian people have spoken words to make a false covenant? How many people have marched down to an altar to dedicate their lives to God, have done it repeatedly, and still nothing changed? How often do we say words but not really mean business with God?
“Thus judgment springeth up as hemlock in the furrows of the field.” Or, getting it down to the level of most of us, judgment will spring up like weeds in our planted gardens.
The inhabitants of Samaria shall fear because of the calves of Beth-aven: for the people thereof shall mourn over it, and the priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it [Hos. 10:5].
“Beth-aven” is a term of ridicule for Beth-el. Since one golden calf was located at Beth-el and the other at Samaria, the inhabitants of these two cities were jealous of one another over who had the biggest calf or the most gold in it.
“For the people thereof shall mourn over it.” The actions of people mourning over these calves is really more the idea of trying to outdo one another over it. It would be in our day like “keeping up with the Joneses.” They bought a Cadillac, so we must buy a Continental. They built a house with three bedrooms and three baths, so we must build one with six bedrooms and six baths. They were trying to outdo each other in their calf worship!
“The priests thereof that rejoiced on it, for the glory thereof, because it is departed from it.” God is saying, “All the glory of your religion that your priests have boasted in will one day disappear.” The word Ichabod, meaning “the glory is departed,” will be written over the door.
What will happen to it?
It shall be also carried unto Assyria for a present to king Jareb: Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel [Hos. 10:6].
Those golden calves are going to be carried into Assyria for a present to the king. They would make a gift fit for a king—after all, there was a lot of gold in those calves.
“Ephraim shall receive shame, and Israel shall be ashamed of his own counsel.” Their counsel will come to naught.
As for Samaria, her king is cut off as the foam upon the water [Hos. 10:7].
God makes it very plain that He is going to cut off the king of the northern kingdom. He’ll be “cut off as the foam upon the water”—that royal line, as well as the royal line from the southern kingdom, will spend their time singing, “I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles.” In other words, they will be reduced to nothing.
The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, shall be destroyed: the thorn and the thistle shall come up on their altars; and they shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us [Hos. 10:8].
“The high places also of Aven … shall be destroyed.” As we have seen before, they worshiped their idols in groves of trees on the mountains.
“They shall say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us.” They want to be hidden from the judgment that is coming upon them. This will also be said in the Great Tribulation (see Rev. 6:15–17).
O Israel, thou hast sinned from the days of Gibeah: there they stood: the battle in Gibeah against the children of iniquity did not overtake them [Hos. 10:9].
This probably refers to the terrible events recorded in Judges 19–20. Even after the civil war, and the men of Gibeah were wiped out, the sin remained, and Gibeah was emblematic of gross and cruel sensuality. Along with the idolatrous practices of Israel were also gross sensual sins.
It is in my desire that I should chastise them; and the people shall be gathered against them, when they shall bind themselves in their two furrows.
And Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn; but I passed over upon her fair neck: I will make Ephraim to ride; Judah shall plow, and Jacob shall break his clods [Hos. 10:10–11].
“Ephraim is as an heifer that is taught, and loveth to tread out the corn.” Ephraim is like an heifer that loves to tread out the corn. They enjoyed the wonderful, bountiful harvest that they got, but they sure didn’t like the idea of going out and plowing the ground to break up the clods. God is saying that He will force Ephraim to go back to doing the thing he does not want to do.
Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord, till he come and rain righteousness upon you [Hos. 10:12].
This is a principle that runs throughout the Bible. It is exactly what Paul wrote to the believers in Galatia: “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting” (Gal. 6:7–8). Hosea is saying that if they would sow in righteousness, they would reap in mercy. It is always true that we cannot live by the Devil’s standards and then expect to reap a reward from God!
Ye have plowed wickedness, ye have reaped iniquity; ye have eaten the fruit of lies: because thou didst trust in thy way, in the multitude of thy mighty men [Hos. 10:13].
Israel hadn’t learned her lesson. She plowed wickedness, so she would reap iniquity. They have eaten the fruit of lies. They trusted in mighty men, in their leaders who lied to them. They believed these men rather than God. So they got exactly what was coming to them—the fruit of lies.
In Daniel we read that God set over the nation the “… basest of men” (Dan. 4:17). My friend, in our day, regardless of what political party you are talking about, a sinful, godless people cannot elect a righteous leader. If the people are liars, they will get a liar as a leader. If they are adulterers, they will get an adulterer. If they are thieves, that’s the kind of ruler they will have. My friend, you cannot beat God at this. As the Greek proverb puts it, “The dice of the gods are loaded.” You can’t gamble with God without losing. If you think that you can be a liar, an adulterer, a thief, and get by with it, I have news for you. When you roll the dice of life, you think they are going to come up in such a way that you will be the winner. Well, God already knows how they will come up, because He has loaded them. When you sow sin, you will reap sin. That is inescapable. If you think that you can escape the results of sin, you are making God out a liar and the Bible a falsehood. It is true that some have thought that they have gotten by with sin, but no one ever has. If we could bring Ahab and Jezebel or Judas back to testify, they would tell you that they did not get by with sin. And if we could bring back to life some Americans who have died, they would testify to the same thing.
Therefore shall a tumult arise among thy people, and all thy fortresses shall be spoiled, as Shalman spoiled Beth-arbel in the day of battle: the mother was dashed in pieces upon her children [Hos. 10:14].
“Shalman” is an abbreviated form of Shalmaneser, the King of Assyria. “Beth-arbel” apparently refers to a place the Greeks call Arbela. It is in the northern part of the country in the region of Galilee. It seems there was a battle here, although it is difficult to identify in secular history just which incident is being referred to in the verse.
“The mother was dashed in pieces upon her children.” This was a method used not only by the Assyrians, but also used later on by the Babylonians. This was mentioned by the children of Israel as they wept in Babylon. “O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us. Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones” (Ps. 137:8–9).
Those people used an awful, brutal, uncivilized method of destruction in war. Was it so uncivilized? Are we any better today? Have you read of things that are done by those in the drug culture, by homosexuals, by demon worshipers, by the new morality of our day? Was dashing the heads of little babies against the stones any worse than the sins that are committed today?
A brokenhearted man in Atlanta, Georgia, said to me one day, “The day I sent my boy to college it would have been better for him if I had taken him to the cemetery and buried him instead.” In other words, it would have been better for him to have been brutally killed as a baby by a ruthless pagan. But the ruthless pagans of the present hour are not condemned by our society. Instead they are accepted and even approved.
So shall Beth-el do unto you because of your great wickedness: in a morning shall the king of Israel utterly be cut off [Hos. 10:15].
The Assyrians came, and overnight Israel was being transported to Assyria and a life of slavery.
CHAPTERS 11–12
Theme: Israel must be judged, but God will not give her up
Chapter 11 opens on a new note. Up to this point the emphasis has been on the disobedience of God’s people, but now there is a new note sounded. That new note is the love of God—how wonderful it is!
When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt [Hos. 11:1].
This verse speaks primarily of the nation Israel—there is no question about that. It reveals the close relationship between God and the nation. In effect God is saying, “Israel as a nation was my son, and I took him out of Egypt. I did not take them out of Egypt because they were wonderful people who were serving Me. They were not serving Me but were in idolatry even then. It was not because of their ability, their superiority; they had nothing like that. I took them out of Egypt because I loved them.” My friend, that is the reason He saved you and me. Love is not the basis of salvation, but it is the motive of salvation. Back of the redemption we have in Christ, the fact that He would die, is “… God so loved the world …” (John 3:16, italics mine). “When Israel was a child, then I loved him,” God says. “I took him out of Egypt not because he was worthy, not because he performed good works, but because I loved him.”
Matthew in his gospel applied this verse to the Lord Jesus (see Matt. 2:15). This is an example of how statements in the Old Testament can also have application to the future. That baby boy who was born yonder in Bethlehem is identified with these people—He is an Israelite. The woman of Samaria knew this when He came there to the well. She said to him, “… How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria? for the Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans” (John 4:9). God sent Him down to this world to die, and the Lord Jesus came and identified Himself with His people. As a baby He was taken down to the safety of Egypt, but the time came when God called Him out of the place of safety back to the place of danger within the land. He moved into the arena of life where He was to demonstrate the love of God by dying upon the cross—to furnish a redemption that man might have a righteous basis on which his sins could be forgiven. He identified with His people; He identified with humanity; He identified with you and me. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
As they called them, so they went from them: they sacrificed unto Baalim, and burned incense to graven images [Hos. 11:2].
God had put the Canaanites and the other pagans out of the land because they worshiped Baalim. However, when the Hebrews got into the land they also turned to the worship of Baalim and to carved images.
I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms; but they knew not that I healed them [Hos. 11:3].
God blessed Israel in many different ways, and His blessing was the gentle way in which He led them.
I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love: and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them [Hos. 11:4].
God says, “I did not force them to serve Me.” God will not force Himself upon you either, my friend. Many people say, “Why doesn’t God break through today? Why doesn’t He do this or that?” I don’t know why God doesn’t do a lot of things—He just hasn’t told me. He is God, and I happen to be a little creature down here and I lack a great deal of information. Although I’m not able to answer that, I do know this: God will not force you. The only band He will put on you is the band of love. He says, “I won’t bridle you, I won’t push you, the only appeal I make to you is that I love you.” My friend, that is the appeal that God makes to you and to me today. He moved heaven and hell to get to the door of your heart, but He stopped there and politely knocks on the door and says, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock …” (Rev. 3:20). That is where He is—He has never crashed the door; He is not going to push Himself in. You will have to respond to His love.
It is interesting that love has always been the strongest appeal. It is said that Napoleon made the statement, “Charlemagne, Alexander the Great, and other generals have built up empires, and they built them on force, but Jesus Christ today has millions of people who would die for Him, and He built an empire on love.” That is His only appeal to you—don’t think He will use any other method. He will judge you, but He will not draw you to Himself except by love. That is the strongest appeal that can possibly be made. The band is a band of love.
He shall not return into the land of Egypt, but the Assyrian shall be his king, because they refused to return [Hos. 11:5].
Israel ran down to Egypt to get help but then found out that Egypt was his enemy. Then he ran up to Assyria to get help there. God said, “I’m going to make Assyria his king”—Assyria is where He sent Israel into captivity.
And the sword shall abide on his cities, and shall consume his branches, and devour them, because of their own counsels.
And my people are bent to backsliding from me: though they called them to the most High, none at all would exalt him [Hos. 11:6–7].
This is the second time in Hosea that the word backsliding occurs. Again, it is the figure of the backsliding heifer, that little calf who, when you try to push her up the runway into the old wagon, simply puts down her front feet and begins to slide backwards—and you just have to start all over again. That is a picture of what backsliding is—it is to refuse to listen to God, to refuse to come to Him.
How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together.
I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of thee: and I will not enter into the city [Hos. 11:8–9].
This is a plaintive note. It seems as if God is on the horns of a dilemma here, as if He is frustrated. Listen to Him: “How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?” He doesn’t want to give them up. God loves them, but because of their sin God must judge them.
“How shall I deliver thee, Israel?” My friend, God has no other way to save you except by the death of Christ. You may think you have two or three different ways yourself, but God has but one way. Since He says, “There is no saviour beside me” (Hos. 13:4), you had better listen to Him. You and I are not in the saving business, but He is.
“How shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim?” Admah and Zeboim were cities down on the plain which God judged along with Sodom and Gomorrah. God is saying to Israel, “I hate to judge you like that.” However, God had to judge them, and today it is just as desolate in Samaria as it is there along the Dead Sea where these cities were once located.
“Mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together. I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger.” In other words, Israel did not receive half of what they deserved. Why? Because God says, “I will not return to destroy Ephraim”—He intends to redeem them and to put these people back in that land some day. Their present return to the land is not a fulfillment of this at all; do not blame God for what is happening in that land today.
However, God will put them back in the land. Why will He do it? For one reason: “For I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of thee: and I will not enter into the city.” This is something else we need to learn today. We feel like we live in a democracy and that our government exists for us and exists to carry out the decisions we make, but God says, “I am the sovereign God. I’m not accountable to anyone. I do not have a board of directors, and nobody elected Me to office. I do what I please.” My friend, if you do not like what God is doing today, it’s too bad for you, because God is going to do it—He is not accountable to you. There are a lot of things which God does that I don’t understand, but He is God, and He is surely not accountable to Vernon McGee. He does not come down and hand in a report to me. The folk who work for me at “Thru the Bible” headquarters hand in reports to me, but God doesn’t give me a report. Why? Because He is God, and He doesn’t have to report to me.
They shall walk after the Lord: he shall roar like a lion: when he shall roar, then the children shall tremble from the west [Hos. 11:10].
God intends to judge, my friend—a judgment upon the nations in the west. And the United, States happens to be west from the land of Israel.
They shall tremble as a bird out of Egypt, and as a dove out of the land of Assyria: and I will place them in their houses, saith the Lord.
Ephraim compasseth me about with lies, and the house of Israel with deceit: but Judah yet ruleth with God, and is faithful with the saints [Hos. 11:11–12].
Judah still had a few good kings in the southern kingdom, but there were none in the northern kingdom. Some of the kings made a profession, but they were using lies and deceit. My friend, I believe we live in a day when you can fool everyone. Abraham Lincoln made the statement (everybody believes it because good old Abe said it), “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.” Lincoln did not live in this day of television and brainwashing. You can fool all the people all the time. There has never been such a day of brainwashing as today. But nobody is fooling God. He knows, and someday He will judge according to truth.
Chapter 12 continues God’s statement of judgment against Israel.
Ephraim feedeth on wind, and followeth after the east wind: he daily increaseth lies and desolation; and they do make a covenant with the Assyrians, and oil is carried into Egypt [Hos. 12:1].
“Ephraim feedeth on wind, and followeth after the east wind.” This is a reference to the east wind which comes over the burning Arabian desert and blows through that land. God is saying, “I intend to let the Assyrians come through the land just like the east wind.”
The Lord hath also a controversy with Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways; according to his doings will he recompense him.
He took his brother by the heel in the womb, and by his strength he had power with God:
Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed: he wept, and made supplication unto him: he found him in Beth-el, and there he spake with us [Hos. 12:2–4].
Many people have questioned why God put it in His Word that Jacob took hold of his brother Esau’s heel. It is interesting to note that today medicine and psychology have said that probably the most important period of a man’s life is when he is in the womb, because even in the womb character is being formed as well as the human body. This little fellow Jacob began to reveal something in the womb—he revealed that he wanted to be the firstborn. Although Esau beat him out, Jacob wanted to be the firstborn. I do not know how to explain it other than to say that it was in his heart from the very beginning. He wrestled at his birth, and God had to wrestle with him later on in his life at Peniel to bring him to submission so that He would be able to bless him. “Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed.” How did he prevail? Was he a better wrestler? Would he appear on television today as an outstanding wrestler? No, Jacob wasn’t much of a wrestler. He had his ears pinned back and his shoulders pinned to the mat. God had him down, but he won. How did he win? By surrendering. My friend, you can fight God all you want to, but you’ll never win until you surrender to Him.
Even the Lord God of hosts; the Lord is his memorial [Hos. 12:5].
The name Jehovah, or “the Lord,” is a name God gave to Israel as a memorial. He said, “You will always know Me by My name. I am Jehovah, the self-existing one, the living God.” We do not need images to remind us of God. His very name expresses His nature.
Therefore turn thou to thy God: keep mercy and judgment, and wait on thy God continually [Hos. 12:6].
These people needed to practice what they preached. In our day, the worship of Satan and the giving over to homosexuality is leading to the basest of crimes. Only by coming to the living God and waiting upon Him continually will we have mercy and justice; they go together—you will not have one without the other.
He is a merchant, the balances of deceit are in his hand: he loveth to oppress [Hos. 12:7].
This speaks of dishonesty in business, something of which God does not approve.
And Ephraim said. Yet I am become rich, I have found me out substance: in all my labours they shall find none iniquity in me that were sin [Hos. 12:8].
In other words, Ephraim felt he was able to buy his way with money. He had made his money dishonestly, but he thought he was being blessed of God.
And I that am the Lord thy God from the land of Egypt will yet make thee to dwell in tabernacles, as in the days of the solemn feast [Hos. 12:9].
God is saying to Israel, “I am not through with you—I’ll not give you up.”
Is there iniquity in Gilead? surely they are vanity: they sacrifice bullocks in Gilgal; yea, their altars are as heaps in the furrows of the fields [Hos. 12:11].
“Is there iniquity in Gilead?” Gilead is the place where there should be a balm to heal the wound, but Gilead was then a place of sin.
Ephraim provoked him to anger most bitterly: therefore shall he leave his blood upon him, and his reproach shall his Lord return unto him [Hos. 12:14].
“Therefore shall he leave his blood upon him.” His blood shall rest upon his own head, for he is guilty and deserves death. Blood had been shed profusely, and the guilt of his sin remained upon him.
Israel had turned from God, and therefore He must judge them.
CHAPTERS 13–14
Theme: Israel will be judged in the present; Israel will be saved in the future
ISRAEL WILL BE JUDGED IN THE PRESENT
In chapter 13 we see that God’s judgment of Israel is inevitable.
When Ephraim spake trembling, he exalted himself in Israel; but when he offended in Baal, he died [Hos. 13:1].
In other words, when Ephraim served the living God, God exalted him; but when he began the worship of Baal, he died. My friend, not only did Ephraim die and was put out of the land, but the land also died, and I do not think that it has come back today. The ruins of Samaria and the other cities in that area are the most desolate that you will find anywhere on the earth.
And now they sin more and more, and have made them molten images of their silver, and idols according to their own understanding, all of it the work of the craftsmen: they say of them, Let the men that sacrifice kiss the calves [Hos. 13:2].
This was a form of worship. The people were actually going up and kissing those golden calves!
There are many people today who think that to kiss a certain image or to kiss a certain area of ground is to worship God. On one of our tours to Israel there was a lady who got down on her hands and knees at the Garden Tomb and started kissing the place. I immediately took her by the arm and reminded her that we had been told not even to drink the water in that land and that she must get up out of the dirt. “Oh,” she said, “that doesn’t make any difference. This is a holy place; this is where my Lord was buried.” Then I said to her, “He’s not here today. He is the living Christ at God’s right hand. You cannot kiss Him today, but you can worship Him and praise Him.” It is nonsense to go around kissing something as an act of worship of the living and true God. You worship Him, my friend, by the life that you live. You worship Him in the way you conduct your business, carry on your social life, the way you run your home, and the way you act out on the street—not only in the way you act in the sanctuary. We are the ones who have made a distinction between the sanctuary and the street, but in God’s sight there is no difference at all.
Therefore they shall be as the morning cloud, and as the early dew that passeth away, as the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the floor, and as the smoke out of the chimney.
Yet I am the Lord thy God from the land of Egypt, and thou shalt know no god but me: for there is no saviour beside me [Hos. 13:3–4].
Listen to Him, my friend. You may work out a plan of salvation, but He is the only Savior, and since He is, you had better come His way. The Lord Jesus said, “… I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). Now either that’s true or it’s not true. Millions of people have come that way, and they have found it to be true. You may think you have your way of salvation, but God is the only Savior, and He is the only one who can offer you a plan of salvation.
I did know thee in the wilderness, in the land of great drought.
According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted; therefore have they forgotten me [Hos. 13:5–6].
God says, “I have been your God, the one who brought you out of Egypt. I am not about to give you up, but I am going to judge you.”
Therefore I will be unto them as a lion: as a leopard by the way will I observe them:
I will meet them as a bear that is bereaved of her whelps, and will rend the caul of their heart, and there will I devour them like a lion: the wild beast shall tear them [Hos. 13:7–8].
There is a prophetic sidelight here that is very interesting. In Daniel’s vision (ch. 7) Babylon is pictured as a lion, Greece (under Alexander the Great) is pictured as a leopard, and the empire of Media-Persia is pictured as the bear. Now here in Hosea’s prophecy God is saying that in the future He will come against them like a lion and a leopard, but in the immediate future He will come like a bear—represented by Media-Persia, which at that early date was dominated by Assyria. God says, “I will meet them as a bear that is bereaved of her whelps.” There is nothing more ferocious than a mother bear that has been robbed of her cubs, and she is an apt illustration of the brutal Assyrian army.
O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thine help [Hos. 13:9].
We often blame God for what happens to us. When you feel like that, this is a good verse to turn to. You have destroyed yourself, and you are responsible for your condition. But you can get help from God; He will furnish help to you.
I will be thy king: where is any other that may save thee in all thy cities? and thy judges of whom thou saidst, Give me a king and princes?
I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath [Hos. 13:10–11].
“I gave thee a king in mine anger.” When Israel asked for a king, God gave Saul to them. “And took him away in my wrath.” He took the last king, Hoshea, away from the northern kingdom, He took Zedekiah away from the southern kingdom, and He did it in His wrath. Judgment! It was His judgment in the beginning, and His judgment at the end.
Samaria shall become desolate; for she hath rebelled against her God: they shall fall by the sword: their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up [Hos. 13:16].
“Samaria shall become desolate.” I have been to Samaria, and I agree with God. It is a desolate place today.
ISRAEL WILL BE SAVED IN THE FUTURE
Chapter 14 is a wonderful chapter, for it speaks of the future salvation of Israel.
O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity [Hos. 14:1].
The Lord tells the people that it is because of their sin that they will go into captivity.
Asshur shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses: neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Ye are our gods: for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy [Hos. 14:3].
Imagine making something with your hands and then falling down and worshiping it! Many men today worship their own ability. They worship their brain, their intellect. They worship what they are doing and what they are able to do. You are nothing but a pagan and a heathen when you do that, my friend.
I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him.
I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.
His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon.
They that dwell under his shadow shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and grow as the vine: the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon [Hos. 14:4–7].
“I will heal their backsliding.” God says, “The people have been backsliding, slipping away from Me, but I am going to heal them. I will love them freely, for Mine anger is turned away from them.”
Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? I have heard him, and observed him: I am like a green fir tree. From me is thy fruit found.
Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? prudent, and he shall know them? for the ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall walk in them: but the transgressors shall fall therein [Hos. 14:8–9].
Verse 8 is one of the most wonderful verses in the Bible. This is a victory song. “Ephraim shall say”—this is future. God is finally going to win. Love is going to win the victory here. God has said to Ephraim, “Oh, Ephraim, how shall I give you up?” And He said, “Ephraim—let him alone because he has turned to idols.” Now God says, “But there is a day coming when Ephraim will see that he’s made a great blunder and mistake, and he will turn back to Me. He is going to say, ‘I don’t have anything more to do with idols.’”
I cannot help but believe in the midst of this tragedy of sin, this drama of human life which is being enacted down here in this world today, that God is going to come out the victor. I believe that there are going to be more people saved than there will be lost. That was Spurgeon’s belief also; he said that many times. You and I have our noses pressed against the present hour. We look around at the world today, and all we see is the little flock the Lord Jesus talked about—that is, the church, the people whom He is calling out of this world. But there are many whom He has saved in the past. For example, at one time He saved the entire population of Nineveh (although a hundred years later they reverted to sin, and He judged them). There have been other great revival movements in the past also, but the greatest turning to God is to take place in the future. That will occur, of all times, during the Great Tribulation Period. The Millennium is also going to be a period of salvation, by the way. God is going to win, my friend. Love will triumph. Our God today is riding victoriously in His own chariot—He is the sovereign God. God pity the man who gets under those chariot wheels! I don’t know about you, but I want to go along with God I’m hitchhiking a ride with Him today. That is the reason it is so urgent that we know His Word—to find out how to stay in His will in this difficult day in which we are living.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Israel. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Joel
INTRODUCTION
The prophecy of Joel may seem unimportant as it contains only three brief chapters. However, this little book is like an atom bomb—it is not very big, but it sure is potent and powerful.
We know very little about the prophet Joel. All we are told concerning him is in Joel 1:1, “The word of the Lordthat came to Joel the son of Pethuel.” Joel means “Jehovah is God,” and it was a very common name. There have been some people who have jumped to the conclusion that the prophet Joel was a son of Samuel because 1 Samuel 8:1–2 says, “And it came to pass, when Samuel was old, that he made his sons judges over Israel. Now the name of his firstborn was Joel ….” But if we read further the next verse tells us, “And his sons walked not in his ways, but turned aside after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted judgment” (1 Sam. 8:3). Samuel’s son could not have been the same as the prophet Joel.
We can be sure that Joel prophesied in Jerusalem and the Jerusalem area. Throughout his prophecy he refers again and again to “the house of the Lord.” For instance, in Joel 1:9 we read, “The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house of the Lord; the priests, the Lord’s ministers, mourn.” He also mentions Jerusalem in Joel 3:20, “But Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.” And then again, in Joel 3:17, we read, “So shall ye know that I am the Lord your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more.” Therefore we know that this man was a prophet in the southern kingdom of Judah.
Joel prophesied as one of the early prophets. Actually there were quite a few prophets—at least fifty—and it is generally conceded by conservative scholars that Joel prophesied about the time of the reign of Joash, king of Judah. That would mean that he was contemporary with and probably knew Elijah and Elisha.
Joel’s theme is “the day of the Lord.” He makes specific reference to it five times: Joel 1:15; 2:1–2; 2:10–11; 2:30–31; and 3:14–16. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel all refer to the Day of the Lord. Sometimes they call it “that day.” Zechariah particularly emphasizes “that day.” What is “that day”? It is the Day of the Lord, or the Day of Jehovah. Joel is the one who introduces the Day of the Lord in prophecy. Yonder from the mountaintop of the beginning of written prophecy, this man looked down through the centuries, seeing further than any other prophet saw—he saw the Day of the Lord.
The Day of the Lord is a technical expression in Scripture which is fraught with meaning. It includes the millennial kingdom which will come at the second coming of Christ, but Joel is going to make it very clear to us that it begins with the Great Tribulation Period, the time of great trouble. If you want to set a boundary or parenthesis at the end of the Day of the Lord, it would be the end of the Millennium when the Lord Jesus puts down all unrighteousness and establishes His eternal kingdom here upon the earth.
The Day of the Lord is also an expression that is peculiar to the prophets of the Old Testament. It does not include the period when the church is in the world, because none of the prophets spoke about a group of people who would be called out from among the Gentiles, the nation Israel, and all the tribes of the earth, to be brought into one great body called the church which would be raptured out of this world. The prophets neither spoke nor wrote about the church.
James, at the great council of Jerusalem, more or less outlined the relationship between the church age and this period known as the Day of the Lord. He said, “Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up” (Acts 15:14–16). James says, “After this”—after what? After He calls out the church from this world, God will again turn to His program with Israel, and it is to this time that the Day of the Lord refers. James went on to say, “That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things” (Acts 15:17). Today God is calling out of the Gentiles a people; in that day, all the Gentiles who will be entering the kingdom will seek the Lord. I think there will be a tremendous turning to God at that time unlike any the church has ever witnessed.
Someone may question, “Why is God following this program?” James said, “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world” (Acts 15:18). Don’t ask me why God is following this program—ask Him, because I do not know and nobody else knows. He is following this program because it is His program and it is His universe. He is not responsible to you or to me. God doesn’t turn in a report at the end of the week to tell us what He’s been doing and to receive our approval. My friend, all I can say is that it is just too bad if you and I don’t like it because, after all, we are just creatures down here in this world.
There are several special features about the prophecy of Joel which I would like to point out. Joel was the first of the writing prophets, and as he looked down through the centuries, he saw the coming of the Day of the Lord. However, I do not think he saw the church at all—none of the prophets did. When the Lord Jesus went to the top of the Mount of Olives, men who were schooled in the Old Testament came and asked Him, “What is the sign of the end of the age?” Our Lord didn’t mention His cross to them at that time. He didn’t tell them then about the coming of the Holy Spirit. He didn’t tell them about the church period or mention the Rapture to them. Instead, the Lord went way down to the beginning of the Day of the Lord. He dated it, but it’s not on your calendar or mine; the events He predicted will identify it for the people who will be there when the Day of the Lord begins: “When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)” (Matt. 24:15). That is how we are to know the beginning of the Day of the Lord. Joel will make it clear to us that it begins with night—that is, it begins as a time of trouble. After all, the Hebrew day always began at sunset. Genesis tells us, “And the evening and the morning were the first day” (Gen. 1:5). We begin at sunup, but God begins at sundown. The Day of the Lord, therefore, begins with night.
It is remarkable to note that, unlike Hosea, Joel says practically nothing about himself. In Hosea we find out about the scandal that went on in his home, about his unfaithful wife. We do not know whether Joel had an unfaithful wife or not; we don’t even know if he were married. The very first verse of the prophecy gives us all that we are to know: “The word of the Lordthat came to Joel the son of Pethuel” (Joel 1:1).
Unlike many of the other prophets, Joel does not condemn Israel for idolatry. Earlier in their history, at the time Joel was prophesying, idolatry was not the great sin in Israel. Joel will only mention one sin, the sin of drunkenness.
Joel opens his prophecy with a unique description of a literal plague of locusts. Then he uses that plague of locusts to compare with the future judgments which will come upon this earth. The first chapter is a dramatic and literary gem. It is a remarkable passage of Scripture, unlike anything you will find elsewhere in literature.
Finally, Joel’s prophecy contains the very controversial passage in which he mentions the outpouring of the Holy Spirit which was referred to by the apostle Peter on the Day of Pentecost (see Joel 2:28–29). There is a difference of interpretation concerning the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, and we will look at that in detail when we come to it.
OUTLINE
I. Literal and Local Plague of Locusts, Chapter 1:1–14
II. Looking to the Day of the Lord (Prelude), Chapters 1:15–2:32
III. Looking at the Day of the Lord (Postlude), Chapter 3
A. The Great Tribulation, Chapter 3:1–15
B. The Millennial Kingdom, Chapter 3:16–21
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Literal and Local Plague of Locusts; Looking to the Day of the Lord (prelude)
The prophecy of Joel contains only three very brief chapters, but it holds an important position in Scripture. As the first of the writing prophets, it is Joel who introduces and defines the term, “the day of the Lord.”
LITERAL AND LOCAL PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS
The word of the Lord that came to Joel the son of Pethuel [Joel 1:1].
There are those who have thought that Joel was a son of Samuel (see 1 Sam. 8:1–2), but Samuel’s sons were very wicked and this Joel certainly is not. This boy’s father was Pethuel. Joel was a common name, and it means “Jehovah is God.”
Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers? [Joel 1:2].
Apparently Israel was in the midst of a great locust plague at this time. Locust plagues were rather commonplace in that land, but Joel calls to the old men and says, “Did anything like this ever happen in your day? Did it happen in the day of your fathers? Have you ever heard anything like this locust plague?” Of course, they had to say, “No, this is the worst we’ve ever had.” The trouble with most of us as we begin to get older is that we have grandiose ideas about the past. If some young person comes and says to us, “Say, we just had a wonderful meeting at our church,” we like to say, “That’s wonderful, that was a great meeting, but we had a meeting that was twice as good back in my hometown when I was young.” Joel said, “You old men have never heard of anything like this”—and the old men had to agree that they had not.
Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation [Joel 1:3].
Joel goes on to say, “You can pass this on down. Tell your children about this and have them tell their children, because there’s not going to be a plague of locusts like this ever again.” Does this remind you of another passage of Scripture? In the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24, when the Lord Jesus identified the period which He Himself labeled the Great Tribulation Period, He said the same thing about it. He said that there has never been anything like it before, and there is not going to be anything like it afterward. Now that more or less puts parentheses around that period and slips it into a unique slot in history. During the Great Tribulation no one will be able to say, “This reminds me of when I was a young fellow—we had a real time of trouble back then.” We have never had a period like the Great Tribulation. For all periods of recorded history in the past, there have always been previous times in history that could match it. However, the Lord Jesus made it very clear concerning the Great Tribulation: “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Matt. 24:21). When people are in the midst of the Great Tribulation, there will be none of this questioning that we hear today: “Do you think that the Great Depression was the Great Tribulation?” Or, “Do you think that all this turmoil today is the Great Tribulation?” The answer is very easy to come by when we turn to the words of the Lord Jesus. He said there is nothing like it in the past. We’ve had times like this before, my friend—they can all be duplicated in the past. And since things are not getting better but getting worse, neither can we say there will be nothing like this in the future.
In a very dramatic way, Joel is saying, “Look, this locust plague is unique—there has never been anything like it, but there is coming another unique period called the Day of the Lord.” The Day of the Lord will open with the Great Tribulation after the church has left this world. It will be a frightful time on this earth, horrible beyond description, and then Christ will come and establish His kingdom. I wish the people who deny that the Bible teaches these things would study the total Word of God and not just lift out a few verses here and there. We need to study the entire Word of God to know what it says.
This plague of locusts stands alone as being different from any other plague that has taken place. The plague of locusts in the land of Egypt at the time of Moses was a miraculous plague—it was a judgment of God. However, this plague was what we would call a natural event.
There are several things that we need to understand about the locust as many of us are not familiar with them at all. As a boy I always enjoyed lying on my bed before an open window on a summer evening and listening to the locusts in the trees. However, they were never a plague, and they probably were not the same kind of locusts which were in Israel in Bible times or even today. If you have ever seen pictures of fields after a plague of locusts, you know that locusts seem to have a scorched earth policy of their own—it looks just as if a fire had burned over the field and destroyed everything.
The Word of God speaks of locusts, and one passage I will draw your attention to is Proverbs 30:27, “The locusts have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands.” Locusts march as an army, and they are divided into different bands as they go. That will help us understand Joel’s description of this locust plague as we come to verse 4—
That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpillar eaten [Joel 1:4].
It is true that four different words are used here—the palmerworm, the locust, the cankerworm, and the caterpillar. There are those who believe that this refers to four different types of insects, but there really is no basis for that. The palmerworm means “to gnaw off.” The word for locust in Hebrew is arbeh and it suggests that there are many of them and they are migratory—they move as a great swarm. The cankerworm means “to lick off,” and the caterpillar means “to devour or to consume.” These four words describe the locust and what he does. The locusts move in bands just like an army. First of all, there are the planes which come over and drop the bombs. Then after the bombs have been dropped by the air corps, the artillery comes through and destroys every section, leaving great areas devastated, but a great deal remains. Then the infantry comes along—that’s the third group—and they get what has been left. The mop-up crew follows after that, and they will get what little may still be there. What we have here, therefore, are four words which describe the different bands of locusts. They have no general, they have no king, they have no lieutenants or sergeants, but they move just like an army.
Locusts were often sent by God as a judgment, but we would put this plague in the category of a natural plague. I believe that it was not necessarily a judgment, but a warning to the people, a warning to the nation. Joel was the first writing prophet, and he prophesied at the same time as Elijah. As Elijah was warning the northern kingdom, this man Joel, in a most dramatic manner, was warning the southern kingdom of a judgment that was coming. He will move from the local judgment—it was the method of all the prophets to move from the local situation into the future—to the judgment that is coming at the Day of the Lord.
The Day of the Lord is one of the most misunderstood terms and yet one of the most important in Scripture. Joel was the first to use it, and he makes very clear what the Day of the Lord is. After him, all the other prophets had to do was to speak of “that day,” and it was understood as to what they were referring.
Now I am getting a little bit ahead of this chapter, but I want to say that Joel will move from this literal and local plague of locusts to speak of the Day of the Lord which begins with the Great Tribulation Period. How does the Great Tribulation Period open? It opens with the four horsemen of the Apocalypse: there is a false peace, then war breaks out, followed by a famine, and then finally the pale horse of death. I see a tremendous parallel between these four bands of locusts and the four horsemen of the Apocalypse. During the Great Tribulation Period it will not be literal locusts, but it will be something far worse that is going to ride, not just through that land, but through the entire world. The world will be totally devastated when the Lord Jesus Christ returns to the earth to set up His kingdom.
Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine, for it is cut off from your mouth [Joel 1:5].
The locusts have gotten to the grapes first. They have stripped all the vineyards, and there will be no more wine for the drunkards. The man who was an alcoholic in that day found himself taking the cure before he intended to, because there was no more wine to drink.
This reveals that, even at the beginning of the downfall of the nation Israel, the great sin was drunkenness. We are frequently reminded that most of the accidents which take place on our highways are caused by some individual who is exercising his freedom and right to drink. Entire families have been killed on the highway while out on a holiday because some drunk driver has hit them head-on. I may be criticized for moving into the realm of politics but, my friend, I am studying the Word of God, and when it talks about drunkenness, I am going to talk about drunkenness. And when God’s Word speaks about the king being a drunkard, then I will talk about drunkenness in my nation’s capital. When we are told that there are dozens of cocktail parties every day in Washington, D.C., it is no wonder that some of the decisions which are being handed down look as if they were coming from men who are not in their right minds.
“Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine.” At the very beginning, drunkenness was beginning to chip away the foundation of the nation Israel. This is the only sin Joel will mention. He will not mention idolatry at all, the great sin of turning from God, which eventually brought the nation down. At this time the people still made a profession of worshiping God.
For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion [Joel 1:6].
Here the locusts are compared to an invading army and its destructiveness. These little bitty insects, the locusts, can tear a tree down. They can move through a field of grain and absolutely leave nothing but bare ground. They came along in these four bands with no leader, no king. They came, in most cases, as a judgment from God, but this plague was a warning from God. Later Joel will move ahead to that which is still future, the Day of the Lord which will be just like a locust plague upon the earth. The four horsemen of the Apocalypse are yet to ride.
He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof are made white [Joel 1:7].
The locusts actually can kill a fig tree. They absolutely stripped a fig tree of its bark, leaving nothing but the naked wood exposed.
Joel is sending out a message to the people, and he is going to tell them what they are to do at a time like this. He will tell them ten things they are to do—
Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth [Joel 1:8].
He says something now that is unusual: (1) They are to lament. Like a young bride who has lost her husband, perhaps killed in battle, that is the way this nation should weep.
The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house of the Lord; the priests, the Lord’s ministers, mourn [Joel 1:9].
“The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house of the Lord.” In other words, they are not able to make an offering at all. (2) “The priests, the Lord’s ministers, mourn.” All through this passage the same thing is said. The drunkards mourned and the priests mourned—the entire economy was affected by this plague.
This verse and other verses lead us to believe that the prophet Joel was in Jerusalem. He speaks here to the priests who minister in the house of the Lord.
The field is wasted, the land mourneth; for the corn is wasted: the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth [Joel 1:10].
There was no olive oil and no grapes and no grain. The three staple crops which they had were now destroyed. Even the land is to mourn. You see, the land and the people were very closely intertwined. The Mosaic Law was not only given to a people, it was given to a land.
Joel has spoken to the drunkards, he has spoken to the priests, and now he will speak to the farmers:
Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished.
The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men [Joel 1:11–12].
(3) “Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen.” (4)“Howl, O ye vinedressers.” The vinedressers are vineyard owners. “The apple tree” is actually the orange tree which is indigenous to that land.
Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God: for the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden from the house of your God [Joel 1:13].
(5) “Gird yourselves,” (6) “and lament, priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar.” The priests could not perform their function because there was nothing for them to use for the offerings. They were to lie all night girded with sackcloth and ashes because there was no meat offering and no drink offering. The economy of the land was wrecked, and there was not even enough to make an offering to God. However, God makes it clear that it was not the ritual that was important but the hearts of the people.
In these verses God is asking the people to something that He had not asked before. When God gave the Mosaic Law, He gave seven feast days to these people, and He made it clear that He did not want them to come before Him with a long face. He wanted them to come to His house rejoicing and with joy in their hearts.
Have you noticed today that when Christians meet together in church it is generally not a very joyful occasion? I am even rebuked for telling funny stories. Sometimes I see a lot of saints who just sit there and do not even crack a smile. I wish they would—I think it would do them good. There is no joy today, and there was no joy in Joel’s day.
Why is God for the first time telling His people, “I want you to lament. I want you in sackcloth and ashes. I want you to mourn”? Before He had told them, “I want you to come before Me with joy.” The reason is because of sin in the nation. That is the same reason there is such a lack of joy today. The world is surely working hard today. The music has to be loud and fast, and the jokes have to be dirty to even get a laugh. Even in our churches it is considered almost sinful to laugh out loud. Oh, my friend, where is our joy today? It is gone because of sin. God won’t let us have joy. He said to these people, “Come before Me now with your mourning. I do not like it, but you are sinful and I want to see your repentance.”
Sanctify ye a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the Lord your God, and cry unto the Lord [Joel 1:14].
(7) “Sanctify ye a fast.” God had never asked them to do that before. God had given them feast days—He never gave them a fast day until they plunged into sin. The one sin Joel mentions which was destroying the nation was drunkenness. It was robbing people of their normal thinking; they were not able to make right judgments.
(8) “all a solemn assembly.” In other words, they were to come together. God had wanted them to come together and rejoice in His presence, but now He says this is to be a solemn assembly.
(9) “Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the Lord your God.” This was a time to go to church. During World War II there were two rather godless men who were good friends and belonged to all different kinds of clubs (drinking clubs, most of them), but they met one Sunday at church. One of them said, “Well, I didn’t know you went to church!” The other replied, “I don’t usually go to church—this is my first time. But I’ve got a son over there fighting in this war, and I thought it was about time I got to church.” My friend, times of great trouble drive people to God. The people of the land were to come together for a fast day.
(10) “Cry unto the Lord.” Why? Because God is merciful. God is gracious. God wants to forgive. Our God is a wonderful God. They were to come to Him in this time of difficulty, and He would hear and answer their prayer.
Joel has given a warning to these people, and he has given them these injunctions. These are the things they are to do if they want the blessing of God upon them.
LOOKING TO THE DAY OF THE LORD (PRELUDE)
In a masterly way, Joel now moves from the local situation, this plague of locusts, down to the end of the age and the Day of the Lord.
Alas for the day! for the day of the Lord is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come [Joel 1:15].
“Alas for the day!” What day are you talking about, Joel? “For the day of the Lord is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come.” Like a little model, a little adumbration of that which is coming in the future, this local plague of locusts was a warning, a picture of the coming Day of the Lord. It should have alerted the people.
Joel is now going to tell them about something in the future. That which was coming in the future, the thing which had been promised to David, was a kingdom. David would be raised up to rule over that kingdom. War would cease, and there would be peace on the earth. All the prophets spoke about that, but they also spoke about what Joel is saying here—the coming of the Day of the Lord.
The Day of the Lord must be understood in contrast to the other days which are mentioned in Scripture. You and I are living today in what Scripture calls man’s day. It began with Nebuchadnezzar, and the Lord Jesus labeled it “the times of the Gentiles.” He said, “… Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled” (Luke 21:24). We are living in a man’s day. Man is the one who makes the judgments today. We appeal to the Supreme Court, but we do not appeal to God. We have forgotten Him altogether. His name is just a word to swear by and to blaspheme.
Dr. Lewis Sperry Chafer makes this comment concerning man’s day: “This theme, obscured at times by translators, is referred to but once in the New Testament, namely, 1 Corinthians 4:3, which reads, ‘But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self.’ Now in this passage the phrase, ‘man’s judgment’ is really a reference to human opinion current in this age, which might properly and literally be translated, ‘man’s day.’”
We are living in the day of man. Believe me, humanism abounds today. Man believes he can solve the problems of the world, but what has man really done? He has gotten the world into an awful mess right now. Every new politician who comes along thinks he has the answer. My friend, they do not have the answers; man cannot solve the problems of this world. I understand there have been some admissions in the cloakrooms of our own government and the chancelleries of the great nations of the world that man is incapable of solving the problems of the world today.
Scripture speaks of another day that is coming—the Day of the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:7–8: “So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.” What is the Day of the Lord Jesus Christ? It is the day when He will come to take His church out of this world, and then the church will come before the judgment seat of Christ. My life verse is Philippians 1:6 which reads, “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (italics mine). He is going to keep us until that day when He takes us out of the world and we appear before Him to see whether we receive a reward or not.
Both the Old and the New Testament speak of the Day of the Lord. Second Thessalonians 2:2 tells us, “That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand.” The Thessalonian believers were afraid that they would miss the Rapture. Our translation of this verse is an unfortunate one—the word Christ should have been translated as “Lord”—in other words, “as the day of the Lord is at hand.” Paul is assuring the believers that they will not go through the Day of the Lord.
Joel will make very clear what the Day of the Lord is. He will say that the Day of the Lord is a dark, gloomy, and difficult day. The Hebrew viewpoint was that they would enter immediately into the kingdom—that life would be a breeze with no problems at all. But Joel says that the Day of the Lord begins with night, with darkness. That darkness is the Great Tribulation Period. It will be like this locust plague that has come with its four bands of locusts like the four horsemen of the Apocalypse who will ride in the Great Tribulation Period. Then the Day of the Lord will include the coming of Christ to the earth to establish His kingdom. Then His people will enter into the sunshine of His presence. That was the Old Testament hope; that was the thing the Old Testament taught.
My friend, you can see how important it is to study all of the Bible. One man wrote to me to explain what he thought the day of the Lord was. He wrote several pages, giving Scripture after Scripture, but he never gave one verse from Joel. He didn’t understand that Joel is the very key. Joel was the first of the writing prophets. You cannot say the Day of the Lord is something other than what Joel says it is; it must fit into the program which he describes. All the prophets who came after him used this term many times. “The Day of the Lord” occurs about seventy-five times in the entire Bible; “the day of the Lord” occurs five times and “that day” one time in the Book of Joel. All of the prophets have a great deal to say about the Day of the Lord, and we need to recognize that it is a technical term which is defined and used consistently in Scripture.
To summarize, there is (1) man’s day, the day in which we are living now; (2) the Day of the Lord Jesus Christ, when He will take the church out of this world; then (3) the Day of the Lord beginning with the Great Tribulation Period. After all, we label the different days of the week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and so on. God has labeled these different periods of time also. This is not something men thought of, but it is what the Word of God teaches.
I should say that the Day of the Lord is not the same as the Lord’s Day that is mentioned in Revelation 1:10. The Lord’s Day is the first day of the week, which the New Testament makes very clear. Many people say the Day of the Lord and the Lord’s Day are the same just because they use the same two words. That is ridiculous—as ridiculous as saying there is no difference between a chestnut horse and a horse chestnut. If you take two words and turn them around, you get something altogether different. In the one you’ve got a nut, and in the other you’ve got a horse! The Day of the Lord and the Lord’s Day are two different things.
Is not the meat cut off before our eyes, yea, joy and gladness from the house of our God? [Joel 1:16].
Joel continues talking about this plague of locusts. There was no more joy and gladness in the house of God. I have had the privilege in the past few years of my ministry of speaking in the great pulpits of this country and at many of the great Bible conferences. I have noted that there is a sadness in congregations as they come together today. In many places I have found that at the first service there is an air of expectancy. You can feel it, the air is charged with it, but there is no note of gladness. At some meetings in Florida, a man with the FBI said to me, “I’ve been watching your method. I’ve noted that you get up before a congregation, and you slide very quietly and slowly into a funny story to get the people into a good humor.” I said, “You’ve noticed that?” And he said, “Yes, and I think I know why you do it. I think you’re doing it because there is a low level of joy among the people today.” I told the man that he was right. The joy was gone in Israel, and today, even when we have everything, there is no joy in our services.
The seed is rotten under their clods, the garners are laid desolate, the barns are broken down; for the corn is withered [Joel 1:17].
“The seed is rotten under their clods.” The grain couldn’t even come up, because the locusts had just gnawed off the shoots even with the ground. “The garners are laid desolate”—they could not fill up the granary.
How do the beasts groan! the herds of cattle are perplexed, because they have no pasture; yea, the flocks of sheep are made desolate.
O Lord, to thee will I cry: for the fire hath devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame hath burned all the trees of the field [Joel 1:18–19].
The locusts have their own scorched earth policy. It was just as if the ground had been entirely burned off.
The beasts of the field cry also unto thee: for the rivers of waters are dried up, and the fire hath devoured the pastures of the wilderness [Joel 1:20].
This was a very terrible, treacherous time. Even the animal world—both the animals in the barnyard and the wild animals out yonder in the forest—were being affected by this plague. It was a judgment that touched all life in that land in that day, and it becomes a picture of the Day of the Lord that is coming.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Looking to the Day of the Lord; God’s plea; promise of deliverance; promise of the Holy Spirit
This chapter continues the prelude which was begun in 1:15, and, of course, continues the theme.
LOOKING TO THE DAY OF THE LORD
You recall that God had promised David a kingdom, and that wonderful future kingdom became the theme song of all the prophets after David. The great message is that the millennial kingdom is coming upon this earth. As we read the prophets, it sounds like a stuck record as one after another looks forward to it.
Now Joel, the first of the writing prophets, makes it clear that the Day of the Lord—which includes the millennial kingdom—will not be all peaches and cream. Before the millennial kingdom (when the Lord Jesus will be ruling on this earth), there will be a time which the Lord Jesus defined as the Great Tribulation Period. Chapter 2 will make this clear to us.
Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand [Joel 2:1].
“The day of the LORD cometh.” Let me remind you that Joel is the first of the writing prophets, and he looks way down through the centuries and sees the Day of the Lord. It begins with darkness, that is, with judgment. Then Christ comes to the earth and establishes His kingdom. Malachi speaks of Him as the “hellip; Sun of righteousness [who will] arise with healing in his wings …” (Mal. 4:2).
“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain.” “Zion” and “my holy mountain” refer to Jerusalem. He says they should blow the trumpet and sound an alarm. It is important for us to understand the significance of the trumpet. One needs to have a full-orbed view of the Bible so that on any given subject we are able to put our thinking down on all four corners and make an induction. Understanding the background will enable us to appreciate what the writer is saying.
What is the significance of the blowing of the trumpet? Back in the Book of Numbers we learn that when the children of Israel started through the wilderness, God commanded them to make two silver trumpets. He gave the instructions to Moses: “And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Make thee two trumpets of silver; of a whole piece shalt thou make them: that thou mayest use them for the calling of the assembly, and for the journeying of the camps” (Num. 10:1–2). When Israel was in the wilderness, God used the trumpets to move them on the wilderness march. The first blowing of the trumpet was a signal that everybody should get ready to march. When the pillar of cloud would lift and move out, they would take down the tabernacle. Then immediately the trumpet would sound again, and Moses and Aaron would move up front ahead of the tribe of Judah, and the ark would go out ahead with them. You will remember that Israel was encamped around the tabernacle on all four sides, three tribes on each side. Now each section would move out in turn, signaled by the blowing of the trumpets. Actually, to get the whole camp on the march, the trumpets were blown seven different times.
Now when we come to Revelation, the final book of the Bible, we find the blowing of the trumpets again. Although some expositors feel that this is in relation to the church, there is no blowing of the trumpet for the church. The sound of the trumpet at the time of the Rapture (1 Thess. 4:16) will be the shout of Christ Himself: “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God …”—His voice will be like a trumpet.
The seven trumpets in Revelation have nothing to do with the church. The church will have been completed and will have been taken out of the world. The seven trumpets are identified with the nation Israel, just as there were the seven trumpet calls in the wilderness march.
If we turn back to the Book of Numbers, we will see that the different trumpet calls meant certain definite things. They were a way of giving instructions to Israel: “And when they shall blow with them, all the assembly shall assemble themselves to thee at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And if they blow but with one trumpet, then the princes, which are heads of the thousands of Israel, shall gather themselves unto thee. When ye blow an alarm, then the camps that lie on the east parts shall go forward. When ye blow an alarm the second time, then the camps that lie on the south side shall take their journey: they shall blow an alarm for their journeys. But when the congregation is to be gathered together, ye shall blow, but ye shall not sound an alarm” (Num. 10:3–7). Then he gives instructions for the time they will be in the Promised Land: “And if ye go to war in your land against the enemy that oppresseth you, then ye shall blow an alarm with the trumpets; and ye shall be remembered before the Lord your God, and ye shall be saved from your enemies” (Num. 10:9). During the time of war the trumpet would call the men of war to defend their country when an enemy was coming.
Now here in Joel’s prophecy he says, “Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain.” Why? “Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh [near] at hand.” You see, after the Lord has called His church out of the world, He will turn again to the nation of Israel, which becomes the object of worldwide anti-Semitism. This is the beginning of the Day of the Lord.
Now in this second chapter, Joel is going to give a blending of the plague of locusts together with the threat of the Assyrian army and then look down the avenue of time into the future and the Day of the Lord. Of course the liberal theologian would say this refers simply to the locust plague and the local situation. He would like to dismiss a great deal of meaning from the Word of God. The other extreme view is to say this refers only to the Great Tribulation Period.
I think we need to see that in Joel there is a marvelous blending. He moves right out of the locust plague to the Day of the Lord which is way out yonder in the future. You recall that was the practice of the prophets to speak into a local situation and then move out into the future Day of the Lord—which includes the Tribulation Period and the Millennium.
The local situation was the plague of locusts, and in the near future the Assyrian army was coming down: “But I will remove far off from you the northern army” (v. 20). I think it would be rather ridiculous to call a plague of locusts the northern army, but the plague of locusts was a picture of the Assyrian army that would be coming out of the north, and the Assyrian army becomes the picture of the enemy which will be coming out of the north in the last days. As we see in chapters 38 and 39 of Ezekiel, the northern army refers to present-day Russia which will invade Israel. In fact, Russia’s coming will usher in the last half of the Great Tribulation Period.
Let me remind you that the Day of the Lord is not a twenty-four hour day, but a period of time. The apostle Paul used it in that sense when he said, “… now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Cor. 6:2, italics mine), speaking of the age of grace.
Let me repeat that the Day of the Lord is different from the Lord’s Day, which refers to the first day of the week. Although the two words are the same, their arrangement makes all the difference. The difference is as great as between a chestnut horse and a horse chestnut!
Now Joel will put down God’s definition that will condition and limit the prophets who will speak in the future. After this, all of them will speak into this period. It is interesting to find that none of them contradict each other, even though some of the prophets didn’t know what the others were prophesying.
A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more after it, even to the years of many generations [Joel 2:2].
This is the same period about which the Lord Jesus said, “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Matt. 24:21). The Great Tribulation opens the Day of the Lord, because that is the way the Hebrew day opens; it begins in the evening at the time of darkness. I have a notion that when the plague of locusts came over the land, they would actually darken the sky because there would be so many of them. And the Day of the Lord will begin with darkness.
A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them [Joel 2:3].
Before the plague of locusts came, the earth looked like the Garden of Eden. Everything was green with rich, luxurious foliage. The land was beautiful. After the locusts left, there was not a bit of green to be seen. It looked as if a fire had swept over the land.
The Day of the Lord will be the same in that it will be a time of destruction. When the four horsemen of the Apocalypse ride through this world, there will be war and famine and death. In one fell swoop, one fourth of the population will be wiped out, and at another time, one third of the population will be destroyed.
The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run [Joel 2:4].
As I indicated before, the head of the locust resembles a horse’s head, and the Italian word for locust means “little horse”; the German word means “hay horse.” As the horse eats hay, the locusts would eat up everything green. Joel is describing the locust plague and is beginning to make application of it to the Day of the Lord.
Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array.
Before their face the people shall be much pained: all faces shall gather blackness [Joel 2:5–6].
“All faces shall gather blackness”—that is, they will be scorched.
They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war; and they shall march every one on his ways, and they shall not break their ranks [Joel 2:7].
In the Book of Proverbs it says this: “The locusts have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands” (Prov. 30:27). They don’t need a king or a leader—each one knows his place. They come in bands. When Joel describes four different groups of locusts here, I believe he is describing the movement of a great army—an army of locusts. In the last days, there will come against that land another enemy, and it will come like a locust plague. This is a preparation for the Book of Revelation in which the apostle John writes of a locust plague that will take place on the earth during the first woe which follows the blowing of the fifth trumpet: “And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of the pit, as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth: and unto them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads” (Rev. 9:1–4).
This is an unusual locust that will not attack anything green—that is all the normal locust would attack. They did not attack human beings. But these locusts will attack “only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads.”
It will be such a terrifying time that men will seek death and will not be able to find it; that is, they will not be able to commit suicide: “And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man. And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them” (Rev. 9:5–6).
Now notice this description of the locusts:“And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men. And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions” (Rev. 9:7–8). My friend, that is an unusual type of locust! This plague will take place during the Great Tribulation.
You can see that Joel, way back here at the beginning of the writing prophets, prepares the ground for the apostle John to come later and give the detailed description of the locusts as they will appear in the Day of the Lord.
May I just say that this is the reason I think it is tragic today to find so many people who have just been converted who think they are qualified to start a Bible class. What books do they like to start to teach? Usually you will find they choose either the Gospel of John or the Book of Revelation. In my judgment, that is not the place to begin with new believers. I believe Matthew is the key book to the Bible. Until you understand Matthew, I don’t think you will quite get the message of the Gospel of John and I know you will miss the message of the Book of Revelation. And this little prophet Joel, who has been by and large ignored, sheds a great deal of light on the last days which he calls the Day of the Lord.
When Joel writes: “They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war,” he is beginning to move from the local locust plague into the future which he has labeled the Day of the Lord.
In the next verse we will see that he is talking about the Day of the Lord.
Neither shall one thrust another; they shall walk every one in his path: and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded.
They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb up upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief.
The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining [Joel 2:8–10].
Obviously this is more than a local locust plague or else Joel is exaggerating; the prophets spoke God’s Word as He gave it to them—they didn’t exaggerate. This is the same picture that John gives us in the Book of Revelation.
And the Lord shall utter his voice before his army: for his camp is very great: for he is strong that executeth his word: for the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; and who can abide it? [Joel 2:11].
This is the third time Joel has mentioned the Day of the Lord.
“Who can abide it?” This is very much the same as Jesus said, “Except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved” (Matt. 24:22). And Joel asks, “Who can abide it?” Well, John gives the answer in Revelation. In chapter 7 he says that God will shut down the forces of nature, withholding the winds from blowing (which are judgments of God upon the earth) until the two great companies of the redeemed are sealed and made secure. If God’s people are going to make it through the terrible time of tribulation, they will have to be sealed. When Joel asks, “Who can abide it?” the “it” is the Day of the Lord, which begins in darkness, the night of the Great Tribulation.
GOD’S PLEA
Now the question is: What can a sinner do in a period like this? Well, Joel gives the answer for that:
Therefore also now, saith the Lord, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning [Joel 2:12].
“Turn ye even to me with all your heart.” The word turn means “repent.” God says to His people whose hearts are turned from Him, “Repent.” Repent means primarily to change your mind. You indicate a change of mind by turning around. It is true there may be some shedding of tears along with the repentance, but that is only a by-product of repentance. Repentance really means to change your mind.
When I first entered the ministry, I went to my home church in Nashville as a pastor. I had some of the most wonderful people in that church—they had to be wonderful to put up with me! It was my first pastorate, and I was as green as grass. I could be very serious but also rather frivolous. I was not married yet; so I would take off to go to Atlanta, Georgia, or to Memphis, Tennessee, because I knew some girls in both places.
The man who was humanly responsible for, my entering the ministry was in that church. He had arranged a loan for me, because I was a poor boy with no money. Also he had helped me get a job. He was like a father to me, and I loved him as a father.
One day I went to the bank to tell him something that I had in mind. He let me know immediately that my idea was not a very good idea, as many of mine have not been. He let me know in no uncertain terms. That angered me, so I turned and started out the door. When I got to the street, I thought, “This is not right. I owe this man a great deal.” So I turned around and went back. Do you know why I turned around? Because it came into my mind and into my heart that I ought to do it. When I got back to his office I saw tears coming from his eyes. By the way, when my wife and I were in Nashville on our honeymoon, he said to her, “I don’t know much about you, whether or not you get angry quickly, but Vernon has a very high temper, and don’t both of you get angry at the same time!” Well, one of the things that made my wife so attractive to me was her mild, even temper, and she has put up with a whole lot from this poor preacher! But the day I returned to his office I repented of the thing I had done, and I manifested it in turning and going back to him.
Now when God says, “Turn ye even to me with all your heart,” He means to repent, and the by-product of it will be fasting, weeping, and mourning. Unfortunately, a great many people think that if they go down to an altar and shed enough tears, they are converted. Well, I went through that process as a boy and found it to be absolutely meaningless.
And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil [Joel 2:13].
You see, this was to be a heart experience, not some outward gesture. Actually, the Mosaic Law forbade the priest from tearing his garments. Repentance was not to be shown by being a fanatic. The tear was to be in the heart.
“And turn unto the Lord your God” is repentance.
Now he gives the reason for turning to the Lord: “For he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.” In the Books of Exodus and Jonah, I deal more thoroughly with the question of what it means when God repents. When Israel was in Egypt it looked as if God changed His mind. He sent plague after plague to Egypt to give Pharaoh the opportunity to repent and turn to Him, but he didn’t. Also in Jonah’s day, God sent Jonah to preach to the Ninevites that He would destroy the city. However, Nineveh repented and turned to God; so God did not destroy the city. It looked as if God had changed His mind after He said that He would destroy the city, but He did not change His mind. God is immutable. He is always gracious; He is always merciful, and He is always slow to anger.
My friend, you can always depend upon God. He never changes, He is immutable; but when a sinner repents and turns to Him, God says in effect, “You were under My judgment, and I was going to judge you, but now that you have turned to Me, I will not judge you.” God is always gracious and ready to forgive.
Who knoweth if he will return and repent, and leave a blessing behind him; even a meat offering and a drink offering unto the Lord your God? [Joel 2:14].
In other words, “The Lord will bless you again in the field and in the vineyard, and you will have a drink offering and you’ll have a meat offering to bring to Him.”
Incidentally, the drink offering is mentioned here; yet there is no instruction in Leviticus for a drink offering. The drink offering was poured on the other offerings and became a part of them. When it was poured on the sacrifice, it went up in steam on the hot coals. The apostle Paul, you recall, said that he wanted his life to be like that—just a drink offering on the sacrifice of Christ.
Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly [Joel 2:15].
At the beginning of this chapter we saw that the blowing of the trumpet was used to call an assembly and also to sound an alarm. In verse 1 it was to sound an alarm. Now here at verse 15 it is to call an assembly. The people were to be brought together to hear God’s message so that they might have the opportunity to turn to God. He is gracious and good, and He is willing to accept them.
“Sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly.” As we have seen, in the Mosaic system God gave His people only feast days. They were to come before Him with rejoicing. But now that they are in sin and rebellion against Him and have turned from Him, they are to fast and come before Him in a solemn assembly.
My friend, the only way we can come to Him is to come as sinners wanting to turn from our sins. If you have been turning from God and now will turn to God, all you have to do is call upon Him and He will save you. “… Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved …” (Acts 16:31). You don’t need to do anything but that. You don’t need to join a church, go through a ceremony, or promise Him something. You simply turn as a sinner to Christ for His mercy.
It is interesting that the word for preaching or evangelizing or heralding the gospel is a word that means trumpet. The trumpet call of the New Testament is the gospel message that we are to get out to the world. “Blow the trumpet in Zion.” This is to call a solemn assembly. When people respond to an altar call and come down to the front of the church, it is a solemn moment. They are testifying that they are turning to God from sin. That is serious business and should not be done lightly. However, I emphasize again that it is not merely going to the altar of a church that constitutes real repentance.
A lovely young couple in Memphis responded to an altar call and came down to the front of the church after a message I had given. I went down to talk to them and asked them, “Is this the first time you have responded to a call?”
“No, we come down every Sunday.”
“Then why do you come down to the altar?”
“Because we want all that God has for us.”
“Do you think you will get that by just coming down here.”
“We hope so.”
“Let me ask you another question. Do you think you have it now?”
“No, we don’t.”
“Then I would get a little discouraged if I were you. Maybe this isn’t the way it is to be done. Maybe you are trying man’s way, and God has another way. God wants to be good and gracious to you, and He wants to save you, but you must come to Him His way. No man comes to the Father but by the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the only door to heaven.” Jesus Himself said, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture” (John 10:9).
Gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children, and those that suck the breasts: let the bridegroom go forth of his chamber, and the bride out of her closet [Joel 2:16].
“Gather the children, and those that suck the breasts” sounds as if the little children were to be taken care of in the nursery so their mothers could give this assembly their full attention. Notice that even the bridegroom is to go to the assembly. When a man was married in Israel, he was excused from going to war for one year. In fact, he was excused from a lot of duties so he could get acquainted with his bride. I guess that was an advantage of getting married! However, God is saying here that everybody is to be gathered together—even the bridegroom and the bride if they are on their honeymoon.
Let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O Lord, and give not thine heritage to reproach, that the heathen should rule over them: wherefore should they say among the people, Where is their God? [Joel 2:17].
The priests and the ministers of the Lord are to weep. Joel is in Jerusalem, you see; he is a prophet of the southern kingdom.
They were to pray, “Spare thy people, O Lord, and give not thine heritage to reproach, that the heathen [nations] should rule over them.” Israel has been scattered throughout the world to this day. Although they have a nation and a government and a flag, they are still pretty well subject to the nations of the world. As I write this, they are caught in the oil slick which is causing them a great deal of trouble, and it will continue to cause trouble because they are not back in the land today in fulfillment of prophecy. When God puts them back into the land, there will be no problem relative to the oil situation.
Golda Meir made a statement which inferred that Moses had made a mistake. She said something like this: “Imagine! Moses led all of our people around through the wilderness for forty years and brought them to the only place in this area that has no oil!” Well, if she believed the Old Testament, she would know that they were led by a pillar of fire by night and a pillar of cloud by day, and that God had a definite purpose for keeping them from settling on land that was rich with oil. They would never have gotten their land back—that’s for sure! Actually what Israel needs is not oil but water. They don’t have enough water because the judgment of God is upon them. Moses made no mistake because he was following the orders of God, and certainly God makes no mistakes.
“Wherefore should they say among the people, Where is their God?” They were wondering what was happening to them. And today that is still their question. In Israel I talked with a sharp young Jewish fellow at the King David Hotel. He said, “If it is as you say that we are God’s chosen people, why doesn’t He intervene for us today?” I told him very candidly, “Because right now, you are not with God. Until you come back in repentance to Him, He is not dealing with you as His chosen people. Today God is doing a new thing: He is calling out from among your people and my people—Jews and Gentiles—a people to His name. You are just not up to date with God. You are going way back to the Mosaic system which is outmoded. The latest thing, the newest model, is the church of the Lord Jesus Christ.” You see, God is inviting “whosoever will” to trust Christ and become a part of the new organism which He calls the church.
PROMISE OF DELIVERANCE
Now he is definitely moving into the future. Notice the time-word “Then.” It will appear several times in this chapter.
Then will the Lord be jealous for his land, and pity his people [Joel 2:18].
In the Olivet Discourse (see Matt. 24–25), the Lord Jesus used the word then to advance in time the happenings that will take place in the Great Tribulation Period. At the end of the Great Tribulation Period, just before the Lord returns to this earth, then will He be jealous for His land and pity His people.
Yea, the Lord will answer and say unto his people, Behold, I will send you corn, and wine, and oil, and ye shall be satisfied therewith: and I will no more make you a reproach among the heathen [Joel 2:19].
At that time the Lord will give them corn and wine and oil; they will be satisfied, and no longer will they be a reproach among the heathen. Even the most radical radical today would not say that this is being fulfilled now. The largest population of Israel is not in the land. There are more Jews in New York City than there are in Israel. And there is a great company of them even in Russia. This is not being fulfilled at this time. This still looks forward to the future. It is definitely the period known as the Day of the Lord, which will begin with darkness and move on into the dawn of the Millennium, past man’s rebellion that breaks out on the earth, and on to the beginning of the eternal kingdom. From here on we are bottled into that particular period.
But I will remove far off from you the northern army, and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things [Joel 2:20].
“I will remove far off from you the northern army” certainly is not talking about locusts but an army coming down from the north. This was partially fulfilled when Assyria came down and took the northern kingdom, but God miraculously delivered the southern kingdom from them. It was another hundred years before the southern kingdom went into captivity—and then it was to the Babylonians, not the Assyrians.
However, there is still a future fulfillment of the removal of the northern army. This is given in more detail in Ezekiel 38–39. In the Great Tribulation Period Russia will come down from the north, but God will deliver Israel. The description given here fits the description of the Battle of Armageddon. “And will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things.” The Sea of Galilee is on one side and the Mediterranean Sea is on the other side of the Valley of Esdraelon where Armageddon will take place. God will intervene as we have seen in Ezekiel. He will destroy this enemy that comes from the north, and He does it to glorify His name.
God is glorified when He judges sin just as much as He is when He saves a sinner. That is hard for us to believe; it is a bitter pill for man to swallow. God is holy, and a holy, righteous God is going to judge. Every one of the prophets says that. The Word of God has a lot to say about the judgment of God. But He doesn’t like to judge. We have already seen that He is gracious and merciful and slow to anger. Judgment is a strange work for God. That is why He holds out His hands all the day long and asks us to come to Him. When people refuse to turn to Him, He must judge them in His righteousness and in His holiness.
This is true even for the children of God. When we do wrong, if we do not judge ourselves, God must judge us. He chastens us to bring us back to Himself. To be honest with you, I have had some chastening from the Lord. I want to stick very close to my Heavenly Father because, I can tell you, I don’t enjoy the chastening of the Lord.
Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice: for the Lord will do great things [Joel 2:21].
The Tribulation Period will lead to the coming of Christ to earth to establish His kingdom. Today that land is still under a curse. They need water. The land is far from being a Garden of Eden. Anyone who has driven from Jerusalem to Jericho will have to admit it is just as desolate as the desert in Arizona and California.
You will notice that the church is not in this picture. Neither do we find the church in the Olivet Discourse nor in the Book of Revelation after chapter 4. The believers have been raptured, and there is no longer a church on earth. And when the church gets to heaven it will no longer be called the church (ekklesia, meaning “called out”), but the figure changes and the believers will be called the bride of Christ.
Be not afraid, ye beasts of the field: for the pastures of the wilderness do spring, for the tree beareth her fruit, the fig tree and the vine do yield their strength [Joel 2:22].
This day has not come yet.
Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God: for he hath given you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month [Joel 2:23].
Who are the “children of Zion”? Of course they are the people of the southern kingdom—that is where Zion is located. You and I may sing lustily, “We’re marching to Zion,” but we are not marching to the Zion here upon this earth.
When he speaks of the “rain,” he is talking about literal rain. In verse 28 Joel will make application of it in the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, but he is referring to literal rain in this verse. The former rain came in October, and the latter rain came in April. There are other passages in the Bible that speak of the former and the latter rains which were quite literal rains in the land of Israel (see Lev. 26:3–4; Deut. 11:14–17; 1 Kings 8:35–36; Jer. 3:3; Hos. 6:3).
Before I went over to Israel, I heard that the latter rain was returning to that land. Well, I have been over there in April, and it rained a little. But, gracious, I don’t think people would call that the kind of rain which the Lord is talking about. In former days they really had rain. All those rugged hills of that land were covered with trees. The enemies came in and denuded the land, and today they are trying to set out trees, but they are having trouble making those trees grow because there is not enough of the latter rain. Joel is talking about these literal rains—H2O—which God has promised in the future.
And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.
And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpillar, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you [Joel 2:24–25].
“I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten.” There have been a great many sermons preached on this, spiritualizing this passage. And it certainly can be used as an application, since it states a great principle. We find the same thought in the Book of Revelation where God says, “… Behold, I make all things new …” (Rev. 21:5). He is speaking of the New Jerusalem in this chapter. Those of the church, the sinners who have trusted Christ, are going to be there. He tells us how wonderful it will be and about the fact that He will wipe away all tears from our eyes. What a change that will be! There are a lot of tears in this old world. I rejoice that He will make all things new.
I don’t know about you, but I can say that I am not satisfied with my life down here. I have never preached the sermon I have wanted to preach—I wish I could do it. I have had it in my heart and in my mind, but somehow I have never been able to preach as well as I have wanted to. I have never been the husband that I have really wanted to be. I wish that I could have been a much better husband to my wife. When I was sick, she and I went back over the days when we met and how we courted, and all that sort of thing. As I told her, I wish I could change many things which would make it lots more wonderful than it was. Neither have I been the father that I wanted to be. I have never really been the man that I have wanted to be. That is why I love Revelation 21:5: “… Behold, I make all things new ….” My Lord will say, “Vernon McGee, you didn’t quite make it down there on the earth. You never really accomplished your goals. You were frustrated. You were limited. You were down there with that old sinful nature. Now I am going to make all things new. I’m going to give you a new scratch pad and a new pencil without an eraser. You can write it all out now. You can accomplish what you wanted to accomplish.”
My friend, that will really make heaven heaven for a lot of us. We will be able to do the things and be the person that we have wanted to be down here. Oh, to be free from the hindrances of circumstances, of sin, of the environment, and even of heredity. What a glorious experience to be free of all this and to be in the presence of Christ! He will make all things new. He will restore the years that the locusts have eaten.
And ye shall eat in plenty, and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, that hath dealt wondrously with you: and my people shall never be ashamed.
And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed [Joel 2:26–27].
This will take place when he is “in the midst of Israel”; that is, when Christ has come to the earth and has established His kingdom. At that time there will be a fulfillment of all the physical blessings which God has promised to the nation Israel. And the blessings in the Old Testament were largely physical blessings. God promised to bless the land so that they would have bumper crops and their cattle would thrive and multiply. Actually the spiritual blessings seem almost secondary. In contrast to this, the blessings God has promised the church are spiritual blessings—only. We have all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus.
Even though the primary blessings to Israel were physical blessings, we come now to a passage which speaks of spiritual blessing to Israel. This is a very controversial passage of Scripture.
PROMISE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
As we come to this section, it is important to keep in mind that we are in the prophecy of Joel that began with the record of a frightful locust plague which he compared to that which is coming in the future, which he calls the Day of the Lord. We have seen that the Day of the Lord will begin with the Tribulation Period, after which Christ will come and establish His kingdom on the earth. In verse 27 we have just read that the Lord at this time will be in the midst of them. Now let’s see what He is going to do.
And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:
And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit.
And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.
The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord come.
And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the Lord hath said, and in the remnant whom the Lord shall call [Joel 2:28–32].
There are many wonderful things that we could say about this passage of Scripture. Dr. Charles L. Feinberg, a Jewish Christian, and an outstanding Hebrew scholar, has written a fine series of books on the Minor Prophets which have been very helpful to me. In Joel, Amos, and Obadiah, pp. 26–27, he calls attention to something that I had not known before: “Verses 28 through 32 form chapter 3 in the Hebrew text; and chapter 3 in the English translations is chapter 4 in the original. No one will be inclined to doubt that the disclosure of truth in 2:28–32 is of sufficient importance to warrant its appearing in a separate chapter.” I certainly agree that these five verses are important enough to make them a separate chapter.
In understanding this prophecy, it is of utmost importance to note the time of fulfillment indicated in this passage: “And it shall come to pass (afterward).” Joel has been telling us about the coming Day of the Lord. As the first of the writing prophets, he introduced it, and he tells what is going to take place during that period. He has emphasized the fact that it will begin with the darkness of the Great Tribulation Period (our Lord Jesus gave it that name). We noted the importance of the time sequence in Hosea. In chapter 3, verse 5 of that prophecy it is written: “Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the Lord their God, and David their king; and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days.” We identified the “latter days” as that time of the Great Tribulation Period which ushers in the kingdom by the coming of Christ to the earth, which is the beginning of the Millennium. This leads us to conclude that Joel is now speaking of a very definite period of time, that this prophecy is to be fulfilled during the Day of the Lord, after the night of the Great Tribulation Period. Then God will pour out His Spirit upon all flesh.
Although Joel is the first of the writing prophets, he is not the only one to mention the pouring out of the Spirit. In Isaiah we read: “Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest” (Isa. 32:15). He is speaking of the kingdom which is coming on the earth, and the pouring out of the Spirit has reference to the Millennium. Of course none of the prophets spoke of the church age; all of them spoke of the last days in reference to the nation Israel.
Ezekiel 36:27 says this: “And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.” Then he continues, “And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God” (Ezek. 36:28). Now he is talking to a particular people and a particular land—Israel. It is also a particular period of time when God will pour out His Spirit. Also Ezekiel says: “And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord”(Ezek. 37:14). That’s not all: “Neither will I hide my face any more from them: for I have poured out my spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord God” (Ezek. 39:29).
Zechariah is one of the last of the writing prophets. He says, “And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him; as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn” (Zech. 12:10).
Joel also makes it clear in the passage we are discussing—“And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance”—that he refers to a certain spot on the map.
The question arises: What did Peter mean when he referred to this passage of Scripture on the Day of Pentecost? Did he mean that the prophecy of Joel was fulfilled? No, he didn’t say that. He never claimed that this prophecy was fulfilled.
On the Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples they began to speak to Jews who had come to Jerusalem from all over the Roman Empire. Every man heard the message in his own tongue. These were not unknown tongues in which the disciples were speaking the message. Each tongue was the native tongue of one or more of the men who were gathered there from all over the Roman Empire and even beyond the empire.
Well, many believed, but others began to mock and say that the disciples were drunk—filled with new wine. So Simon Peter is the one who gets up to answer them. He acted as the spokesman for the group, and he gave an answer to the accusation that they were drunk. “… Ye men of Judaea, and all ye that dwell at Jerusalem, be this known unto you, and hearken to my words: For these are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day” (Acts 2:14–15). Peter says you wouldn’t find people drunk in the morning. (It’s a little different in modern America—some people start drinking pretty early in the day.)
Peter continues, “But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel” (Acts 2:16). You will notice that Peter does not say that this is in fulfillment of what the prophet Joel said. All the Gospel writers and the apostle Paul are very clear when they say that something is the fulfillment of a prophecy. I couldn’t begin to mention all of the passages. For examples, turn to Matthew 2:17–18: “Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet, saying, In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children,and would not be comforted, because they are not” (italics mine). That was a fulfillment of prophecy that had to do with incidents associated with the birth of Christ. Drop down to verse 23: “And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene” (italics mine). Or turn to Acts 13 to the sermon of Paul at Antioch in Pisidia. He speaks of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and says, “And we declare unto you glad tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children, in that he hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee” (Acts 13:32–33, italics mine). The Bible is very definite about fulfillment of prophecy.
What does Peter say in Acts 2:16? “… this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel” (italics mine). He does not say it was a fulfillment of what Joel had predicted. Rather, he said, “This is that”—this is like that or similar to that. If you will go back in your mind to the Day of Pentecost, you will realize that Peter was not talking to Gentiles; he was speaking to Jews who were schooled in the Old Testament. They knew the Old Testament. They were Jews from all over the empire who had come to Jerusalem for the feast; they had traveled long distances because they were keeping what was required of them according to the Mosaic Law. Peter says to them in effect, “Don’t mock, don’t ridicule this thing which you see happening. This is like that which is going to take place in the Day of the Lord as it is told to us by the prophet Joel.”
He quotes Joel’s prophecy. “And it shall come to pass in the last days. saith God. I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh …” (Acts 2:17, italics mine). This is to occur in the last days. Then the Spirit of God will be poured out upon all flesh. Was that fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost? Hardly. It was experienced by those enumerated in the previous chapter. And three thousand were saved. Even if it had been three hundred thousand who were saved, it still would not have been a pouring out of the Spirit upon all flesh. It would still not have been a fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy.
In effect, Peter is saying to them, “Don’t mock at what you see happening. You ought to recognize from your own Word of God that Joel says the day is coming when God will pour out His Spirit on all flesh. If it is poured out on a few people today, you ought not to be surprised at that.”
Then Peter went on to quote the rest of Joel’s prophecy regarding what would take place: “I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come” (vv. 30–31). Was that fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost? Of course not. There were no earthquakes, no changes in the sun and moon. These will occur on “that great and notable day of the Lord.” Joel calls it “the great and the terrible day of the Lord.” The Day of Pentecost was a great day, but it was not a terrible day. It was a wonderful day!
My friend, if we understand the Book of Joel, we will never come to the conclusion that Peter was saying that the prophecy of Joel was being fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost. Simon Peter was merely using Joel’s prophecy as an introduction to answer those who were mocking.
Now the question arises: What was the subject of Simon Peter’s message? On the Day of Pentecost the subject of Simon Peter’s sermon was the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now when he comes to his text, he uses Psalm 16:8–10, which prophesied the resurrection of Christ. Notice how he applies it to Christ: “This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear” (Acts 2:32–33).
The conclusion both in Joel and in Peter’s address is, “And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lordshall be delivered [Peter says, Shall be saved].” This is one of the many passages that causes me to make the statement that I think the greatest time of salvation is yet in the future. I believe God will save more of the human race than will be lost. I agree with Spurgeon who said that he believed God would win more to Himself than would be lost. When Christ comes to the earth to establish His kingdom, there is going to be the greatest time of individuals turning to God that the world has ever seen. Also during the Tribulation Period there will be a great turning to the Lord—much greater than there has been during the church age. The resurrection of Jesus Christ whom God has made both Lord and Christ is the whole point of Peter’s sermon. He is not emphasizing the phenomenon they had witnessed. The important issue is coming to know Jesus Christ. Oh, my friend, don’t be so occupied with having an experience that you miss coming to know Christ. What place does He occupy in your thinking, in your life, in your ministry?
This section of Joel’s prophecy is all-important, but it is yet to be fulfilled.
CHAPTER 3
Theme: Looking at the Day of the Lord (postlude)
For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem [Joel 3:1].
“For, behold, in those days.” What day? The Day of Pentecost? No, for He says, “when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem.” He did not bring them back at Pentecost; in fact, the Lord Jesus reversed the order when He said, “… ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Instead of bringing the captivity back to Jerusalem, Christ, as head of the church, said to those who now have been born again and are in the body of believers, “Go to the ends of the earth. Take the message out that I am raised from the dead. Tell them that God is gracious and longsuffering and merciful, and that whosoever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved.”
The gospel seems so simple that a lot of smart people miss it today. How wonderful it is! All you do is believe. I want to say that I do not believe in a works salvation—that is obvious—but I do believe in a salvation that works. That is important to see. If you have been saved, you’ll want to get the gospel out. If you don’t want to, my friend, I’d question your faith—not your works, but your faith—because faith works.
I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land [Joel 3:2].
“I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat”—that is there at Jerusalem.
“And will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.” Before the Lord Jesus comes again to the earth, believers will already have appeared before His judgment seat to see whether or not they are to receive a reward. When He comes to the earth, then He will judge to see who will enter the kingdom. We have this marvelous prophecy here, but it is not found only in the Book of Joel. Joel is the first of the writing prophets, but all of the prophets mentioned it. One of the last prophets, Zechariah, said the same thing, “Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion: for, lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord. And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people: and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto thee” (Zech. 2:10–11). This is the same thing Joel told the people at the beginning. This was their great hope, their bright hope, that the Lord will come to establish His kingdom on the earth and the Spirit will be poured out on all flesh.
And they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for an harlot; and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink [Joel 3:3].
This is an awful thing that Joel describes here. I get a little provoked sometimes with the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals which has come up with some unusual demands as to how we should treat animals. They are opposed to the foxhunt, although the fox generally gets away and they don’t really need to worry about him at all; they also are opposed to all types of hunting and shooting of game. However, they haven’t been down to the stockyards yet to stop the slaughter of cattle, because most of them like their porterhouse and sirloin steaks as well as their prime rib roast. But that is really not my point, because I agree that animals should not be mistreated and that they often suffer because of man’s sin. The greatest cruelty today, however, is cruelty toward children. It is one of the most appalling things that is happening in our day. I read sometime ago of a mother who had co-habited with some no good, ne’erdo-well man who beat her little boy. A precious little boy—what a beautiful child he was at the beginning. But they also showed a picture of him near the end; he’d been beaten and mistreated and finally killed by that man! Actually, there was not much protest over that. The mistreatment of a dog has caused more furor in our communities than did the mistreatment of that child. Such cruelty toward children is one of the signs of the end of an age.
Why are so many children running away from home in this day? I think any parent who has a runaway child needs to get down on his knees before God and ask Him what he has done wrong. Someone will say, “Well, the child got in with the wrong crowd. We need the help of a psychologist.” My friend, we don’t need that—we need to read the Word of God. God says the evil day will come when “they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for an harlot.” How many fathers today are setting the right example for their sons? “And sold a girl for wine, that they might drink.” How many girls are being plunged into immorality because of liquor in their homes? One young girl, who had become a harlot and was arrested, was asked where she took her first drink. She said that it had been with her mother. God have mercy on a mother who would do a thing like that! Someone needs to speak out today in this so-called suave and sophisticated age that wants to think we are advancing in civilization. My friend, we are going down the tubes so fast it’s making us dizzy.
Yea, and what have ye to do with me, O Tyre, and Zidon, and all the coasts of Palestine? will ye render me a recompence? and if ye recompense me, swiftly and speedily will I return your recompense upon your own head [Joel 3:4].
God says that they have gone past the time and are unable to turn to Him sincerely.
Because ye have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried into your temples my goodly pleasant things:
The children also of Judah and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto the Grecians, that ye might remove them far from their border [Joel 3:5–6].
Even at this time the children of Israel were being sold into slavery, yet this was before Rome had come to power.
Behold, I will raise them out of the place whither ye have sold them, and will return your recompence upon your own head:
And I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the children of Judah, and they shall sell them to the Sabeans, to a people far off: for the Lord hath spoken it [Joel 3:7–8].
God’s judgment of Tyre and Sidon, prophesied also by Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Isaiah, has all been literally fulfilled.
Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up:
Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong [Joel 3:9–10].
“Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears.” Someone will say, “I thought the Bible said to beat your swords into plowshares.” It does say that, but the time to do that is when the kingdom is established on the earth (see Isa. 2:4; Mic. 4:3). When Christ is ruling you can get rid of your sword, but until then you’d better keep your ammunition dry and you’d better be prepared. I do not agree that we should get rid of guns today. I think we need to protect our homes, our loved ones, and our nation. You and I are living in a big, bad world in which there are a lot of wild animals loose—they are human beings and they are two-legged, but they’re mean and ferocious and they will destroy you. Also there are nations which are like that. In fact, that is the way God describes nations; He calls one a lion, another a bear, another a panther, and another a nondescript beast. Believe me, my friend, the nations of the world are like wild beasts, and we need to keep a few atomic bombs in our arsenal. Paul said, “For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them …” (1 Thess. 5:3). I am afraid we are going to have our teeth jarred out one of these days by the falling of a bomb, and we won’t be able to retaliate because we have had too many soft-hearted and soft-headed leaders. The United Nations has as its motto the verse in Isaiah which says to beat your swords into plowshares; I think they ought to have this verse from Joel: “Beat your plowshares into swords.” We need to be prepared today—we live in a bad, bad world.
Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O Lord.
Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about [Joel 3:11–12].
In the Olivet Discourse the Lord Jesus said that He will judge the nations and that He will judge them according to the way they have treated His people. Someone will ask, “Are they peculiar? Are they better?” No. Why, then, will He judge in this way? Because the 144,000 Jewish witnesses are going to be the only witnesses upon this earth after the church is removed. The Lord said that if anyone gave a cup of cold water in His name to one of these witnesses He would reward him. Many people think that that excuses them for giving only a dime or a quarter in the offering plate. However, may I say to you, in that day it would cost you your life to give a cup of cold water to one of the 144,000 who will be witnessing for Christ throughout the world.
Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the vats overflow; for their wickedness is great [Joel 3:13].
When he speaks of a “harvest,” he is speaking of the end of the age.
Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision [Joel 3:14].
Joel identifies this period as “the day of the Lord.” All that Joel says falls within the parentheses of the Day of the Lord which begins after the Rapture of the church with the Great Tribulation and continues through the second coming of Christ to establish His kingdom and the judgment as to who will enter the kingdom. Then Christ will reign for one thousand years; there will be a brief period of rebellion when Satan is let loose, then the final judgment at the Great White Throne, and eternity will begin. All of that is included in the Day of the Lord.
Again Joel speaks of the disturbance in the heavenly bodies—
The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining.
The Lord also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the Lord will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel.
So shall ye know that I am the Lord your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more [Joel 3:15–17].
Jerusalem is still being trodden down by Gentiles. The Garden Tomb was so crowded with tourists the last time we were there that we could not get into it. It was not Jews who were there, but it was Gentiles from all over the world—tourists coming and going all the time. The day is coming when the Garden Tomb will not be the tourist attraction in Jerusalem. Someday the Lord Himself will be there!
Now we move into the time of the kingdom—
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the Lord, and shall water the valley of Shittim [Joel 3:18].
“And it shall come to pass in that day”—that is, the Day of the Lord. “The mountains shall drop down new wine”—this is in the time of the kingdom. “And the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters.” Israel is short of water today, but they will not be short in that day.
“And a fountain shall come forth of the house of the Lord, and shall water the valley of Shittim.” This is interesting because the valley of Shittim is on the other side of the Jordan River. How could these waters flow from Jerusalem across the Jordan? Zechariah tells us that the mountain will be split in that day. Instead of the great rift running from north of Byblos in Lebanon, down through the Sea of Galilee, through the Jordan valley, through the Dead Sea and into Africa, it is going to run the opposite direction—it is going to run east and west.
Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land [Joel 3:19].
God will judge Egypt and Edom even into the millennial kingdom. They have always been enemies of the nation Israel.
But Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.
For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed: for the Lord dwelleth in Zion [Joel 3:20–21].
“For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed”—the Lord has not yet moved in their behalf. “For the Lord dwelleth in Zion”—He doesn’t dwell there today. Jerusalem is as pagan and heathen as any city on topside of the earth, but the day is coming when the Lord will dwell there. Then we will see all these things fulfilled. We would need to see Christ Himself there to say that these things are being fulfilled today. But that is not where we see Him, for at this very moment He is at God’s right hand. It is my prayer that we might be continually conscious of Him and have the reality of His presence in our lives.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Israel. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Amos
INTRODUCTION
Amos’ prophetic ministry took place during the reigns of Jeroboam II, king of Israel, and Uzziah, king of Judah. He was contemporary with Jonah and Hosea who were prophets in the northern kingdom of Israel and with Isaiah and Micah who were prophets in the southern kingdom of Judah.
Amos presents God as the ruler of this world and declares that all nations are responsible to Him. The measure of a nation’s responsibility is the light which a nation has. The final test for any nation (or individual) is found in Amos 3:3, “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” In a day of prosperity, Amos pronounced punishment. The judgment of God awaited nations which were living in luxury and lolling in immorality.
Amos is, in my words, “The Country Preacher Who Came to Town.” I want us to get acquainted with him personally, because to get acquainted with Amos is to love him and to understand his prophecy better. We will find that he was born in Judah, the southern kingdom, but he was a prophet to the northern kingdom. His message was delivered in Beth-el at the king’s chapel. It was most unusual for a man to have come from such a country, out-of-the-way place with a message of judgment against all of the surrounding nations. Amos had a global view of life and of God’s program for the entire world—not only for the present but also for the future. All this makes this man a most remarkable prophet.
In Amos 1:1 we read, “The words of Amos, who was among the herdmen of Tekoa, which he saw concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel, two years before the earthquake.” Tekoa was Amos’ birthplace and his hometown. Six miles south of Jerusalem there is the familiar little place of Bethlehem of which the prophet Micah said, “But thou, Beth-lehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting” (Mic. 5:2). Bethlehem has become famous, but there was another little place that was another six miles southeast of Bethlehem called Tekoa which is not so well known. In fact, Amos himself is not even mentioned anywhere else in the Old Testament. There is an Amos in Mary’s genealogy given in the Gospel of Luke, but he is no relation to the prophet Amos. And the little town of Tekoa from which he came is practically an unknown place. It is the place where a prophetess came and gave David a message (see 2 Sam. 14); David was familiar with this area because it was the area to which he fled to hide from King Saul.
Tekoa is located on a hilly ridge which overlooks a frightful desert wilderness that continues down to the very edge of the Dead Sea. Wild animals howl by night, and by day the only thing you can see are spots here and there which indicate the remains of the camps of the Bedouins. There is nothing but the blackened ground left by these nomads and vagabonds of the desert who moved through that area. Dr. Adam Smith said, “The men of Tekoa looked out upon a desolate and haggard world.”
Today the nation Israel has constructed a modern highway along the Dead Sea that leads to Masada. The highway comes back through Arad and up through Hebron and Bethlehem, but it never gets near Tekoa because Tekoa is over in that wilderness. I’m sure most of you have never heard of it for, even in its heyday, Tekoa was never more than a wide place in the road. It was a whistle-stop, a jumping-off place. The name Tekoa means “a camping ground.” It was really only a country crossroads out on the frontier. Years ago I heard a man say that, to reach the place where he was born, you go as far as possible by buggy and then you get off and walk two miles! Tekoa was that sort of place, and it was the birthplace of Amos—that is its only claim to greatness.
We need to turn to chapter 7 to get a little personal insight into this man and his ministry in Samaria, the northern kingdom of Israel. There we read: “Then Amaziah the priest of Beth-el sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel: the land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos saith, Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land. Also Amaziah said unto Amos, O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there: But prophesy not again any more at Beth-el: for it is the king’s chapel, and it is the king’s court. Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycomore fruit: And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel” (Amos 7:10–15).
Amos tells us he was a “herdman.” An unusual word is used here which means that he was the herdsman of a peculiar breed of desert sheep. They were a scrub stock, but they grew long wool because of the cold in the wintertime. He also says that he was a “gatherer of sycomore fruit”; the literal is a “pincher of sycamores.” This was a fruit like a small fig which grew on scrub trees down in the desert. These trees grew at a lower level than the sycamore that we know today.
We can see, then, that Amos had to travel to his job. He was a migrant worker, if you please. His sheep and his sycamores pushed Amos far out into that desert. He was truly a farmer. He was a country rube. He was a rustic. He was a yokel and a hayseed. He was a country preacher. He was a clumsy bumpkin who was “all thumbs” among the ecumenical preachers up yonder in Beth-el.
But before you laugh at Amos, may I say this? He was one of God’s greatest men, and he was a remarkable individual. Listen to what Amos says: “And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel” (Amos 7:15). God sent Amos all the way from down there in the desert and the wilderness up to Beth-el, one of the capital cities of the northern kingdom where he found city folk living. God called him to preach, God gave him a message, and God sent him to Beth-el.
Beth-el was, at first, the capital of the northern kingdom, and it was the place where Jeroboam I had erected one of his golden calves. It was the center of culture and also of cults. The people worshiped that golden calf and had turned their backs upon almighty God. Beth-el was where the sophisticated and the suave folk moved; the jet set lived there. It was a place that was blasé and brazen. It was also the intellectual center. They had a School of Prophets there. The seminaries taught liberalism. They would have taught the Graf-Wellhausen hypothesis which denies the inspiration of the Pentateuch and gone in for all the latest theories of a theologian like Rudolf Bultmann.
What was done in Beth-el was the thing to do. When filter-tipped cigarettes were introduced, Beth-el was the first place they were advertised and used, and from there they spread everywhere. It was the place where you could see the styles which would be popular the next year. Are we going to wear the wider lapel next year? Will there be two or three buttons on the suit coat? Should you leave the last button unbuttoned to be in style? Well, you would go to Beth-el to find out all that.
Then here comes to town this country preacher, this prophet of God with a message—a most unusual message, different from any other prophet. Amos’ suit of clothes was not cut to the style of Bethel and neither was his message. He did not give the type of messages they were used to hearing. In the king’s chapel there was always a mild-mannered preacher, very sophisticated and well-educated, but a rank unbeliever who stood in the pulpit giving comforting little words to the people. He gave them pabulum; saccharine sweetness was in his message. But now here’s a different kind of man. When Amos first arrived, people stared at him. But they were very indulgent, of course (they were broad-minded, you know), so they smiled at him. I think he had on high-buttoned yellow shoes which were not in style that year, and his suit probably didn’t fit him and was buttoned improperly. He had on his first necktie, and it looked like it had been tied by a whirlwind. Everyone was embarrassed except Amos. Amos was not embarrassed at all. He must have created quite a stir. He had left the backwoods and had arrived on the boulevard. He had left the desert; now he entered the drawing room. He had been with the longhaired sheep out on the desert all of his life; now he was with the well-groomed “goats” up yonder in Bethel. He had left the place of agriculture and had come to the place of culture.
I think almost everyone came to hear him at first. They said, “We don’t believe he can preach.” They came out of curiosity, saying, “We don’t think this man has any message.” They came in amusement, but they left in anger. He was a sensational preacher, for his sermons weren’t cut to the style of Beth-el. However, today we do not have any record of the liberal sermons of that day, but we certainly have the sermons and the prophecy of Amos.
Amos preached the Word of God. Many people were moved, and some turned to God; but he disturbed the liberal element. Organized religion in Beth-el, the worship of Baal and of the golden calf, got together. They had the ecumenical movement going there, so they had the same program. If you don’t believe anything, my friend, there is nothing to keep you apart. If I don’t believe anything and you don’t believe anything, we can get together. That is the ecumenical movement, and it was going great guns even in that day.
Amos was in the midst of all this organized religion which was plotting against him to silence him and to run him out of town. Some of the leading ecumenical leaders called a meeting. They wanted to remove Amos; they wanted to withdraw support from him; they told him he’d lose his pension if he didn’t change his message. There were also some fundamental leaders called evangelicals in Beth-el who began to criticize him because he was drawing the crowds. They tried to undermine his ministry. But God blessed him, and Amos would not compromise but continued to preach the Word of God.
They had a mass meeting of all the religions in Beth-el—it was really the first meeting of the World Council of Churches—and the motto of this first meeting was, “Away with Amos, away with Amos.” And the inevitable happened at this meeting: they appointed a committee chairman, Amaziah, to go and confront Amos. Amaziah was a priest who had gone into idolatry. (Does all of this sound modern to you? It’s the same old story; we think it’s modern, but this sort of thing has been happening ever since man got out of the Garden of Eden.) Amaziah was the hired hand of religion. He was polished, he was educated, he was proud, he was scholarly, he was pious, and he was a classic example of a pseudosaint.
Cleverly and subtly, Amaziah worked a master stroke. He went to Jeroboam II and poisoned his mind against Amos. Amaziah got the king to support him because he believed that the church and state, religion and politics, should be combined. This is what happened: “Then Amaziah the priest of Beth-el sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel: the land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos saith, Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land” (Amos 7:10–11). Let me ask you, friend, is that what Amos said? No, he had not said that. His actual words were that God had said, “I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword” (Amos 7:9). If you follow the record, you will find that Amos’ pronouncement was accurate. It is too bad that Jeroboam II did not believe Amos because his grandson was later slain with the sword, thus ending his kingly line. It was true that Amos had said something about the sword and about Jeroboam, but he had not said that Jeroboam personally would die by the sword. Amaziah was an ecclesiastical politican who was twisting the truth, and that is the worst kind of lying.
I think Amaziah had two other men on his committee when he went to see Amos. There was Dr. Sounding Brass, president of the School of Prophets—false prophets, by the way. Proud and pompous, he was a politician par excellence. There was also Rev. Tinkling Cymbal. He was the pastor of the wealthiest and most influential church in town. He was the yes-man to the rich. He couldn’t preach, but he was a great little mixer. It is amazing the things he could mix, by the way. He didn’t pound the pulpit because he didn’t want to wake up his congregation, but he could sure slap their backs during the week. This is the committee which waited upon Amos.
Amaziah, with biting sarcasm, with a rapier of ridicule, and with a condescending manner, said to Amos, “O thou seer.” In other words, he’s calling him, “Parson.” “Also Amaziah said unto Amos, O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there” (Amos 7:12). In effect, Amaziah said to Amos, “Who told you that you were a preacher? Where is your degree? What school did you go to? Who ordained you? Where did you preach before you came here? Go, flee away.” In other words, he’s saying to him, “Get out of town. Get lost.” Then Amaziah adds, “And there eat bread.” He is insinuating to Amos, “You’re just in it for the money, and therefore we don’t want you here.”
Verse 13 is the crowning insult of all: “But prophesy not again any more at Beth-el: for it is the king’s chapel, and it is the king’s court” (Amos 7:13). That is the height of Amaziah’s insolence and his arrogance. He uses here a satire that is not only biting but also poisonous. He says in effect, “Remember, you’ve been speaking in the leading church here in Beth-el, the king’s chapel. You have been in the king’s sanctuary, and he’s dissatisfied with you. Your message disturbs him. In fact, there are a lot of people who do not like you. You don’t use a very diplomatic method. You don’t pat them on the back and tell them how wonderful they are. You do not patronize the rich and the affluent. And you’re not very reverent. You tell funny stories every now and then. You’re not dignified. You pound the pulpit, and you lack graceful gestures. You do not use a basso profundo voice as if you were thundering out of heaven. What you need is a course in homiletics. And you don’t seem to have read the latest books. By the way, have you read the latest, Baal Goes to Yale?” And, of course, poor Amos hadn’t read the latest book.
I want you to listen to the answer that this great prophet of God gave, this man who preached the righteousness of God and the judgment of God. There are those who like to call him a hell-fire prophet, but will you listen to his answer and notice how gracious it really is: “Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycomore fruit: And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel” (Amos 7:14–15). And then Amos continued with his message in which he has some pretty harsh words to say to this man Amaziah.
Now I ask you a fair question: Does his answer sound like that of a fanatic? Frankly, I have one criticism of Amos. He is too naive. He’s rather artless; he’s rather simple. Down in the desert of Tekoa, he knew his way around. He could avoid the dangers in that howling wilderness which was filled with wild beasts, but, in the asphalt jungle of Beth-el, he was rather helpless.
By the way, there is a jungle today in this world. You will find that in church circles—in liberal churches and even in fundamental churches—it’s a little dangerous. You’re not really safe because there is often someone who will want to tear you to pieces. There will be the roar of some big lion, such as Mr. Gotrocks who is on the board of deacons. I tell you, you had better pat him on the back, you had better play up to him, or else he may give you real trouble. There is also the hiss of a serpent in the asphalt jungle today, Mrs. Joe Doaks who has a poison tongue. James, in his epistle, talked about those who have poison under their lips (see James 3:8). It is worse than a rattlesnake bite to have some of these folk criticize you.
This man Amos is very naive. He says, “You say that I’m no preacher. I know it—I’m no preacher. And you say I’m not a prophet. You’re right, I’m no prophet. I’m not even a prophet’s son. I’m a country boy, but God called me.” Listen to him: “And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel” (Amos 7:15, italics mine). Amos says, “You want my credentials? Here they are: God called me.”
May I say to you, if you give out the Word of God today, you are going to be challenged. I recently received a letter from a man in Salt Lake City, Utah, which presents a very devious argument. He concludes by saying, “I am interested in knowing how you got your authority.” I can answer that very easily. When I was in my teens, God called me, and I knew He called me. Maybe you think that was because I had great faith. No, as a poor boy, I didn’t even have enough faith to believe that the Lord would get me through school. I’ll be very frank with you, I had no faith at all. I just had a tremendous and overweening desire to continue. Now since I’m toward the end of the journey, I have no doubt that I was called of God—and that is my authority. Amos was naive, but he was called of God, and the Lord was leading him all the way.
Amos was God’s man giving God’s message. Simply because Israel was being religious on the surface did not guarantee that God would not judge their sin. Because of their rejection of His law—their deceit and robbery and violence and oppression of the poor—God said, “I hate, I despise your feast days …. Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will not accept them …. Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs …. But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream” (Amos 5:21–24).
It was a day of false peace. In the north was Assyria hanging like the sword of Damocles ready to fall, and in the next half century it would destroy this little kingdom. Israel was trying to ignore it, and they kept talking about peace. But Amos said, “Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth” (Amos 9:8). His message was not a popular message. He warned that it was God’s intention to punish sin.
OUTLINE
I. Judgment on Surrounding Nations, Chapters 1:1–2:3
A. Introduction, Chapter 1:1–2
B. Judgment against Syria for Cruelty, Chapter 1:3–5
C. Judgment against Philistia for Making Slaves, Chapter 1:6–8
D. Judgment against Phoenicia for Breaking Treaty, Chapter 1:9–10
E. Judgment against Edom for Revengeful Spirit, Chapter 1:11–12
F. Judgment against Ammon for Violent Crimes, Chapter 1:13–15
G. Judgment against Moab for Injustice, Chapter 2:1–3
II. Judgment on Judah and Israel, Chapters 2:4–6:14
A. Judgment against Judah for Despising the Law, Chapter 2:4–5
B. Judgment against Israel for Immorality and Blasphemy, Chapter 2:6–16
C. God’s Charge against the Whole House of Israel (Twelve Tribes), Chapter 3 (Privilege creates responsibility; the higher the blessing, the greater the punishment.)
D. Israel Punished in the Past for Iniquity, Chapter 4
E. Israel Will Be Punished in the Future for Iniquity, Chapter 5
F. Israel Admonished in the Present to Depart from Iniquity, Chapter 6
III. Visions of Future, Chapters 7–9
A. Visions of Grasshoppers, Chapter 7:1–3
B. Vision of Fire, Chapter 7:4–6
C. Vision of Plumbline, Chapter 7:7–9
D. Historic Interlude, Chapter 7:10–17 (Personal Experience of the Prophet)
E. Vision of Basket of Summer Fruit, Chapter 8
F. Vision of Worldwide Dispersion, Chapter 9:1–10
G. Vision of Worldwide Regathering and Restoration of Kingdom, Chapter 9:11–15
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Judgment on surrounding nations
Amos was a fearless man with a message from God. Not only was Amos an unknown when he arrived in Beth-el of the northern kingdom of Israel, but he is still rather unknown today. In our country, Amos is a name that is associated with Andy because of the popular radio program of the past generation, “Amos and Andy.” Actually, we should associate the Amos of Bible times with Hosea. They were contemporary prophets, and I am sure they knew each other. Hosea’s message emphasized the love of God, but a God of love who also intends to judge. Amos spoke of the lofty justice and the inflexible righteousness of God which leads Him to judge.
It is startling to see that Amos had a world view, a global conception. He spoke first to the nations which were contiguous to and surrounding the nation Israel. He spoke to the great world powers of that day—that in itself isn’t something unique. The later prophets—Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel—did it also. But the method of these other prophets was first to speak of God’s judgment of the nation Israel and then to take up the judgment of the other nations. Amos reverses that method. He spoke first of God’s judgment of the nations round about and then of Israel’s judgment.
When Amos first spoke in Beth-el, saying that God was going to judge Syria, Philistia, Phoenicia, Edom, Ammon, and Moab, everybody filled the king’s chapel. He really was drawing a crowd. They were very glad for him to preach on the sins of the Moabites, you see, but not on their sins. There are people even today who like the preacher to preach on the sins of the Moabites which were committed four thousand or more years ago, but any preacher who mentions the people’s own sins is in real trouble. Amos exercised a great deal of diplomacy, it seems to me, in speaking of the other nations first. He was an eloquent man. Although he was a country preacher from out yonder in the desert, he used the language of a Shakespeare. He was, in my judgment, a great preacher.
The words of Amos, who was among the herdmen of Tekoa, which he saw concerning Israel in the days of Uzziah king of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel, two years before the earthquake [Amos 1:1].
“In the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel”—this is Jeroboam II, by the way.
“Two years before the earthquake.” This earthquake is also mentioned by Zechariah nearly two hundred years later. According to the historian Josephus, it took place during the reign of Uzziah. The important thing is that this does help us to see that Amos was contemporary with Hosea, he was one of the first of the prophets, and he was a prophet to the northern kingdom of Israel.
And he said, The Lord will roar from Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the habitations of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither [Amos 1:2].
“And he said, The Lord will roar from Zion.” This is very figurative and eloquent language in many ways. You may recall that Joel also used this expression. It suggests the roar of a lion as it pounces upon its prey. Believe me, this is an arresting way for Amos to begin his message! It speaks of the coming judgment of God upon the nations which were round about.
“And the habitations of the shepherds shall mourn, and the top of Carmel shall wither.” Apparently, a drought and a famine would come upon that land, a famine that would extend throughout the entire land.
When I was in Israel some time ago, I came over Carmel where Haifa is located, and I noticed how beautiful it is there. There are wonderful shrubbery and lovely flowers there today. It must have been that way in the day of Amos also, but now he says that there is coming a drought so severe that beautiful Carmel “shall wither.”
JUDGMENT AGAINST SYRIA FOR CRUELTY
We begin now a section of this prophecy which deals with the judgments of God upon the nations which were contiguous to the nation Israel, that is, those that surrounded that nation. This man Amos gives us a world view. The Word of God, even the Old Testament, shows that God is not only the God of the nation Israel but He is also the God of the Gentiles. In the New Testament, Paul is the one who makes that abundantly clear. And God judges the nations. Although in this day of grace God has one great purpose, that of calling out a people to His name, that does not mean that He has taken His hands off the affairs of this world—He has not. He still moves in judgment upon the nations of the world, and this Book of Amos has a tremendous message along that line.
The first nation that is considered is Syria of which Damascus was the capital—
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron [Amos 1:3].
“For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four.” Amos is not attempting to give us a list of their transgressions. He could have said, “Not for three, not for four, or five, or six, but for many transgressions.” In other words, the cup of iniquity was filled up, and nothing could now hold back the judgment of God that was coming upon Syria.
“Because they have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron.” This is the atrocity which Syria had committed and for which they were to be judged. Those threshing instruments were sharp and were to be used to beat out the grain. It is believed that with them they had torn and mangled the bodies of the people of Gilead. In 2 Kings 10:32–33, we read: “In those days the Lord began to cut Israel short: and Hazael smote them in all the coasts of Israel; From Jordan eastward, all the land of Gilead, the Gadites, and the Reubenites, and the Manassites, from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon, even Gilead and Bashan.” Syria came down against these tribes first and actually destroyed them.
What does Amos mean by “Gilead”? Gilead was on the east bank of the Jordan River. It was the land which came up as far as the Sea of Galilee where the tribes of Reuben and Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh remained on the wrong side of the Jordan. Syria is located right to the north and came down against them. Even as I am writing this there is constantly a dogfight going on in the air between Syria and Israel around the Golan Heights which would correspond to the ancient land of Gilead. In that day, Syria had come down against God’s people and simply threshed them, and He says He is going to judge them for their cruelty and for their brutality.
But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which shall devour the palaces of Ben-hadad.
I will break also the bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the plain of Aven, and him that holdeth the sceptre from the house of Eden: and the people of Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir, saith the Lord [Amos 1:4–5].
A fire is to come upon Hazael, the king, and upon the palaces of Ben-hadad. If you have ever been to Damascus, you know that you do not see there the original city or its original location. It claims to be the oldest city in the world, but it has actually shifted around in the area to several different locations. It has burned to the very ground a number of times, and this is one of the occasions when that took place.
“And cut off the inhabitant from the plain of Aven.” If you travel from Beirut to Damascus, you go by a place known as Baalbek, and Baalbek is in the plain of Aven. The ruins there are spectacular. The Romans attempted to colonize it because it was such a lovely area. The temple ruins there testify to that. But Baalbek has been destroyed, and the great population is no longer in that area.
“And the people of Syria shall go into captivity unto Kir” means that they were to be taken captive by the Assyrians. Kir was a province in the Assyrian empire. It is good to have a knowledge of the geography of this area as it makes all of this more understandable. You must remember that when you are reading the Bible, you are not reading about the never-never land and you are not reading about some place in outer space. It deals with reality; even when the Bible talks about heaven, it is talking about that which is real.
JUDGMENT AGAINST PHILISTIA FOR MAKING SLAVES
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they carried away captive the whole captivity, to deliver them up to Edom:
But I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour the palaces thereof:
And I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him that holdeth the sceptre from Ashkelon, I will turn mine hand against Ekron: and the remnant of the Philistines shall perish, saith the Lord God [Amos 1:6–8].
“For three transgressions of Gaza, and for four.” As we said before, this is an idiomatic expression which means that there could be listed here quite a few transgressions. The cup of iniquity had been filled up.
“Gaza” was in Philistia, or the Philistine empire.
The judgment against the Philistines was for making slaves. They took a certain number of Israelites, and they sold them into slavery to Edom and also to Phoenicia. The Phoenicians were great traders, and they in turn sold them as prisoners of war into slavery. They would send them all over the Mediterranean world. Because of this, God says that He intends to judge Philistia.
It is quite interesting that as I am writing this the territory we know as the Gaza Strip is still an unknown quantity; that is, it is an Arab area which is now under the control of Israel. Israel is having a real problem with that territory, as you know. However, “Ashdod” and “Ashkelon” are still in Israel. Today you will find that in Ashdod there is a great refinery, and a new harbor has been constructed there. It will probably become a more important shipping place than even Haifa has become. I think it is probably better located than Haifa. Ashkelon is directly south of Ashdod. There you can still see the remains of the temple of Dagon where Samson was (see Jud. 16). All of these are very real places.
The judgment of God came upon these places exactly as God said it would. He said, “I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour the palaces thereof.” In the historical record of the reign of Hezekiah, we read: “He [Hezekiah] smote the Philistines, even unto Gaza, and the borders thereof, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city” (2 Kings 18:8). The record goes on to say how Hezekiah destroyed all that particular area. Amos’ prophecy, you see, was literally fulfilled. This example of fulfilled prophecy makes this section particularly interesting. It also puts down a pattern for the way in which God will fulfill prophecy in the future.
JUDGMENT AGAINST PHOENICIA FOR BREAKING TREATY
We come now to the judgment against Phoenicia. The judgment against them is not only for selling slaves—the Philistines sold slaves to Phoenicia, and Phoenicia in turn sold them out in the world—but the judgment is for breaking their treaty with Israel. Hiram, king of Tyre, had been a personal friend of David, and they had enjoyed many years of friendship. No king of Israel or Judah had ever made war upon Phoenicia. Now Phoenicia had broken the treaty.
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Tyrus, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they delivered up the whole captivity to Edom, and remembered not the brotherly covenant [Amos 1:9].
“Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Tyrus, and for four.” He is not just giving them ad seriatim. He says, “I will not give one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten reasons.” He could have listed probably a hundred, but he will mention the main ones.
“I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they delivered up the whole captivity to Edom, and remembered not the brotherly covenant.” In other words, they had broken a covenant that they had with Israel.
But I will send a fire on the wall of Tyrus, which shall devour the palaces thereof [Amos 1:10].
First the Assyrian came against Tyre, and he was not able to take the city. Then there has been some question whether the Chaldeans under Nebuchadnezzar took the city or not. However, it is conceded that Nebuchadnezzar forced the Tyrians (Tyre was the great city of the Phoenicians) to retire to an island that was out to sea about one-half mile. The Tyrians built their city there, and Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the old city that was on the mainland. About 250 years later, Alexander the Great came along. He saw that very prosperous, very wealthy city out on the island, and he built a causeway out to it. In doing so, he fulfilled Ezekiel’s prophecy in which God said that they would absolutely scrape the ground of old Tyre and throw it into the ocean (see Ezek. 26). Alexander made a causeway out to the island; he took it and destroyed it, bringing Tyre to an end. Amos’ prophecy concerning Tyre was literally fulfilled.
JUDGMENT AGAINST EDOM FOR REVENGEFUL SPIRIT
The judgment against Edom is because of their revengeful spirit. Back of revenge one ordinarily finds jealousy. The Edomites were jealous of their brothers. You see, Edom came from Esau, and Israel from Jacob; Jacob and Esau were twin brothers, the sons of Isaac.
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because he did pursue his brother with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually, and he kept his wrath for ever:
But I will send a fire upon Teman, which shall devour the palaces of Bozrah [Amos 1:11–12].
In the rock-hewn city of Petra, the capital of Edom, which is located in Teman, everything was destroyed that would burn. The palaces of Bozrah have been destroyed and have disappeared. This prophecy against Edom has been literally fulfilled. Judgment came upon them because of their revengeful spirit, because they were jealous of their brother, Israel.
JUDGMENT AGAINST AMMON FOR VIOLENT CRIMES
We come now to Ammon, the nation of the Ammonites. If you will notice, geographically, we are moving around almost in a circle. We began with Syria, came over to Phoenicia, down to Philistia, then over to Edom on the south, and now to Ammon.
What was the cause of God’s judgment against the Ammonites? Theirs was a violent crime—
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of the children of Ammon, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have ripped up the women with child of Gilead, that they might enlarge their border [Amos 1:13].
The Ammonites were located over on the east bank of the Jordan, and they joined with the Syrians in fighting against the two and one-half tribes of Israel which were in the land of Gilead. They did it “that they might enlarge their border.”
But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it shall devour the palaces thereof, with shouting in the day of battle, with a tempest in the day of the whirlwind:
And their king shall go into captivity, he and his princes together, saith the Lord [Amos 1:14–15].
“But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it shall devour the palaces thereof.” This is God’s judgment against the Ammonites. Rabbah was a great city and the capital city of the Ammonites. Later on it was called Philadelphia by the Greeks. It was named after Ptolemy Philadelphus of Egypt. We know it today as Amman, the capital of the nation of Jordan. You can see ruins there of the great civilization of the past which was totally destroyed. Modern Jordan has been built upon the ruins of the nation of the Ammonites.
We can turn to 2 Kings 8 to see the sin that had prompted God’s judgment against them. “And Hazael said [to Elisha], Why weepeth my lord? And he answered, Because I know the evil that thou wilt do unto the children of Israel: their strong holds wilt thou set on fire, and their young men wilt thou slay with the sword, and wilt dash their children, and rip up their women with child. And Hazael said, But what, is thy servant a dog, that he should do this great thing? And Elisha answered, The Lord hath shewed me that thou shalt be king over Syria” (2 Kings 8:12–13). In other words, Elisha said to Hazael, “You say that only a dog would do such a thing, but you are going to do it.” Whether Hazael was a dog or not, he did the very thing he said only a dog would do. We read in these verses of the violent things he would do to the children of Israel. He was going to dash their children and rip up their women with child. It was a horrible, awful thing, and it was for this crime that God would judge the Ammonites.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Judgment against Moab, Judah, and Israel
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Moab, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because he burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime [Amos 2:1].
Iconsider this man Amos to be a great preacher. The mold was broken after he was made—there is only one of him. He uses unusual expressions. “For three transgressions of Moab, and for four”—that is his way of saying that there were many transgressions; but, as usual, he will mention only one specifically.
JUDGMENT AGAINST MOAB FOR INJUSTICE
“Iwill not turn away the punishment thereof; because he burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime.” The judgment against Moab is for an awful spirit of revenge. The Moabites had gained a victory in battle over their enemies, the Edomites, and had killed their king. You would think that that would be enough, but they even burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime. The Moabites carried their revengeful spirit to the nth degree, and God says here that He will judge them for that.
But I will send a fire upon Moab, and it shall devour the palaces of Kirioth: and Moab shall die with tumult, with shouting, and with the sound of the trumpet:
And I will cut off the judge from the midst thereof, and will slay all the princes thereof with him, saith the Lord [Amos 2:2–3].
“Moab shall die with tumult”—that is, they will go out with a real bang, and the nation will be ended. This proud nation was brought to extinction later on at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar, and you haven’t seen a Moabite since then.
But isn’t it interesting that, many years before, out of this heathen country had come that gentle, lovely, and beautiful girl by the name of Ruth who became the wife of Boaz? Her story is recorded in one of the loveliest books in the Bible. Ruth is in the genealogical line which leads to Jesus Christ. And she had come from Moab, of all places. They were really a heathen, pagan people with a sad and sorry beginning and just as sad and tragic an end as a nation. But Ruth’s story reveals what the grace of God can do in the life of a believer if the believer will let Him do it.
JUDGMENT AGAINST JUDAH FOR DESPISING THE LAW
Now Amos turns to the nation Israel in a reverse of the method which the other prophets used later on. They would always mention God’s judgment of Israel and then the judgment of the other nations which surrounded them. However, Amos has taken up these other nations first before he turns to Israel against whom the judgment of God will be greater. The reason for their greater judgment is quite obvious: Privilege always creates responsibility. The more light that you have, the more responsible you are to God. I believe that you and I are more responsible to God than people who are denied Bibles and who are not hearing the Word of God at all. We are more responsible than they are. We often like to sit in judgment of these other nations round about us, but have you ever stopped to think of the tremendous responsibility that you and I have because of the privilege of having the Word of God? We boast of the fact that we have the Bible, but the important thing is our own personal obedience to the Word of God and whether or not we are doing anything to help get it out to others.
As Amos turns from the surrounding nations, he takes up the sins of God’s people. He begins with Judah, the southern kingdom, from which he himself had come.
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have despised the law of the Lord, and have not kept his commandments, and their lies caused them to err, after the which their fathers have walked [Amos 2:4].
“Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof.” God could enumerate many transgressions of which they were guilty, but here is the key one.
“Because they have despised the law of the Lord, and have not kept his commandments, and their lies caused them to err, after the which their fathers have walked.” This is saying in a very brief way what the prophet Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel took quite a few pages to say; that is, that God would judge the southern kingdom. For what would He judge them? They did not keep the commandments of God; they despised God’s law Judah had the law of God and despised it. They even had the temple which was in Jerusalem. Therefore, God now judged them according to the Law.
Have you noticed that God did not judge any of these other nations on that basis whatsoever? He judged them for certain specific sins which are common to the natural man. Because these other nations did not have God’s law, they were not judged according to God’s law.
But I will send a fire upon Judah, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem [Amos 2:5].
Again and again, Amos mentions, as do the other prophets, that there is to be a judgment by fire. When Nebuchadnezzar came against the city, he absolutely burned Jerusalem to the ground. There was nothing left but the stones—of which there is an abundance in that particular area.
JUDGMENT AGAINST ISRAEL FOR IMMORALITY AND BLASPHEMY
Remember that Amos is delivering these messages in Beth-el of the northern kingdom. He is speaking in the king’s chapel. I think that every time he got up to speak, he would take as his subject one of these nations, and he would pronounce God’s judgment upon it. Now he has even talked about Judah, and that’s getting pretty close to home. It may be that a few people squirmed in their pews when he mentioned Judah. However, the ten northern tribes and the two southern tribes were at war with one another a great deal of the time. There were several occasions when they made alliances, but that was only because of fear and of the necessity to stand together against a common enemy. Most of the time they were enemies. Therefore, when Amos gave his message of judgment against the southern kingdom, everyone was present and “amened” him. They agreed that God should judge Jerusalem and Judah. But what about the northern kingdom? Beginning with verse 6, he will speak to the northern kingdom. Beth-el is the city where the king worshiped, and this man was speaking in the king’s chapel. Amos is getting closer to home. He’s going to start meddling.
The story is told of the preacher who one Sunday morning was preaching against various sins. He preached about the sin of drunkenness, and a woman sitting in the congregation loudly “amened” him. He preached against the sin of smoking, and she “amened” him for that. Then when he started preaching against the sin of chewing tobacco, she shifted her wad to the other cheek and grumbled, “Now he’s quit preachin’ and has gone to meddlin’!”
Amos is starting to meddle now. He is going to talk about the sin of the congregation which was before him. No longer will his message be about the sins of the “Moabites” but the sins of the northern kingdom. They, too, had God’s law, and they were schooled in the commandments of God. Listen to Amos as he speaks—
Thus saith the Lord; For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes [Amos 2:6].
“Thus saith the Lord.” May I say to you, I personally have never felt that I have any right to stand in the pulpit and speak unless I can speak on the basis of “Thus saith the Lord.” What the Word of God has to say should be the basis of all pulpit ministry.
“For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof.” There are more transgressions than that, and Amos will mention more than that. He is going to deal with the Mosaic Law. He will not deal with the Ten Commandments as he did with Judah, but with the Mosaic Law which had to do with man’s everyday life.
“Because they sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes.” The ten tribes in the north had the Mosaic Law, but they were committing the same sins as the nations that were round about them. The fact of the matter is that the very people whom God had put out of that land were guilty of the same sins that Israel was now committing.
First of all, we have here the mistreatment of the poor. You will find that Amos has a great deal to say about the poor. In Amos 4:1 we read, “Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan, that are in the mountain of Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say to their masters, Bring, and let us drink.” Listen again to Amos: “Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor …” (Amos 5:11).
In studying the prophets, I see again and again that the poor are not going to get justice, nor will they be treated fairly upon this earth until Jesus Christ reigns. The only hope of the poor is in the Lord Jesus Christ. We are told today that certain political parties will take care of the poor. Well, they’ve been taking care of us all right! Every time another politician wants my vote, he tells me how much he’s going to help me. I vote for him and then my taxes go up, and they keep going up and up and up. I will be very frank with you, I find that most of these politicians are rich men. They are millionaires, and they don’t know my problem. They do not understand the poor. I am thankful there is one, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is someday going to bring justice to the poor.
God will judge a nation for its mistreatment of the poor. He gave a number of laws regarding this, but I will mention just one: “Thou shalt not wrest judgment; thou shalt not respect persons, neither take a gift: for a gift doth blind the eyes of the wise, and pervert the words of the righteous” (Deut. 16:19). God put down this law to protect the poor. In that day a man might be absolutely innocent, but his adversary could slip a bribe under the table to the judge and thus receive a favorable verdict for himself. By the way, that practice doesn’t seem to be out of style today. Other styles change, but this one has not. It is difficult for the poor to receive justice today when money seems to be the determining factor. Amos was speaking to a very pertinent problem of his day when even a pair of shoes would pervert judgment and cause the poor to suffer.
That pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the meek: and a man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name [Amos 2:7].
“That pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor.” This could mean several things, but I personally think it means that these selfish, greedy, rich judges even resented that the poor had enough dust left to throw upon their heads in mourning. Believe me, that is the covetousness, the modern idolatry, of our day. God judges nations for that.
“And turn aside the way of the meek.” Justice was being turned aside in disfavor to the meek. Why? Because the meek did not speak out. The old saying is true: “It’s the squeaky wheel that gets the grease.” The meek are not inheriting the earth today. It is inherited by those who are forward and are grabbing for all they can get. The poor and the meek were not receiving justice in Israel, nor are they receiving justice anywhere in the world today.
“And a man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name.” Apparently, Amos is talking about a maid who is a prostitute. Both the father and the son went in to her. God says that adultery profanes His holy name. May I say to you, what we call “the new morality” isn’t new at all. Israel was practicing the new morality, but God said He hated it. They were breaking the laws which He had put down concerning these things.
You can see that Amos is not going to be popular. He took the side of the poor, and he condemned unrighteousness. He condemned injustice. He condemned the fact that the poor were getting a bad deal, and he condemned immorality.
And they lay themselves down upon clothes laid to pledge by every altar, and they drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their god [Amos 2:8].
“And they lay themselves down upon clothes laid to pledge by every altar.” God had a very lovely law concerning this: “And if the man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge: In any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment, and bless thee: and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the Lord thy God” (Deut. 24:12–13). A very poor man would have nothing to put up as collateral for a small loan except his outer garment, and that is what he needed to keep himself warm. God said, “You can take it as a pledge, but when the sun goes down, let him have it back in order that he might not be cold in sleeping that night.” Now God points out that Israel had broken this law and was not obeying Him at this point either.
We talk about how just our own laws are today, but how sad it is that we will permit an entire family to be moved from their home when they cannot pay the rent because of poverty. My friend, the Word of God has a great deal to say in behalf of the poor.
“By every altar.” God had given Israel only one altar, and that was in the temple in Jerusalem. This reveals that they had gone into idolatry and had a multitude of altars.
“And they drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their god.” He condemns their drunkenness.
Yet destroyed I the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath [Amos 2:9].
Notice the expressive and figurative language of this country preacher who had come up from Tekoa in the desert in Judah. Through Amos, God says of the Amorite, “He was tall like the cedar. He was strong like the oaks, but I destroyed him. I destroyed the fruit above, and I destroyed the roots from beneath.” God got rid of the Amorites. We read in Joshua 24:8, “And I brought you into the land of the Amorites, which dwelt on the other side Jordan; and they fought with you: and I gave them into your hand, that ye might possess their land; and I destroyed them from before you.” We have already said that there are no Moabites around today, and I wonder when the last time was that you saw an Amorite.
God had said to Abraham way back yonder, “I cannot put you in the land right now because the Amorite is in the land, and his iniquity is not yet full. I am going to give him an opportunity to turn to Me, to turn from these gross sins that he is committing.” You may want to say to me, “Dr. McGee, after all, these heathen nations didn’t have the Mosaic Law, and they didn’t know any better.” Paul makes a very interesting statement in his Epistle to the Romans: “For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law; (For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified. For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves” (Rom. 2:12–14). Why would Gentiles who do not have the Mosaic Law refrain from murder? Why would they refrain from lying? Why would they refrain from stealing? Paul continues, “Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;)” (Rom. 2:15). You and I have a conscience, and even if we had never heard of the Ten Commandments, our consciences would either accuse us or excuse us. We would either say, “I’m guilty,” or we would be free of any sense of guilt. Man has been given a sense of that which is right and that which is wrong.
It was on that basis that God judged the Amorite—he continued in sin. God said to Abraham, “I am going to put your offspring down in Egypt for 420 years until the iniquity of the Amorite is full.” I do not think that even the most rabid liberal would want to ask God to give the Amorites more than 420 years of opportunity to repent. I personally will go along with the Lord that when you give a nation 420 years to decide what to do, they have had long enough.
The fact of the matter is that the Amorites did not turn to God. When Joshua crossed over the Jordan River, he came into the land of the Amorites. Jericho was an Amorite city, and the harlot Rahab was an Amorite. She and her family were the only ones who were not destroyed. The Moabites disappeared, but Ruth the Moabitess is in the genealogy of Jesus Christ. The Amorites, too, have long since disappeared, but Rahab the harlot is also in the line that led to the Messiah.
God is saying to Israel, “I judged the Amorites for the same sins which you are now committing. I have given you My law, and you have broken it.”
Also I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and led you forty years through the wilderness, to possess the land of the Amorite.
And I raised up of your sons for prophets, and of your young men for Nazarites. Is it not even thus, O ye children of Israel? saith the Lord [Amos 2:10–11].
In effect God is saying, “I wanted you to serve Me in the land. I wanted you to bring up your young men to serve Me, to be prophets, and to be Nazarites.” But what had happened?—
But ye gave the Nazarites wine to drink; and commanded the prophets, saying, Prophesy not [Amos 2:12].
A Nazarite was an Israelite who took a vow voluntarily to dedicate himself to God. There were three things that a Nazarite did not do. First, he did not cut his hair. Why? Because for a man to have long hair, Paul says, is a shame to him (see 1 Cor. 11:14). When I look around me today and see some fellows, I agree with Paul that it is sort of a shame for a man to have long hair. But I will simply say that the Nazarites let their hair grow because they were willing to bear shame.
The second thing was that a Nazarite was not permitted to drink wine or touch any fruit of the vine. They were not to eat grapes or even raisins. The Israelites were causing a Nazarite to break his vow when they gave him wine.
The Nazarite also was not to touch a dead body or come near to one. When a loved one died, he did not even attend the funeral. This was done as an evidence of the fact that he had put God first in his life.
“And commanded the prophets, saying, Prophesy not.” The people said to the prophets, “We don’t want to hear you. We don’t want to have any messages from you at all.” They refused to listen to God’s prophets.
Let me again make an analogy to our own nation today. We are following the same pattern that Rome followed when she went down. Rome was not destroyed from the outside, and I do not believe that there will come a missile over the North Pole which will destroy America. I think the missile which will destroy us is the propaganda that is abroad today. Through it we have become convinced that we are a sophisticated, very progressive nation and that nothing can happen to us. The truth is that we are probably going down as fast as any nation in history. A leading statesman has said, “This nation has gone down faster in the past ten years than it did in its entire history from its inception.” How true that is!
There are two things which are bringing us down as a nation. One of them is drunkenness. There are a shocking number of alcoholics in this country. A majority of the fatal accidents that take place on our highways involve drunk drivers. Yet we are criticized if we speak out about this. We make laws concerning the use and abuse of drugs, and I agree with those laws; but what about liquor, my friend? Liquor is one of the things that is destroying us as a nation.
The other thing that characterizes us today is that we are not hearing the Word of God. The liberal preacher is the popular preacher. If we are going to hear the opinion of a minister on television, it will be the liberal preacher. The other day there was a panel discussion on television about abortion. They included a minister on the panel. You guessed it—he was a liberal. Recently I also viewed a discussion about women’s rights. Again, the minister who spoke was a liberal. They do not ask a Bible-teaching preacher to tell what God has said on the subject. And yet we talk about religious liberty! My friend, the voice of God is not being heard in this land except for a few of us weak fellows who are trying to declare the Word of God.
The same thing was happening in Israel. Amos said, “You are giving the Nazarite wine, causing him to break his vow and turning him from God. And you say to the prophets, ‘Prophesy not.’ You say to me, ‘Don’t talk like that. We want to hear something that will butter us up and make us feel good.’”
Behold, I am pressed under you, as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves [Amos 2:13].
There are different ways of interpreting this verse, even different ways of translating it. It is the belief of some that it is rather degrading to think of God as being pressed down like a cart. I do not feel that way about it. God is saying here, “You have put Me in a difficult situation. You are My people, I put you in the land, and I put the Amorite out. Now here you are committing the same sins they commit! Do you expect Me to shut My eyes to your sin because you are My people? I’m being pressed down `as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves.’”
Therefore the flight shall perish from the swift, and the strong shall not strengthen his force, neither shall the mighty deliver himself:
Neither shall he stand that handleth the bow; and he that is swift of foot shall not deliver himself. neither shall he that rideth the horse deliver himself.
And he that is courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day, saith the Lord [Amos 2:14–16].
There are some expositors who believe this refers to the earthquake mentioned in the first verse of Amos’ prophecy. I do not think there is any reference here to an earthquake at all. The point is this: Israel was a strong nation. God had kept the enemy out, and no one had ever advanced into their land. Now everything is breaking down, even the walls of the city. The enemy has come in, and the strong are no longer strong.
We as a nation today ought to do a little thinking about what has happened in our land. In two world wars we were able to cross the sea and to bring an end to the conflict. In that we became a great nation, and we were very proud. We felt we didn’t need God at all—we had the atom bomb. Then a little country called North Vietnam came along, and we thought that we would subdue them overnight. I am not attempting to fix blame on anyone, but I do say that America should have learned a lesson from that. We did not win a victory. We were never able to subdue the little enemy and we were divided at home. It is true that we did not want to bring the full force of our military power to bear, but this reveals the fact that we are becoming weak as a nation. We ought to wake up instead of shutting our eyes to the condition of our land. We ought to begin to call attention to the fact that God is already beginning to bring us down as He brought His own people down.
God said to Israel, “You are becoming weak, and you do not seem to realize that I have already begun to judge you.” That was Amos’ message, and it is no wonder that the people wanted to run him out of town. It is no wonder they didn’t want to hear the message he had for them. And he is not through yet!
CHAPTER 3
Theme: God’s charge against the whole house of Israel
Hear this word that the Lord hath spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying [Amos 3:1].
Now God is ignoring the fact that the nation is split. He says that He is speaking to the whole family of Israel which He brought out of Egypt. In His eyes there were not two nations but one. The twelve tribes are one family before Him.
You only have I known of all the families of the earth: therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities [Amos 3:2].
This is getting right down to where the rubber meets the road, which shows the kind of prophet Amos was. He didn’t beat around the bush. He didn’t mince words. He comes right out and says that God will punish Israel for her iniquities. It’s too bad the politicians and the priests wouldn’t listen to him. If they had, it could have been a different story for Israel.
“You only have I known of all the families of the earth.” After the disaster of the Flood, man was still in such sin that at the Tower of Babel all mankind had departed from God. It was total apostasy. Then God reached down to Ur of the Chaldees and called a man, told him to get away from his home of idolatry and to go to a place which He would show him. God said that from this one man, Abraham, He would make a nation and give them a land. This is what God means when He says, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth. ”
In order to get a message through to the world, God had to use this method. At the Tower of Babel, man was not building an escape in case there should be another flood—that was never the point. It was an altar that was built, apparently, to the sun. It was a place of worship. After the Flood men had the false idea that the god of darkness and the god of the storm had brought the Flood. So now they are going to worship the sun. It was sun worship that prevailed in the Tigris-Euphrates valley and continues until this very day. In the religion of Zoroaster there is the worship of light even down to the present.
God chose Abraham from among the nations, out of Abraham He brought forth the nation Israel, and to the nation He gave His Word. His purpose was that this nation would give His Word to the world. And this is God’s purpose for us, my friend. For this reason I am attempting to get out His whole Word—all sixty-six books—by all means available to me.
“Therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.” God is saying, “I intend to judge you.” The nation Israel occupied a unique relationship to God. God had given to them His commandments. And the reason He would judge Israel so severely is because they had broken so many of His commandments. You see, light creates responsibility. An enlightened nation has a greater responsibility than a nation which is in darkness.
This is a great principle that God puts down here. He intends to judge in a harsher manner those who have received light than those who are in darkness. The Lord Jesus also mentioned the fact that some would receive fewer stripes and others would receive more stripes. Many times I have made the statement that I would rather be a heathen Hottentot in the darkest corner of this earth, bowing down before an ugly, hideous idol of stone, than to be the so-called civilized man in this country, sitting in church on Sunday morning while he hears the gospel preached and does nothing about it. The man who hears the Word of God has a greater responsibility than the man who doesn’t. Therefore, there are different degrees of punishment.
God makes it clear that He intends to punish them for their iniquities. Now a great many people today like to hear of the love of God. The love of God is indeed wonderful, and I don’t think any teacher has emphasized it more than I have. It is something we need to rest upon and rejoice in. The love of God is manifested in the cross of Christ—“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son …” (John 3:16). The cross is where God revealed His love, and when that love is rejected, there is nothing left but punishment. A great many folk feel that God should not punish; but, since they are not running the universe, I am of the opinion that their viewpoint will not be followed. God has already said that He is holy, righteous, just and that He intends to punish. Judgment upon sin is the logical consequence.
In fact, there will be a set of questions asked and answered, which reveal what a logical matter-of-fact prophet Amos really was. He deals with certain basic truths. He was a man from the edge of the wilderness down in Tekoa, and he draws from his long experience down there. He takes his lessons from the world of nature. He learned some things that folk still need to learn today.
I shall never forget the day my daughter went to a dairy on a school excursion. She had grown up in Pasadena, so she was a city girl. She came home from the excursion that day with the most exciting news you have ever heard. She told us that milk came from a cow! She had thought that milk came from the market and had originated there.
Well, this man Amos is a country man, and he has observed many wonderful things in nature.
Notice his first question:
Can two walk together, except they be agreed? [Amos 3:3].
Can two walk together? Yes, but they cannot go together unless they are in agreement. I watched a young couple the other day who hadn’t been married long. They were walking down the street arm in arm. All of a sudden she turned around, stamped her little foot, and started walking back toward their home—but he kept on going. They weren’t walking together any more because there had been some disagreement. Can two walk together, except they be agreed?
Here is a cause and an effect. The cause: there must be agreement if you are to walk together with God. The effect: you will walk with Him when you are in agreement. This doesn’t mean that God will come over and agree with you. You and I will have to go over to His side and agree with Him. As someone has said, God rides triumphantly in His own chariot. And if you don’t want to get under the wheels of that chariot, you had better get aboard and ride. After all, God is carrying through His purpose in the world.
It was very interesting to me to visit England and see Windsor Castle and Hampton Court. I think of Henry VI, Henry VIII, and Richard II, who were some of the boys who made the Tower of London famous because they sent many there who lost their heads. They had their way for a while—especially Henry VIII, but no one today is paying much attention to what Henry VIII thought or to what he did. My friend, God is running His universe His way and is not asking advice from little man. If you and I are going to walk with God, we will have to go His way. Amos has stated a great principle in his first question: “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?”
Now here is Amos’ second question:
Will a lion roar in the forest, when he hath no prey? will a young lion cry out of his den, if he have taken nothing? [Amos 3:4].
“Will a lion roar in the forest, when he hath no prey?” Of course not. A lion moves about stealthily, quietly, silently on his padded feet. He is noiseless until he pounces on his prey. When he has captured his prey, then you can hear him roar.
“Will a young lion cry out of his den, if he have taken nothing?” No. The little lion doesn’t make a sound because his mamma told him to keep quiet while she was away getting something for him to eat. But when she comes back with his supper, then he lets out a cry—but not until then.
You see, there is always a cause and a result. And the judgment of God will follow man’s iniquity.
Amos has another question:
Can a bird fall in a snare upon the earth, where no gin is for him? shall one take up a snare from the earth, and have taken nothing at all? [Amos 3:5].
A “gin” is a trap. Of course a bird is not going to get caught in a snare unless a trap is laid for him. When I was a boy, they used to tell me that I could catch a bird if I put salt on its tail. So I ran all over the neighborhood trying to get salt on a bird’s tail—and found it didn’t work! I found that I couldn’t catch a bird without a trap. In nature there is always the principle of cause and effect. If you are going to catch a bird, you will have to have a trap.
Now here is another question: “Shall one take up a snare from the earth, and have taken nothing at all?” A man is not going to keep setting a trap if he doesn’t catch anything in it. I used to have six traps when I was a boy. In the fall of the year, I would ride down on my bicycle every morning before school to see if I had caught anything. In one of those six traps I would usually have a possum or a rabbit, sometimes I would have a skunk. (I always gave the skunk to a friend of mine. Although I could get more for the fur, I didn’t care for the scent.) After I had left a trap in a place day after day and caught nothing, it would be foolish for me to continue to leave the trap there; so I would move it to some other place. If you are going to put out a trap, you expect to catch something in the trap.
Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it? [Amos 3:6].
“Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid?” God has said that He is going to judge the people, and judgment is coming. It is rather foolish to fail to respond. It should have had an effect on their lives, but they are not listening to the prophet—any more than our nation is listening to the Word of God today.
“Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it?” First of all, let’s understand that the word “evil” does not mean something which is sinful or wrong. It means calamity or judgment. Amos is saying, “Shall there be a calamity in the city, and the Lord has not done it?” This means, my friend, that there is no such thing as an accident in the life of a child of God. There must be a cause for the effect. God is not moving this universe in a foolish, idle manner. Therefore, when calamity strikes, there is a lesson to be learned from it. I believe that if America had learned the lesson of the “dust bowl” and of the drought period and of the depression, we would never have had to fight World War II. But we did not learn. Neither did we listen to God’s warning in World War II, so we fought a tragic war in Vietnam, and still we are not listening to God. My friend, God will not let any nation dwell in peace and prosperity when it is in sin. Oh, it may have a period of peace and prosperity, but judgment will come.
Amos asks seven questions which illustrate that for every effect there is a cause and that the judgment of God which is coming is not accidental but is a result caused by the sin of the people.
Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets [Amos 3:7].
Amos is saying that God will not move in judgment until He gives His message to the prophets. He will let them know what He intends to do.
The lion hath roared, who will not fear? the Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy? [Amos 3:8].
The prophets were giving God’s message to Israel.
The problem in our day is not that people do not have a Word from God; the problem is that they will not hear that Word from God. His warnings are given in His Word. I feel that the Bible is more up to date than tomorrow morning’s newspaper. After all, tomorrow morning’s paper will be out of date by noon when the afternoon edition comes off the press. But the Word of God will be just as good the next day and on to the end of time.
It has always been God’s method to reveal information to those who are His own concerning future judgment. You will recall that during Noah’s day, God told him of a coming flood judgment and gave Noah 120 years to warn his generation. But the world did not heed his message. Also, remember that God let Abraham know ahead of time regarding the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. It is a good thing He did that, because if He had not, it would have given Abraham a wrong viewpoint of the almighty God. It has always been God’s method to reveal such things to His own. When He was here in the flesh, He told His disciples, “Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you” (John 15:15). There are many examples of this throughout the Bible. He gave a forewarning to Joseph in Egypt of the seven years of famine that were to come upon the earth. Also, Elijah was forewarned of the drought that would come upon Israel. He walked into the courts of Ahab and Jezebel to announce to them that they were in for a drought—“… As the Lord God of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word— [and I’m not saying anything!]” (1 Kings 17:1). Then he walked out of the court and dropped out of sight for over three years. Since it is God’s method to warn of impending judgment, our Lord told His apostles, when He was gathered with them on the Mount of Olives, that Jerusalem would be destroyed—not one stone would be left upon another.
It is God’s method always to give a warning of impending judgment, and that is all that Amos is doing here although his contemporaries are very critical of him. Folk just don’t want to hear about judgment. They would much rather hide their head in the sand like the proverbial ostrich. Some people will not even go to a doctor because they do not want to know that something is wrong with them. The human family does not want to hear the bad news of judgment which is coming. If you preach and teach the truth, they will say you are a pessimist, a killjoy, a gloom-caster. However, God follows the principle that for every effect there is a cause, and God sends judgment only upon a sinning people.
God also makes it clear that the prophet is obligated to give His message—regardless of what it is. In fact, he ought to be in fear if he fails to relay God’s message to the people. Frankly, I feel sorry today for the liberal who is refusing to declare God’s message. He ought to be in fear. “The lion hath roared, who will not fear?” God has spoken. Now let’s speak what God has to say. Let’s get off this social gospel—which is almost like being on dope and taking a trip of sweetness and light, rose water and sunshine, expecting everything to work out beautifully. Well, I have been told all my life by politicians and preachers that there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and we are going to arrive there shortly. But I’ve been on this trip for most of this century, and we haven’t arrived yet—in fact, conditions get worse and worse. They refuse to face up to the fact that the real problem is sin in the heart of man.
Publish in the palaces at Ashdod, and in the palaces in the land of Egypt, and say, Assemble yourselves upon the mountains of Samaria, and behold the great tumults in the midst thereof, and the oppressed in the midst thereof [Amos 3:9].
“Publish in the palaces at Ashdod.” Ashdod is in the country of the Philistines. At the time I am writing this, Israel has Ashdod. They have built a great many apartment buildings, a man-made harbor, and have erected a big oil refinery there so that oil is brought into Ashdod today.
A friend of mine who teaches prophecy attempts to find fulfilled prophecy in modern Palestine. When the oil pipeline came into Haifa in the northern part of Israel and an oil refinery was in operation and oil tankers were loading there, my friend said, “See, here is the fulfillment of the prophecy that Asher will dip his foot in oil!” However, that pipeline was cut, and the only oil brought into Haifa was by tankers. Now there is a pipeline across the Negeb from the Red Sea to Ashdod. Oil is piped from the tankers across to the refinery in Ashdod. It looks like it would be the tribe of Dan that gets its foot in oil today! My friend doesn’t mention the fulfillment of this particular prophecy anymore because he can see it doesn’t apply. I personally do not think that prophecy is being fulfilled in that land at all. However, I do see the setting of the stage that will later on bring the fulfillment of prophecy. It is foolish to pick out these little specific prophecies and insist that they are currently being fulfilled.
However, when Amos was giving his prophecy, Ashdod was a prominent city of the Philistines and stands here in this particular verse as representative for all of Philistia. “And in the palaces in the land of Egypt.” God was instructing His prophets to spread this word upon the palaces of Ashdod and Egypt. Now notice what the invitation was—
“Assemble yourselves upon the mountains of Samaria, and behold the great tumults in the midst thereof, and the oppressed in the midst thereof.” Samaria was the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, and the palace of Ahab and Jezebel was there. Samaria was built on one mountain, but there were other mountains surrounding the city. From these surrounding mountains, people could see what was going on in the city. Sin was going great guns. “The great tumults” were riots caused by the oppression of the poor. If the pagan nations of Philistia and Egypt condemned Israel, wouldn’t a holy God condemn them?
For they know not to do right, saith the Lord, who store up violence and robbery in their palaces [Amos 3:10].
Samaria was storing up in their palaces that which they had been stealing.
Therefore thus saith the Lord God; An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled [Amos 3:11].
My friend, today the palaces of Samaria lie in ruins—I have seen them on several occasions.
Thus saith the Lord; As the shepherd taketh out of the mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear; so shall the children of Israel be taken out that dwell in Samaria in the corner of a bed, and in Damascus in a couch [Amos 3:12].
After God’s judgment has fallen on Samaria, the remaining remnant is likened to a piece of an ear and two legs which are all that are left of a lamb after a lion has devoured it. You see, God’s judgment was severe because Samaria had light from heaven which made their responsibility great.
Hear ye, and testify in the house of Jacob, saith the Lord God, the God of hosts,
That in the day that I shall visit the transgressions of Israel upon him I will also visit the altars of Beth-el: and the horns of the altar shall be cut off, and fall to the ground [Amos 3:13–14].
“The altars of Beth-el” refer to the worship of the golden calf. “The horns of the altar shall be cut off.” God is saying that He intends to remove this gross idolatry from His land.
And I will smite the winter house with the summer house; and the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses shall have an end, saith the Lord [Amos 3:15].
“The houses of ivory shall perish.” Ahab and Jezebel had built on the top of the hill in Samaria. Their tremendous palace was in a most beautiful location. I particularly noticed that on my last trip there. That palace covers the very brow of the hill, the tip-top of the hill. From their palace they could look in every direction. To the west they could see the Mediterranean Sea on a clear day. To the east they could see the Jordan valley. To the north they could see the Valley of Esdraelon with Mount Hermon in the distance. To the south they could see Jerusalem. What a view!
There they built a palace of ivory. Of course, the enemy in days gone by has carted away that beautiful ivory, but excavations have been going on there recently. In fact, Israel is excavating there now. Our guide told us that they have found several very delicate vessels of ivory. Apparently one of them was for perfume. The other vessels were probably for wine. Ivory was the color scheme of the palace, if you please. Everything was done in ivory. Apparently, Ahab and Jezebel had the best interior decorator of the period come up and decorate for them. It was a palace of luxury.
God said He would destroy it and bring it to an end. I do not know of a more desolate spot today than the ruins of Samaria on top of that hill. I have many pictures that I took of it. God has certainly fulfilled that prophecy. Although we do not see prophecy which is being fulfilled in that land today, we can see that many prophecies have been fulfilled in the past. However, I repeat, that certainly the stage currently is being set for the fulfillment of future prophecies in the land of Palestine.
CHAPTER 4
Theme: Israel punished in past for iniquity
Beginning with this chapter, we have a series of three chapters which deal specifically with Israel, the ten tribes of the northern kingdom. In chapter 4 we will be reminded that God in the past punished Israel for iniquity. Then in chapter 5 we will see that in the future Israel will be punished for her iniquity. Finally, in chapter 6 we will see Amos admonishing his generation in the present to depart from iniquity. You see that this section has a very practical application to us as well as to Israel in the days of Amos.
As Amos is attempting to call the people back to God, he uses sarcasm that is really cutting.
Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan, that are in the mountain of Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say to their masters, Bring, and let us drink [Amos 4:1].
“Ye kine of Bashan”—kine are cows. Bashan is a territory on the east of the Jordan River between the mountains of Gilead in the south and Mount Hermon on the north. It was settled by the three tribes that stayed on the wrong side of Jordan, and it was part of the northern kingdom of Israel. It was a very fertile area and noted for its fine breed of cattle. The cows of Bashan were strong and sleek in appearance because of the lush grazing lands.
Now whom is Amos addressing? Who are the “cows of Bashan”? Because the word cows is feminine, some expositors believe he is speaking to the women who were living in luxury, well fed, well dressed, well groomed. To enable them to enjoy this wealth, the poor were oppressed. In fact, Amos says, “which oppress the poor, which crush the needy.” Generally, a nation reveals its moral position and its economic standard by the way women dress. When women are well dressed and bejeweled, it denotes a time of affluence in the nation. So Amos could be referring to the women of Bashan.
However, I believe that Amos is speaking to the rulers. Why, then, does he use the feminine gender? Well, that crowd was homosexual. If you will read the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, you will see that homosexuality is a thing which God judges. We know from history that when a nation starts to go down, homosexuality comes to the forefront. It was that which began the downfall of Rome. Nero was a homosexual. Nero was known as a mad king. He was mad, yes, in a very unnatural way. In his great palace, he had one separate room which was reserved for the basest kind of sexual deviation imaginable. It was given over to the satisfying of his homosexual cravings. This certainly can be brought up to date. What is taking place in our own country is alarming, and it can spell our national doom. We need an Amos to speak out against the growing acceptance and even encouragement of homosexuality today.
The Lord God hath sworn by his holiness, that, lo, the days shall come upon you, that he will take you away with hooks, and your posterity with fishhooks [Amos 4:2].
God uses the picture of having a hook in the jaw of the northern kingdom to drag them off into captivity. We sometimes speak of people being “hooked” on drugs. A person can be “hooked” by any besetting sin. God says these people are “hooked” for judgment. They are going to be dragged out of the land. We know from history that their conquerors did lead off their captives by a hook through the nose.
And ye shall go out at the breaches, every cow at that which is before her; and ye shall cast them into the palace, saith the Lord [Amos 4:3].
In effect, God is saying, “If you think because you are rich or because you are a ruler living in a palace that you will be spared, you are wrong.” And we read in the historical record that when Assyria finally came and took them into captivity, the king was taken also. This was true also of the southern kingdom when it went into Babylonian captivity.
Now we come to an arresting expression:
Come to Beth-el, and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years:
And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and publish the free offerings: for this liketh you, O ye children of Israel, saith the Lord God [Amos 4:4–5].
I am sure you recognize that Amos is using bitter sarcasm as he invites them to come up to Beth-el (the place where they went to worship the golden calf) “Come to Beth-el, and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression.” The word Gilgal means “circle, or to roll along.” It was the first place to which Israel came after they had crossed the Jordan River under Joshua’s leadership, and it became a sacred place to them. Later it became a center of idolatry, and here again it is associated with idolatry. So Amos invites them to “multiply transgression” at Gilgal. That would be saying today, “Come to church to sin.” Obviously, one goes to church for the very opposite. Amos is using pungent satire and taunting rebuke. He makes such an ironical and ridiculous statement to alert the people as to what they are actually doing.
Do you know that sometimes it can actually be dangerous to go to church? The Devil goes to church, you know. I think that he gets up bright and early on a Sunday morning, and wherever there is the preaching and teaching of the Word of God, he is there trying to wreck their work in any way he can. That is the reason we ought to pray for Bible-preaching and Bible-teaching pastors. The Devil doesn’t need to be busy in cults or in liberal churches which deny the Word of God. Those places are already in his domain. He must concentrate his efforts in those places where there is spiritual life and the Word of God is being given out.
When Jesus Christ was about to die and His enemies were plotting the details of His execution, He spent time in the Upper Room with His twelve disciples. You would think that was the most sacred spot in all the world at that moment. You might expect that the Devil was busy with those who were plotting the death of Jesus. But do you know where the Devil was that evening? He was in the Upper Room! He hadn’t been invited, but he was there. Satan had entered into the heart of Judas Iscariot to betray Him, and he walked into the Upper Room on the legs of Judas. That’s how he got there. And, my friend, sometimes he walks into our so-called conservative, fundamental churches on the legs of a deacon or a Sunday school teacher or another church member. It is tragic today to fail to recognize our enemy and to be ignorant of his devices.
In the days of Amos, the people of Israel were coming to the place of worship in a very pious manner. Amos indicates that they were offering a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven. If you are familiar with the Book of Leviticus, you may think it was strange that they used leaven in their offerings since in the Scriptures leaven represents evil—evil or wrong doctrine and evil living. In the Levitical system, at the Feast of Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Feast of Firstfruits, the use of leaven was forbidden. However, at the Feast of Pentecost, there was to be a meal offering to the Lord, which was to be presented in two loaves of fine flour baked with leaven (see Lev. 23). Pentecost was to depict the beginning and origin of the church. There has never yet been a church in which there wasn’t at least a little leaven—that is, a little error or a little sin. For this reason leaven is included in the offering at Pentecost.
Also, leaven was used in the thanksgiving offerings. Leviticus 7 gives the law of the sacrifice of the peace offerings: “If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and unleavened wafers anointed with oil, and cakes mingled with oil, of fine flour, fried” (Lev. 7:12). This is the Godward side of the offering. You see, the Lord Jesus Christ has made peace with God for us. Because it represents Christ, there is no leaven in this first offering. In the New Testament this is made clear: “Therefore being justified by faith [not by works—we could never be justified by anything but faith], we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). Now, although the first offering represents Christ and contains no leaven, the second represents the manward side; the one who is bringing the sacrifice of thanksgiving offers himself to God: “Besides the cakes, he shall offer for his offering leavened bread with the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace offerings” (Lev. 7:13).
We can make an application of this to our own lives. You and I can dedicate our lives to the Lord. Sometimes this is done in a ritual which is called a “consecration” service. Since the literal meaning of consecration is to set something apart as being holy, that is really a misnomer for that kind of ritual. We can never present ourselves holy or perfect before God. We will always contain some “leaven.” So present yourself as a living sacrifice to God, as we are admonished in Romans 12:1. But don’t ever think that you can present yourself perfect to God. If you are waiting for that before you feel you can present yourself to God, you will be waiting your whole lifetime.
Now, when Amos sarcastically invites the people of Israel to come to Beth-el and Gilgal to transgress, it is very significant that he tells them to “offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven.” He doesn’t even mention the first unleavened part of the offering. Why? Because the people are totally removed from the living and true God. Therefore, the only thing they can do is offer evil to God. Of course, God will not accept that at all. This prophet Amos, just a country preacher, has a lot on the ball! He is an outstanding minister of the Word of God. This is tremendous.
My friend, I hope you understand the satire and sarcasm of Amos when he invites people to Gilgal to transgress. He is not asking them to sin, but in biting sarcasm he is saying, “That’s what you do when you come to Beth-el and to Gilgal. You come to sin, not to worship God!”
Next Sunday morning when you put on your Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes, it might be well to first get down on your knees and ask God about the condition of your heart. Will you be taking a clean heart to church? Will you be taking lips that will not speak anything to hurt the cause of Christ? The message of Amos is very pertinent even in our day. If Amos were still around and if I were still a pastor, I would invite him to my church to preach. I think the modern church needs ministers like him. There are many ministers who give only nice little messages on comfort and how to solve personal problems. Somebody needs to say something very strong about sin in people’s hearts in our day. Sin is rampant in and out of the church, and it is rampant in your heart and in my heart this very day. The biggest problem you and I have is to overcome the sin which is in our lives. There is no use trying to cover it up by church attendance or by going to some little course or seminar. The essential thing is to have a confrontation with the Lord Jesus Christ and to get your relationship with Him straightened out.
Amos now reminds the people of Israel of the judgments God had sent upon them—
And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord [Amos 4:6].
They didn’t have “cleanness of teeth” because God had given them a new toothpaste or new mouthwash! The reason they had clean teeth was that they had nothing to eat. God had judged them with famine, but it had not awakened them to their spiritual condition. “Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.” It made no impression on them.
And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city: one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered.
So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord [Amos 4:7–8].
Then God sent a drought. God is the one who controls the rainfall—some think the weatherman does it! God withheld the rain three months before it was time to harvest, which was disastrous. And note that God caused it to rain on one city and not on another. God did this to show them that the rainfall was not by chance but by His sovereign will. The drought was so serious that people from one city would go to another city where there was water, and they would carry a little water home in a jug or wineskin. This should have turned them to God. “Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.”
Those of us from Texas can appreciate this. It was a three-year drought in West Texas that caused my dad to leave there when I was a small boy. People in Dallas, Texas, can remember the drought that dried up the water supply for that city. They had to draw water from the Red River into which oil had been poured. I want to tell you, I have never tasted any other drinking water that was as bad as that! People who had friends or relatives in the little towns around Dallas would go there to fill up a jug of water to take it home for drinking. This wasn’t new; it was the same thing the people were doing in the days of Amos. It was a warning from God, but they paid no attention to it.
I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord [Amos 4:9].
“Blasting and mildew.” The crops were blasted by the scorching east wind from the desert, and the mildew was from excessive drought, not moisture. “The palmerworm devoured them” refers to a locust plague which devoured what was left. “Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.”
I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord [Amos 4:10].
“The stink of your camps” was the stench of the dead bodies from the pestilence and from the warfare. Yet with all of this, they did not return to the Lord!
I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord [Amos 4:11].
Some Bible expositors feel that this is sort of summation of the previous plagues. I rather doubt that, because we know from the Book of Jonah that at this time the Assyrians were making forays down into the northern kingdom. Assyria would strike here and there and sometimes would take an entire community into captivity. God was permitting the Assyrian, just like a bird, to peck here and there in the kingdom. This should have been a warning to all the people that the whole kingdom might fall some day. They didn’t accept the warning from God but continued on in their evil ways. “Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.”
Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel [Amos 4:12].
God does not tell them here what He is going to do. He simply says, “Thus I will do unto thee” and “because I will do this unto thee.” It is going to be a surprise. We know now that it was the Assyrians who came down upon them suddenly and took them into captivity. In other words, the people of Israel simply did not believe God and did not turn to Him.
God goes even beyond the judgment of the Assyrian captivity. He says, “Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.” When Assyria came down, they didn’t take all the people into captivity. Many of them were slain. This means that they were to meet God in death, which is something that every individual must do. We all must meet God in death. “Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.” This is a message to every individual even today.
God has dealt very definitely with a friend of mine because of the sin that was in his life. He told me the story of how God had dealt with him. The judgment that had come upon him was rather severe, although it was something that a man could bear. As I was sympathizing with him about it, he said to me, “McGee, the judgment that has come upon me is not the thing that disturbs me. I have yet to stand before God, and I tremble.”
I answered him, “You know that Vernon McGee is also going to stand before God. If I stood before Him as I am, I would be frightened to death. But I am not going to stand before Him as Vernon McGee. I am in Christ, and God is going to see Christ. I have been made acceptable in the Beloved.” My friend answered, “Yes, that is the only comfort that I have for the life that I have lived.”
Well, my friend, that message is for you also. Prepare to meet thy God. Suppose at this very moment you went into the presence of God—perhaps both you and I will be going there shortly. Suppose this life is past. The things that were so important to you down here will have no importance any more, I assure you. Life on earth is over, you’re through, you’re out of it, and you are in God’s presence. How are you going to stand before Him? Perhaps you have lived to please people and have tried to keep up with the Joneses. Don’t you know that you cannot stand in your own strength, your own life, your own character? You and I have nothing to offer to God—we are bankrupt, friend. We were dead in trespasses and sins. The only way you and I can stand there is in Christ. He “was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:25), that you and I might stand before Him justified. We stand before God in the righteousness of Christ.
Now our country preacher will tell us who this God is whom we are to meet. This is one of the most majestic, awe-inspiring statements in the Word of God—
For, lo, he that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind, and declareth unto man what is his thought, that maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth upon the high places of the earth, The Lord, The God of hosts, is his name [Amos 4:13].
Amos presents Him as the omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent God. He is the omnipotent Creator. He has all power. It was He who formed the mountains and created the wind. He is omniscient, knowing your thoughts afar off. And He is omnipresent—He “treadeth upon the high places of the earth.” No matter where you go, even to the moon, you won’t get away from Him, friend. Perhaps you have been able to keep up a pretty good front so that your friends and neighbors (and maybe even your mate) think you are a fine person. But in heaven, the psalmist says, “Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance” (Ps. 90:8). God knows you. There is no use trying to keep up a front. You might as well go to Him and turn yourself in. The FBI or the police may not be after you, but God knows your transgressions. As Dr. Louis Sperry Chafer used to say to us in class, secret sin on earth is open scandal in heaven. God not only knows us through and through, but He also knew personally the people to whom Amos was speaking. With intensity of feeling Amos urged them, “Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.”
CHAPTER 5
Theme: Israel will be punished in the future for iniquity
The previous chapter closed with a bang, with a note of finality. It would seem as if God had closed the door, that judgment was inevitable, and that there was no hope for Israel at all. Although chapter 5 reaches into the future and makes it very clear that God will punish them for their iniquity, in the first fifteen verses God pleads with Israel to seek Him so that judgment can be averted. As long as He did not bring that final stroke of judgment, their captivity, there was hope for them.
Hear ye this word which I take up against you, even a lamentation, O house of Israel [Amos 5:1].
He is taking up a dirge. He is singing a funeral song, a very sad one. He speaks of them now with tenderness—
The virgin of Israel is fallen; she shall no more rise: she is forsaken upon her land; there is none to raise her up [Amos 5:2].
When Hosea began his prophecy, he spoke of the experience he had had in his home. He had married a harlot, and God sent him out to speak to the northern kingdom, saying, “You’re a harlot, but God still loves you.” Here Amos says, “You were a virgin, God espoused you to Himself” That is the picture of every believer today. Paul said even to the Corinthians, “I espoused you as a chaste virgin to Christ” (see 2 Cor. 11:2). When we come to Him, our sins are forgiven, and we start new with Him. But how about it, friend? How has it been going the past few years? Have you done what Israel did? Have you played the harlot? Have you turned away from the One who loves you? Have you been led astray into the world and into the things of the flesh? Is the Devil leading you around like a pig with a ring in its snout? A great many Christians are in that condition today. This is a sad funeral dirge: “The virgin of Israel is fallen; she shall no more rise: she is forsaken upon her land; there is none to raise her up.”
For thus saith the Lord God; The city that went out by a thousand shall leave an hundred, and that which went forth by an hundred shall leave ten, to the house of Israel [Amos 5:3].
“The city that went out by a thousand shall leave an hundred.” Amos is saying, “Prepare to meet your God. Look at the number that are going to be slain.” “That which went forth by an hundred shall leave ten, to the house of Israel.” These are the ones who will be left back in the land, but a great company of them will be slain.
Listen to Amos. This is, as it were, a last call to the nation—
For thus saith the Lord unto the house of Israel, Seek ye me, and ye shall live [Amos 5:4].
The invitation is still open. The Word has gone out. God is calling upon them to turn to Him; if they do even now, they will live.
But seek not Beth-el, nor enter into Gilgal, and pass not to Beer-sheba: for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Beth-el shall come to nought [Amos 5:5].
“But seek not Beth-el.” Beth-el is where one of the golden calves was erected. By the way, you cannot find Beth-el today. I have had two different spots pointed out to me by guides, so we cannot be sure just where it is. The general location is pretty well known, but to be able to pinpoint it seems to be a problem.
“Nor enter into Gilgal.” Gilgal is the place where Israel camped when they crossed the Jordan River when they first came into the land under the leadership of Joshua. There they set up the tabernacle, and there was the staging area for their march upon Jericho. It became a very sacred place. In fact, God had told them to tell their children that that was the place where He had delivered them. Instead, these people had gone into idolatry, and these places that had been sacred for God became places to set up an idol.
“And pass not to Beer-sheba.” Beer-sheba was way down in the southern kingdom of Judah in the Negeb. It is another very famous place. It was at Beer-sheba that Abraham and Abimelech made a covenant, and then Abraham called on the name of the Lord (see Gen. 21). The expression, “… from Dan to Beer-sheba …” (e.g., see Jud. 20:1), is used in Scripture to designate the whole land of Israel from north to south. In the days of Amos, the people in the northern kingdom were making pilgrimages to Beer-sheba for the worship of idols.
“For Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Beth-el shall come to nought.” Why doesn’t Amos mention Beer-sheba at this point? Because Beer-sheba is not in the northern kingdom but in the southern. It will be more than another hundred years before Beer-sheba goes into captivity with the southern kingdom. However, these two in the northern kingdom, both Beth-el and Gilgal, are about to go into captivity. How accurate Amos is in his statement here!
But he goes on to say that there is still hope for them—
Seek the Lord, and ye shall live; lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and devour it, and there be none to quench it in Beth-el [Amos 5:6].
“Seek the Lord, and ye shall live”—what a wonderful invitation this is! “Lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph.” God says, “If you do not turn to Me, I will have to judge you.”
Ye who turn judgment to wormwood, and leave off righteousness in the earth [Amos 5:7].
The man who was liberal in his theology used to make a great deal of this section of Scripture. He presented a “works salvation,” finding justification for it in this passage. Unfortunately, he did not consider Amos’ entire message. The condition of the people of Israel was that they were going through the form of worship that God had prescribed. They were offering sacrifices, they were going through a ritual that God had given to them, but their lives did not commend their profession. In other words, their practice did not equal the profession which they made.
Years ago Dr. G. Campbell Morgan said that he was more afraid of the blasphemy of the secular than he was of the blasphemy of the sanctuary. Many people think that if you participate in all the forms and rituals of the church, you are very pious, but if you do something in the sanctuary which is not according to the ritual of the church, it is blasphemous. My friend, I do not feel that the real danger is in that sort of thing. The real danger is in the man who goes to church and sings the doxology, “Praise God from whom all blessings flow,” but outside the church is living a life in which he is not honest and a life in which there is neither justice nor righteousness. That is the blasphemy of the secular or the blasphemy of the street. That is the thing that God is condemning in the lives of the people of Israel.
I am not saying that a living faith in Christ is not essential. It is absolutely essential to trust in Christ for your salvation. But, my friend, if you make a profession of trusting in Christ and your life outside the church does not commend the gospel at all, then, may I say to you, there is not but one word to describe that. It is a harsh word, but the Lord Jesus is the one who used this word more than anyone else. He called the religious rulers of His day, “Ye hypocrites.” That is His word for it—I did not think of it. It is brazen hypocrisy today, either in the pulpit or in the pew, when a profession is given and a protestation is made of our wonderful love for and trust in Christ, and then we go out and live a life which condemns the very gospel we are supposed to be professing. This is the thing that hurts the cause of the gospel today. A great many Christians do not want this mentioned because they are very active in Christian work but not very active in living for the Lord in their business and social lives.
I knew a man who was married and very active in the church; I do not think there was an organization within the church in which he was not active. But he got involved with a lady in the choir. He dropped out for a time, and without making any amends, without any apparent change of life whatsoever, he wanted to come back into active service in the church. As pastor, I absolutely condemned that sort of thing, and I was made out to be the unreasonable party because of it.
Amos condemns this idea of making a profession and then not living up to it—this was basic in his message. You see, God had to bring Amos from way down south in the southern kingdom in order to get a man who would give this kind of message. The paid preachers up there in Beth-el and Samaria were saying only what the people wanted them to say.
A leading Bible expositor made the statement several years ago that the modern pulpit had become a sounding board for the thinking of the congregation. Paul wrote to Timothy, “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables” (2 Tim. 4:3–4). The people’s ears itch to hear something nice and sweet, and then they go up and pat the preacher on the back, telling him how sweet he is. It becomes like the old Egyptian game: “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch your back, and we both will have a good time.” A great deal of that type of thing is going on in our churches today; liberalism has done it for years, and we find it in many conservative churches today.
The people of Israel were insulted that this man Amos would even suggest that they were not very religious or very pious, but that was his message to them.
Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion, and turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night: that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The Lord is his name [Amos 5:8].
Again, this is God’s gracious call. God is long suffering. God is much more patient than I would be. I have found out that I need to learn to be patient with the patience of God. How long suffering and patient He is!
“Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion.” Orion is one of the many constellations in the heavens, and it was the one, of course, familiar to these people in that day.
“And maketh the day dark with night: that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth.” That is, it is God who makes the rain fall. It is true that rainfall is controlled by the law of hydrodynamics, but who made the law of hydrodynamics? Who is the one who pulls the water up out of the ocean, puts it on the train (they call it a cloud), moves those clouds with the wind until they get to just the right place, then turns loose the rain? God is the one doing that, my friend. Amos says, “The Lord is his name.” In effect, he is saying to the people of Israel, “You have turned to idols, and your life does not commend your profession of a faith in the living God, the living God who is the Creator.”
That strengtheneth the spoiled against the strong, so that the spoiled shall come against the fortress.
They hate him that rebuketh in the gate, and they abhor him that speaketh uprightly [Amos 5:9–10].
“They hate him that rebuketh in the gate.” The one who rebuketh in the gate would be a judge. The courthouse of that day was the gate of the walled city. You will find all the way through Scripture that the judges sat in the gate. Boaz brought the nearer kinsman to the gate of Bethlehem to settle the inheritance of Naomi and Ruth. When Lot went down to Sodom, he became involved in politics down there, and we are told that he sat in the gate. What was he doing there? He was a judge. Amos says that the judge who rebuked that which was wrong was the one who was hated; therefore, most of the judges chose to cooperate with the evil doers.
“And they abhor him that speaketh uprightly.” When a judge insisted upon justice and upon that which was right, he became very unpopular. I am not sure that human nature has changed very much since Amos’ day.
Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take from him burdens of wheat: ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink wine of them [Amos 5:11].
“Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take from him burdens of wheat.” The poor are the ones who do not get justice. I know that, for I have been on that side of the line for a long time.
“Ye have built houses of hewn stone, but ye shall not dwell in them; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but ye shall not drink wine of them.” The beautiful palaces that were built at Samaria are in ruins today. They were destroyed shortly after this message was given and have been in ruins now for nearly three thousand years.
For I know your manifold transgressions, and your mighty sins: they afflict the just, they take a bribe, and they turn aside the poor in the gate from their right [Amos 5:12].
The poor could not get justice in the court of that day. Has it changed today?
One of the reasons offered for repealing the death penalty has been that the rich man can always escape the gas chamber or the electric chair. I do not think that that is a legitimate reason, although it is true that the rich man can do that. The poor man, when he is found guilty, does not stand a chance of escaping the penalty. The rich man can keep appealing the case, and it takes him a long time to find his way to jail; in fact, in many cases, he never even gets there.
God takes notice when there is no justice in a nation. God has turned over to human government the responsibility of running this earth. The nations of the earth are God’s arrangement, and He holds them accountable. When they fail, He removes them, as Rome was removed from the scene.
Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time; for it is an evil time [Amos 5:13].
In other words, a man in that day knew he could not get justice, and many good people were keeping quiet. It was the prudent thing to do because, if he had attempted to protest, it wouldn’t have done him a bit of good. The tragedy of the hour in which we live is that we talk about the freedom of the press, the freedom of religion, and the freedom of speech, but there is not much of it left. The news media have definitely become a brainwashing agency. It is true that only he who has money can get a public hearing today. As a result, we do have a silent majority in this country, because they know that their voices would not amount to anything at all. We are in a tragic day, very much like the day to which Israel had come.
Seek good, and not evil, that ye may live: and so the Lord, the God of hosts, shall be with you, as ye have spoken [Amos 5:14].
Again, the Lord calls upon Israel to turn to Him.
Hate the evil, and love the good, and establish judgment in the gate: it may be that the Lord God of hosts will be gracious unto the remnant of Joseph [Amos 5:15].
In our day, a man who is liberal and supported by some rich organization can betray our government and escape any penalty (in fact, he is even made a hero), while some poor fellow who is espousing an honest cause does not stand a chance of gaining a hearing. God says, “Hate the evil, and love the good, and establish judgment in the gate.”
“It may be that the Lord God of hosts will be gracious unto the remnant of Joseph.” In other words, Amos says, “It’s a slim chance, but there is hope for you.”
Now Amos moves into another area, the warning of an approaching judgment, the Day of the Lord.
Therefore the Lord, the God of hosts, the Lord, saith thus; Wailing shall be in all streets; and they shall say in all the highways, Alas! alas! and they shall call the husbandman to mourning, and such as are skilful of lamentation to wailing.
And in all vineyards shall be wailing: for I will pass through thee, saith the Lord [Amos 5:16–17].
Because God knew that they would not repent, He now clearly states the judgment which is to come. Death will touch everyone; all will mourn.
Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord! to what end is it for you? the day of the Lord is darkness, and not light [Amos 5:18].
A great many people were very piously saying that they desired the Day of the Lord. Amos expresses it here as a “Woe”—“Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord!” But for them it is nothing in the world but pious sentiment. That day is not going to be as pleasant for them as they think it is going to be.
Amos uses here the expression, “the day of the Lord.” Joel is the one who introduced this subject in prophecy, and every one of the prophets after him has something to say about it. Many people have thought that the Day of the Lord refers to the Millennium; in fact, at the beginning of my theological training that is what I was taught. Joel was very careful (and Amos will be also) to say that the Day of the Lord is not light but it is darkness. The Day of the Lord begins with judgment and moves on to the coming of Christ to establish His kingdom here upon this earth.
There are a number of commentators who feel that the people of Israel were becoming rather cynical and were ridiculing the Day of the Lord. I do not see that here at all; I do not see how that interpretation could possibly be true. Rather, I see that the people were becoming very pious. They were going through the Mosaic rituals, but they were also worshiping idols. It was just religion to them, just as churchgoing is to many people today. There is nothing vital, nothing real in going through a ritual. The reason many church services are so dead is that they are nothing more than ritual. It may be beautiful, it may appeal to your eyes and your ears, but does it change your life? Is it transforming? Is it something you can live by in the marketplace? There are many people today who are premillennial and pretribulational in their theology and who very piously say, “Oh, if only the Lord would come!” If you are one of them, let me ask you this: Do you really want Him to come? Or are you using the Rapture of the church as a sort of an escape mechanism to get you out of your troubles down here?
In seminary a fellow student and I were studying Hebrew. After dinner in the evening, when we had a difficult Hebrew assignment to prepare for the next day, he would look up to the heavens and say, “Oh, if the Lord would only come tonight!” What was he after? He didn’t want to study Hebrew! But I never shall forget the night before graduation (he was to be married and go on his honeymoon the day after graduation) when he came out of the cafeteria, looked up to the sky, and said, “I sure hope the Lord doesn’t come now for several days!” My friend, many of us look forward to the Rapture, not because we love Christ’s appearing, but because we want to escape an unpleasant situation.
Amos says to these people, “You pious folk are just going through the religious rituals, you don’t really know God—you are worshiping idols also! The Day of the Lord is not something which you are to desire. It is not light, but it is a day of darkness. You will first go through a great period of tribulation when the Day of the Lord comes. What you expect to do is to jump right into the Millennium, but that is not the way it is going to happen.
Those of us who believe that the church will not go through the Tribulation should be aware that we will not escape all judgment. My friend, some of us may think we have gotten into the Tribulation after we get to heaven! Do you know why? Listen to what Paul has to say in 2 Corinthians 5:9–10: “Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” The judgment seat of Christ is the bema; it is not the Great White Throne judgment at all. It is to the bema that all Christians come “that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” Is this a judgment for salvation? No, Paul says, “For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 3:11). There is no other foundation any man can lay, but you can build on that foundation. You can build with wood, hay, and stubble; or you can build with gold, silver, and precious stones. But every man’s work—not his salvation, not his person—will be tested by fire. If any man’s work survives the fire, he will receive a reward. But suppose his work does not survive the fire? Paul says, “He himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire” (see 1 Cor. 3:12–15). This is the reason I often make the statement that, although many people are saved, they are going to smell like they were bought at a fire sale when they get to heaven. Everything they did here on earth they did in the flesh, they did it for some earthly reason, for some present satisfaction.
I want to be very frank with you: as I am now getting toward the sunset of life, I’m wondering how Vernon McGee is going to fare at the judgment seat of Christ. You may say that I will get a great reward because of my Bible-teaching ministry through the years. But you don’t know me like I know myself; if you did, you might not want to listen to me. But wait a minute, don’t put the book down, because if I knew you like you know yourself, I wouldn’t want to talk to you.
My friend, the lives which we live down here are to be tested, and it is pious nonsense to pretend to be so interested in the coming of Christ when the truth is that some of us will get to heaven and think that we didn’t miss the Great Tribulation after all. Notice what Paul went on to say after speaking of our judgment at the bema of Christ: “Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men …” (2 Cor. 5:11). If you think that when you appear in His presence He is going to give you a nice little Sunday school medal because you didn’t miss Sunday school for fifteen years, I think you are wrong. I do not think that that is even going to be an issue. I think that the life you live in your home, your witness in your business and social life, your conduct with the opposite sex are the things which are going to come before the judgment seat of Christ—it will be the things that were done in the body down here.
Do you want to go to heaven now? Do you have everything straightened out? Paul writes, “For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged” (1 Cor. 11:31). This is the reason I try to keep everything confessed to the Lord. I want to run short accounts with Him every day. If I don’t, He is going to straighten it out up there someday. You lost your temper and gave a poor witness today. Or you gossiped about another believer. Do you think that when you come into the presence of Christ He will pat you on the back and say what a nice little fellow you were? He is going to judge those things, my friend. Things must be made right in heaven, and that is the purpose of the judgment seat of Christ.
Amos is really putting it on the line to these people. He says, “Cut out this nonsense that you desire the Day of the Lord. It is not a day of light but of darkness. There will be a Great Tribulation that you will go through.” If you are a believer and therefore do not go through that, there will still be the judgment seat of Christ for you. I do not think that it is going to be as pleasant as some folk think it is going to be.
As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him; or went into the house, and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him [Amos 5:19].
Amos is one of the most dramatic preachers that you will find in Scripture. He uses such figurative language. He uses the idiom of the earth and draws his illustrations from nature. Here he describes a man who is out in the woods, and suddenly there is a lion on the trail in back of him. As he runs away from the lion, he sees a bear coming toward him. In other words, if you say you want the Lord to come so that you can get out of your troubles down here, it may be like jumping out of the frying pan into the fire (to use an adage of our day). Seeing the bear coming toward him, the man takes off over the hill and reaches his home. He puts his hand upon the wall to rest and get his breath, only to have a serpent come out of the wall and bite him. It might have been better if the lion or the bear had gotten him than to have the poison of a serpent in him!
Amos is saying that we had better be very careful about the life we are living for God down here. As believers, our salvation is not in jeopardy—Christ has paid the penalty for our sins, but if our sins as believers are not dealt with and made right, He will make them right. My friend, He must do that—He is holy and righteous and just, and heaven is a place where things are right. Therefore, you and I will have to be right when we get there. This is something that a great many people do not realize today.
Shall not the day of the Lord be darkness, and not light? even very dark, and no brightness in it? [Amos 5:20].
“The day of the Lord” begins with a period of judgment that is yet to come upon the nation of Israel. There is more than a period of judgment that is included in the Day of the Lord, however. The Day of the Lord also includes the second coming of Christ to the earth and the time of the millennial kingdom here upon earth.
I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies.
Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts.
Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols [Amos 5:21–23].
Behind their going through the rituals were lives that were dishonest. God’s people need to recognize that their faith must be real. Faith is not fake or fable; it is reality. Faith must lay hold of a person. Believing is not deceiving. Many people say, “If you believe, it is because you are blind. You have a blind faith.” My friend, if it is a blind faith, forget it, because God does not accept that. Faith must have an effect upon the life; James says, “… faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). Paul said that we have been saved in order that we might produce good works. All of this is important.
The people of Israel were living lives of sin. They were engaged in idolatry; yet they were going through all the Mosaic ritual. God says here, “I despise it. I have no use for it.” In some of our song services which we consider to be so enthusiastic, if the hearts of the people are not in it, if there is nothing but a big mouth in it, do you really think God accepts that? If He came to your church or my church, what do you think His viewpoint would be?
But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.
Have ye offered unto me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel?
But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and Chiun your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves [Amos 5:24–26].
Apparently, the people of Israel offered sacrifices in the wilderness, but when they met a heathen people, they wanted to take on the worship of their gods also. The worship of Moloch was that in which small children were put into the arms of a red-hot idol and made human sacrifices. The screams of those children were terrible. God is saying to us, “You come to church on Sunday and go through the motions of worshiping Me, but during the week you worship Moloch, you worship the idol of covetousness as you go after the almighty dollar.”
Cardinal Wolsey was banished from Hampton Court by Henry VIII who would also have had him executed if Wolsey had not died a natural death before the execution could take place. On his deathbed, the cardinal said, “If I had only served my God like I served my king!” Many a Christian will have to say on his deathbed, “I have served the god of Moloch down here; I have served the idol of covetousness. I’ve worshiped the things of the flesh and have not served my God.” My friend, it does not matter how sweet the music will be, nor what nice words the preacher will say at the funeral, you and I are going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ. I will be frank with you, that disturbs me somewhat. Therefore, I want to keep things straightened out with Him down here.
Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, saith the Lord, whose name is The God of hosts [Amos 5:27].
Israel is to be punished in the future. They will go into captivity “beyond Damascus” (that is, beyond Syria), and beyond Damascus was Nineveh. God is telling Israel that the Assyrian would take them into captivity.
CHAPTER 6
Theme: Israel admonished in the present to depart from iniquity
Amos begins this chapter with a “Woe.” He is not a prophet who majors in woes, but you will find them in several other of the prophets and in the Book of Revelation. “Woe” also means “Whoa!”—it means to stop, look, and listen, because this is something that is important. The word woe is one that ought to draw our special attention to that which follows.
Woe to them that are at ease in Zion, and trust in the mountain of Samaria, which are named chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel came! [Amos 6:1].
Zion was, of course, in the southern kingdom of Judah; so both parts of the nation, Judah and Israel, are addressed here. Zion was the center of religion—God’s temple was there, and Samaria was the metropolis of a powerful kingdom.
“Woe to them that are at ease in Zion.” The common expression at departure a few years ago was, “Well, take it easy!” Today we often say, “Have a good day!” which I take to mean practically the same thing. That is what Israel was doing: they were taking it easy. “Woe to them that are at ease in Zion.” They were sitting in the lap of luxury in a day of affluence. We have been doing that as a nation since the Depression and World War II—we have been sitting in the lap of luxury in a day of affluence.
“And trust in the mountain of Samaria.” It was as if Samaria was the place where they stored their atom bombs. It was the capital of the northern kingdom, Ahab and Jezebel had lived there, and lovely palaces of ivory were built there. The mountains of Samaria provided such excellent natural fortifications that the city was able to stand the Assyrian siege for three years before it fell. Samaria was such an important city that, after the Assyrians had destroyed it, Herod later rebuilt it. Herod was quite a builder, and he built all over Palestine. He built Caesarea right from the ground up, but Samaria he rebuilt because it was such a marvelous location. With all this luxury and excellent fortifications, Israel felt secure and well protected.
“Which are named chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel came!” “Chief of the nations” probably refers to Israel’s princes who were men of rank and authority. To these godless and careless heads of the nation the people of Israel came for justice and for help. But the princes were interested only in their own ease and self-indulgence. The term chief of the nations may also refer to Israel herself, as she was recognized among the nations in that day. In other words, she belonged to the United Nations and had a great deal of influence.
Pass ye unto Calneh, and see; and from thence go ye to Hamath the great: then go down to Gath of the Philistines: be they better than these kingdoms? or their border greater than your border? [Amos 6:2].
“Pass ye unto Calneh, and see.” Calneh is one of the cities that was in the intersection of the Tigris River and the upper Zab River. Nineveh was there, Calneh was there, and that area constituted a great center.
“And from thence go ye to Hamath the great.” Hamath is the chief city in Syria. We are going south now.
“Then go down to Gath of the Philistines.” Gath is way south in Philistia and was the leading city of the Philistines.
“Be they better than these kingdoms? or their border greater than your border?” In other words, “Go look at these other nations. Why do you think that you are superior to these nations? You’re not superior. You are engaged in the same sins that they are, and your responsibility is greater. They have no revelation from God, but you do have a revelation from God.”
Now Amos will mention the three national sins of Israel. These are the three sins which brought the northern kingdom down. They also brought the southern kingdom down; they brought Babylon down; they brought Egypt down; they brought Greece down; and they brought Rome down. They have brought down many great nations. They are the reason that France and Great Britain have become second-rate nations today. At one time we said, “The sun never sets on the British Empire,” but today it looks as if the British Empire itself is setting. These three sins are national sins, and they are sins for which God will judge the nations.
Ye that put far away the evil day, and cause the seat of violence to come near [Amos 6:3].
Israel was saying, “Yes, a day of judgment is coming, but it is not near. We do not need to worry about it.” That was the thing that Hezekiah said to Isaiah when Isaiah told him that judgment was coming on the southern kingdom and that they were to be carried into captivity. Hezekiah said, “Will it be in my day?” Isaiah said, “No, it won’t be in your day.” And even Hezekiah, who was a great king, said, “Well, then, that’s all right.”
Our present generation is passing on to our grandchildren a nation that is in debt and in great trouble. I used to worry about my daughter and the day in which she would live. Now I worry about my two little grandsons and the world that they are moving into and in which they will live. The evil day is coming.
What are the three sins which destroy a nation? The first sin is given in verse 4—
That lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall [Amos 6:4].
Illicit sex and gluttony are the two sins that are mentioned here, and they are sins of the flesh.
“That lie upon beds of ivory.” Ahab and Jezebel had built an ivory palace in Samaria. It has been thoroughly excavated now, and the workmen have found there many very fine, delicate vessels that were in the rubble and ruin of that great palace. That palace represented the life of the upper class of that day. “They lie upon beds of ivory”—they all had king-sized beds. They were taking it easy.
“And stretch themselves upon their couches” suggests their preoccupation with sex. That was the thing that they were engaged in, and it is that which characterizes our own day. Someone tried to answer the current women’s liberation movement by saying that the woman’s place is in the kitchen and in the bedroom. May I say to you, that is an awful thing to say. I totally disagree with that comment, but it does show the color and complexion of our nation today. Much has been reported in the press regarding the social life in our nation’s capital. We are told that when they get together, they are heavily involved in drinking and that the main topic of conversation is who is dating whose wife. Such activity is not limited to those of any particular political party. Thank God there are individuals who are exceptions to this type of thing, but I am afraid that more attention is paid to sex in Washington, D.C., than to any of the problems which face this nation. When our lawmakers appear on television, they become very serious, but their social life—this is not true of all of them, of course—seems to be very corrupt.
No nation has been able to survive such involvement in sin. Rome was probably the greatest of all nations; then why did it fall apart? No outside enemy destroyed Rome. It was like “Humpty-Dumpty”—
Humpty-Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty-Dumpty had a great fall;
All the King’s horses, and all the King’s men
Could not put Humpty-Dumpty together again.
Why did Rome fall? Gibbon, in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, mentions that the destruction of the family was one of the important reasons Rome fell. When immorality came in, then the nation began to go down.
The second national sin is given in verse 5—
That chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of music, like David [Amos 6:5].
They came up with a lot of new tunes in that day. You may think that jazz, rock and roll, and hard rock music are something new, but Israel had it back in that day. The character of music can destroy a nation, and as far as I’m concerned, we have arrived at that point in our nation. I know that I sound like a square and a real backward fellow, and that I am. Someone will say, “You just don’t know anything about music.” While it is true that I do not know much about music, I do know what I like and what I don’t like; a lot of it I don’t like today, and I simply do not listen to it.
“They chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of music, like David.” But the music was no longer used as it was in David’s day. David was a genius whose music was to praise and glorify God. Israel also had geniuses in Amos’ day, but they were not writing music to the praise and glory of God. Instead, it was that which took people away from God and from the worship of God.
Now we come to the third national sin—
That drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments: but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph [Amos 6:6].
“That drink wine in bowls”—not just in little glasses but in bowls; they were really alcoholics.
“And anoint themselves with the chief ointments: but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph.” In that day there was a great deal of attention given to the matter of getting the right kind of ointment for the underarms. I don’t mind mentioning this because it is mentioned on television all the time. It was pretty important in Israel that you use the right kind of deodorant, but it was drunkenness that was destroying the nation.
Drunkenness is the thing that is destroying our nation today along with these other sins—and we are not getting by with it, my friend. There is an alarming number of alcoholics in this country and many, many more people whose lives are directly affected by the alcoholic. A majority of the fatal automobile accidents are caused by alcohol. More people are being killed in automobile accidents in this country than were ever killed in Vietnam, but no one is protesting about that.
I was amazed a few years ago when one of the distilleries ran an advertisement about young people drinking, saying they were concerned about the problem. In their ad, they said: “Teenagers, especially in a group, are often tempted to do things they might not do on their own, like taking a drink when they know they shouldn’t. We are sure you are concerned about this problem.” Imagine the liquor makers telling you and me that they think we are concerned because they are concerned! Well, why don’t they quit making the stuff? Their ad continued: “You don’t have to worry much about it, if you’ve shown your youngster over the years that your ideas about drinking are healthy and mature.” What are “healthy and mature” ideas about drinking? Drinking is drinking, isn’t it? They certainly were not running an advertisement for prohibition!
I would like to share with you this poem, “It’s Nobody’s Business”—
It’s nobody’s business what I drink.
I care not what my neighbors think,
Or how many laws they choose to pass.
I’ll tell the world I’ll have my glass.
Here’s one man’s freedom cannot be curbed.
My right to drink is undisturbed.
So he drank in spite of law or man,
Then got into his old tin can,
Stepped on the gas and let it go,
Down the highway to and fro.
He took the curves at fifty miles,
With bleary eyes and a drunken smile.
Not long ’til a car he tried to pass,
Then a crash, a scream, and breaking glass.
The other car was upside down,
About two miles from the nearest town.
The man was clear, but his wife was caught,
And he needed the help of that drunken sot,
Who sat in a maudlin, drunken daze
And heard the scream and saw the blaze,
But too far gone to save a life.
By helping the car from off the wife.
The car was burned and a mother died,
While a husband wept and a baby cried.
And a drunk sat by, and still some think
It’s nobody’s business what they drink.
—Unknown
The sins of the flesh (illicit sex and gluttony), heathen music, and drunkenness are the three great sins which have brought great nations down. I simply cannot believe that our nation will be the exception to the rule. It is enough to break any person’s heart to see what is happening in this great nation of ours. Yet we try to explain it away by saying that now we are civilized, now we have a new morality, now we have grown up and gotten rid of the old Puritan notions. By the way, the Puritans and the Pilgrims founded a great nation. Are we, the sophisticated and suave folk, going to keep that great nation, or are we losing it?
This message from Amos was fulfilled in his day. The northern kingdom was destroyed and went into captivity. These are the sins that brought it down. In verse 4 it was gluttony and illicit sex; in verse 5 it was heathen music; and in verse 6 it was drunkenness. It is the same old story: wine, women, and song. That is what a great many people think life is all about. Actually, that is not what life is all about but what death is all about. It is the philosophy which says, “Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” Or the philosophy which says, “Pick the daisies while you can”—the day is coming when you won’t be able to pick them. In other words, satisfy self. But if a man (or a nation) goes down that line, he will find out that it does not lead to a pot of gold; it is a dead-end street with the emphasis upon dead. It has led to the death of individuals and of nations.
All of this reveals something quite interesting about the human heart. You can put the whole world into the heart and it still will not be satisfied. That is remarkable, is it not? Only God can fill the vacuum of the human heart. The iniquity of Israel is going to lead to the destruction of the nation—
Therefore now shall they go captive with the first that go captive, and the banquet of them that stretched themselves shall be removed [Amos 6:7].
“Therefore.” One preacher has said that when you come to therefore in the Bible, you’d better investigate what it’s there for. Here it leads to this great statement that, because of these three great sins, the northern kingdom will go into captivity first. That is the direction in which they were moving, and they were moving rapidly. They were much closer to it than they could really believe.
The Lord God hath sworn by himself, saith the Lord the God of hosts, I abhor the excellency of Jacob, and hate his palaces: therefore will I deliver up the city with all that is therein [Amos 6:8].
Their palaces were places of corruption and storehouses of plunder from the poor. God hated all this. If you want to know God’s attitude toward the present-day philosophy of the new morality, of illicit sex, gluttony, degrading music, and drunkenness, He makes it very clear here. God says He hates them. As a result of these sins, Israel had become a godless nation. These are the things which will take you away from God or prevent your coming to Him in the first place.
And it shall come to pass, if there remain ten men in one house, that they shall die [Amos 6:9].
Some expositors believe that this refers to the coming of a devastating plague, such as often follows warfare.
And a man’s uncle shall take him up, and he that burneth him, to bring out the bones out of the house, and shall say unto him that is by the sides of the house, Is there yet any with thee? and he shall say, No. Then shall he say, Hold thy tongue: for we may not make mention of the name of the Lord [Amos 6:10].
This is a strange statement. I shall give you Dr. Charles L. Feinberg’s explanation (from his book Joel, Amos and Obadiah pp. 89–90), which is probably accurate:
How widespread the plague will be is noted for us in verse 10. When one’s next of kin, to whom the duty of burial belonged, would come to carry the corpse out of the house to burn it, he would find but one remaining out of the ten who lived there formerly. And that last surviving one hidden away in the innermost recesses of the houses fearfully awaiting the hour when the plague would carry him away also. In ancient Israel in accordance with the words of Genesis 3:19 burial was the accepted method of disposal of the dead. In this the New Testament doctrine of the body concurs. Hence cremation was considered wrong and not countenanced (see Amos 2:1). But when God’s judgment falls upon His people, there will be so many dead that they will not bury but burn them. The cases here and 1 Samuel 31:12 are exceptional cases. Here cremation is resorted to in order to prevent contagion; in 1 Samuel it was done to obviate further dishonor of the bodies of Saul and his sons by the Philistines. When asked if there are others alive, the remaining occupant of the house will say there is none. Immediately he will be told to hold his peace for fear he would mention the name of the Lord in announcing the death of the others in the household, or in praising God for his own deliverance. Punishment will so work fear and despair in them all that they will refrain from even the mention of the name of the Lord (which should be their sole refuge in such an hour) lest further wrath come upon them.
For, behold, the Lord commandeth, and he will smite the great house with breaches, and the little house with clefts [Amos 6:11].
High and low, great and small were going into Assyrian captivity.
Shall horses run upon the rock? will one plow there with oxen? for ye have turned judgment into gall, and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock [Amos 6:12].
“Shall horses run upon the rock?” If you have ever ridden horseback in mountain country where there is a great deal of rock, you know that a horse can slip and fall there. As a young fellow I belonged to the cavalry division of the National Guard. We were out on patrol duty, and I was riding a big, tall red horse. The section I patrolled was a very rocky one up in middle Tennessee. My horse slipped and fell on one of my feet. As a result, I got out of patrol duty and was sent home because they did not want me hanging around. That got me out of a lot of hard work, and very frankly, I have always appreciated that old red horse. “Shall horses run upon the rock?” Well, they’d better not because they will slip and fall.
“Will one plow there with oxen?” You cannot run a plow over a rock.
“For ye have turned judgment into gall, and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock.” Israel had done that which was contrary to reason, that which was contrary to righteousness. Amos is saying to them, “You’ve acted foolishly”—as foolish as I was in riding that old red horse over rocky terrain.
Ye which rejoice in a thing of nought, which say, Have we not taken to us horns by our own strength? [Amos 6:13].
“Have we not taken to us horns by our own strength?” Since in the Scriptures “horns” are symbolic of power, this is probably a reference to the military strength of Jeroboam II in which Israel was trusting.
But, behold, I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel, saith the Lord the God of hosts; and they shall afflict you from the entering in of Hemath unto the river of the wilderness [Amos 6:14].
“They shall afflict you from the entering in of Hemath;” that is, from all the way up in Syria, for Hemath was the chief city of Syria.
“Unto the river of the wilderness” should be translated “unto the river of Arabah.” Arabah is the river on the other side of the Jordan River which flowed into the Dead Sea.
God is saying, “Through the whole extent of your land this enemy will come down from the north.” That enemy was not Ben-hadad of Syria, but it was the king of Assyria who would take these people into captivity.
CHAPTER 7
Theme: Visions of future
Chapter 7 opens the third and last major division of the Book of Amos. These final three chapters contain visions of the future. Although this fellow Amos might be called a clodhopper and a country preacher, he could soar to the heights. Some of the visions the Lord gave to him are quite remarkable.
VISION OF GRASSHOPPERS
Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me; and, behold, he formed grasshoppers in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and, lo, it was the latter growth after the king’s mowings [Amos 7:1].
“Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me; and, behold, he formed grasshoppers in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth.” These are called grasshoppers in our translation, but they were, of course, locusts.
“And, lo, it was the latter growth after the king’s mowings.” There were two crops that could be harvested from the land in that day, and the first crop went to the king as taxes. Actually, the people paid more than one-tenth as a tithe. It is estimated that they paid out about three-tenths of what they took from the land, and here we can see an example of that. However, this time, after the king had gotten his due, a plague of grasshoppers or locusts came in and took their share so that there was nothing left for the people who had really done the work. This was a judgment that should have shaken the people and should have awakened them.
And it came to pass, that when they had made an end of eating the grass of the land, then I said, O Lord God, forgive, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small [Amos 7:2].
Amos says to the Lord, “We have been cut down to size. This has so weakened us that we’ll not be able to stand.” He calls out to God to forgive and help them. And notice, the Lord is still patient with Israel—
The Lord repented for this: It shall not be, saith the Lord [Amos 7:3].
The Lord said, “I will not do it—I will not weaken you in this way.” He got rid of the grasshoppers, and He gave them a good crop. You would think that because of His tender mercy the people would return to God, but they did not.
VISION OF FIRE
Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me: and, behold, the Lord God called to contend by fire, and it devoured the great deep, and did eat up a part [Amos 7:4].
Many commentators believe the fire here was actually a drought. I am perfectly willing to say that a drought has to go along with the fire. When we have dry weather here in Southern California, we often have fires in the mountains. We have a great many fires here due, in my judgment, to the carelessness of the public. Many of them have been started by cigarettes. Nevertheless, the high fire danger is usually brought on by a drought. But the thing which did the destroying, I believe, was a literal fire, and I think Amos makes that very clear.
Then said I, O Lord God, cease, I beseech thee: by whom shall Jacob arise? for he is small.
The Lord repented for this: This also shall not be, saith the Lord God [Amos 7:5–6].
Apparently, God sent rain, and the fires were put out. Again, God heard them. When it says that God “repented,” it is because of the prayers of the people. God was tenderhearted and would not go through with it. The awful thing, my friend, in rejecting Christ and thus being lost eternally, is the fact that you have to do it against a God who is tenderhearted and who is gracious and loving. God loves you, and to sin against that love is an awful, dreadful, and terrible thing.
VISION OF PLUMBLINE
Thus he shewed me: and, behold, the Lord stood upon a wall made by a plumbline, with a plumbline in his hand.
And the Lord said unto me, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A plumbline. Then said the Lord, Behold, I will set a plumbline in the midst of my people Israel: I will not again pass by them any more [Amos 7:7–8].
We find the plumbline used many places in the Word of God. In Jeremiah 31:38–39 we read, “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the city shall be built to the Lord from the tower of Hananeel unto the gate of the corner. And the measuring line shall yet go forth over against it upon the hill Gareb, and shall compass about to Goath.” The “measuring line” is the plumbline, if you please. Every time that you have a vision of the plumbline in Scripture (see Isa. 28:I7; Zech. 2:1–2), it means that God is getting ready to judge. In the Book of Daniel, the prophet of God said to King Belshazzar, “… Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting” (Dan. 5:27). When God begins to measure either in length or in weight, you can be sure that the people have not measured up to God’s requirements, and judgment is the thing which He has in mind. Amos does not intercede for the people again, realizing that God’s judgment is just.
And the high places of Isaac shall be desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword [Amos 7:9].
In other words, God says that Jeroboam will not have peace. God’s principle is, “There is no peace, saith the Lord, unto the wicked” (Isa. 48:22). And Jeroboam will not have peace.
PERSONAL EXPERIENCE OF THE PROPHET
We have wedged in here, between these visions, a little historic interlude, a very personal experience of the prophet Amos. I have considered this section at length in the Introduction, and it also fits very well into the story here.
Then Amaziah the priest of Beth-el sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel: the land is not able to bear all his words.
For thus Amos saith, Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel shall surely be led away captive out of their own land [Amos 7:10–11].
If you go back and read verse 9 carefully, you will find that Amaziah is lying here. This is one of the tragic things that goes on in the church today. When I teach I try to speak as simply and as plainly as I possibly can, and yet I discover that people will misquote me. They represent me as having said something that I have not said at all. Sometimes this is done through simply not understanding or failing to comprehend what was said; other times it is done deliberately.
Amaziah was the priest of the golden calf, and you can imagine the type of individual he was. He was a hired preacher—he said what the king wanted him to say. And I suppose that he was very cultured and used very flowery language. I’m sure he was a good backslapper; he wasn’t a pulpit-pounder but a backslapper. And he could, of course, entertain. He had charisma, and he was very attractive in many ways.
Amaziah went in and deliberately lied to the king about Amos. Amos had not said that Jeroboam would perish with the sword, and Jeroboam did not. Amos had said, “And I [God] will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword,” which meant that warfare would come, and it did come. Israel was finally taken into captivity to Assyria.
Also Amaziah said unto Amos, O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there:
But prophesy not again any more at Beth-el: for it is the king’s chapel, and it is the king’s court [Amos 7:12–13].
Amaziah came to Amos, insulted him, and, in effect, called him an ignoramus. I’d like to know where the books are that Amaziah wrote. We have had one book preserved now for over twenty-five hundred years that was written by Amos but none that were written by Amaziah. Amaziah called Amos a country rube and insinuated that he was not fit to speak in the king’s chapel. He said, “We want soft words spoken here. We don’t want anyone to be offended.”
“O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah.” In other words, “Get out of town and get lost. We don’t want you here anymore. You’ve been speaking in the king’s chapel and, after all, you are just not up to it. You’re not the caliber of preacher that should be in the pulpit there.” Now although Amos was a country man without seminary training, he was no slouch by any means. I hope we agree that he was thoroughly capable of filling the pulpit; in fact, he was a great preacher of God. The people knew when they listened to him that they were getting the Word of God. It is always a comfort to people to have a pastor who is giving the Word of God—that is something very important in these days.
Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycomore fruit:
And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel [Amos 7:14–15].
Amos answered in such a proper manner that it was evident that he was a moderate man. He wasn’t giving out the wild utterances of a prophecy monger. He was no fanatic at all. He said, “Why, I know I’m no prophet. I never claimed to be a prophet. I never went to your seminaries. I’m not even a prophet’s son. I was just a herdsman, a gatherer of sycamore fruits, and the Lord took me, and the Lord told me to prophesy. I’m here because the Lord put me here.” When a man has that kind of confidence, he’s really got confidence, my friend.
A man should be very sure that he has a call from God if he is going to be in the ministry. If there is any doubt in his mind, he ought not to do it. Some say that if you can do anything else, then don’t go into the ministry. I don’t quite agree with that, because a great many of us could have done something else and might have preferred doing it, by the way. The important thing is: Did God call you? If God has called you, my friend, you ought not to let anything stand in the way.
Now Amos has a personal prophecy for Amaziah, and this is strong medicine for him. Many folk say to me, “Dr. McGee, you are very harsh at times with certain people or certain groups or certain churches.” In answer to that, I can truly say that I carry no bias or hatred in my heart against any of those that I mention. What I am trying to do is to say what the Word of God says. The argument given to me is that, as a Christian, I ought to be sweet and nice and I ought not to speak harshly. Love is to be the theme today: Love, love, love! My friend, listen to Amos as he talks to “brother Amaziah”—
Now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord: Thou sayest, Prophesy not against Israel, and drop not thy word against the house of Isaac.
Therefore thus saith the Lord; Thy wife shall be an harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, and thy land shall be divided by line; and thou shalt die in a polluted land: and Israel shall surely go into captivity forth of his land [Amos 7:16–17].
“Therefore thus saith the Lord”—Amos says that he has a word from God to this man Amaziah. This is a very disturbing prophecy, and it’s a very strong prophecy, but the thing is that it was a true prophecy. When Assyria came down, they did make the women harlots. The sons and daughters were destroyed, and those who were not destroyed were taken into captivity. And this old priest of the golden calf, Amaziah, was taken into Assyrian captivity. I am sure that Amaziah’s word on his deathbed would have been like that of old Cardinal Wolsey (whom I mentioned earlier) who wished that he had served his God as he had served his king. Cardinal Wolsey had tried to play politics with Henry VIII and did not really tell him what the Word of God had to say.
If we as ministers fail to give out the Word of God, there is no reason for us to point our fingers at the politicians in Washington and accuse them of failing our country and jeopardizing our nation. My friend in the ministry, if you are not giving out the Word of God, there is no other traitor in this land today as guilty as you are. If you are called to be a minister, you are called to be a minister of the Word of God. If you are not giving that Word out, you are a traitor to the cause of Christ today. Those are strong words, I know, just as Amos’ words were strong.
CHAPTER 8
Theme: Vision of basket of summer fruit
This is the fourth vision, and it takes in the entire eighth chapter of this book. It is important to get the meaning of this vision, because that will help us in the interpretation of passages that come later on. Especially it will clarify some of the things that our Lord Jesus said.
Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me: and behold a basket of summer fruit [Amos 8:1].
A great deal can be said about a basket of summer fruit. I love fruit. To me all fruits are delicious. I enjoy the citrus fruits of California or Florida, the fruits of northern California and Oregon and Washington. Wherever I am, I enjoy the fruit produced in that locality. There is nothing more attractive than a basket of summer fruit, and that basket of summer fruit has a message.
First of all, a basket of summer fruit represents a harvest. It tells us that the tree is no longer producing. My apricot tree had some lovely apricots on it this past summer, but there is no need for me to go out now to see if there is fruit on the tree. The limbs are bare; there is no fruit. The harvest is past. There will be no fruit until next year. So we see that, although a basket of summer fruit is delightful and delicious, it also speaks of the end of the harvest.
A basket of summer fruit also tells us of rapid spoilage and quick deterioration. Back in the time of World War II, a missionary from South America wrote to us from the East that she was coming to the West Coast. Since she was a personal friend and would be staying with us during her time in California, she told us the day of her arrival. You may remember that in those days trains were crowded and the military had priority over all else. When our friend reached Chicago, she learned that her reservation had been cancelled. She had to wait a week before she could come out to California. We had prepared the guest room for her for the day we had expected her to arrive. I had gone out and picked some lovely apricots off my tree and had put a basket of apricots in her room. When we got the telegram from her telling us of her delay, we just closed the door to her room. We forgot all about the basket of apricots. Then when the time came for her to arrive, we opened the door to her room, and I want to tell you the odor was not very pleasant! In fact, it took us weeks to get the odor out of that room. There is a message in a basket of summer fruit. God gives us a dramatic and a figurative illustration.
And he said, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A basket of summer fruit. Then said the Lord unto me, The end is come upon my people of Israel; I will not again pass by them any more [Amos 8:2].
We have seen in chapter 7 in the previous visitations of God’s judgments that Amos prayed for the survival of Israel and that God changed His mind and withheld His hand. But now the basket of summer fruit indicates that the harvest is past. The jig is up. The northern kingdom of Israel has come to the end of the line. Judgment will come, and harvest is symbolic of that.
Since harvest speaks of a time of judgment and falls at the end of an age, I think that some things our Lord said are misunderstood if one does not understand what is meant by the harvest. Jesus said to His disciples, “… The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few; Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest” (Matt. 9:37–38). Our Lord was speaking at the end of an age when the dispensation of the law was coming to an end. Christ was going to go to the cross. He said that He needed harvesters to go out into Israel.
After His death on the cross, it is a different picture. For this age of grace He gives His parable of the sower. A sower went forth to sow seed. “… Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel …” (Mark 16:15), is the message for our age. Go out into the world and sow the seed. This is the time for sowing the Word of God. My business and your business is just sowing the seed. It is the Lord’s business to do the converting. We believe that the Spirit of God will take the Word of God and make a son of God. We are just seed-sowers. We are not harvesters. Harvest speaks of judgment, and it speaks of the end of an age. Our business today is to be out sowing the seed. I wish so much that I could get this message across to people. I wish I could motivate all believers to do what God has called us to do. Our business is to sow the seed of the Word of God.
And the songs of the temple shall be howlings in that day, saith the Lord God: there shall be many dead bodies in every place; they shall cast them forth with silence [Amos 8:3].
The place for praising God will be changed into a place of wailing. The place of rejoicing before God will be changed into a place of weeping. The slain bodies will be everywhere. This is a terrifying prophecy.
Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail [Amos 8:4].
Again God is speaking of the exploitation of the poor. Although I have commented on this before, I feel it is important for us to realize how God feels about the poor of this world. I have experienced being poor. My dad was a workman. I remember him wearing his overalls and drawing his paycheck on Saturday. After he would pay the grocery bill and the doctor bill and the rent, he always gave my sister and me a nickel each, but I remember one Saturday night when he had only one nickel left. He told me to go to the store and buy a sack of candy. I got gumdrops, because I could get a big sack of them for a nickel in those days, and my sister and I divided the gumdrops.
My dad died when I was fourteen, and it was up to me to support my mother and sister. At fourteen I had to secure a special permit to get a job. Then, after I was converted and felt called to the ministry, some folk took an interest in me and helped me get through school. Believe me, I am for the poverty program—but not the one we have had in our society that puts money in the pockets of those who already have it. I want to see a poverty program that will really help the poor get on their feet and enable them to work.
In the days of Amos, God accuses them of even making “the poor of the land to fail.” That is, the poor were brought down to such a low poverty level that they never could escape from it. The poor always suffer more acutely in a godless nation—I don’t think that statement can be successfully contradicted.
Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit? [Amos 8:5].
If you had been among the people in that day—especially down in Jerusalem at the temple—you would have wondered what the Lord was talking about. You would have seen them going through the rituals which God had prescribed. But, you see, God knew what was in their hearts. “The new moon” and “the sabbath” were holy days on which business was not transacted. God is saying that even when the rich went to the temple to praise God, they were so greedy and covetous that they were thinking about business the next day and how they could make more money by cheating their customers. They not only practiced their sin during the week, but they carried it into the temple. What a picture this gives us of Israel in that day—and of modern man as well.
That we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat? [Amos 8:6].
“That we may buy the poor for silver.” The poor even had to sell themselves into slavery. That was permitted in that land under the Mosaic system. They would buy the needy for a pair of shoes—that’s how cheap they were! And they would sell the poor the refuse of the wheat. That means they got the “seconds,” the leftovers which an honest dealer throws away.
I have never felt right about giving old clothes to help the poor in the church. I have never felt they should be given the leftovers of anything. When I was just starting my ministry, a dairyman in Georgia told me he generally had a quart of skim milk left over and he would leave it for me since I preached in a little church there. I didn’t accept the milk even though I could have used it. I felt it would not be fair to the man to give him the feeling he was doing a great service to the Lord by giving his leftovers. Remember how David said, “… neither will I offer burnt offerings unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing …” (2 Sam. 24:24).
It is no accident that the Lord Jesus, when He was here on earth, sat and watched how the people gave in the temple. Was that His business? Yes. And He is interested in how much we give to Him and how much we keep for ourselves.
I guess you can tell that I can identify with Amos. Maybe the reason I love this man Amos so much is that he talks my language. He was a poor man himself, and he says the thing that I understand.
You see, Amos is explaining why Israel was like a basket of summer fruit. The goodness of Israel was just as perishable and just as soon deteriorated as summer fruit. One evidence of this was the way they treated the poor.
The Lord hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob, Surely I will never forget any of their works [Amos 8:7].
“The Lord hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob.” The excellency of Jacob is the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord has sworn by the Messiah who is coming. No oath could be taken that is higher than that.
Now notice what it is that He has sworn: “Surely I will never forget any of their works.” As we have seen previously in this book, God does not forget the works of any of us—believer or unbeliever. Those of us who are believers will one day “… appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Cor. 5:10). In the days of Amos, they had heaped up sins unto the day of God’s wrath, and He remembered every one of them.
Shall not the land tremble for this, and every one mourn that dwelleth therein? and it shall rise up wholly as a flood; and it shall be cast out and drowned, as by the flood of Egypt [Amos 8:8].
Some commentators think this refers to an earthquake. That is possible, and I certainly wouldn’t want to rule that out. However, I think it is the fact that God is coming down hard upon them in judgment that makes the land tremble. Even today one cannot go through places like Samaria and the rugged hill country around Gilgal and Beth-el without being impressed by the frightful state of the land. It once was a very fruitful area with a great deal of vegetation, including a great many trees, but today the land has been pretty much denuded. It shows the evidence of judgment upon it. God came down heavily upon the land. We will see in the next chapter that the promise for the future includes a promise for the land.
When we study prophecy, we need to remember that, whether God promised judgment or blessing, the land was involved as well as the people. That is one reason why I cannot accept the idea that the prophecies of the Scripture are being fulfilled in the present return of Jews to that land. Although they have returned physically to the land, they have not returned spiritually to the Lord. It is obvious today that God’s blessing is not upon that land. It hasn’t changed. It is true that a great deal of hard work has gone into it, areas have been recovered from swamps, and irrigation has reached the desert in many places (which has made it blossom like a rose), but those places are few and far between even in that small land. Therefore, it cannot be said that these great prophecies are being fulfilled. Israel’s last return to the land has not yet taken place. Let’s remember that there are more Jews in New York City than there are in the entire nation of Israel—that ought to tell us something.
And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord God, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day [Amos 8:9].
Now here is Amos speaking of “that day,” which we have already seen is a technical expression that refers to the Day of the Lord. And generally it refers to the Great Tribulation because that comes first—the day begins at night as far as Israel was concerned.
Amos gives a mingling of prophecy of the near future and the far distant future. The Day of the Lord has not yet arrived. The sun has not gone down at noon, nor has the earth been darkened in the clear day. When Amos wrote this, this was still in the far distant future.
Now he turns to the more immediate future for Israel—
And I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; and I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins, and baldness upon every head; and I will make it as the mourning of an only son, and the end thereof as a bitter day [Amos 8:10].
“And I will turn your feasts into mourning.” God gave to the nation Israel seven feasts. The males of Israel were required to come before Him for three of those great feasts. They were to come with rejoicing. It was to be a time of praise and thanksgiving and glorifying God. Now God says that, since they have been celebrating the feasts but not giving praise to Him, He will turn their feasts into mourning. They will become the very opposite of what He intended them to be. “And all your songs into lamentation.” When God’s judgment falls upon them, there will be no more singing—no more joy—only lamentation.
Although I am certainly no music critic, I have been interested to observe the trend of modern music. When I was a young fellow, the popular music was the blues. That was followed by jazz and then rock and roll. Today it is hard rock. Do you detect any joy in that music? Oh, the songs have a beat to them so that you hop up and down like a yo-yo, but it is almost a mindless kind of motion which requires no thinking. That kind of music stimulates the flesh but certainly gives no real joy. This is the type of music that the world produces. It is mournful and it is tragic. When I had the privilege of being in Vienna, I attended an opera there. It was the first opera I had ever heard, and I have to confess that I enjoyed it. However, it was a tragedy. The boy didn’t get the girl. It was a tragic story, and the songs were lamentations and wailings. Now that is the type of music which the world produces. I am struck with the fact that God has said, “I will turn … all your songs into lamentation.”
“And I will make it as the mourning of an only son, and the end thereof as a bitter day.” Sackcloth on all loins and baldness on every head are indications of deepest mourning. This was literally fulfilled in the judgment that was to come unto them presently.
Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord [Amos 8:11].
Here is a most unusual famine. God had given them His Word, and they had rejected it. They had despised it and turned aside from it. Now God tells them that the day is coming when they will no longer have the privilege of hearing His Word.
God tells any church or any nation that, if they will not hear His Word after He has given it to them, He will withdraw it from them. I think we can see this happening in America. There has been a rejection of the Word of God. The churches have turned to liberalism, and the Word of God is no longer preached. There has come a famine of the Word of God. So many of the formerly great churches of this country, the great downtown churches, have turned from the Word of God. As a consequence, many of them have had to close shop. Others are just barely operating, and many of them are operating in the red. Even those which have stayed open have lost their influence and have lost their drawing power.
Actually, very little of the Word of God is getting out in this land today. There is a Gideon Bible in every room in every hotel and motel in this country. Nearly everyone owns a Bible. But who is studying it? Who is reading it? Who is believing it? I think we are beginning to see the famine of the Word of God in this country.
And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, and shall not find it [Amos 8:12].
The distraught people will wander from sea to sea seeking the Word of God but will not find it. God in His great love for His chosen people had sent His Word by prophet after prophet, but they had rejected His Word, persecuted and even slain His prophets. Now one of God’s judgments will be His silence.
We see something of this same situation in our own land. I receive numerous letters from folk all over the country who tell me that they have no Bible teaching in their town or community and haven’t had any for many years. The famine has already set in for this land of ours. My friend, the most important thing in the world that we can do is to give out God’s Word by every means at our disposal.
In that day shall the fair virgins and young men faint for thirst [Amos 8:13].
Even the young people, the most hopeful and vigorous members of society, will faint for thirst after the Word of God.
They that swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, Thy god, O Dan, liveth; and, The manner of Beer-sheba liveth; even they shall fall, and never rise up again [Amos 8:14].
It was their custom to swear in the name of their gods. “The sin of Samaria” refers to the golden calf which was located at Beth-el. The second golden calf was located at Dan, and there was an idolatrous sanctuary at Beer-sheba, as we have seen. God’s judgment upon them from such idolatry concludes this chapter: “they shall fall, and never rise up again.” This indicates the dissolution and permanent downfall of the northern kingdom. The ten tribes are going into captivity, and they will never return as the northern kingdom of Israel. When they come back to their land, they will come as part of the twelve tribes.
CHAPTER 9
Theme: Vision of worldwide dispersion, regathering and restoration
This chapter concludes the message of judgment which Amos has been delivering to Israel. Then Amos looks into the far future and gives the glorious prospect of the restored kingdom of Israel.
I saw the Lord standing upon the altar: and he said, Smite the lintel of the door, that the posts may shake: and cut them in the head, all of them; and I will slay the last of them with the sword: he that fleeth of them shall not flee away, and he that escapeth of them shall not be delivered [Amos 9:1].
This describes the coming of the Assyrians. We need to understand that “the altar” is not the altar of Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem but is probably the altar of the temple to Baal in Samaria. I have seen the ruins of this temple in Samaria.
“Smite the lintel of the door, that the posts may shake: and cut them in the head, all of them.” At the time of the siege, the people would seek refuge in the temples, but the temples would be brought down so suddenly that many of the people would be trapped when the pillars crumbled.
“He that fleeth of them shall not flee away, and he that escapeth of them shall not be delivered.” Those who would escape alive from the city would be carried into captivity.
Now notice this frightful statement—
Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down [Amos 9:2].
“Though they dig into hell.” The word translated “hell” is the Hebrew word sheol, meaning “the grave or the place of the dead.”
There are two things which cause the terror of the wicked. In our day, folk have been so brainwashed by our society that many of them try to blot it out of their minds; but if they give any thought to it at all, the two things which bring terror to the heart of the wicked person are the omnipresence and the immutability of God. God is omnipresent; that is, He is everywhere. Even death cannot separate you from Him. And the immutability of God means that God never changes. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. These two truths are a great comfort to God’s children, but they are frightening to the wicked.
To the child of God the omnipresence of God assures him that God will never leave him. The Lord Jesus said, “… I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee” (Heb. 13:5). How wonderful that is! Also He said, “… him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out” (John 6:37). When He receives you, He receives you for eternity. No one can take you out of His hand; and, if you are in His hand, you are very close to Him, you see. The Lord Jesus also likened our relationship to Him to that of a vine and its branches. What can be closer to a vine than its branch? The omnipresence of God is a great comfort to the believer.
However, for the unbeliever, the omnipresence of God is a terror. Many people commit suicide because they want to get away from it all. A prominent man here in Southern California left a suicide note which read, “I want to end it all and get rid of this life.” Well, he got rid of his problems and a great many things which were annoying him here—he was in deep trouble—but he didn’t get rid of God. Death didn’t separate him from God. David understood this when he wrote, “Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there” (Ps. 139:7–8). And the poet Francis Thompson was not being irreverent when he characterized God as “the hound of heaven” because, regardless of who you are, God is right on your track. You cannot get rid of Him.
Then there is the immutability of God. God didn’t learn anything new by reading the morning newspaper. The president or the Senate or the college professors or the scientists cannot teach God anything that is new to Him. He doesn’t change His mind. He never changes. “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever” (Heb. 13:8). That is wonderful for the child of God to know. The same One who walked by the Sea of Galilee, who was so gracious and merciful to people, is still the same One who walks with the believer today.
And though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out thence; and though they be hid from my sight in the bottom of the sea, thence will I command the serpent, and he shall bite them [Amos 9:3].
“And though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out thence.” The city of Haifa is located on Carmel today. Mount Carmel is wooded and rises to a height of about eighteen hundred feet. I have been there several times and have noted the caves which are along the sides of that mountain. It is said that there are over a thousand caves there, especially on the side toward the sea. But even there God said He would search them out. And although they should try to hide in the bottom of the sea, they would find God there. They could not escape Him.
And though they go into captivity before their enemies, thence will I command the sword, and it shall slay them: and I will set mine eyes upon them for evil, and not for good [Amos 9:4].
“And though they go into captivity before their enemies”—that is, going voluntarily in order to spare their lives, they still will not escape God’s judgment.
My friend, the wicked do well to fear God and to fear the future. There is no escape for them. The man who commits suicide, thinking that he will get rid of his troubles, will move into real trouble when he faces God. It is like jumping from the frying pan into the fire—and that almost literally.
And the Lord God of hosts is he that toucheth the land, and it shall melt, and all that dwell therein shall mourn: and it shall rise up wholly like a flood; and shall be drowned, as by the flood of Egypt [Amos 9:5].
You cannot go through that land today without being conscious of the fact that it certainly is no longer a land of milk and honey. Even with all the irrigation and cultivation, it is far from that. Judgment has come upon it.
When I was in a hotel there, I met a lovely Jewish couple in the elevator. We began to talk about the land. They had come out to buy an apartment. They thought they might retire permanently to Israel or at least spend part of the year there. He told me very candidly, “Although we bought the apartment because we want to help our people in this land, we really don’t ever expect to use it. I don’t think this is the land that the Bible says it is.” Obviously, he had not read the prophecy of Amos and did not realize that God’s judgment had come upon the land.
It is he that buildeth his stories in the heaven, and hath founded his troop in the earth; he that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The Lord is his name [Amos 9:6].
In this beautiful way Amos is reminding his people of the omnipotence of God. Not only is He omnipresent, but He is also omnipotent. It is He who does all of this. Out yonder in the heavens, the sun, the moon, the planets, the tremendous galaxies, the quasars, the whole universe obeys God. He has made certain laws by which they are to move, and they obey those laws. But little man—little man is in rebellion against the omnipotent God. In effect, Amos is asking Israel, “Do you think we can escape such a God?”
Now here is one of the strangest statements in the Bible, and it is quite wonderful—
Are ye not as children of the Ethiopians unto me, O children of Israel? saith the Lord. Have not I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt? and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir? [Amos 9:7].
When God wanted them to know how much He loved them, He said, “I love you as I love the Ethiopians!” At the time that the Italians under Mussolini invaded Ethiopia in 1935, I made a study of the biblical prophecies concerning Ethiopia. It was amazing to me to discover the place which Ethiopia has in the program of God for the future. It is a nation which may seem very unimportant to us, but it is very important to God.
Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth; saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, saith the Lord [Amos 9:8].
“The sinful kingdom” is Israel, of course. “I will destroy it from off the face of the earth” means that He will destroy it as a separate kingdom. When God returns the people of Israel to their land, they will not be a divided kingdom but will be one nation under the sovereignty of the One sitting on the throne of David.
For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth [Amos 9:9].
“I will sift the house of Israel among all nations.” If you want to know where the so-called “lost tribes of Israel” are, look in your phone book for the Cohens, the Goldbergs, etc. They are scattered throughout the world, but they are not “lost” as far as God is concerned. “Yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth.” God will not lose one of them.
All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, which say, The evil shall not overtake nor prevent us [Amos 9:10].
How about the sinners? They are going to die. He will judge the individuals who won’t turn to Him. We have the same analogy in the contemporary church. Not all church members are saved. Believe me, if you have been a pastor as long as I have, you would know that not all church members are genuine believers—but they are church members. And the apostle Paul says, “… For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel” (Rom. 9:6). There are two kinds of Israelites, the natural and the spiritual Israel. Although “not the least grain” will fall to the ground, all sinners of the nation will perish, especially the defiant ones whom Amos has been addressing.
This brings us to the final vision of Amos, that of the worldwide regathering and restoration of the kingdom of the Lord. Amos saw beyond the terrible days of judgment and scattering of His people, even beyond the Great Tribulation (which is still future in our day).
In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old [Amos 9:11].
The phrase “in that day” refers to the last days of Israel. “In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen.” To follow through on this, listen to James in Acts 15 where he quotes this prophecy of Amos: “And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, Men and brethren, hearken unto me: Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up: That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things. Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world” (Acts 15:13–18).
Today God is calling out a people for His name among the Gentiles. After this He will raise up the tabernacle of David. In other words, he is speaking of the kingdom age, the Millennium, the greatest day which is yet in the future.
That they may possess the remnant of Edom, and of all the heathen, which are called by my name, saith the Lord that doeth this [Amos 9:12].
There will be many nations which will enter the Millennium.
Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt [Amos 9:13].
This is the proof of what I have mentioned previously, that when the people of Israel are being blessed, the land of Israel is being blessed. The people and the land belong together. God makes it clear that when He returns the people of Israel to their land, it will again be the land of milk and honey. The land is not that now; so I take it that the present return is not the one which is predicted. Although Jews are returning to their land, they are not returning to their God.
And I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them [Amos 9:14].
God is going to restore Israel to the land. Never again will it be the southern kingdom of Judah and the northern kingdom of Israel. It will all be Israel, an undivided kingdom, as it was in the beginning of its history. It will be all twelve tribes. They are scattered over the whole world today. They are sifted among all nations. Any idea that “the ten lost tribes” are the people of Great Britain and of the United States is unscriptural. The prophecy clearly states that they will be sifted among all nations. Just look around you. Has God done that, or hasn’t He done it? But it will not be that way forever. God will return them to the land. “I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them.”
And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the Lord thy God [Amos 9:15].
When God puts them in the land, they will be there permanently.
These are the things God has said He will do for His people: (1) He is going to restore the Davidic dynasty. Who do you think will be the king? It will be a son of David by the name of Jesus, born in Bethlehem of the house and lineage of David. He will be the ruler. (2) Israel will take her place among the nations of the world. She will no longer go to the United Nations with her hat in her hand (nor will she be shutting out Arabs). She will be a nation that is going to be blessed of God and will occupy a place among the nations of the world. (3) In addition to this, there will be a conversion of the nations of the world! This will occur after the church leaves this earth. The greatest conversion to Christ is still in the future. What a day that will be! When God returns Israel to her land, (4) they will build the waste cities and inhabit them. (5) They will eat the fruit of their gardens and drink the wine of their vineyards. The curse on the land will be lifted, and it will produce bountifully. (6) And the people of Israel “shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the Lord thy God.”
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Cohen, Gary G. and Vandervey, H. Ronald. Hosea and Amos. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1981.
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Israel. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975.
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Obadiah
INTRODUCTION
The name Obadiah means “servant of Jehovah.” He is one of four prophets about whom we know absolutely nothing except that he wrote prophecy. The other three prophets are Habakkuk, Haggai, and Malachi. These four prophets are cloaked in anonymity. Obadiah is like a ghost writer in that he is there, but we do not know him. He lived up to his name, for he was a servant of Jehovah. A servant boasts of no genealogy neither exploits nor experiences. He doesn’t push himself forward. He has to demonstrate by what he does that he can even claim the place of a servant. So Obadiah is just a prophet who wrote one of the great prophecies of the Scripture. Dr. Pusey said, “God has willed that his name alone and this brief prophecy should be known to the world.” Obadiah is a little book, but it is an example of an atomic bomb in the Bible. It is a small thing, but it has a potent message.
The chief difficulty with the prophecy of Obadiah is where to fit it into the history of the nation Israel. There are some who give the date of 887 b.c., which fixes the time during the reign of Jehoram and the bloody Athaliah (see 2 Kings 8:16–26). Dr. Pusey placed it during the reign of Jehoshaphat (see 2 Chron. 17:7). Although the name Obadiah does occur in this passage, it was a common name in that day and probably was not the same Obadiah who wrote this prophecy. Canon Farrar gave the date as 587 b.c., and Dr. Moorehead concurred in this, suggesting that Obadiah was probably a contemporary of Jeremiah’s. The whole question seems to hinge on verse 11: “In the day that thou stoodest on the other side, in the day that the strangers carried away captive his forces, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, even thou wast as one of them.” Either this was written as prophecy before it happened or it is an historical record of what did happen. The natural interpretation, of course, is to accept it as history rather than prophecy, which places the date of Obadiah’s prophecy around 587 b.c., after the Babylonian captivity and during the ministry of the prophet Jeremiah.
The little kingdom of Edom is the subject of this brief prophecy. Verse 6 is the key verse: “How are the things of Esau searched out! how are his hidden things sought up!”
OUTLINE
I. Edom—Destruction, vv. 1–16
A. Charge against Edom, vv. 1–9
B. Crime of Edom, vv. 10–14
C. Catastrophe to Edom, vv. 15–16 (Poetic justice [lex talionis]—law of retaliation)
II. Israel—Restoration, vv. 17–21
A. Condition of Israel, v. 17
B. Configuration of the House of Esau, v. 18
C. Consummation of All Things, vv. 19–21 (“And the kingdom shall be the Lord’s”)
OBADIAH
Theme: Edom—destruction; and Israel—restoration
Obadiah is the shortest book in the Old Testament—only twenty-one verses. There are many folk who feel that this book is not worth reading and that if it were omitted from the Bible, it would not be missed. However, the brevity of the message does not render it less important or less significant. Like the other Minor Prophets, the message is primary, it is pertinent, it is practical, and it is poignant. It is a message that can be geared into this day in which we are living.
None of these so-called Minor Prophets are extinct volcanoes; rather, they are distinct action. There is no cold ash in any of them; they are spewing hot lava. Obadiah’s prophecy is of devastating judgment against the little kingdom of Edom.
CHARGE AGAINST EDOM
The vision of Obadiah. Thus saith the Lord God concerning Edom; We have heard a rumour from the Lord, and an ambassador is sent among the heathen, Arise ye, and let us rise up against her in battle [Obad. 1].
Obadiah tells us immediately, bluntly, and to the point that this is a vision given to him by God Himself.
Who is Obadiah? As I mentioned in the Introduction, he is one of the Minor Prophets about whom we know absolutely nothing. His name was a very common one in Israel, and it means “servant of Jehovah.”
“Thus saith the Lord God concerning Edom.” Edom is the key to this little book, and so we shall have to go back to Genesis to determine the identity of Edom. In Genesis, where we have the record of the generations of Esau, notice this comment: “Now these are the generations of Esau, who is Edom” (Gen. 36:1). Also this: “Thus dwelt Esau in mount Seir: Esau is Edom. And these are the generations of Esau the father of the Edomites in mount Seir” (Gen. 36:8–9).
That is the record that is given to us here, and it is repeated three times. Although I am sure Moses did not know, the Spirit of God knew that this would need to be emphasized—Esau is Edom and Edom is Esau. The Edomites were those who were descended from Esau, just as the Israelites are those who are descended from Jacob.
The story of Esau is that of twin brothers, sons of Isaac and Rebekah. The boys were not identical twins; actually, they were opposites. The record given back in Genesis 25 begins as Rebekah is about to give birth to these twins: “And the children struggled together within her; and she said, If it be so, why am I thus? And she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger” (Gen. 25:22–23). From the very beginning these two brothers were struggling against each other. Esau was an outdoor fellow who loved to hunt. Jacob would rather stay in the house and learn to cook. He was tied to his mama’s apron strings. However, Jacob had a spiritual discernment that Esau did not have. Esau was a man of the flesh and did not care for spiritual things. In fact, he so discounted his birthright that he traded it to Jacob for a bowl of soup! “And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee, with that same red pottage; for I am faint: therefore was his name called Edom. And Jacob said, Sell me this day thy birthright. And Esau said, Behold, I am at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me? And Jacob said, Swear to me this day; and he sware unto him: and he sold his birthright unto Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentiles; and he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way: thus Esau despised his birthright” (Gen. 25:30–34).
He didn’t sell his birthright because he was so hungry that he was about to perish, nor because there wasn’t anything else to eat in the home of Isaac, but because his was a desire of the flesh and he was willing to trade all of his spiritual heritage for a whim of the moment. The man who had the birthright was in contact with God, and he was the priest of his family. He was the man who had a covenant from God. He was the man who had a relationship with God. In effect Esau said, “I would rather have a bowl of soup than have a relationship with God.”
This is an illustration of a great truth for believers today. It is a picture of Christians. A believer has two natures within him, and they are struggling with each other and against each other. In Galatians 5:17 Paul says, “For the flesh lusteth [wars] against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.” These are the two natures of the believer, the new nature and the old nature. They are opposed to each other. Esau pictures the flesh, the old nature, and Jacob pictures the spirit, the new nature.
The name Edom means “red or sunburned.” A sunburn occurs when the skin is able to absorb all the rays of light except the rays that make it red. The sunburned man in Scripture is the man who could not absorb the light of heaven, and it burned him. My friend, the light of heaven will either save you or burn you. You will either absorb it, or you will be burned by it. This is always true. Esau represents the flesh. He became Edom. Jacob, who became Israel, a prince with God, represents the spirit.
Having seen Esau in the first book of the Old Testament, look now at the last book of the Old Testament and read this strange language: “I have loved you, saith the Lord. Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord: yet I loved Jacob, And I hated Esau …” (Mal. 1:2–3). This is a strange thing for God to say—“I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau.” It immediately presents a problem.
A student once approached Dr. Griffith Thomas with this question, “Dr. Thomas, I am having a problem with this statement in Malachi. I cannot understand why God says He hated Esau.” Dr. Thomas replied, “Young man, I am having a problem with that verse also, but my problem is different from yours. I can understand why He hated Esau, but I cannot understand why He loved Jacob.”
Well, the thing that lends importance to the little Book of Obadiah is that it is the only place in the Word of God where we find the explanation of why God hated Esau.
Ginsburg, the great Hebrew scholar, translated Obadiah 6 like this: “How are the things of Esau stripped bare!” In other words, they are laid out in the open for you to look at for the first time. Obadiah puts the microscope down on Esau, and when you look through the eyepiece you see Edom. Not only did Obadiah focus the microscope on him, but Obadiah is God’s microscope! Come here and look through the microscope. Look! One Esau—oh, he is magnified!—one Esau is now 250,000 little Esaus, and that is Edom. The photographer takes a miniature and makes a great enlarged picture. He says, “I blew up the picture.” Obadiah is the “blown up” picture of Esau. You inflate a tire tube to find a tiny leak in it. You could not find that leak until you inflated it. Just so, Obadiah presents Esau inflated so that you can see where the flaw is in his life, and you can see why God said He hated him. What at the beginning was a little pimple under the skin is now a raging and angry cancer. What was small in Esau is now magnified 100,000 times in the nation. God did not say at the beginning that He hated Esau; He had to wait until he became a nation and revealed the thing that caused God to hate him.
God never said that He hated Esau or loved Jacob until He came to the last book in the Old Testament. Both men have become nations, Edom and Israel. Israel has been mightily used of God through the centuries. Israel produced men like Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Hezekiah, Nehemiah, Ezra, and on down the line. But the nation that came from Esau became a godless nation. Edom turned its back upon God, but what was it that caused God to hate Esau and to hate the nation?
Behold, I have made thee small among the heathen: thou art greatly despised [Obad. 2].
This great people—they were a great people, as we are going to see in this book—are now going to be brought down. Obadiah gives this as a prophecy which looks to the future, but from where we stand today, we see that it has been fulfilled.
What was the great sin of Edom which brought about God’s judgment upon her?
The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee, thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high; that saith in his heart, Who shall bring me down to the ground? [Obad. 3].
“The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee.” What was it for which God hated Edom? It was pride. I am confident that, the minute I say this, the wind is taken out of the sails of many of my readers. They are going to say, “Is that all? Pride is bad, but it’s not that bad, is it?”
Let me illustrate to you how we today have things all out of proportion concerning sin. Suppose that I knew of a certain Christian who was drinking very heavily and that I came to ask your advice as to what his church should do with him. I am sure that you would say that he ought to be put out of the membership of the church, and I would agree with you. Now suppose that I told you of an officer in a church who was caught by the police the other night in a supermarket as he was breaking into the safe. I’m sure that you would say he ought to be put out of the church and that he ought to be disciplined. I’d agree with you on that. Suppose, though, that I told you that I knew of a certain church member who was filled with pride, who was one of the proudest persons I had ever met. I dare say that you would not suggest that he be put out of the church. Many who have a very tender heart would say, “I think the pastor should talk to him and tell him that it’s wrong to have pride. But it’s not such a bad sin after all. At least, it’s one that doesn’t show. It’s not like getting drunk; it’s not like stealing; it’s not like lying.” Would I surprise you if I told you that, in the sight of God, pride is a much worse sin than getting drunk? Now the Bible does have a great deal to say about the sin of drunkenness. God condemns drunkenness. It contributed to the downfall of Israel, Babylon, the kingdom of Alexander the Great, and Rome. It has brought down all the great nations, and it will bring down our nation. But, may I say to you, in God’s sight, pride is worse than drunkenness. This is something which gets right down to where we live today. This is right where the bat hits the ball. This is where the plane of your life and my life touches down on the runway of the life of God. We are given here a proper perspective concerning pride. Pride is the sin of sins. It is one of the worst sins of all. It is something that Scripture condemns above everything. God has said that He hates pride, and if that is the thing that Edom is eaten up with, God can say, “Esau have I hated because of his pride.”
Notice what the writer of the Proverbs says: “These six things doth the Lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him.” And then he gives us the list: (1) “A proud look”; (2) “a lying tongue”; (3) “hands that shed innocent blood”; (4) “an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations”; (5) “feet that be swift in running to mischief”; (6) “a false witness that speaketh lies”; and (7) “and he that soweth discord among brethren” (Prov. 6:16–19). Do you see what is number one on God’s hate parade? A proud look. When a man or woman walks into church and looks at some poor saint who is known to have committed a sin, and that man lifts his head and puts his nose in the air, or the woman draws her skirts about her, that in the sight of God is worse than getting drunk. This is not to condone drunkenness; it is saying that drunkenness is bad, but pride is much worse.
This is not all that God has to say about pride. God says that He resists the proud, but He is always on the side of the humble. “The fear of the Lord is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate” (Prov. 8:13). John tells us, “hellip; the pride of life, is not of the Father …” (1 John 2:16). Where does the pride of life come from? If there is anything that comes from the Devil, that is it.
A great many saints today have pride of race, pride of face, and pride of grace—they are even proud they have been saved by grace! My friend, your salvation ought not to make you proud; it is not even something to brag about. It is something about which to glorify God, and it is something that should humble you. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself that you have to be saved by grace because you are such a miserable sinner? I wish I had something to offer God for salvation, but I have nothing. Therefore, I must be saved by grace, and I cannot even boast of that. There are too many folk boasting of the fact that they have been sinners. God gives grace to the humble. Paul writes, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5). What kind of mind did He have? Lowliness of mind. He said, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart …” (Matt. 11:29). Pride is that which is destroying the testimony of many Christians and has made them very ineffective for God. They go in for show, but the thing they are building is a big haystack. They are not building on the foundation of Christ with gold and silver and precious stones. Pride has a great many saints down for the count of ten; it has pinned the shoulders of many to the mat today.
Pride, after all, was the sin of Satan. He said, “I will exalt my throne above the stars of God … I will be like the most High” (see Isa. 14:13–14). Pride was also actually the root of Nebuchadnezzar’s insanity. He strutted like a peacock in the palace of his kingdom of Babylon. “The king spake, and said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?” (Dan. 4:30). And what happened to Nebuchadnezzar? “While the word was in the king’s mouth, there fell a voice from heaven saying, O king Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken; The kingdom is departed from thee. And they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field …” (Dan. 4:31–32). That was no accident, my friend. The psychologists today would call Nebuchadnezzar’s condition hysteria which leads to a form of amnesia. This man did not know who he was, and he went out and acted like an animal of the field. Why? Because, when a man is lifted up with pride, he’s not lifted up but has come down to the level of beasts. God debased Nebuchadnezzar and brought him down to the level of the beasts of the field.
What is pride? Let me give you a definition of it: Pride of heart is the attitude of a life that declares its ability to live without God. We find here in the Book of Obadiah that pride of heart had lifted up this nation of Edom just like Esau who had despised his birthright. Even in the home of Isaac, where there was plenty to eat, he liked that bowl of soup, and he liked it more than he liked his birthright. He didn’t care for God at all. In despising that birthright, he despised God. And now Esau had become a great nation that had declared its ability to live without God.
“Thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high; that saith in his heart, Who shall bring me down to the ground?” He lived in a very unique place. He lived in the rocky mountain fastness of the rock-hewn city of Petra. It is still in existence today and can be viewed. Many who see it are overwhelmed by the size of the city. It is a ready-made city hewn out of the rock. It is protected by the entrance way which is very narrow in places. A horse and rider can get through but with just a bit of twisting and turning. It was, therefore, a city which could easily be defended. Everything was secure. It was like the First National Bank in that many of the nations of the world deposited vast sums of gold and silver there because they felt that the city could never be taken.
They dwelt “in the clefts of the rock.” They were living in great buildings which were hewn out of solid rock inside this great canyon and up and down the sides of it. They were perfectly secure—at least they thought they were. The Edomites had signed a declaration of independence. They had a false sense of security and had severed all relationship with God. They had seceded from the government of God. They had revolted and rebelled against Him.
Now what is God going to do in a case like this?
Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith the Lord [Obad. 4].
“Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle.” The eagle is used in Scripture as a symbol of deity. The Edomites were going to overthrow God, as Satan had attempted to do, and they were going to become deity. They were going to handle the business that God was supposed to handle. “And though thou set thy nest among the stars”—this was the sin of Satan, for he sought to exalt his throne above the stars. God says, “Thence will I bring thee down.”
How many people today are attempting to run their lives as if they were God? They feel that they don’t need God, and they live without Him. The interesting thing is that when God made us He did not put a steering wheel on any of us. Why? Because He wants to guide our lives. He wants us to come to Him for salvation first, and then He wants to take charge of our lives. When you and I run our lives, we are in the place of God. We are in the driver’s seat. We are the ones who are the captains of our own little ships or our own little planes, and we are going through the water or the air just to suit ourselves. That is pride, and anyone who reaches that position, if he continues in it, is committing a sin which is fatal because it means he will go into a lost eternity.
Will you come now and look down into the microscope again? Edom is the incarnation of Esau. There stands Esau. What do you see? You see a human animal; you see animalism in the raw. Oh, the terrifying ugliness of it all! At this point you may say to me, “I thought we descended from animals, but here you are saying that men act like animals.” That is exactly what I am saying, my friend. We didn’t descend up, we descended down. There has been no ascension, there has been a descension.
The teaching of evolution as a fact of science is the greatest delusion of the twentieth century. When we do come out of the fog, the unbeliever will move to another explanation for the origin of things. Actually, evolution does not give the origin of things at all. It has been accepted by the average man as gospel truth because he has been brainwashed through radio, television, our schools, and our publications to believe that evolution is a proven fact—and it absolutely is not. The strong and intelligent objections that have been given by reliable scientists are entirely ignored today. I am not going to discuss the pros and cons of evolution—that is not my point—but it is something that I became interested in even before I was sixteen years of age. I had a great desire to read and study, and I appealed to the wrong man, a minister who was a liberal, and he urged me to read Darwin. I read The Origin of Species, The Descent of Man, and other miscellaneous papers. I studied it, of course, later in college and again in a denominational seminary. At the seminary they taught theistic evolution, which is probably the most absurd of all interpretations of the origin of things. I want to say to you that I totally reject the godless propaganda of evolution—this idea that it is from mud to man, from protoplasm to personality, from amoeba to animation! I would like to dismiss the argument with a quotation from Dr. Edwin Conklin, the biologist, who said: “The probability of life originating from accident is comparable to the probability of the unabridged dictionary resulting from an explosion in a printing shop.” That is good enough for me.
The chief difficulty with the theory of evolution is its end results. Evolution leads to an awful, fatal pessimism. It leads man to believe that he has arrived, that he is something, that he is actually up at the top; and that belief has led to a fatal pessimism today. That pessimism is seen in our colleges and in the alarming rate of suicide among young people. I attribute it to the teaching of evolution. It was Dr. Albert Einstein who made this statement: “The man who regards his own life and that of his fellow creatures as meaningless is not merely unfortunate but almost disqualified for life.” That is a good statement.
If you want to see how this teaching has affected men, listen to the poetry of the late Wystan Hugh Auden:
Were all the stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.
How pessimistic! And then he added this:
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell.
May I say to you, that is pessimism, and that is the thinking to which evolution has led.
But wait just a minute! The startling and amazing thing is that the little Book of Obadiah is God’s trenchant answer to evolution, and this is the reason He said what He did about Edom.
On Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles there are what are known as the La Brea Tar Pits, where they have also now built a great museum. The tar pits and this museum are a tourist attraction in Southern California. When I first came to California as a tourist, I went there when it was just a small museum. The museum showed, according to the scientists, how man lived one hundred thousand to two hundred thousand years ago in California. They showed that he lived like an animal and that he looked like an animal, according to the picture that they displayed. By the way, they didn’t have a photograph of him. The fellow must have turned around before they could get the picture! Of course, they didn’t have a photograph but composed an imaginary picture of him.
God has something to say to us, my friend. Will you hear me carefully? Why go back one hundred thousand years? Right this moment, if you were to ride down that same Wilshire Boulevard, you would see men and women who are living like animals. They don’t look like animals—some of them are called “the beautiful people”—but they are living like animals. The fact is that they have come down from the high plane where God had created them to the plane where they do not depend on God. Not only do they live like animals, they live lower than animals. No animal gets drunk or beats his wife or shoots his children or murders or practices homosexuality. Only mankind does that. Man lives in our day lower than animals, and they were living like that yonder in Edom in Obadiah’s day.
You may have heard the story of the pig in Kentucky that got out of its pen, wandered out in the woods, and found a still. Mash had leaked out of this still, and the pig began to eat it and also to drink the liquid leaking out with it. The pig got drunk, and I mean drunk. He couldn’t walk, and he sprawled right down in the mud. He stayed there for twenty-four hours until he sobered up. Then as he started off grunting, he was heard to say, “I’ll never play the man again.”
Or, as someone else has expressed it:
How well do I remember,
’Twas in the bleak December
As I was strolling down the street in manly pride,
When my heart began to flutter
And I fell into a gutter,
And a pig came up and lay down by my side.
As I lay there in the gutter,
My heart still all a-flutter,
A man passing by did chance to say,
“You can tell a man that boozes
By the company he chooses,”
And the pig got up and slowly walked away.
—Unknown
No, my friend, man has not evolved from the animal world. Tremendous though his achievements are, man can sink lower than an animal when he determines that he is going to live without God.
Remember that God said to the Edomites: “Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down.”
Obadiah continues to set forth the complete destruction of Edom—
If thieves came to thee, if robbers by night, (how art thou cut off!) would they not have stolen till they had enough? if the grapegatherers came to thee, would they not leave some grapes? [Obad. 5].
Obadiah is saying that if a thief came to rob them, he would take only what he wanted—he wouldn’t take everything. That would also be true of a grape gatherer—he would leave some grapes. But God said to Edom, “When I judge you, the destruction will be complete.”
How are the things of Esau searched out! how are his hidden things sought up! [Obad. 6].
This is the key verse to the Book of Obadiah. “How are the things of Esau searched out!” Let me repeat that Ginsburg, the Hebrew scholar, translates this, “How are the things of Esau stripped bare!” Or, as we have put it, God has put Esau under a microscope, and God says, “Come, look. Look through the Word of God, and look at this man. I hate him. Why do I hate him? It is because of his pride of life. He has turned his back on Me and has declared his ability to live without Me.” That is the pride of life, my friend.
“How are his hidden things sought up!” Frankly, when I read the story of Esau back in the Book of Genesis, I don’t quite understand it, but although I missed it in Genesis, I sure don’t miss it here. I can now take the microscope and go back and look at Esau and see why he wanted to trade in his birthright for a bowl of soup. It was for the very simple reason that the birthright meant that he would be the priest in the family and it meant a relationship to God. Frankly, Esau would rather have had a bowl of soup than to have had a relationship with God. When you reach that place, my friend, you have sunk to the level of the pig that got down in the gutter.
All the men of thy confederacy have brought thee even to the border: the men that were at peace with thee have deceived thee, and prevailed against thee; they that eat thy bread have laid a wound under thee: there is none understanding in him [Obad. 7].
Edom was a nation which all the enemies of that day just passed by. They just couldn’t be bothered with him because he was safely holed up in the rock-hewn city of Petra. However, Nebuchadnezzar was able to get spies inside the city, and through them he was able to take the city. Just as God used Nebuchadnezzar to destroy Jerusalem, the city of Jacob’s sons who had turned from God, He used Nebuchadnezzar also to reach in and take Edom, the nation of Esau’s sons.
Shall I not in that day, saith the Lord, even destroy the wise men out of Edom, and understanding out of the mount of Esau? [Obad. 8].
Not only was Edom noted for the fact that they were well protected in their rocky mountain fastness, in the beautiful city of Petra, but they also had developed a wisdom and learning and superstition. Petra was a pagan center where there were many “pillar cults.” Expeditions have excavated the great high place on top of the mountains round about Petra where bloody human sacrifices had been offered. Also Edom was famous for its wisdom. Job’s friend Eliphaz was a Temanite (see Job 4:1). People traveled from afar to hear the wisdom of its wise men (see Jer. 49:7). God says that He will destroy the wise men out of Edom and understanding out of the mount of Esau.
And thy mighty men, O Teman, shall be dismayed, to the end that every one of the mount of Esau may be cut off by slaughter [Obad. 9].
“Teman” takes its name from a grandson of Esau and is located in the southern portion of Edom. The Temanites were noted for their courage.
CRIME OF EDOM
In verses 10 through 14, Obadiah is going to give a list or a catalog of the reasons that God is going to destroy Edom. The pride of life, we have said, was their great sin, but it led also to the committing of other sins. Pride is an attitude, but it is an attitude that you cannot conceal very long. It is going to break out like a running cancer because it is such a tremendous driving force in man. Your philosophy of life is going to gradually work its way down into your fingers, your feet, your eyes, and all your senses. You are going to express that philosophy in some way. If you are godless, you are going to lead a godless life. If you are godly, you are going to lead a godly life—that naturally follows. Therefore, Obadiah is now going to spell out the terrible sins that came from Edom’s pride of life.
You must remember at this point that Esau and Jacob were brothers, twin brothers, although not identical twins but opposites. They did grow up in the same family and had the same father and mother. There was a struggle between them from the very beginning. There was a hatred and a bitterness that was never healed. It was never healed even when they became two great nations.
We find, however, that God had something to say to His people about their relationship to Edom. In Psalm 137:7 we read, “Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof” Edom, instead of befriending Israel in the dark hour when the Babylonians destroyed that nation, stood on the sidelines and, in fact, became the cheering section, urging the Babylonians on in their brutalities. But God had said to Israel at the very beginning, when they came into the land, “Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite; for he is thy brother: thou shalt not abhor an Egyptian; because thou wast a stranger in his land” (Deut. 23:7). Israel’s tie with the Edomite was greater—he was his brother, a blood brother—and because of that, God said they were not to hate him. However, we will see that Edom manifested a hatred and bitterness toward Israel throughout the entire length of the history of their nation.
There are five specific actions mentioned here which are derived from pride, from their attitude that they could live without God.
The first one is violence—
For thy violence against thy brother Jacob shame shall cover thee, and thou shalt be cut off for ever [Obad. 10].
Two things were to happen to them. (1) “Shame shall cover thee.” Finally, Babylon was able to capture the city of Petra and take the inhabitants into captivity. There was a period in which they were a captive people. (2) “Thou shalt be cut off for ever.” Edom as a nation would be utterly destroyed. It is interesting that in our day we hear a great deal about Israel but nothing whatever about Edom.
Edom was a nation that attempted to live without God, and they were a violent, warlike people. Violence is not God’s method. In my own country we have discovered that very little can be settled by war and violence. It does not finally settle any matter at all.
The second charge against Edom is that they joined the enemies of Israel—
In the day that thou stoodest on the other side, in the day that the strangers carried away captive his forces, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, even thou wast as one of them [Obad. 11].
Instead of attempting to befriend and help the people of Israel, to whom they were related by blood, they went over to the side of the brutal enemy which had invaded the land.
But thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy brother in the day that he became a stranger; neither shouldest thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction; neither shouldest thou have spoken proudly in the day of distress [Obad. 12].
They rejoiced over the calamity that had come to Judah. That is always an action of pride. When you hear someone rejoicing over the trouble that another individual is having, you may be sure that you are listening to someone who is very proud. Pride is something that God says He hates.
Now the fourth heartless action of the Edomites is looting—
Thou shouldest not have entered into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity; yea, thou shouldest not have looked on their affliction in the day of their calamity, nor have laid hands on their substance in the day of their calamity [Obad. 13].
Not only did they join with the enemy against Israel, but they actually moved in to loot and plunder after the enemy had taken Israel away into captivity.
My friend, pride will lead a man to do some terrible things, and one of them is to steal. Many a man, in order to keep up a front in his business or to keep up with the fellows at the club, will resort to dishonest methods. Also, many a man, in order to win a woman as his wife, will actually resort to dishonest methods. Our contemporary society is honeycombed with dishonesty. What is our problem? Well, the root problem is pride. A proud man, living his life apart from God, will drift into this sort of thing.
The Bible is still the best book on psychology. It will get down to the root of the problem in the human heart. Let’s forget all these little psychological courses on how to improve ourselves and, rather, get back to the Word of God. Perhaps you did not realize that in the little Book of Obadiah you would find the root of the thing that is leading our own nation to self-destruction—pride, the attitude of life that declares its ability to live without God.
Now here is the fifth action that springs from pride—
Neither shouldest thou have stood in the crossway, to cut off those of his that did escape; neither shouldest thou have delivered up those of his that did remain in the day of distress [Obad. 14].
In my opinion, this is their lowest action—they hit bottom when they did this. In this they revealed their animal philosophy of the survival of the fittest. They betrayed their brothers. You see, when Nebuchadnezzar invaded Jerusalem, the inhabitants scattered and many of them fled to the rugged country of Edom where they could hide. The Edomites, standing at the crossroads, would betray their hiding places. When the Babylonian soldiers were hot on their trail, the Edomites would say, “Yes, we saw a bunch of Israelites come by here. They went that way. You’ll find them holed up in that canyon.” They betrayed their brothers.
Not long ago a businessman in Los Angeles, California, told me that the business world is “dog-eat-dog.” That is what man has come to by living without God. Man wants to make a name for himself. He wants to make money. He wants to be a success. What is in back of it? Pride. What is pride? It is an attitude of living life without God. It leads men to betray others. It will cause people to betray fellow workers in order to obtain their jobs. Many men will pretend to be friends when, in fact, they are enemies. There are many men in government today who will betray at the drop of a hat. It is sickening when you take a good look at our society today.
Although I hate to say it, there is also pride in the church. I was a pastor for over forty years and served with many wonderful, faithful men upon whom I could depend. But I learned to my sorrow that, when I had a member on the staff who was a proud young man, he would bear watching. A proud young man, trying to get on in the world, is willing to climb the ladder of success by stepping on the fingers of those who are below him. And every now and then I would add a man to my staff who, for personal advancement, would even be willing to put a knife in my back although I had been helpful to him.
The head of the Church of England was speaking to a bishop many years ago when he made this statement which has a double meaning, “Every bishop has a crook on his staff.” Primarily he was referring to the crook on a shepherd’s staff which is used to correct the sheep, but he was also saying that every bishop had a crook in his staff of helpers. There would always be at least one who would try to put a knife in the bishop’s back.
Do you see now why God hates pride? It leads men to act like animals—in fact, the horrible truth is that when a man attempts to live without God, he is lower than animals. Therefore, the Book of Obadiah is God’s devastating answer to the theory of the evolution of the species. What consummate conceit of man, living apart from God, to think that he has evolved from an animal when he is living like an animal. He boasts, “I have evolved from the animal world, and look at me today!” In effect, God says, “Do you really know where you have come from? I created you in My own image, and you fell—you fell so low that you are below the animal world.” Repeatedly God says that He hates pride, and He has never asked me to apologize for Him.
To see the final issue of Edom and Israel, come with me to the time of Christ. I see a man walking by the Sea of Galilee, over the dusty roads of Samaria, and through the narrow streets of Jerusalem. His name is Jesus. He is in the line of Jacob. Also, I see a man on the throne during those years. His name is Herod, and the Scriptures are very careful to identify him—Herod, the Idumaean, the Edomite, in the line of Esau. When a warning came to the Lord Jesus to flee because Herod would kill Him, He said, “Go tell that fox ….” Fox? Yes. “Go, and tell that fox, Behold, I cast out demons, and I do cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall have finished” (Luke 13:32, New Scofield Reference Bible). And when the Lord Jesus was finally brought before him for judgment, He wouldn’t even open His mouth before Herod. There they stand, Jesus and Herod, the final issue of Jacob and Esau.
CATASTROPHE TO EDOM
For the day of the Lord is near upon all the heathen: as thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee: thy reward shall return upon thine own head [Obad. 15].
“For the day of the Lord is near.” Let me remind you that the phrase, “day of the Lord,” is a technical expression which covers a period of time beginning with the Great Tribulation Period. You and I are living in the day of grace or the day of Christ. The emphasis in our day is upon the Holy Spirit who takes the things of Christ and shows them unto us. After the removal of true believers (collectively called the church), the Day of the Lord will begin, and it will begin with the darkness and judgment of the Great Tribulation Period. Following that terrible time, the Sun of Righteousness will arise with healing in His wings, which will be the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ to the earth to establish His kingdom here.
“For the day of the Lord is near upon all the heathen”—that is, all the nations. When the Lord Jesus Christ has come to earth to establish His kingdom, there will be a judgment of the nations, described by our Lord Himself in Matthew 25. Now, very frankly, it is not clear whether the ancient nations of the past, which have long since disappeared from view, will be raised for this judgment or if their judgment will be the final judgment at the Great White Throne (see Rev. 20:11–15). I find that the commentators differ on this, but I’ll give you my private viewpoint. When I go out on a limb, you better not go with me because the limb may break off, but it is my opinion that when Obadiah says, “The day of the Lord is near upon all the nations,” he means that Edom will again become a nation during the end times. If you doubt that this is possible, look at the nation Israel. For twenty-five hundred years Israel was not a nation, but in 1948 she again became a nation. When Obadiah says that the Day of the Lord is near upon all nations, I interpret that as meaning all the nations, including the ancient nations which will come back into existence and will be judged.
Some expositors believe that Edom will experience the full wrath of God when the Lord Jesus Himself executes the judgment of God upon Edom and her allies (see Isa. 63:1–6).
You see, a nation is responsible to God. The Word of God makes that clear. For example, in Deuteronomy 21:1–3 we read: “If one be found slain in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee to possess it, lying in the field, and it be not known who hath slain him: Then thy elders and thy judges shall come forth, and they shall measure unto the cities which are round about him that is slain: And it shall be, that the city which is next unto the slain man, even the elders of that city shall take an heifer, which hath not been wrought with, and which hath not drawn in the yoke.” In other words, when a man was found slain out on the highway, they were to measure to determine which city was closest to that slain man, and that city was responsible for taking over the case and attempting to find out who killed that man. I think that is a great principle that God put down.
Christians talk about their citizenship being in heaven; and it’s true that the Head of the church is in heaven, but the feet of the church are on earth. Christians have a responsibility as citizens of the nation of which they are members to exert an influence for God as much as they can. I don’t mean to say that a Christian should jump into politics, but I do believe that God could use many more genuine, Bible-believing Christians on the political scene. Some folk say that politics has become so dirty that no Christian should get involved in them. Well, I am of the opinion that a real Christian, willing to stand on his two feet and be counted, could be used by God in our governmental processes. Our nation is responsible to God, and we are part of it.
This does not mean that God will judge nations on the basis of whether or not they have accepted or rejected Christ, because never yet has any nation accepted Christ wholeheartedly. It is a mistake to speak of any nation as a Christian nation. While it is true that Christians have had a great influence on nations like England and our own country, they never were truly Christian nations, and certainly both are far from God at the present time.
“As thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee: thy reward shall return upon thine own head.” Edom was destroyed just as Obadiah had predicted. First it was captured by Babylon some time after Jerusalem was destroyed. That was accomplished by getting spies inside the capital, Petra, the impregnable fortress-city. Later, the Maccabees further subjugated Edom, and finally, the Romans destroyed Edom when they destroyed Jerusalem in a.d. 70. At that time Edom as a nation disappeared from the world scene and has not been heard of since.
Whether or not Edom will live again as a nation is debatable and makes no real difference to you and me. If Edom is around during the Millennium, I’ll be happy; and if it is not, I’ll still be happy because I know that God is working out His own plan.
For as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain, so shall all the heathen drink continually, yea, they shall drink, and they shall swallow down, and they shall be as though they had not been [Obad. 16].
In other words, God says to Edom, “As you have done, it is going to be done to you. You will be rewarded in the same way.” This is what we call today poetic justice.Lex talionis is the law of retaliation. The Lord Jesus said, “As you judge, so shall you be judged” (see Matt. 7:1). Or, “Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap” (see Gal. 6:7). Edom will suffer in the same ways that she caused others to suffer. I very frankly shudder when I consider that my nation was the first nation to drop an atom bomb and that we have been a warlike nation. I do not think that God lets any nation get by with that. The history of all nations confirms that, as they have dealt it out, in a similar way it has come back to them. This is something which has worked itself out throughout the history of the world.
In verses 17 through 21 we come to the second and last major division of the Book of Obadiah. It is only a few verses, and it concerns the nation Israel. For Edom it was destruction, but for Israel it is to be restoration. The little nation of Israel fits into the program of almighty God. Everything fits into the program of almighty God. For every individual, it does not matter who you are, the interesting thing is that had not God thought of you, you wouldn’t be around. You were in the mind of God. The great question is: Are you going to be in step with Him? Are you going to move into eternity with Him or against Him? His plan and program will be carried out, and you will do well to be on His side.
CONDITION OF ISRAEL
Although God judged Israel, they were not to be destroyed as a nation—
But upon mount Zion shall be deliverance, and there shall be holiness; and the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions [Obad. 17].
“But upon mount Zion shall be deliverance.” Salvation is to be offered upon Mount Zion for the world. That is where it is offered to you and me today. The Lord Jesus came and died on Golgotha for you and me. He is coming back to this earth again. Although we are told that at that time His feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives, He will be coming into Jerusalem, and He will, I believe, rule from the top of Mount Zion.
“And there shall be holiness.” There is no holiness there today. I have been on Mount Zion half a dozen times, and I have not found any holiness there. They are just as far from God there as they are over in the Arab section of the old city of Jerusalem. There is no holiness there today, but there shall be holiness when the Lord Jesus reigns.
“And the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions.” I like this expression. They are not possessing their possessions today. They are in the land—that’s true. They have a nation—that’s true. They’ve returned to the land, but they have not returned to God, and as a result they do not possess their possessions. There is a great deal of difference between having a possession and possessing it.
CONFLAGRATION OF THE HOUSE OF ESAU
And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble, and they shall kindle in them, and devour them; and there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau, for the Lord hath spoken it [Obad. 18].
There will be ultimate, final judgment of Esau. I believe that “the house of Esau” is a kingdom that will not enter into the eternal kingdoms of this earth which will become the kingdoms of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. What is it that keeps them from being there? Pride of heart—that attitude of a life that declares its ability to live without God. Friend, if it is your decision to live without God, you are going to live without Him not only now but throughout eternity.
CONSUMMATION OF ALL THINGS
And they of the south shall possess the mount of Esau; and they of the plain the Philistines: and they shall possess the fields of Ephraim, and the fields of Samaria: and Benjamin shall possess Gilead [Obad. 19].
The southern section of Judah will expand to possess “the mount of Esau.” Those on the west will include the coastland of the Philistines. “The fields of Ephraim, and … Samaria”—that is, the northern kingdom—will be restored to the nation, and Benjamin will include Gilead, which is on the east bank of the Jordan River.
And the captivity of this host of the children of Israel shall possess that of the Canaanites, even unto Zarephath; and the captivity of Jerusalem, which is in Sepharad, shall possess the cities of the south [Obad. 20].
Zarephath is way up north between Tyre and Sidon in Lebanon. “The cities of the south” refers to Negeb, the southern part, actually, the Sinaitic peninsula. Israel will occupy all the land that God promised to them. He had promised to Abraham a land that contains about three hundred thousand square miles. Even at their zenith, they occupied only about thirty thousand square miles.
And saviours shall come up on mount Zion to judge the mount of Esau; and the kingdom shall be the Lord’s [Obad. 21].
“Saviours” should be translated “deliverers.”
“And the kingdom shall be the Lord’s.” God is moving forward today undeviatingly, unhesitatingly toward the accomplishment of His purpose; that is, of putting His King on Mount Zion. He says that He will turn and turn and overturn the nations until He comes whose right it is to rule (see Ezek. 21:27).
Nothing can deter or detour or defer God in His plan and in His program. No son of Esau, no animal, can stop Him. No proud man walking this earth can cause God to relinquish or retreat one inch. He is moving today to victory. The kingdom is the Lord’s!
There is only One who can lift the heads of men and women walking through life with their heads down like animals (only humans look up as they walk; animals look down). Evolution has not lifted mankind one inch. Look at our world that has been schooled in this godless philosophy. The deadly poison of godless materialism and humanism will bring upon us the judgment of God! God says, “Though you be lifted up, little man, I’ll bring you down.”
But He also says, through the lips of His Son, our Savior: “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me” (John 12:32). Which way are you going, my friend? Down the way of pride, pessimism, unbelief and rebellion, down, down, down? You who were made in the likeness of God can be restored. You will have to lay aside your pride and come in helplessness to this Savior. He can lift you.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Judah. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975. (Obadiah, Joel, Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk.)
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Jonah
INTRODUCTION
Jonah is the book of the Bible which perhaps has been criticized more than any other. Unfortunately, many Christians thoughtlessly cast aspersions upon this important book in the canon of Scripture without realizing that they are playing into the hands of the critics and innocently becoming the dupes of the skeptics. You hear even Christians say, when they hear a tall story, “My, that’s a Jonah!” What they really mean is that it is something that is hard, or maybe even impossible, to believe.
In warfare the tactic of the enemy is always to feel out the weak spot in the line of the opposition and to center his attack at that vantage point. Judging by this criterion, many critics have evidently come to the conclusion that the Book of Jonah is the vulnerable part of the divine record. This book is the spot where the enemy has leveled his heaviest artillery. As a result, the average Christian today feels that this is the weakest of the sixty-six links in the chain of the Scriptures. If this link gives way, then the chain is broken.
Is the Book of Jonah “the Achilles’ heel” of the Bible? It is, if we are to accept the ridiculous explanations of the critics. The translators of the Septuagint were the first to question the reasonableness of this book. They set the pattern for the avalanche of criticism which has come down to the present day. The ancient method of modernism is to allegorize the book and to classify it with Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver’s Travels. Today liberalism uses the same tactics. They make of it an allegory, saying that actually it never took place at all.
Some of the extravagant theories of the critics are so farfetched and fantastic that they are almost ridiculous. It is much easier to believe the Book of Jonah as given than to believe their explanations of it. I would like to pass on to you some of these outlandish explanations of the Book of Jonah:
1. Some critics, without a scrap of evidence to support their claim, say that Jonah was the son of the widow of Zarephath.
2. There are some who have put forth the theory that Jonah had a dream in the ship while he was asleep during the storm and that the Book of Jonah is the account of his dream.
3. Some relate the Book of Jonah to the Phoenician myth of Hercules and the sea monster. There is no similarity at all and, again, they are reaching for an explanation.
4. Another group holds that, although Jonah was a real character and did take a ship to Tarshish, a storm wrecked the ship. Then after the storm and shipwreck, Jonah was picked up by another ship on which there was a fish for its figurehead, and that gives support for the record in the Book of Jonah. I can well understand that if Jonah had been picked up after the storm, he might have been unconscious for awhile. I can also imagine that he might have felt like he was in a fish at that time. But I’m of the opinion that after recovering, on about the second day, Jonah would have come to the conclusion that he was on a ship and not inside a fish!
5. Still others resort to the wild claim that there was a dead fish floating around and that Jonah took refuge in it during the storm. This group has a dead fish and a live Jonah. Before we are through with this book, I am going to turn it around and say that what we have is a live fish and a dead Jonah.
Therefore, liberalism largely takes the position that the Book of Jonah is nothing in the world but an allegory, that it is merely a fairy story to be put in the same category as Aesop’s Fables. The producers of these speculations claim that the Book of Jonah is unreasonable, and they bring forth these theories to give credence to their story. It would be very interesting indeed to get Jonah’s reaction to their “very reasonable” explanations.
We must dismiss all of these speculations as having no basis in fact, no vestige of proof from a historical standpoint, and as having existence only in the imaginations of the critics. It can be established that Jonah was an historical person, not a character from mythology. It can be ascertained on good authority that the account is accurate. And it can be shown that the message of the book is of utmost significance even for this crucial time in which we live.
Jonah is an historical character and the author of this book. I want to turn to an historical book, 2 Kings, where we read: “In the fifteenth year of Amaziah the son of Joash king of Judah Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel began to reign in Samaria, and reigned forty and one years” (2 Kings 14:23). As far as I know, no one has ever questioned that Jeroboam II lived, that he was a king in the northern kingdom of Israel, and that he reigned forty-one years. This is an historical record. We read further: “And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord: he departed not from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin. He restored the coast of Israel from the entering of Hamath unto the sea of the plain, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which he spake by the hand of his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai, the prophet, which was of Gath-hepher” (2 Kings 14:24–5, italics mine). Jeroboam was a real person, Israel was a real nation, Hamath was a real place, and it is quite unlikely that this man Jonah is just a figment of the imagination. This is an historical record, and it is reasonable to conclude that Jonah is an historical character.
It is begging the point to say that this is another Jonah. It is not reasonable to believe that there were two Jonahs whose fathers were named Amittai and who were both prophets. This is especially evident when it is observed that the name of Jonah was not a common name; after all, Jonah is not like our American surname of Jones! The only times that the name occurs in the Bible are in this reference in 2 Kings, in the Book of Jonah itself, and in the New Testament references to that book. There is only one Jonah in the Bible, and he is an historical person.
It is quite interesting in this regard to compare the case of Jonah with another of the prophets, Obadiah. As far as I know, no critic has ever questioned the existence of a man by the name of Obadiah who wrote the Book of Obadiah; yet there is not one historical record in either the Old or New Testament concerning Obadiah. The liberals accept Obadiah, but they reject Jonah. Why? Because they want to deny the miracle that is recorded here.
We have an historical record of Jonah in the Old Testament, and we also have one in the New Testament given by the greatest authority who has ever lived on this earth, the Lord Jesus Christ. He personally gave authenticity to the historical character of Jonah and to his experience in the fish. We read in Luke 11:30, “For as Jonas was a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of man be to this generation.” Then in Matthew 12:39–41 we read: “But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas: For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.”
The moment you question the historical record of the Book of Jonah, you question the credibility of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is very strange to hear the liberal say, “Jesus was the greatest teacher that ever lived,” since one of the marks of a great teacher is that what he teaches is accurate and truthful. If Jesus is a great teacher, my friend, then His authentication of the Book of Jonah has to stand.
I want to conclude this section in which I have attempted to meet the objections of the critics by quoting the late Sir Winston Churchill on the subject of the inspiration of the Scriptures:
We reject with scorn all those learned and laboured myths that Moses was but a legendary figure upon whom the priesthood and the people hung their essential social, moral and religious ordinances. We believe that the most scientific view, the most up-to-date and rationalistic conception, will find its fullest satisfaction in taking the Bible story literally, and in identifying one of the greatest human beings with the most decisive leap forward ever discernible in the human story. We remain unmoved by the tomes of Professor Gradgrind and Dr. Dryasdust. We may be sure that all these things happened just as they are set out according to Holy Writ.
Jonah was a prophet, but his little book is not a prophecy—that is, there is no prophecy of the future recorded in it. It is, instead, a personal account of a major event in the life of Jonah; as the narrator, he tells us his experience.
This narrative carries two great messages. We have here in miniature a picture of the nation Israel in the Great Tribulation Period, a picture of how God will preserve His people, the 144,000 who are sealed in the Book of Revelation. We also have here a marvelous teaching concerning the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This book is actually prophetic of the Resurrection. The Lord Jesus Himself said that just as Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites, He also would be a sign to His generation in His resurrection from the dead.
The Book of Jonah is not a fish story, and that is something which really disturbs the gainsaying world which makes a great deal of how impossible it is to believe it. This book is a picture of a man who was raised from the dead, and of a throne in the midst of which “stood a Lamb as it had been slain.” This Lamb is a resurrected Lamb, and a Christ-rejecting world will some day cry out, “… hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb” (Rev. 6:16).
Sometimes the literary excellence of this brief brochure is lost in the din made by the carping critics. It is well to recall the tribute paid by Charles Reade, the English literary critic and author, who wrote, “Jonah is the most beautiful story ever written in so small a compass.” It is well to keep in mind that we have before us a literary gem, not a fish story.
Another salient point that I want to make is that the fish is neither the hero of the story nor the villain of the story. This book is not even about a fish, although the fish does become very important. The chief difficulty is in keeping a correct perspective. The fish is merely window dressing and cake trimming. In every play there are certain props and settings. It does not really matter whether Hamlet is played against a black, red, blue or white backdrop—that is not the important thing. In the story of Jonah, the fish is among the props and does not occupy the star’s dressing room.
In dealing with any book of the Bible, we need to distinguish between what Dr. G. Campbell Morgan calls the essentials and the incidentals. The incidentals in the Book of Jonah are the fish, the gourd, the east wind, the boat, and even the city of Nineveh. The essentials here are Jehovah and Jonah—God and man—that is what the book is all about.
Conservative scholars place the writing of the Book of Jonah before 745 b.c. The incidents took place about that time. Some even place it as early as 860 b.c. In my judgment, it seems best to place it between 800 and 750 b.c. Students of history will recognize this as the period when Nineveh, founded by Nimrod, was in its heyday, when the Assyrian nation was the great world power of the day. That nation was destroyed about 606 b.c. By the time of Herodotus, the Greek historian, the city of Nimrod had ceased to exist. When Xenophon passed the city, it was deserted, but he testified that the walls still stood and were 150 feet high. Historians now estimate they were 100 feet high and 40 feet thick. Nineveh, as we are going to see, was a great city, and we are told as much here in the record.
The brevity of the Book of Jonah is apt to lead the casual reader to the conclusion that there is nothing of particular significance here except the diatribe about the whale that swallowed Jonah. (The Greek word for whale is ketos, meaning “a great sea monster.” Although it could have been a whale, I do not think it was—for the Scripture tells us that a special fish was prepared.) But the Book of Jonah has four very brief chapters, and it is only a little more than twice as long as the Book of Obadiah, which is the shortest book in the Old Testament. Because it is very brief, we are apt to pass over it. However, we should not call any of these books “minor” prophets, for each is like a little atom bomb, just loaded with power and with a program of God.
There are six significant subjects which are suggested and developed in the Book of Jonah which make it very relevant for us today:
1. This is the one book of the Old Testament which sets forth the resurrection of Jesus Christ. All of the great doctrines of the Christian faith are set forth in certain books of the Old Testament. For instance, the Book of Exodus sets forth redemption. The deliverance from sin for the sinner who comes to Christ is illustrated in that book. In the Book of Ruth you have the romance of redemption, the love side of redemption. In the Book of Esther, you have the romance of providence. The Book of Job, I believe, teaches repentance. You can go through the Scriptures and find that the great doctrines of our faith are illustrated in various books of the Old Testament. The little Book of Jonah illustrates and teaches the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. If this book does not teach the great doctrine of resurrection, then this most important doctrine of the Christian faith is not illustrated by a book in the Old Testament. For this reason alone, I would say this is a significant book.
2. The Book of Jonah teaches that salvation is not by works, but by faith which leads to repentance. This little book is read by orthodox Jews on the great Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. The way to God is not by works of righteousness which we have done, but by the blood of a substitutionary sacrifice provided by the Lord. The most significant statement in the Book of Jonah is in the second chapter: “Salvation is of the Lord” (Jonah 2:9). He is the author of salvation; He erected the great building of our salvation; He is the architect.
3. The third great purpose of this book is to show that God’s purpose of grace cannot be frustrated. Jonah refused to go to Nineveh, but God was still going to get the message to Nineveh. The interesting thing in this particular case is that Jonah was going to be the witness for God in Nineveh—he didn’t know he was going there, but he did go.
4. The fourth great truth in this book is that God will not cast us aside for faithlessness. He may not use you, but He will not cast you aside. There are a lot of football players sitting on the bench; in fact, more sit on the bench than play in the game. A player is called out to play only when it is believed that he can make a contribution to the game. If you and I are faithless, God may bench us; but we are still wearing our uniform, and He will not cast us aside. Anytime we want to get back in the game of life and do His will, He will permit us to do it.
5. The fifth great truth is that God is good and gracious. Read Jonah 4:2 for the most penetrating picture of God in the entire Bible. It is wrong to say that the Old Testament reveals a God of wrath and the New Testament reveals a God of love. He is no vengeful deity in the Book of Jonah.
6. The sixth and last great teaching is that God is the God of the Gentiles. When God chose Abraham, in effect He said to the Gentiles, “I’m going to have to leave you for awhile because of the sin that has come into the human family. I’m going to prepare salvation for you through a man and a nation, and I’ll bring the Redeemer, the Savior, into the world through them.” Now God has a salvation for all mankind. I have written Romans 3:29 over the Book of Jonah in my Bible. Paul writes, “Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also.” The Book of Jonah reveals that even in the Old Testament God did not forget the Gentiles. If He was willing to save a woman like Rahab the harlot, and a brutal, cruel nation like the Assyrians, including inhabitants of Nineveh, its capital, then I want to say to you that God is in the business of saving sinners.
OUTLINE
There are two approaches to the study of the Book of Jonah. The one that is the most popular and is followed by most commentators is to note the striking resemblance between Jonah and Paul. Both Paul and Jonah were missionaries to the Gentiles, both were cast into the sea, both were witnesses to the sailors on board the boat, and both were used to deliver those sailors from death. There are other striking comparisons, which a careful study would reveal. Including his trip to Rome, which I consider to be a missionary journey, there were actually four missionary journeys of the apostle Paul. The four chapters of the Book of Jonah may be divided into four missionary journeys of Jonah. The first journey was into the fish; the second was to the dry land; the third was to Nineveh; and the fourth brought him to the heart of God.
That is a very good and reliable division of this little book, but it never actually satisfied me, and I have attempted to make an outline of the book without making a comparison with Paul. Very frankly, I had more difficulty outlining the little Book of Jonah than I did the Book of Revelation.
I have another approach to outlining Jonah, and I want to tell you how it came about. Many years ago, I was waiting for the train one night in Nashville, Tennessee. I was returning to seminary, and at that time I was working on outlines for each book of the Bible, for I started early in that type of ministry. But I couldn’t figure out an outline for Jonah. When I got to the Union Station in Nashville, I discovered that the train was late and that I would have to wait thirty minutes to an hour. I did what I’m sure you do whenever you must wait in an airport or railroad station. I walked around for quite awhile before I sat down. I walked by the popcorn machine; I walked by the cigar stand (today they call them gift shops); I walked by the soda pop vendor; and I walked by the restaurant that was there. I just kept walking around, and I came to the railroad timetable. As I was looking at the timetable, it occurred to me that the Book of Jonah could be outlined according to a timetable.
Three important things are to be found on a timetable. The first is the time and place that the train or plane is leaving. Second, there is the destination of the train or plane. Finally, you need to know the time it will arrive at its destination. I go to many places today on speaking engagements, and if I fly, there are three things that are important to know: the time I leave, my destination, and the time of my arrival.
Therefore, if we look at the Book of Jonah as a timetable, this becomes my outline for the book:
LEAVE
DESTINATION
ARRIVE
Chapter 1
Israel (Samaria or Gath-hepher)
Nineveh
Fish
Chapter 2
Fish
Nineveh
Dry Land
Chapter 3
Dry Land
Nineveh
Nineveh
Chapter 4
Nineveh
Gourd Vine
Heart of Go
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Call and commission of Jonah; Jonah goes west; the great wind; Jonah arrives in the fish
CALL AND COMMISSION OF JONAH
Now the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the son of Amittai, saying [Jonah 1:1].
Jonah is identified for us as a prophet and as the son of Amittai. (See the Introduction for a detailed discussion of the evidence that Jonah was a historical character.)
Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and cry against it; for their wickedness is come up before me [Jonah 1:2].
This is God’s call and commission of Jonah to go to Nineveh. The city of Nineveh is called “that great city.” It was the capital of the Assyrian Empire and was located on the Tigris River. It was the world power in that day. Later on, we will deal with the matter of the size of the city, because it is emphasized two more times in this book. Here the emphasis is actually upon the wickedness of the city. It is a great city but great in wickedness. Its wickedness is so great that it has come up before God, and He has now determined that He will judge the city—that is, if the city does not turn to Him.
JONAH GOES WEST
But Jonah rose up to flee unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord, and went down to Joppa; and he found a ship going to Tarshish: so he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord [Jonah 1:3].
Jonah leaves his hometown of Gath-hepher in the northern kingdom of Israel and, with this call and commission from God, you would think that he plans to head for the city of Nineveh. Jonah would have had to go east from Israel to get to Nineveh. Instead of going in that direction, he does a very strange thing. He goes down to Joppa and buys a ticket on the first boat for Tarshish. Tarshish was a city founded by the Phoenicians on the southern coast of Spain. It was the jumping-off place of the west.
What we have before us is a greater problem than the problem of Jonah in the fish. The problem in the Book of Jonah is not the fish—it’s Jonah. God asks him to go to Nineveh, but he buys a ticket for Tarshish. God tells him to go east—Jonah decides not to obey God, and he goes west. The question naturally arises: Why did Jonah do this? There are several reasons:
1. Jonah hated the Ninevites, and he did not want them saved. There was a basis for his hatred. Assyria was one of the most brutal nations of the ancient world. They were feared and dreaded by all the peoples of that day. They used very cruel methods of torture and could extract information from their captives very easily. One of the procedures was to take a man out onto the sands of the desert and bury him up to his neck—nothing but his head would stick out. Then they would put a thong through his tongue and leave him there to die as the hot, penetrating sun would beat down upon his head. It is said that a man would go mad before he died. That was one of the “nice little things” the Assyrians hatched up.
As an army, the Assyrians moved in an unusual manner. One of the reasons the Babylonians were able to overcome them was the slowness of the march of the Assyrian army. They took their families with them and had very little order in the army. They moved as a mob across the countryside. It is very easy to see that their disorder would militate against them. However, when they moved down like a plague of locusts upon a town or village, it is said that they were so feared and dreaded that on some occasions an entire town would commit suicide rather than fall into the hands of the brutal Assyrians. You can see that they were not loved by the peoples round about.
We also know that at this time the Assyrians were making forays into the northern kingdom of Israel. For a long time, it was Syria and the northern kingdom that fought against each other, but they finally came to an alliance because of the threat of Assyria to the north and east of them. However, Assyria eventually took both Syria and Israel into captivity. When the Assyrians were beginning to penetrate into a nation they hoped to conquer, they would make a surprise attack upon a city, take captive the women, and then brutally slay the men and the children. We don’t know this for sure, but it is reasonable to conceive that the Assyrians had come down against Jonah’s hometown of Gath-hepher at one time. They may have come even to his home, and he may have seen his own father and mother cruelly, brutally slain before his eyes. Or he might have seen his sisters raped by the Assyrians. At least we know that Jonah hated the Assyrians, and he did not want them saved. Therefore, he goes in the opposite direction—he’s not going to carry God’s message to them.
2. There is a second reason that Jonah went west. Somebody might point out that Jonah’s message was not one of salvation. His message was to be one of judgment. Although it is true that it was to be a message of judgment, Jonah knew God, and it was because Jonah knew God that he went in the opposite direction. He knew that if he went to Nineveh with a message of judgment and if the people of the city turned to God in repentance, God would not judge them but would save the city! Jonah didn’t want that city saved. It just wasn’t something he looked forward to. And so he went in the opposite direction.
3. A third reason that Jonah went in the opposite direction was because he was a disobedient prophet of God—there is no question about that. He was out of the will of God, very much like the prodigal son. The prodigal son ran away from home. He didn’t want to live under the will of his father, and so he went to the far country. Jonah was out of the will of God. He was a prophet who is certainly not in step with God. We will find that the entire fourth chapter deals with his rebellion and how God brought him back into step with Himself.
4. Here is a fourth and final reason that Jonah disobeyed God. Have you ever noticed that in the Old Testament God never sent His messengers as missionaries to other countries? The method that God used in the Old Testament was really the opposite of His method today. Israel was to serve and worship God as a nation that was located at the crossroads of the world, where the three continents of Europe, Asia, and Africa meet. The nations of that day, if they were not traveling by water, would take the route through the land of Israel. God took the people of Israel, put them there at the crossroads, and had them build a temple to worship Him in order that they might witness to God by serving Him. Their witness was to a world that was looking in on them. The invitation was, “Come, and let us go up to the house of the Lord and worship Him.” Israel witnessed by serving God at the crossroads of the world, and the world came to them.
For example, the Queen of Sheba came from the ends of the earth to Israel. Why did she come? She had heard how they worshiped and, when she got there, she found that there was an altar there for sinners. That was the thing which brought her to a saving knowledge of God. If you read the historical record, you will find that not only did she come but also the kings of the earth came to hear the wisdom of Solomon. During that brief period, Israel did witness to the world; they witnessed not by going out as missionaries but by the world coming in to them.
We are given only the one example of the Queen of Sheba in the Old Testament. In the New Testament we have the examples of one son of Ham, one son of Japheth, and one son of Shem who were converted—the Ethiopian eunuch, Saul of Tarsus, and Cornelius, the Roman centurion. Although we are given only these examples, there were literally thousands and, later, millions who were led to Christ.
However, for the church today the method is the opposite of that in the Old Testament. I think it was rather startling for the twelve disciples, all of whom were Israelites brought up on the Old Testament, when the Lord Jesus said to them, “… Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel …” (Mark 16:15). I imagine they looked at each other and said, “My, this is something brand new! We did not know that it was to be done this way.” Instead of, “Come up to Jerusalem,” the Lord Jesus said, “Beginning at Jerusalem, you are to go now to Judea, Samaria, and on to the ends of the earth” (see Acts 1:8). That is the method today. We often criticize Israel for their failure, but we build a church on the corner and expect the world to come to us, when instead we are supposed to be going out to the world. It took me years to learn that, but that is why the burden of my ministry today is to get the Word of God out to the world via radio. We believe that this is God’s method today.
But that wasn’t the method in Jonah’s day, and Jonah was surprised when God said to him, “Arise, go to Nineveh.” I think Jonah was the same kind of man as Simon Peter, and he probably talked back to the Lord. I think he said, “Wait a minute here! You never sent Elijah down to Egypt, and You never sent Elisha over into India. Why are You asking me to do something You’ve never asked a prophet to do before?” I have great sympathy for Jonah. He didn’t understand why God would want to change His method. However, this book reveals that God is the God of the Gentiles. Paul wrote in Romans 3:29, “Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also.” Jonah could say amen to that statement but not at this point in time. It wasn’t until after the experiences related in this book that he realized that God is the God of the Gentiles also.
“And he found a ship going to Tarshish: so he paid the fare thereof, and went down into it, to go with them unto Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.” Jonah’s experience may be helpful to you if you are having a difficult time and wonder if you are in the will of God. Although I cannot tell you whether or not you are in God’s will, I can say this to you: The fact that you are having a difficult time is not a proof that you are out of the will of God. Rather, it may be a proof that you are in the will of God. If you are having it too easy today and things are breaking just right for you in every direction, and if that is all you are using to interpret that you are in the will of God, then you are leaning on a poor, broken reed, and it will not hold you up in time of a crisis.
Let’s look closely at the illustration of Jonah. Here is a man who hears God’s call and heads in the opposite direction. He is definitely out of the will of God. He goes down to Joppa, and when he goes down there, he encounters no problems. He finds a ship. He buys a ticket. He gets on board the ship, and he goes to sleep! Everything is lovely.
I’m of the opinion that Jonah could give a testimony, the kind of which I have often heard. Jonah went down to buy the ticket, perhaps wondering if he were in God’s will or not. (He should have known he wasn’t. But a lot of us say that we wonder whether we are or not.) He was standing in line to buy a ticket, and the ticket agent said to the man right ahead of Jonah, “I’m sorry, but all space is sold.” Jonah was about to turn away when the phone rang and the ticket agent answered it. A Mr. Goldberg was calling to say that he was in the hospital, having suddenly taken sick, and he would not be able to make the trip. So Jonah waited, and the ticket agent turned to him and said, “Brother, are you lucky! I’ve just had a cancellation.” Jonah must have thought, I sure feel lucky. I feel more than that—maybe this means I’m in God’s will.
How many Christians think like that today? If they are having a difficult time, they say, “Oh, I am out of the will of God.” If things are going easy and everything works out well, they say, “Oh, I must be in the will of God.” My friend, I am of the opinion that if you are having problems, it may be that the Devil is getting a little uneasy because you are growing and proving effective for God. I have found this to be true in my own ministry. Just because you are having trouble does not mean you are out of the will of God.
Everything seemed to be propitious for a very pleasant journey for Jonah. Everything had worked out so well. Someone has called this “the fortuitous occurrence of circumstances.” But we know that Jonah is going in the wrong direction and that God will have to put him inside a fish in order to turn him around.
God’s men down through the centuries, both in the Bible and out of the Bible, have not found the going so easy. It hasn’t always been so propitious. Things have been difficult. I have thrilled at the story of David Livingstone, but that man really suffered. If I had been penetrating dark Africa as he did, after a few of the rough experiences that he had, it would have been very easy to say in a very pious voice, “I think it is the will of God for us to turn around and go home.” Likewise, John G. Patton, a missionary in the New Hebrides, met disappointment on every hand. He had to overcome handicaps daily, but this is the way God leads.
We read in the Book of Hebrews, “And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment: They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth” (Heb. 11:36–38). We read also in Hebrews that some escaped the edge of the sword by faith, but others by faith were slain by the sword. Therefore, you cannot always interpret the good circumstances as being God’s will and the unfavorable circumstances as not being God’s will.
Jonah is on shipboard now; and, as the ship pulls out, I imagine that Jonah stands on the top deck, smiling as the land fades away in the distance. He may be saying to himself, “My, what a beautiful journey this is going to be!” But we will find that this man is not going to have it quite that easy.
THE GREAT WIND
But the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea, and there was a mighty tempest in the sea, so that the ship was like to be broken [Jonah 1:4].
“But the Lord sent out a great wind into the sea.” God was responsible for this storm. I call your attention to that at the very beginning. This storm is supernatural.
The storm on the Sea of Galilee, during which our Lord was asleep in the boat, was such that those men on board knew that they were going to perish. They were experienced with that sea and knew that it was a storm which they could not weather and that their boat soon would be at the bottom of the sea. It was a supernatural storm also, but Satan was responsible for that one in an attempt to destroy the Lord Jesus. Peter came to Him and said, “… carest thou not that we perish?” (Mark 4:38)—for that is what would have happened had He not intervened.
Here in the Book of Jonah, God is using a storm, and He is using it for a good purpose. He is going to save a city with this storm. He is going to turn around a prophet who has been going the wrong way and start him going the right way.
Then the mariners were afraid, and cried every man unto his god, and cast forth the wares that were in the ship into the sea, to lighten it of them. But Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship; and he lay, and was fast asleep [Jonah 1:5].
These “mariners” are sailors accustomed to the Mediterranean, and they detect that this is no natural storm.
“But Jonah was gone down into the sides of the ship; and he lay, and was fast asleep.” I once entertained the popular viewpoint that if a man gets out of the will of God and into sin, he will be tormented with a bad conscience and will simply be in misery. Is that true of Jonah? Jonah is definitely out of the will of God, going the opposite way, actually running away from the presence of God. He wants to get as far from Nineveh as he possibly can, and he is headed for Tarshish. Yet he is confident that everything is all right. He can sleep in this storm when even the sailors are frightened, and these sailors are a bunch of pagans, worshiping all kinds of gods.
So the shipmaster came to him, and said unto him, What meanest thou, O sleeper? arise, call upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon us, that we perish not [Jonah 1:6].
In effect, the shipmaster says, “You sleepyhead, you! Do you mean that you can sleep in a storm like this?” Jonah could. In fact, he is the only one on board who could sleep! The shipmaster goes on, “Arise, call upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon us, that we perish not.” So Jonah now comes up on deck, and he sees this great storm they are in which is threatening to send the ship to the bottom.
And they said every one to his fellow, Come, and let us cast lots, that we may know for whose cause this evil is upon us. So they cast lots, and the lot fell upon Jonah [Jonah 1:7].
On other occasions when I have taught the Book of Jonah, some folk have misunderstood me at this point and have thought that I approved of gambling. I hope you will follow me very carefully at this time. I think that gambling is an awful curse. I believe that the use of the lottery and of gambling in order to raise revenue for the government will ultimately corrupt our people and our nation. In the end it will be more destructive than it could possibly be helpful.
Other folk are quick to point out that this was a superstitious thing the sailors were doing, casting lots to see why this evil had come upon them. They cast lots, and it fell on Jonah. Apparently God was in this and used this, but that does not mean that God approved of it.
These sailors cast lots. Can God use something like that? I want to share with you an experience that I had in my first pastorate. The very wonderful pastor whom I followed there told me about a certain family in the church. The wife and the little girl, a beautiful, redheaded little girl, were both believers and attended the church, but the pastor had not been able to reach the father, the head of the home. At Christmastime that year, the father came to church. I whispered to several people to be friendly to him, and they all shook hands with him and greeted him. His criticism was that we overdid it. We were too friendly. So at Eastertime when he again came to church, I simply told the folk that he didn’t want us to shake hands with him and be friendly. So they didn’t, and I just barely shook his hand at the door. His criticism of the church then was that we were too cold. Now there was a fellow you couldn’t please at all! When I went to visit him, he practically ordered me out of the house—he didn’t want me to talk to him about the Lord.
About six months later, as I was getting ready for bed one night—in fact, I already had on my pajamas—the doorbell rang. I opened the door, and there stood this man with a very frightened look on his face. I let him in, and we sat down to talk. He told me that he ran a dry cleaning place and had a woman working there for him at the desk as a cashier. One morning she had come to work and told him, “I went to a fortune teller last night, and the fortune teller told me that I’m going to die suddenly.” Both he and the woman had laughed about it. Then she went on to say, “The fortune teller also said that the man I am working for is going to die suddenly.” They laughed again because they thought it was all preposterous and ridiculous.
But about two days later, as she stepped off the streetcar, that woman was hit by a car and was killed almost instantly. I want to tell you, when he heard it, he really became frightened. It was the very night when he came and knocked on my door. He said to me, “I must be next.”
I told him, “Well, I think I can relieve your fear there. The fortune teller had nothing in the world to do with her death—she had no prior knowledge of it. This is just one of those strange circumstances of life which we call a coincidence. This doesn’t mean that you will die.”
He said, “But I want to be prepared. Would you explain to me the plan of salvation?” I got down on the floor in my pajamas, with some wrapping paper and a piece of crayon, and I outlined the plan of salvation for him. I explained to him how God had sent Christ into the world to die for our sins. That man was ready that night and he accepted Christ as his Savior.
I have always thought that the Devil had pushed that fellow a little too far, because he was responsible for the man getting saved. Very frankly, God can use things like that. He says that He will make the wrath of man to praise Him, and He can also make the superstition of man to praise Him.
Those sailors on board with Jonah were superstitious fellow. God used their superstition. They cast lots, and the lot fell upon Jonah. Notice what happens—
They said they unto him, Tell us, we pray thee, for whose cause this evil is upon us; What is thine occupation? and whence comest thou? what is thy country? and of what people art thou [Jonah 1:8].
Jonah apparently has had some time to talk to these sailors, but he hasn’t told them much about himself. He certainly is no witness for God. A man out of the will of God can never be an effective witness for God. That is something very important for us to keep in mind.
Notice what Jonah did not tell them. First of all they say to him, “We want to ask you some questions since this evil has fallen on us. What is thine occupation?” Jonah hasn’t told anybody he is a prophet; he’s kept quiet on that. “And whence comest thou?” Jonah hasn’t told them he is from Gath-hepher in the northern kingdom of Israel. He hasn’t said anything about his hometown. “What is thy country?” He hasn’t said that he is a citizen of Israel. “And of what people art thou?” He hasn’t said that he belongs to the Israelite people who have a revelation of the living and true God. He hasn’t explained that he is a prophet who represents the living God and who has been called to go to Nineveh to bring a message of hope and salvation. Jonah hasn’t said any of that. Why? He is entirely out of the will of God.
And he said unto them, I am an Hebrew; and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven which hath made the sea and the dry land [Jonah 1:9].
“I am an Hebrew”—that meant a lot. The Hebrews were known to be monotheistic; that is, they worshipped one God, never an idol. They had no other gods before them but worshipped the God who is the Creator. Jonah says, “I fear the Lord, the God of heaven which hath made the sea and the dry land.” Jonah tells them that he worships the God who made the ocean which they could see right before them being so stirred up by the storm. He made the sea, and He made the dry land also. I think these sailors knew about Israel, but they were pagan and had no knowledge of the living and true God.
Then were the men exceedingly afraid, and said unto him, Why hast thou done this? For the men knew that he fled from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them [Jonah 1:10].
Although he could sleep with it very nicely, without question Jonah had a bad conscience. Jonah tells the sailors, “The reason I am taking this trip is for a pleasure trip Actually, I had business over in Nineveh, but I decided not to go over there. I know that I am getting away from my God in making this trip.” But Jonah hasn’t divulged too much information to them.
These men say to Jonah, “Why hast thou done this?” May I say to you, that is the good question that the unbeliever sometimes asks of the believer—and can be an embarrassing one.
When I was a pastor of a church in Los Angeles, an unsaved man who had visited the church came to see me. I had met him before in a business in downtown Los Angeles and had invited him to come to church. He said to me, “Is So-and-so a member of your church?” I said, “Yes, and he’s an officer in the church.” He said, “I’ve known that man for several years, and I’ve done business with him. I never would have dreamed that he is a Christian. If I were a Christian, I would not do the things that man does.” You know, it’s embarrassing when an unbeliever says to a Christian, “Why are you doing this? I thought you were a child of God.” I think Jonah must have turned three or four different shades of red at this particular time.
JONAH ARRIVES IN THE FISH
Then said they unto him, What shall we do unto thee, that the sea may be calm unto us? for the sea wrought, and was tempestuous [Jonah 1:11].
These men recognize that they are up against a very hard decision, and they want Jonah to make that decision. They ask him, “What shall we do unto thee, that the sea may be calm unto us?” And Jonah gives them a very straightforward answer—
And he said unto them, Take me up, and cast me forth into the sea; so shall the sea be calm unto you: for I know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you [Jonah 1:12].
Jonah recognizes that the hand of God is in all of this and that God is moving in his life at this time. He knows that the only solution to the problem of the storm is to get him off the ship going to Tarshish. God has determined that this man is not going to Tarshish but to the place where He wants him to go.
Nevertheless the men rowed hard to bring it to the land; but they could not: for the sea wrought, and was tempestuous against them [Jonah 1:13].
These pagan sailors certainly stand in a good light at this point. Although they are pagan and heathen, they do not want to throw him overboard. They try their best to get the ship out of the storm. They row as hard as they can to bring the ship to land, but they cannot do it. At this particular point in the book, these pagan sailors stand in a better light than Jonah does and prove to be rather outstanding men.
Wherefore they cried unto the Lord, and said, We beseech thee, O Lord, we beseech thee, let us not perish for this man’s life, and lay not upon us innocent blood: for thou, O Lord, hast done as it pleased thee [Jonah 1:14].
Notice the change that is taking place in these men’s lives. They are turning now to the living and true God. Of course, they are turning in their desperation. They call upon God to forgive them for what they are going to do, because they have no other alternative.
So they took up Jonah, and cast him forth into the sea: and the sea ceased from her raging [Jonah 1:15].
This reveals very definitely that it was a supernatural storm under God’s control.
Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly, and offered a sacrifice unto the Lord, and made vows [Jonah 1:16].
The fear of the Lord, we are told in Scripture, is the beginning of wisdom. “Then the men feared the Lord exceedingly.” Did they fear their god? No. They feared the one who is the Creator of the sea and of the land.
“And offered a sacrifice unto the Lord.” That sacrifice points to Jesus Christ—there is no alternative.
“And made vows.” What vows do these men make? They vow to the Lord that they will now serve Him. Through this experience, they now turn to the living and true God. So something good is accomplished by the storm, by Jonah’s being on board the ship, and by his being cast overboard.
Notice now what happens to Jonah—
Now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights [Jonah 1:17].
The Greek word translated as “whale” in Matthew 12:40 is ketos, meaning “a huge fish.” It is called here “a great fish.” I do not think it was a whale, but the thing that is important is the fact that the fish was prepared by the Lord for this special event. I am of the opinion that we have a miracle in this fish in the sense that it was a specially prepared fish to swallow up Jonah.
“And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.” Notice that it does not say that Jonah was alive inside the fish.
A review of my timetable for the Book of Jonah shows that in chapter 1 Jonah leaves Israel, his destination is Nineveh, but he arrives in the fish.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: When did Jonah pray? Jonah’s prayer; Jonah arrives on the dry land
Our timetable for chapter 2 tells us that Jonah is going to leave the fish, his destination is still Nineveh, and he will arrive on the dry land. First, however, we want to examine the experience of this man inside the fish.
WHEN DID JONAH PRAY?
Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish’s belly [Jonah 2:1].
Immediately someone is going to say to me, “You believe that Jonah was dead inside the fish and that God raised him from the dead, but it says here that Jonah prayed unto the Lord God out of the fish’s belly—that means he was alive inside the fish.” That is true, but my question is: When did Jonah pray this prayer? Did he pray this prayer when he first got into the fish? Or, when Jonah found himself inside the fish, did he say to himself, “My, I am really here in a precarious position, and things sure don’t look good for me. I want to prepare a prayer to send to God that He’ll hear and answer”? Did he decide to write out his prayer, work on it for a couple of days, memorize it, and then on the third day say the prayer to God? If Jonah did that, then my interpretation of this is all wrong—I’m all wet, if you please. But if I know human nature at all, Jonah didn’t wait very long to pray this prayer. When he found himself in this condition, you can be sure of one thing: he immediately went to prayer before God. In fact, I think he prayed on the way down, and by the time he got into the fish’s tummy, it was time to say amen.
Men don’t pray a prepared prayer in time of crisis. They get down to business immediately when the crisis comes. I am reminded of a friend of mine in the ministry who lost the index finger on his right hand below the first joint—there was nothing left but a stub. When anyone would ask him how he was called to the ministry, he would hold up that little stub of a finger and wiggle it, and then he would tell his story.
When he was a boy, an evangelist came to their church to hold meetings. The first night of the meetings, his dad, who was an officer in the church, made him sit on the front row, and the preacher really made that seat hot for him. He knew the preacher was talking right to him, although the preacher himself didn’t realize it. His dad made him go to the meeting the second night, and he knew that if he went yet another time, he not only would accept Christ as his Savior but would also give his life to enter the ministry. He had a feeling even at that time that that would be his call. So that night after everybody went to bed, he got an extra shirt and his pajamas and ran off to Mississippi. There he got a job in a sawmill. I don’t know if you are acquainted with the old-time sawmill. A man would take a great hook and would roll the logs over onto the carriage which would take the log on down to the big saw. The saw would then rip that log right down through the middle. My friend’s job was to roll the logs onto the carriage.
One afternoon after he had worked there for about two weeks, he ran out of logs. So the foreman got some old logs which had not been run through the saw for one reason or another. There was one log among them that had already been ripped about halfway. For some reason they hadn’t finished it but had pulled it back out. When my friend rolled that particular log over onto the carriage which carried it into the band saw, the place where the log had previously been ripped opened up, and the index finger on his right hand got caught in it. He felt himself being pulled along the carriage toward that big band saw. He began to yell at the top of his voice, but by that time, the other end of the log had hit the saw and was already going through. If you have ever been around a sawmill, you know that that makes a terrible racket—nobody could hear him. He was yelling at the top of his voice, very frightened as he found himself being pulled against his will right into that saw.
It would take only about forty-five seconds for him to get to the saw. His finger was way out in front of him, and the place where the log had been sawed was clamped down tight on it. His finger hit the saw and was cut off. But that released him, and he rolled to the side and was safe. In that forty-five seconds, he had prayed to the Lord. He accepted Christ as his Savior, promised the Lord he would go into the ministry and do His will, and told Him a lot of other things also! My preacher friend used to say that he told the Lord more in that forty-five seconds than he has ever told Him in an hour’s prayer since then.
May I say to you, he prayed that prayer immediately when the crisis came. That’s when I pray; that’s when you pray. You don’t wait to pray in a time of emergency. I recall one time on a plane when we got into unusually rough weather—I don’t like flying even in good weather, and this rough weather was terrific. The minute the plane began to drop—it seemed to me like it was never going to quit dropping!—I began to pray. I didn’t say, “I’m going to wait until we are off the plane, I’m going to wait until we get out of this storm before I pray.” I began to pray right there and then. I’m sure that’s what you do, and I’m almost sure that’s what Jonah did, also.
So Jonah prayed this prayer as he went down from the mouth of the fish and through the esophagus. By the time he went “kerplunk” into the fish’s tummy, this man Jonah had already completed his prayer and had said amen. I think he prayed a great deal more than is recorded here—I think we have “the abridged edition” of it.
Some folk put a great deal of emphasis upon the time word then—“Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish’s belly.” They assume that this means that after he had been in the fish three days and three nights, then he prayed. This is not what it means at all. It is characteristic of the Hebrew language to give the full account of something and then to go back and emphasize that which is important. This same technique is used in Genesis concerning the creation. We are given the six days of creation, and then God goes back and gives a detailed account of the creation of man, adding a great deal. To attempt to build an assumption on the little word then is very fallacious. It simply means that now Jonah is going to tell us the story in detail; he is going to tell us what really happened inside the fish.
JONAH’S PRAYER
And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice [Jonah 2:2].
“Icried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me.” Notice first that God heard Jonah’s prayer.
“Out of the belly of hell cried I.” The New Scofield Reference Bible translates this as “out of the belly of sheol,” and that certainly is accurate for that is the original Hebrew word. Sheol is sometimes translated in Scripture by the word “grave” and in other places as “the unseen world,” meaning where the dead go. This is a word that, anyway you look at it, has to do with death. It is a word that always goes to the cemetery, and you cannot take it anywhere else. Therefore, my interpretation of what Jonah is saying is that the belly of the fish was his grave, and a grave is a place for the dead—you do not put a live man in a grave. Jonah recognized that he was going to die inside that fish and that God would hear him and raise him from the dead.
Many years ago when I was still a young seminary student, I was asked to preach for a brief period of time at the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, Georgia. I made the Sunday evening service an evangelistic service. One night several young people came forward when I gave the invitation. After the service I talked to them, and then I went to the rear of the church. A young fellow was standing there, and he told me, “I’m a student at Georgia Tech, and I would like to accept Christ, but I have a hurdle, a problem that I can’t overcome.” I asked him what his problem was, and he replied, “I just can’t believe that a man could live three days and three nights inside a fish.”
I said, “Who told you that?”
“Well,” he said, “I thought the Bible said so, and I know I’ve heard preachers say so. And I’ve got a professor at school who spends his time ridiculing that.”
“My Bible doesn’t say that Jonah was alive inside the fish,” I told him. Then I opened my Bible to the second chapter of Jonah and said, “To begin with, this man Jonah makes it very clear that the belly of the fish was his grave. A grave is a place for the dead.”
“Do you mean that he died? Then that means that God raised him from the dead!” the young man said. I told him he was exactly right—that is exactly what happened. He said, “That’s a greater miracle than Jonah’s being kept alive in the fish for three days.” I agreed with him that it was a greater miracle because, as we shall see, we have records of other men who have lived through such experiences.
The important thing to note here is that Jonah cried unto the Lord out of the fish’s belly, out of the belly of hell, out of the belly of sheol, out of the belly of the grave—and that is the place for the dead. Jonah felt like he was there to die and that he was in his grave. You must remember that he did not write this account while he was inside the fish but afterward.
I realize there are those who will not accept my viewpoint concerning this. When I wrote my first booklet on it, I felt very much alone. However, when the late Dr. M. R. DeHaan also took this viewpoint, many folk accepted it because of their confidence in him.
If you hold the other viewpoint that Jonah was alive, that’s all right. God certainly could have kept Jonah alive. But, my friend, don’t hold that viewpoint to the extent that you prevent a lot of young people from defending the Bible. This young man from Georgia Tech went back to college, and when his professor again brought up the subject of Jonah, he said to the professor, “Who told you that Jonah was alive inside the fish?” The professor said, “The Bible says so.” This young fellow said to him, “Not my Bible.” When they got out a Bible (which they had trouble finding) and looked at the Scripture, they found that it does not say that Jonah was alive inside the fish.
I want to share with you a letter that came to me from Austin, Texas, and which reveals the popular interpretation of the Book of Jonah:
Thank you for responding to my letter concerning Jonah. It is a mark of your dedication that you take time to answer such letters, since I am sure you get many. I believe you are doing a fine work for the Lord, and in listening to you over the years, I think you are not getting older but getting better.
(May I say to you, I’m getting older, but no one’s kidding me, I’m not getting better!) The letter continues:
Your story about your fear of flying and how you conquered it brings meaning to a living faith, but as far as Jonah goes, you are, I believe, putting in a private interpretation. You’re straining the Word to make it say something it doesn’t say. May I go on to say that the fact that Jonah lived three days in the whale’s belly doesn’t do any damage to the reference in Matthew 12:39–40.
Why don’t you take your Bible and read it again? If we forget the chapter designation, it helps. “And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord his God out of the fish’s belly.” I guess that Jonah did a lot of soul-searching during those three days. If you interpret this passage like you do, you must believe the writer didn’t have enough sense to put the story down in the sequence it occurred.
… You state that it is assumed that Jonah was alive. Well, I don’t believe it is, but if you want to say that, I think your assumption [that he was dead] is the greater assumption, and I hope you realize you are only assuming. My question to you is: Why?
I appreciate that letter, and I recognize that the general and popular interpretation is that Jonah was alive for three days and three nights inside the fish, that he apparently had a very comfortable weekend inside a “fish-tel” instead of a motel. I don’t think he could have been as comfortable as he would have been in a Holiday Inn, a Ramada Inn, or a Hilton Hotel, but at least it is popularly believed that he spent three days and three nights in there alive. In fact, when I was a boy in Sunday school, I was given a little card on which Jonah was shown inside the fish, sitting at a table! I don’t know where that came from, but that was the way he was pictured and, although I was just a little fellow, it rather disturbed me.
If you hold the viewpoint that Jonah was alive, you are with the majority today, even with the majority of the expositors of the Book of Jonah. You can feel comfortable in being with the majority, but of course, if you want to be right, you’ll want to go along with me, I’m sure! I say this facetiously, of course.
However, I want to make this point very carefully and very seriously. It is not a question of whether God was able to keep Jonah alive inside the fish or not. God could keep him alive. The question is: Did God keep him alive? Was the miracle one of keeping him alive, or was the miracle in raising him from the dead? Since this book illustrates resurrection, I’m of the opinion that God raised him from the dead.
If, after I have had a little talk with Jonah in heaven, I learn that he was alive for three days and three nights inside that fish, then you can come by and say, “I told you so.” Then I will have to confess that I was wrong. I am not, however, as the writer of this letter seems to think, taking an assumption and making a dogmatic statement.
I do want to say that I have had the privilege of teaching the Book of Jonah on quite a few college campuses, and I have found that the position I take does give ammunition to young people today. If you want to hold to the opposite viewpoint, don’t get enraged and become irritated with my viewpoint, for you must recognize that it has been very helpful to a great many students. It has been the means, as in the case of the Georgia Tech student years ago, of bringing some to a saving knowledge of Christ.
It is also not a question of whether a man can live in a fish. Men have been swallowed by a fish or by a whale and have lived to tell the story. There have been recorded some remarkable stories. So that leads me to say that, if you believe Jonah was alive inside the fish, that is not too great a miracle because other men have had the same experience.
Many years ago here in Pasadena, California, there was a very excellent Bible teacher by the name of Miss Grace W. Kellogg. She gave me a copy of her little book, The Bible Today. She held the old viewpoint that Jonah was alive inside the fish, and she wanted me to see that Jonah could have been alive. Of course, I agree that he could have been alive, and if that is what Jonah means to have said, then I have really misunderstood him. Nonetheless, I would like to give you a quotation from Miss Kellogg’s book which shows that it is possible for a man to be swallowed by a fish and live. There are many examples of it, and I am going to give you a few of those that she gave:
There are at least two known monsters of the deep who could easily have swallowed Jonah. They are the Balaenoptera Musculus or sulphur-bottom whale, and the Rhinodon Typicus or whale shark. Neither of these monsters of the deep have any teeth. They feed in an interesting way by opening their enormous mouths, submerging their lower jaw, and rushing through the water at terrific speed. After straining out the water, they swallow whatever is left. A sulphur-bottom whale, one hundred feet long, was captured off Cape Cod in 1933. His mouth was ten or twelve feet wide—so big he could easily have swallowed a horse. These whales have four to six compartments in their stomachs, in any one of which a colony of men could find free lodging. They might even have a choice of rooms, for in the head of this whale is a wonderful air storage chamber, an enlargement of the nasal sinus, often measuring seven feet high, seven feet wide, by fourteen feet long. If he has an unwelcome guest on board who gives him a headache, the whale swims to the nearest land and gets rid of the offender as he did Jonah.
The Cleveland Plain Dealer recently quoted an article by Dr. Ransome Harvey who said that a dog was lost overboard from a ship. It was found in the head of a whale six days later, alive and barking.
Frank Bullen, F.R.G.S., who wrote, “The Cruise of the Cathalot,” tells of a shark fifteen feet in length which was found in the stomach of a whale. He says that when dying the whale ejects the contents of its stomach.
The late Dr. Dixon stated that in a museum at Beirut, Lebanon, there is a head of a whale shark big enough to swallow the largest man that history records! He also tells of a white shark of the Mediterranean which swallowed a whole horse; another swallowed a reindeer minus only its horns. In still another Mediterranean white shark was found a whole sea cow, about the size of an ox.
These facts show that Jonah could have been swallowed by either a whale or a shark. But has any other man besides Jonah been swallowed and lived to tell the tale? We know of two such instances.
The famous French scientist, M. de Parville, writes of James Bartley, who in the region of the Falkland Islands near South America, was supposed to have been drowned at sea. Two days after his disappearance, the sailors made a catch of a whale. When it was cut up, much to their surprise they found their missing friend alive but unconscious inside the whale. He revived and has been enjoying the best of health ever since his adventure.
Dr. Harry Rimmer, President of the Research Science Bureau of Los Angeles, writes of another case. “In the Literary Digest we noticed an account of an English sailor who was swallowed by a gigantic Rhinodon in the English Channel. Briefly, the account stated that in the attempt to harpoon one of these monstrous sharks, this sailor fell overboard, and before he could be picked up again, the shark turned and engulfed him. Forty-eight hours after the accident occurred, the fish was sighted and slain. When the shark was opened by the sailors, they were amazed to find the man unconscious but alive! He was rushed to the hospital where he was found to be suffering from shock alone, and a few hours later was discharged as being physically fit. The account concluded by saying that the man was on exhibit in a London Museum at a shilling admittance fee; being advertised as ‘The Jonah of the Twentieth Century.’ ”
In 1926 Dr. Rimmer met this man, and writes that his physical appearance was odd; his body was devoid of hair and patches of yellowish-brown color covered his entire skin.
If two men could exist for two days and nights inside of marine monsters, could not a prophet of God, under His direct care and protection, stand the experience a day and a night longer—so why should we doubt God’s Word?
This demonstrates the fact that a man could live in a fish, but it also takes away from the unusual character of Jonah’s experience; that is, if these men lived and Jonah lived—and I am told there are even other records of such experiences—then what you have in the Book of Jonah is a record of something that is not really a great miracle. You simply have a record of an unusual incident that took place. I personally believe that the greater miracle is the fact that God raised him from the dead.
Again, I remind you that the question before us is not whether God could make a man live for three days and three nights inside a fish; the question is: Did God do that? Is that what the record says?
For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me [Jonah 2:3].
We cannot treat this lightly. If Jonah lived in the fish, he also lived like a fish, because he was swamped by water. He says, “The floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.” In other words, Jonah is saying, “I got wet.” I think it is all wet to try to say that the man lived three days and three nights. I personally feel that the Devil gets us to argue about that, while we miss the great truth of the resurrection.
Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple [Jonah 2:4].
“Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight”—Jonah is speaking of death. “Yet I will look again toward thy holy temple.” Jonah believed that he would be raised from the dead. He had been brought up on the Old Testament, and I think that Jonah was one of the many in the northern kingdom who faithfully went down to Jerusalem to worship in the temple. The Israelites knew that Solomon’s temple was the place to worship the living and true God. Jonah says, “I’m going to look again toward thy holy temple. God will raise me up again.”
Does this sound to you like a man who is alive?—
The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head [Jonah 2:5].
“The waters compassed me about, even to the soul.” He’s saying, “I got drenched. The depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head.” This sea monster had been eating a bunch of seaweeds. Some seaweeds that I have pulled out along the Pacific Coast are twenty-five feet long—and this monster had his tummy full of them! Jonah says, “I was down there, and I got these things all wrapped around my head.” Do you think this man is describing a very pleasant weekend inside a fish? I don’t think so—I think he is trying to tell us that he went down to the very depths and that he died.
I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God [Jonah 2:6].
“I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever.” This is a very interesting translation because it is in Elizabethan English; this is the way that death was spoken of. “The earth with her bars was about me for ever”—Jonah is speaking here of the bars of death, and that is the meaning of this translation.
“Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God.” “Corruption” is death. The apostle Peter so used this word on the Day of Pentecost when he said that the Lord Jesus did not see corruption (see Acts 2:25–31). The miracle about the Lord Jesus is that when He died He did not see corruption—His body did not corrupt. That is the difference between Jonah’s experience and our Lord’s experience. Jonah did see corruption. His body apparently began to decay in those three days and three nights. “Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption.” What we have here, in my judgment, is a definite statement by Jonah that he died. The miracle here is resurrection, and that is a much greater miracle than for a man to live for three days inside a fish.
I think it is very important that we have a book in the Old Testament which teaches the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Resurrection is one of the two pillars of our salvation upon which the ark of the church rests—the death of Christ and the resurrection of Christ. They are both taught in the Old Testament, and this book illustrates His resurrection.
When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple [Jonah 2:7].
I think a normal explanation of this would be that when this man was swallowed by the fish, he was frightened. He began immediately to call out to God to deliver him as he found himself going down the esophagus of that fish.
“My soul fainted within me.” It must have been at least five minutes before Jonah lapsed into unconsciousness, but before he did, he said, “I remembered the Lord.” This is when he prayed his prayer. Don’t try to tell me that he prayed his prayer on the third day, after he’d spent three days in there under conviction and soul—searching! Jonah has said that his soul got wet, and now he says that his soul fainted within him—that means he lost consciousness inside the fish.
“And my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple.” Before he lapsed into unconsciousness and before death came to him, this man had already prayed his prayer.
Jonah now makes an observation here, and it is one of the many maxims that you find in the Word of God—
They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy [Jonah 2:8].
I have tried to arrive at a satisfactory explanation of this verse, and so far I have been unable to do so. However, I will have to give you the explanation I have: This is another of the great principles in Scripture. Vanity is emptiness. Jonah is speaking here of those who observe that which is empty, that which is vain, that which is just a dream and is not going to come to pass. Jonah calls it a lying emptiness. He says that they forsake the only mercy they can receive. Jonah says at this time, “I called out to the living and true God. I no longer was playing the pouting prophet, rushing off to Tarshish in the opposite direction because I hated the Ninevites and didn’t want them saved. Now I am dealing with reality. I’m getting right down to the nitty-gritty.” (And, my friend, there was a whole lot of nitty-gritty inside that fish!) This man says, “I’m getting right down to business with God. I appealed to Him, to His mercy, and I found that He was merciful to me.”
Jonah cried out to God, and now he shows his gratitude by saying this:
But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord [Jonah 2:9].
“But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving.” Friend, I don’t suppose you and I can possibly conceive of the thanksgiving that was in this man’s heart and life when the fish vomited him out onto the dry land. He was a mess at that time, but he lifted his voice in thanksgiving to God for having delivered him and raised him from the dead.
“I will pay that that I have vowed.” Do you know what Jonah’s vow was? Can’t you imagine what it was? I believe that he now says to the Lord, “I’ll go to Nineveh.” Before he had said, “I won’t go to Nineveh.” But he’s changed his mind—God has changed it for him—and now he makes a vow that he will go to Nineveh.
The Lord has to deal with many of us like that. He has never put me through a fish, but He did give me cancer. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not blaming Him for that—He was judging me. He has also chastised me since then, because I thought that I had learned all the lessons an old man ought to learn, but I found out that I hadn’t learned them. I am prepared to say the same thing Jonah said. I am thankful to Him for the trials He has permitted to come to me and for His deliverance from them. I’ve made vows to God; I’ve promised Him that I would devote the rest of my life to giving out His Word—that is what He has called me to do. Many people find fault and do not like the way I do it—I’m not entirely satisfied myself; I wish I could do it better—but I’ve made a vow to God, and I understand the vow this man Jonah made. He said, “I’m going to Nineveh, Lord, and I’m going to do what You want me to do.”
“Salvation is of the Lord.” In my judgment this is the most important statement that we find in the Book of Jonah. I think it is very, very important. Notice what he says: “I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord”—he is speaking of deliverance.
There are several things about this that we need to note. Salvation is God’s work for us. Salvation is never man’s work for God. God cannot save us by our works, because the only thing that we can present to Him is imperfection, and God simply does not accept imperfection. However, we are unable to present perfection to Him. If it depended on us or our works, if it depended on our doing something, we could never be saved. To begin with, we are lost sinners, dead in trespasses and sins. If deliverance is to come, it will have to come to us like it did to Jonah, who was dead and hopeless in that fish. If he is to live, if he is to be used of God (and he is going to be used), it will be because “Salvation is of the Lord.” And if you ever get saved, it is because salvation is of the Lord.
Salvation is such a wonderful thing that you can put it into three tenses: I have been saved—past tense; I am being saved—present tense; I shall be saved—future tense. So salvation is God’s work from beginning to end. Let’s look for a moment at what Scripture has to say about this.
1. I have been saved—past tense. The Lord Jesus Christ said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life …” (John 5:24). The moment you trust Christ you have everlasting life. That is something that took place in the past for those who are Christians today. If sometime in the past you trusted Christ, that was all His work—you trusted what He did. “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life …” (John 3:36). You received life when you trusted Christ. You did nothing, nothing whatsoever—He offered it to you as a gift. “… the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). I have been saved. How was I saved? By trusting Christ and His work. It was “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost” (Titus 3:5).
2. I am being saved—present tense. God is not through with us; He intends to continue to work in our lives. We are told “… work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12–13). You can’t work it out until God has worked it in. Paul could say, “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Eph. 2:8–9). That’s great, but the apostle didn’t stop there; he went on to say, “For we are his workmanship …” (Eph. 2:10). His workmanship? Yes. “Created in Christ Jesus”—we were given a new life; Paul adds, “Created in Christ Jesus unto good works.” So that now by the power of the Holy Spirit, the child of God is to produce fruit. The Lord Jesus said that He wanted us to bring forth much fruit (see John 15:1–5). Paul writes in Galatians, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law” (Gal. 5:22–23). All of these marvelous, wonderful graces are His work, and He wants to work them in you today.
You and I ought to be growing in grace and in the knowledge of Christ. I am being saved—I ought to be a better Christian today than I was last year. I get a little discouraged in that connection, because sometimes I feel that I’m like the proverbial cat which climbed up three feet on the pole in the daytime but slipped back five feet at night! I feel like I haven’t gotten very far, but nevertheless, there has been some growth. Don’t be satisfied with me, because He is not through with me yet. “Salvation is of the Lord.”
3. I will be saved—future tense. There is coming a day when I will be saved. Paul said to that young preacher, Timothy, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16). As Paul talked to him about the wonderful Word of God, he also said, “… from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation …” (2 Tim. 3:15). Since Timothy was already saved, what did Paul mean when he said, “which are able to make thee wise unto salvation”? He meant that the Scriptures would enable Timothy to grow and enable him to live for God.
But even when we come to the end of life, we are not complete. Dwight L. Moody, the great evangelist, used to tell about the time when he heard Henry Varley, then an unknown preacher. As Moody sat in the balcony, he heard Varley say, “The world has yet to see what God can do with a man who is fully yielded to Him.” Dwight L. Moody, just a young fellow at that time, said to himself, “By the grace of God, I will be that man.” But when he was dying, Moody said, “I wanted to be that man, but it is still true that the world has yet to see what God can do with a man who is fully yielded to Him.” My friend, I am of the opinion that when you and I get to the end of our lives, the same will be true of you and me. It can still be said that the world has yet to see a person completely yielded to God.
So don’t be discouraged with me, and I won’t be discouraged with you, because, beloved, “… it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). We are going to see Him some day, and then we are going to be like Him. Until then, I’ll probably be very unlike Him. Maybe you will make it; I don’t think I will. But in that day, I will be like Him, and at that time you are going to be delighted with me, and you are really going to love me. That is one thing that will make heaven so wonderful. Not only am I going to love everybody, but everybody is going to love me! When we get to heaven, we are going to be like Him.
“Salvation is of the Lord.” This is a wonderful statement, and it is found in the Old Testament in the Book of Jonah. Do you know where this man learned that? He learned that when he was swallowed by a fish and then vomited out—then he was able to make this statement.
JONAH ARRIVES ON THE DRY LAND
And the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land [Jonah 2:1].
I cannot resist making this corny statement: It just goes to show that you can’t keep a good man down! Someone else has put it like this, “Even a fish couldn’t digest Jonah, the backsliding prophet.” But Jonah is a different man now. He’s made some vows to God, and one of them is that he is going to Nineveh. His ticket is now to Nineveh.
CHAPTER 3
Theme: The God of the second chance; Jonah arrives in Nineveh; Nineveh believes God; Nineveh is not destroyed
Our timetable for the Book of Jonah tells us that all along Jonah’s destination has been the city of Nineveh. As we come to chapter 3, his destination is still Nineveh, he leaves the dry land, and he is going to arrive in Nineveh! It has taken him three chapters, and he has had to detour through a fish, but he finally makes it. The turning around place for him was that fish—it turned him around and headed him in the right direction.
I would like to write over this third chapter the words of the Lord Jesus in His day: “For as Jonas was a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the Son of man be to this generation” (Luke 11:3).
THE GOD OF THE SECOND CHANCE
And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time, saying [Jonah 3:1].
“The word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.” I was speaking on the Book of Jonah many years ago at a summer conference, and there was a school teacher attending the meetings. She was a lovely person, but after every session, she would come to me with a question. (School teachers always could ask me questions that I couldn’t answer!) One day she asked me this question: “Suppose that after Jonah got out of the fish, he went back to Joppa and bought another ticket to go to Tarshish. What would have happened?” I had never been asked that question before, but I told her—and I still believe it—that there would have been a second fish out there waiting for him. But that wasn’t necessary because Jonah had already learned his lesson. Now he was going to Nineveh—there’s no question about that—he was headed for Nineveh.
I think the same thing could be said of the prodigal son. Suppose that the next year that boy had said, “Dad, stake me again. I’m going to the far country.” Do you think the father would have staked him? I think he would have. The interesting thing is that the boy didn’t go to the far country. Why? Because he is a son of the father, and he didn’t want to get into the pigpen again. God’s children may get into sin, but they surely are not going to live in sin. Pigs live in pigpens, and sons live in the father’s house. It is just that simple and just that important.
“And the word of the Lord came unto Jonah the second time.” Our God is the God of the second chance—what a marvelous, wonderful thing that is! God will give you a second chance, and He will give you more than that. I know that He has given me a dozen different chances. He is long-suffering and patient. He is not willing that any should perish. If you are His child, He is going to hold on to you—you may be sure of that.
Jonah now gets the call from God a second time. I do not believe that the great corporations of our day would give a man a second chance. General Motors or Standard Oil or General Foods—I have a notion that they would not give a man a second chance. Years ago here in California I became acquainted with a man who was the first vice-president of the Bank of America, which is a tremendous banking corporation. He is a very wonderful Christian and a personal friend of mine. I asked him one time, “Suppose that in one of the branches of your bank the manager absconded with all the funds, disappeared down to South America somewhere, and then, after a few years, came back and asked to be forgiven and given another chance. Would you give him a job?” He replied, “No. He’s through.” Such a man would not be given another chance. Isn’t it wonderful that God gives us a second chance?
This is not something unusual that God did just in Jonah’s case. God is not making an exception with Jonah. Remember the story of Jacob way back in the Book of Genesis? Jacob failed again and again and again and again until he actually became a disgrace to God and a source of embarrassment to Him. But God never let him go. Jacob was a trickster. He was clever. He tried to live by his own ability even when he went down to live with his uncle Laban. Laban was smarter than Jacob and put it over on him, but Jacob did what he could, and he did pretty well. In the end, Jacob had to flee from Laban and get out of the country. He had antagonized both his father-in-law and his brother, Esau, because of his conduct. But he could not keep on like that because he was God’s man. He did want to serve God, but what a poor showing he made of it. As far as I’m concerned, I would have gotten rid of him and would have gotten someone else if I had been the Lord, but God didn’t do that.
At Peniel, when Jacob came back to the land, God wrestled with him one night. Sometimes it is said that Jacob wrestled with God. Jacob didn’t wrestle with God, my friend. With his father-in-law behind him and his brother ahead of him, both of them wishing Jacob dead, you may be sure of one thing: Jacob was not looking for another wrestling match! He had enough problems on his hands, and he was not about to do any wrestling. It was God who wrestled with him at Peniel. That man had to learn something that night. God crippled him before He got him, but when Jacob saw that he was losing, he finally just held on and asked for a blessing.
From that day on, Jacob was a different man. He was changed, as we can see down there in Egypt when he met his grandchildren, Joseph’s sons. I’m a grandfather, and I know that a grandpa is inclined to boast just a little; you would like your grandsons to think well of you. But old Jacob didn’t tell his grandsons how smart he was or how clever he was, how he put it over on Esau or how he put it over on his father-in-law Laban. This is what he did say: “May the Lord, who kept me from evil, keep the lads” (see Gen. 48:16). What a change had come over him! How humble he was. He was now resting in God, and he was a different man.
Then there is the story of David. Even today there are a great many folk who like to criticize David. One evil old man came to me with a leer in his eyes and a sneer in his voice, and he said to me, “Why did God say that David was a man after His own heart?”
I asked him, “Are you trying to say that it was because David committed murder and adultery that God said that about him? Is that what you are trying to say?” “Well, it certainly looks that way,” he said.
That man simply hadn’t read the record at all. It is true that David committed an awful sin, but God punished him for it. God took him to the woodshed and whipped him within an inch of his life. Finally his heart was broken when his son Absalom was slain. That was the boy he had wanted to be king, but Absalom betrayed him. He led a rebellion against David and was murdered. How David wept! He cried, “Oh, Absalom, my son, Absalom; would to God that I had died in your stead!” (see 2 Sam. 18:33). David feared that Absalom did not know God, and so he was heartbroken the rest of his life. God punished David because of his sin, but God forgave David when he came to Him and said, “Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation …” (Ps. 51:12).
I went on to tell that old man who had come to me, “You know, you ought to be very glad that God said David was a man after His own heart because of his relationship with God. If God would save a man like David, He might save you, and He might save me. You ought to be thankful He’s that kind of a God. He gave David a second chance, and He will give you a second and a third chance.”
Simon Peter also stumbled and fell and got himself dirty. He denied Christ, and when he looked through that judgment hall, he caught the eyes of the Lord. They were not eyes looking at him in anger but in pity and in mercy. Peter went outside and wept. And then when our Lord came back from the dead, He appeared to Simon Peter privately so that Simon Peter could get things straightened out with Him.
My friend, if you are a child of God and get into sin, you can come back to Him, but you’d better mean business, and you’d better be sincere. You can go to Him and tell Him what you can tell no one else. He will accept you and receive you—He is the God of the second chance.
There is another man who failed—John Mark. He wasn’t much of a missionary at first. In fact, he was chicken; he turned and went home. I once heard of a man who said that the reason he didn’t fly in airplanes was because he had back trouble. When he was asked what kind of back trouble he had, he replied, “I’ve got a yellow streak up and down my back. ” John Mark had a yellow streak up and down his back—he turned and left that first missionary journey of the apostle Paul. Good old Barnabas wanted to forgive him and take him on the second missionary journey, but Paul said, “I won’t take him again. I’m through with him. I’m not about to take with me anyone who turns and runs home to mama as that boy did.” Paul had to change his mind later, because God will receive, and God did receive John Mark. So when Paul wrote his swan song, 2 Timothy, he said, “Take Mark, and bring him with thee: for he is profitable to me for the ministry” (2 Tim. 4:11). John Mark made good. Aren’t you glad that God gives us a second chance?
My final illustration is one not from the Bible but is very much up-to-date. Years ago here in Southern California, I was teaching the Book of Jonah on an evening radio broadcast that I had at that time. A day or two after I had enlarged on this first verse of the third chapter, I received a letter from a medical doctor in Beverly Hills, California. He said, “I want you to know that this verse is now the most important verse in the Bible to me. When you said that God is the God of the second chance, I came back to Him.” He went on in his letter to tell me his story. He had come from Chicago where he had been a prominent doctor and also an officer in the church. Problems arose in the church which involved the handling of property and funds. He was blamed for the problems, although he was not guilty and had not been involved at all. He became bitter and actually left the Chicago area. He came to California and established an office here, but he never would darken the door of a church. He did, however, listen to me on the radio. When I said that God is a God of the second chance, this man wrote that “it was just like a cool drink of water to a man who was out on the desert, dying of thirst. That meant more to me than anything.” I sat down and wrote that man a letter, and I did what any preacher would do—I urged him to get into a church and to get busy again for the Lord. He wrote again and said, “I’m already back in church and busy for the Lord.” God is the God of the second chance, my friend; He is wonderful.
Jonah’s story is an illustration of how God treats His children when they sin and come back to Him. The prodigal son came home. When he came home, he didn’t get a beating; he got a banquet. He didn’t get kicked around; he got kisses. Instead of the poor boy being put out of the house and rejected, the father took the boy back. How wonderful this is!
JONAH ARRIVES IN NINEVEH
Now we are going to see how God is gracious to a sinful city. This is a record of perhaps the greatest revival in the history of the world; that is, what we call a revival—people turning to God. What happened in Nineveh makes the Day of Pentecost look very small. A few thousand turned to God on the Day of Pentecost, but there were several hundred thousand in the city of Nineveh who turned to God. There has never been anything quite like it—an entire city turned to God! No one else has ever seen that happen. The apostle Paul never stayed in a city until everyone was converted; he just preached the Word and moved on to the next town. No one from that day down to the present has seen such a moving of the Spirit of God as took place in Nineveh so long ago.
It is interesting to note that all this happened in Nineveh before the church arrived on the scene, and the greatest revival of all time will take place after the church leaves the earth. You see, God is simply not dependent upon the church. If you have the notion that the church or your church or your group are the only ones God has ever had in mind, I say to you very candidly that it is a false notion. God has something even bigger in mind than the church. Now the church is to be the bride of Christ and will, I think, occupy the very closest place to the Son of God throughout eternity, but God had a purpose in mind before the church got here and even before man appeared on this earth. God was not sitting around, twiddling His thumbs and waiting for man to come along, my friend!
Today His purpose is to call out a people from every tribe, tongue, and nation. We believe that we are coming to the end of the age and that God wants the Word to go out so that everyone might hear. However, the greatest revival, the greatest turning to God, is yet in the future, and the story of Nineveh is just a small adumbration of that.
Arise, go unto Nineveh, that great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid thee [Jonah 3:2].
We have been told before that this city of Nineveh was a great city (see Jonah 1:2), and the last verse of the Book of Jonah also says, “And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?” (Jonah 4:11). The unbeliever has criticized the Book of Jonah on many counts, and one of them is the fact that three times in this book it says that Nineveh was a great city, an exceeding great city. The Ninevites were great in sin, to be sure, but they also had a very large city.
However, nothing was known about Nineveh until 1845 when Sir Austen Layard was the first to examine the ruins of this city; he and George Smith excavated the ancient city of Nineveh. Nineveh proper, that is, the tell of Nineveh, was across the Tigris River from the modern city of Mosul. It was built in the shape of a trapezium, which was about two and one-half miles in length and a mile and one-third in breadth. That would make it a pretty good-sized place, but I would say very frankly that that does not meet the demands of the Book of Jonah.
The city of Nineveh lay in a plain which was almost entirely surrounded by rivers. The Tigris River came along to a point at which the Upper Zab River ran into it, forming a V-shaped valley between the two rivers. Then across the top of them, at the north, there was a range of mountains. This entire area, therefore, was protected by the natural fortifications of the rivers and the mountains. There were several prominent cities in this natural enclosure. Nineveh was located up on the Tigris River. Down at the fork where the Upper Zab flowed into the Tigris was Calah, as it is called in Scripture, now known as the Nimrud ruins. Calah was eighteen miles southeast of Nineveh proper. The city of Khorsabad was twelve miles to the northeast of Nineveh on the Upper Zab River.
This statement by Jonah that Nineveh was a great city sounds strange for a day when cities were walled and were by necessity very compact and small. What surprises many folk when they go to Jerusalem is the fact that the walled city is so small. It was even smaller in Christ’s day and certainly in David’s day than it is today. The walled city of ancient days was very compact. It was really a fortress for the people to come into in time of siege. In Nineveh there were really three walled cities—Nineveh proper, Calah, and Khorsabad. Nineveh became the capital, and the entire area was known by its name. In that fertile valley, then, there lived a great multitude of folk who in time of siege would go into these cities. They tell us that one of the reasons Nineveh fell was not primarily because of the enemy from the outside, but because of a flood that took out one whole section of the wall of the city.
It is quite interesting that when we go back to the Book of Genesis, we read this: “Out of that land went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh, and the city Rehoboth, and Calah, And Resen between Nineveh and Calah: the same is a great city” (Gen. 10:11–12). All the way through the Word of God, the greatness of this city is emphasized. All of this area was given the name of Nineveh because it was the capital.
One of the ancient writers, Ctesias, describes Nineveh as a city whose circuit is 480 stadia. This would mean that its circumference was over twenty-seven miles.
So we find that Nineveh was “an exceeding great city” with one community after another. Here in Southern California we have a situation very similar to Nineveh’s. The Los Angeles area includes at least twenty-five smaller municipalities besides the actual city of Los Angeles. We speak of all of them as being a part of “the greater Los Angeles area,” which covers a great deal of ground. In fact, the joke during World War II was that a soldier who got lost up in Alaska and was trying to find his way back finally came to a sign that said, Los Angeles City Limits, and he knew he was no longer lost!
Nineveh was a great city—great in size and great in wickedness. This city was guilty of the same sins, which we read about in the other prophetic books, that brought God’s judgment. In the Books of Amos and Hosea, we find that the reason God brought judgment upon the people was because of their luxurious living and sexual immorality, because of their godless music, and because of their drunkenness. The same things could be said of Nineveh. They were given over to idolatry, their cruelty and brutality to their enemies were unspeakable, and there was gross immorality in the city. It was a city of wine and women, of the bottle and the brothel, of sauce and sex. These were the things that identified the great city of Nineveh.
It is into this great city that Jonah is now called to go and to minister.
So Jonah arose, and went unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey [Jonah 3:3].
Notice that Jonah is now doing things “according to the word of the Lord.” The first time he had set sail for Tarshish, which was not according to the word of the Lord; now he is going into Nineveh according to the word of the Lord.
“Now Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days’ journey.” This, of course, is the statement which caused the critics to laugh and to ridicule. The fact of the matter is, as we have explained, it would take several hours to go through just one of these cities, but there were three cities as well as a great area between them in which was a population estimated at several million. It is into this area that Jonah is now coming. It was “an exceeding great city of three days’ journey.”
And Jonah began to enter into the city a day’s journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown [Jonah 3:4].
The point is that it took Jonah quite a while to cover this ground. He didn’t have radio, he didn’t even have a loud speaker—and I’ve often wondered how he did it. I think of Nineveh’s similarity to the Los Angeles area. I live in a city called Pasadena, about ten miles from downtown Los Angeles. To the south of Pasadena about twenty-five miles is Long Beach, and to the west about twenty miles is Santa Monica. All in between there is just one city after another. Imagine Jonah starting out walking here in Southern California (he didn’t have a car, by the way). He would stop at a street corner, a busy intersection, and give his message. Then he would move on down the street to another intersection and, while he was waiting for the traffic signal to change, he would speak to another crowd. In this manner it would take him quite some time to get through a city.
At this point someone is going to ask me, “How did Jonah get a crowd?” Drawing a crowd is always a problem for a preacher. It’s natural and normal for us to want as many people as possible to hear the Word of God. How did Jonah do it? He didn’t use any of our modern methods or our modern tactics. He didn’t rent a great auditorium and put on a great campaign—there’s nothing wrong with that; in fact, that’s very right to do today—but Jonah didn’t do it. He didn’t use any gimmicks. He didn’t bring in celebrities or some great singer. He didn’t entertain the crowd. That was not his method.
Jonah used a method that is a little different from any that we could use today. His method was that he was a man from the dead, and I think he was rather spectacular to see. A man who has spent three days and three nights in a fish simply cannot come out looking like he did when he went in!
If you will recall the illustrations which I gave earlier of the men who had been swallowed by a fish and lived to tell the story, you will remember that the late Dr. Harry Rimmer told about seeing one man who had spent two days inside a fish. The man was put on display in London as “the Jonah of the twentieth century.” When Dr. Rimmer interviewed him two years after it had happened, this man didn’t have a hair on his body, and his skin was a yellowish-brown color. You see, the gastric juices of the fish had reacted upon the individual as the fish had tried to digest him.
Those chemicals were bound to have an effect upon him, and this is apparently what happened to Jonah also. You can imagine the color of Jonah’s skin, and you can imagine how he must have looked. When he stopped at a corner and the crowd gathered, they would say, “Brother, where have you been?” Jonah told them, “I am a man from the dead. A fish swallowed me because God had sent me to Nineveh but I tried to run away to Tarshish.” People didn’t ridicule Jonah’s story. They listened to him.
I am told that in Russia today, out through the rural areas, there is a great company of people who have turned to the Lord. On one of our tours to Bible lands, I went ahead of the group and was fortunate to go through Belgrade, Yugoslavia. There was a mix-up about the time we were to be there, but I understand that there were some five hundred Christians who were going to be there to welcome us had they known our arrival time. This happened because some of our tapes are being translated into Yugoslavian, Romanian, and several other languages and are being used by folk there today. There is a real moving of the spirit of God in places where we would not expect it.
Who would have thought that in the wicked city of Nineveh people would listen to the Word of God and to a man who said, “I’m back from the dead”? By the way, that is the same message we have. We have a message concerning a man who came back from the dead. Paul writes, “…if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:24–25).
Jonah entered the city with a message of judgment: “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” I think Jonah gave that message with relish—he didn’t like Ninevites!
NINEVEH BELIEVES GOD
So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them [Jonah 3:5].
“So the people of Nineveh believed God”—that is a marvelous statement to find in the Old Testament. All God has ever asked any person, any sinner, to do is simply to believe Him. What does He ask you to believe? Believe what He has done for you. Believe that Christ died for you—that He died for you and for your sins. Believe that He was raised again and is now at God’s right hand. The people of Nineveh believed God—that is still the important thing today.
I am afraid that we have in our churches many people who are as busy as termites—they take little courses, and they talk a great deal about the Bible—but they do not know God. I was speaking with a man the other day who is that type of an individual; he goes to everything that comes along. I had gotten a little weary of hearing him tell about where he’d been and what he’d seen. He has done very little, but he is always telling about the great meetings he attends. I asked him pointblank, “Do you believe God?” He thought for a minute and then said, “Well, I think I do.” May I say to you, all of his work is of no value because he does not really believe God.
“So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast.” They demonstrated their belief. Faith always leads to works. “And put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.”
For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes [Jonah 3:6].
Friend, when people start doing these things they no longer will be committing sin. They are in deep repentance before God and are asking God for mercy. And when you ask God for mercy, you are going to find out that He is merciful.
And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water [Jonah 3:7].
These people, many of whom were alcoholics, are now told not even to drink water.
But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands [Jonah 3:8].
You, also, must turn from sin, my friend. It you come to Christ, you can come just as you are, but when you come, you will turn from sin. You cannot possibly accept Him and not turn from sin.
“Let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.” The Ninevites were a brutal and violent people. They were given to riots. They were given to cruelty and brutality and mob rule. Now the king says, “Turn from all of that and cry to God for mercy.”
The strangest thing happened—the whole city turned to God! Now that was remarkable; in fact, it was quite amazing. From the king on the throne to the peasant in the hovel, they all turned to the Lord. They cried mightily to God, and they believed God. What a glorious, wonderful time this was!
We hear today that we are having revival in certain places. I do not think that you can call what is taking place anywhere (certainly not in the United States) a revival. I do think we are seeing a great moving of the Spirit of God in certain places. Wherever the Word of God is preached and taught, you will see a moving of the Spirit of God; but we are not seeing revival. Instead, we find that the church is quite inactive as far as getting out the Word of God, winning people to Christ, and building them up in the faith.
When I speak of the church, I mean you and me, all of us who are believers, regardless of the group with which we are identified or the local assembly to which we go. Someone sent me this little quote because he had heard me say that there are a great many church members who are not real believers. Here it is: “Church members are either pillars or caterpillars. The pillars hold up the church; the caterpillars just crawl in and out.” That’s accurate, my friend. That is our problem today. We have too many caterpillars and not enough pillars to hold up the church.
NINEVEH IS NOT DESTROYED
Jonah went to the city of Nineveh, and the entire city turned to God. This was something that had never happened before. Certainly Noah didn’t have this kind of experience!—but Jonah did. What will God do now that the city has turned to Him? The king himself asks the question—
Who can tell if God will turn and repent, and turn away from his fierce anger, that we perish not?
And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not [Jonah 3:9–10].
We have come to what is probably the strongest statement in Scripture about God repenting. What does it mean when Scripture says that God repented? Does God repent? The word repentance as it is used in both the Old and New Testaments primarily means ”a change of mind.” In the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament), the word is metanoesen, meaning “to change your mind.” The question arises then: Does God change His mind?
One of the attributes of God is that He is immutable, which means that He never changes. There is no reason for God to change. He knows the end from the beginning. When the Los Angeles Times came out this morning, it didn’t tell God a thing. God has not learned anything from the politicians or from our colleges today—they haven’t taught Him anything. God knows the end from the beginning, and there is no reason for Him to change His mind. He is carrying on the program that He outlined at the beginning, and He is simply following through on it. Therefore, God does not change.
But Scripture does say that God repents. Follow me carefully here: There are expressions used in the Word of God which are called anthropomorphic terms; that is, there are certain attributes of man which are ascribed to God. In the Bible certain physical and psychological attributes of man are attributed to God.
First of all, let us look at some physical attributes of mankind that are ascribed to God. It says in Scripture that “… the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth …” (2 Chron. 16:9, italics mine). Does that mean that God has eyes like I have? If He does, are they blue or brown or gray eyes? God is a spirit, and He does not have eyes like we have. But the one who made the eye can see, and He can see without the eye. The Lord knew that Vernon McGee would have a problem understanding that, and so He said, “The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth.” I can understand that now—that means that God sees everything. That is an anthropomorphic term, ascribing to God an attribute that belongs to man in order that we can understand.
The Bible also speaks of the arm of the Lord and the hand of the Lord. That is very helpful to my understanding, but the one who made my hand and my arm does not have a hand or an arm like I have because God is a spirit. But the Bible says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork” (Ps. 19:1)—that really means finger work. John Wesley put it like this: “God created the heavens and the earth, and He didn’t even half try.” Finger work is like crocheting or knitting; it doesn’t require a great deal of muscle. You don’t have to do sitting up exercises for six months before you can learn to knit. God created the heavens and the earth—that is His finger work.
However, when Isaiah was speaking of God’s salvation and His redemption, he said, “Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the [bared] arm of the Lord revealed?” (Isa. 53:1, italics mine). I understand now what I would not have understood before: It cost God more, and it was more difficult for Him to redeem man than it was for Him to create a universe.
These are examples of anthropomorphic terms, of physical attributes of man being attributed to God for the sake of our understanding. The Scriptures also attribute certain psychological attributes of man to God. For example, the anger of the Lord. Does God get angry? He surely does. He is angry with the wicked all of the time. God can get angry, but His anger is not like my anger. I get angry when I hear that someone has said something bad about me, but that doesn’t bother God at all. His anger is not peevish or petulant but is an anger that is against all wickedness and sin.
Scripture tells us that God loves, and that is something I can understand. In fact, in the little Book of Ruth, God takes a very human relationship—the love of a man for a woman—as a picture of His love for us. Also, the church is called the bride of Christ. That tells us something of the love of God. God loves you, and you cannot keep Him from loving you.
Here in Jonah we have another example: God repents. To repent means to change your mind; that is what it means when it applies to me. When I repent, I change my mind. I did something wrong, and I now see that it was wrong. I turn from it, and I go to God and ask forgiveness for it—I come over on God’s side. To confess your sin is to come over and agree with God about your sin.
But does God repent like that? Does He change His mind? Does He say, “My, I made a mistake there; I shouldn’t destroy Nineveh”? No. We need to see that the city of Nineveh had two options when this man Jonah entered it with his message of judgment. They could reject God’s message, they could ignore it, they could pay no attention to it, and if they did, they would be destroyed—God never changed that. Or they could accept God’s message, they could turn to Him, and God would deliver and save them. God is immutable—He never changes. When His Word is rejected, when people turn from Him, they are lost. But when they turn to Him, He will always save them, regardless of who they are.
Therefore, who changed? Did God change? No, but it looked as if He did. Jonah had said, “Yet forty days, and this city is going to be destroyed. God is going to destroy it.” But God did not destroy Nineveh. Did God break His Word? No. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. The city had two options. If they had not accepted His Word, they would have been destroyed. But they did accept God’s message, they believed God, and they turned from their wickedness. God didn’t change; He will always save people when they turn to Him. Although it looked as if God changed, it was really the city of Nineveh that changed, and that makes all the difference in the world.
CHAPTER 4
Theme: Jonah’s displeasure; God’s gracious dealing with Jonah
This fourth chapter is like an addendum to the Book of Jonah, because at the end of chapter 3 the mission is accomplished. As you know, I arranged each chapter of this book according to a timetable. In chapter 1, Jonah left the northern kingdom of Israel, probably from Gath—hepher, his hometown. His destination was Nineveh, and it took him three chapters to get there. But he accomplished his mission, and the entire city turned to God. It would seem that the book ought to end there. But the problem no longer is Nineveh—the problem now is Jonah. Jonah was a problem child. God had more trouble with a backsliding prophet by the name of Jonah than He had with an entire city of brutal, cruel, pagan sinners.
If I had had the privilege of being the one who brought God’s message to Nineveh and had seen the result that Jonah saw, I believe that I would have gone down to the Western Union office and sent a telegram back to my hometown. I would want to tell people what had happened and cause them to praise and thank God for what had been accomplished. I would rejoice in it, but that is because of where I am and because I am under altogether different circumstances. If I had been in Jonah’s shoes, if I had been in Jonah’s fish, I might have had the same feeling that he did. Yet his reaction is something that seems unbelievable. In fact, I have no problem with the fish, but I have a lot of problems with this man Jonah. At the very beginning, he was called to go in one direction, and he headed in the other direction. I don’t understand that—until I look closely at my own heart and see that I have headed in the wrong direction several times when it was very clear that God wanted me to go in the opposite direction.
Jonah now has a new destination. He is going to leave Nineveh, and he is glad to get out of town. His destination now is a gourd vine or, as I would like to imagine, a trailer court outside the city. Jonah goes out of the city and finds himself a little spot where he can park his camper for awhile. As he leaves Nineveh, his destination is a little spot outside the city, and he is going to arrive in the heart of God. I do not know of a better place for anybody to arrive than in the heart of God, and that is where this prophet is going to arrive.
God is going to seek to win Jonah over to His viewpoint. This chapter will demonstrate to us the fact that God will never interfere with your free will. He is not going to force you on any issue whatsoever, for you are a free moral agent. God has actually moved heaven and hell and has come by way of a cross to knock at your heart’s door. But, my friend, He will not come any farther than that until that door is opened, and it must be opened from the inside. He will never crash the door of your heart; He will never push it in; He will never come as in uninvited. God is now going to have to deal with a backsliding prophet who has a pretty strong will and who hates Ninevites. He is going to try to win Jonah over to His viewpoint.
JONAH’S DISPLEASURE
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was very angry [Jonah 4:1].
It didn’t simply displease Jonah a little bit; it displeased him exceedingly. He wasn’t angry just a little bit; he was very angry. What is this man angry about? He’s angry because the city of Nineveh turned to God—he didn’t like that.
And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil [Jonah 4:2].
“And he prayed unto the Lord”—the last time Jonah prayed he was inside the fish. Here he is outside of Nineveh, with his camper parked up there in a little trailer court, and as he sits in the shade of it, he prays. He’s very unhappy; in fact, he’s miserable.
You may have felt that I was inaccurate in the Introduction when I said that Jonah had hatred and bitterness in his heart against the Ninevites, that he probably had justification for it, and that it was one of the reasons he did not want to go to Nineveh. But listen to him now: “O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.”
Years ago I heard a liberal lecturing at Vanderbilt University who said that Jonah’s problem was that he did not know God. I don’t like to say it like this, but the problem with that lecturer was that he didn’t know the Book of Jonah. It is very clear that Jonah did know God and that he knew Him very well, probably better than that lecturer knew God. Jonah says to God, “I knew You were gracious, I knew You were merciful, I knew You were slow to anger, and I knew You were of great kindness. And I knew that although You said You would destroy Nineveh in forty days, if Nineveh would turn to You, You would save them because that’s what You always do.” Jonah knew God and, knowing God, he said, “I hate Ninevites. I don’t want them saved. I want God to judge them.” So he had headed in the opposite direction from Nineveh. Jonah said, “If those Ninevites would turn to God, God would save them, and you just can’t depend on Ninevites—they might put up a good front. They might say that they’ve turned to God.” Jonah should have known that God knew their hearts and knew whether they were genuine or not. But Jonah did know how merciful and good and gracious God is.
Jonah is in great bitterness and anger. Listen to him—
Therefore now, O Lord, take, I beseech thee, my life from me; for it is better for me to die than to live [Jonah 4:3].
Two of the great prophets of Scripture said the same thing, that they wanted God to take their lives. In other words, they were actually on the verge of suicide. When the prophet Elijah ran from Jezebel—another man running away, and it was unlike him—he went all the way to Beer-sheba, which was the jumping-off place for the Sinai Peninsula. Elijah left his servant there and kept on going as long as he could. When he was out of breath, he crawled up under a juniper tree and he said, “Oh, Lord, let me die!” When God’s man does that, that man is exhausted and drained physically, mentally, psychologically, and spiritually. Every drop is drained out of him. That was true of Elijah. He had been busy, and I mean busy, friend! He had withstood the prophets of Baal way up at Mount Carmel. He had been before the public. Although Elijah loved the spectacular and he loved the dramatic, it drained him after awhile. So when he heard that Jezebel was after him, he simply took out for the far country.
Now I think you’ll agree that Jonah has really been through the mill—in fact, he’s been through a fish. He had quite an experience. Then he came into the city of Nineveh, he gave out God’s Word faithfully, and the city turned to God. This man is now overwrought, overstimulated. He is exhausted, absolutely drained—and he wants to die. Many of us reach this stage sometimes. We get to the place where we feel like saying, “This is it. I give up. I quit. I don’t want to go any farther.” We’re tired; we’re exhausted. But to wish that you were dead is just about as foolish a thing as you can possibly do. As far as I know, no one has ever died by wishing. People die of cancer, of heart trouble, and of all kinds of things, but they just don’t die of wishing to be dead. Jonah is wasting his time.
GOD’S GRACIOUS DEALING WITH JONAH
Notice how graciously God deals with this man—
Then said the Lord, Doest thou well to be angry? [Jonah 4:4].
Dr. G. Douglas Young has given us what I believe is a much better translation here. He has translated it like this: “Is doing good displeasing to you?”—that’s what God meant. God says, “Jonah, I have saved Nineveh because I’m in the saving business and I save sinners. I wanted you to bring them the message of judgment to see whether or not they would turn to Me. If they turned to Me, I would save them. They did turn to Me, and I have saved them.” My friend, if there is joy in heaven over one sinner turning to God, they must have had a real big time up there when all the folk in Nineveh turned to God. God asks Jonah, “Is this displeasing to you that I have saved these Ninevites?”
Jonah is in a huff, and he’s pouting. Notice what he does—
So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city, and there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city [Jonah 4:5].
“So Jonah went out of the city, and sat on the east side of the city.” The east side of the city was up in the hill country, up at an elevation. Jonah got himself a good spot where he could look out over the city. Why? Because he didn’t trust the Ninevites. He thought they would go right back into their sinning; and if they did, he knew God would destroy them because God never changes. Jonah wanted to be up there if the fire fell. That’s the kind of man we are dealing with here—and he’s the man who had brought God’s message.
“And there made him a booth, and sat under it in the shadow, till he might see what would become of the city.” He didn’t believe Nineveh would stick by their conversion, their confession of faith. He’s up there, and he’s waiting for the fire of God’s judgment to fall.
God is now going to move in on this man Jonah, and He’s going to deal with him personally. We are going to have an answer here to the question that is often asked: Do you have to love people before you can bring the Word of God to them? Do you have to love a people before you can go as a missionary to them? Jonah may be a good example in this particular connection, for one thing is sure: Jonah didn’t love the Ninevites.
And the Lord God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd [Jonah 4:6].
“And the Lord God prepared a gourd.” This gourd was prepared in the same way that God prepared the fish. If you don’t believe in the fish, you ought not to believe in the gourd. I believe in the gourd; I believe in the fish.
“And made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief. So Jonah was exceeding glad of the gourd.” Jonah is made happy at last by this little green gourd growing up. Every day Jonah would go down to the Tigris River, fill a bucket with water, and come up and water this gourd that was growing in that dry country. He trained it to run up over his camper, you know. He sat under the shade of it, and he became very attached to it.
If we understand a little about human nature, we can understand Jonah a little better. It is amazing how people can get attached to living things other than human beings, especially if they are lonely. If they have no person to love, they will have a dog or cat or even a vine to love. Several years ago I visited a friend in Chicago who lived in an apartment. She had several plants, and one of them was a geranium. She took me over to show me the geranium which was just a little old stub sticking up out of the pot. In my yard in Pasadena I have to cut back the geraniums with a hoe in order to keep them from taking over! But this lady said to me, “Dr. McGee, look here at this little geranium. I know you grow them in California, but this one is such a sweet one. It grows up each year and has flowers on it. It dies back in wintertime, although the apartment is warm—I don’t know why it does that.” I told her, “Well, geraniums have a habit of lunging out in a spurt of growth at times.” But hers hadn’t done much lunging, you can be sure of that—it was just a little, bitty thing. As we walked away, she patted that little geranium and said, “You sweet little thing, you!” I thought, My gracious, does she talk to the geranium? I guess she did. She certainly was a very sensible and intelligent woman, but she lived alone and really did not have many friends.
Jonah has no friends, he doesn’t like Ninevites, and there’s not a person in that city whom he cares about visiting. He’s alone, and he’s out of fellowship with God at this time. So God lets him get attached to a little old gourd. I have a notion that Jonah would come panting up the hill with a bucket of water every afternoon and would say to the gourd, “Little gourd, I’ve brought you your drink for today.” Can you imagine that? Well, people can get attached to dogs in that way also. One evening when my daughter was just a little thing, I took her for a walk. We came to a corner where there were a lot of vines, and we couldn’t see around the corner, but we could hear a woman talking. I have never heard such sweet talk in my life! I thought we were interrupting a romance; so I took my daughter and started to cross the street. But then the woman came around the corner, and she was carrying a little dog. Imagine talking to a dog like that! I do not know if she was married or not, but if she was, I’ll bet that her husband wasn’t hearing sweet talk like that. We speak of some people leading “a dog’s life”—there are some men who wish they could lead a dog’s life! Jonah talked that way to this gourd vine—he’s attached to it!
Watch how God is going to move in on Jonah—
But God prepared a worm when the morning rose the next day, and it smote the gourd that it withered [Jonah 4:7].
“But God prepared a worm”—this worm is just as miraculous as the fish. “And it smote the gourd that it withered.” This worm cut the vine down because worms just don’t fall in love with gourds—they like to eat them.
And it came to pass, when the sun did arise, that God prepared a vehement east wind; and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah, that he fainted, and wished in himself to die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live [Jonah 4:8].
Here he goes again, wishing—but it won’t do him a bit of good.
And God said to Jonah, Doest thou well to be angry for the gourd? And he said, I do well to be angry, even unto death [Jonah 4:9].
Jonah says, “The only thing that I had that was living and that I cared for was this little gourd vine that grew up here and that You gave to me. And now the worm has cut the thing down, and here I am all alone.”
Then said the Lord, Thou hast had pity on the gourd, for the which thou hast not laboured, neither madest it grow; which came up in a night, and perished in a night [Jonah 4:10].
God says to Jonah, “Jonah, a gourd is nothing.” My friend, I hate to say this, but a pussycat is nothing, a little dog is nothing, but a human being has a soul that is either going to heaven or hell. And God didn’t ask you to love the lost before you go to them. He said, “I love the lost, and I want you to go to them.” That is what He is saying to Jonah: “Jonah, I love the Ninevites.”
And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle? [Jonah 4:11].
God says, “I have spared this city.” What does He mean by “sixscore thousand [120,000] persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand”? He means little children. God says, “You wouldn’t want Me to destroy that city, would you, Jonah? If you can fall in love with a gourd vine, can’t you at least fall in love with Ninevite children?”
Now may I make this application? When I was teaching in a Bible institute, I used to say, like all the other teachers were saying, that if you are called to go as a missionary, you ought to love the people to whom you go. I disagree violently with that now, because how can you love people before you know them? I first applied that to myself. I have never accepted a call to a church because I loved the people; I didn’t know them to begin with. I went because I felt that God had called me to go there and preach. But I also have never been in a church in which I didn’t become involved with the people. I have stood at their bedsides in hospitals, I’ve been at their gravesides when death came, I’ve been with them in the marriages that have taken place in their families, and I can truthfully say that I have never yet left a church where there wasn’t a great company of people whom I loved—and I really mean that I love them in the Lord. But I did not love them when I went there because I did not know them.
God is saying to a great many people today, “I want you to go and take the Word of God to those who are lost.” And they say, “But I don’t love them.” God says, “I never asked you to love them; I asked you to go.” I cannot find anywhere that God ever asked Jonah to go because he loved the Ninevites. He said, “Jonah, I want you to go because I love them. I love Ninevites. I want to save Ninevites. And I want you to take the message to them.”
Again may I say that I am afraid there are a great many people in the church who are caterpillars. Church members are either pillars or caterpillars; the pillars hold up the church, and the caterpillars just crawl in and out. There are a lot of people just crawling in and out of the church, waiting for some great wave of emotion, waiting for some feeling to take hold of them—and they have never done anything yet. God says that we are to get busy for Him.
I remember talking to a missionary who was home from Africa, and he was showing me a picture of some little black boys in the orphans’ home there. I could tell by the way he looked at the picture that he loved those little boys. I said to him, “When you first went to Africa, did you love the Africans?” He said, “No, I really wanted to go to my people in Greece, but at that time the door was closed, and I could not go; so I had to go to Africa.” As he held that picture, I said to him, “But do you love those little fellows now?” Tears came down from his eyes. He said, “I love them now.” God says to you and me, “You go with the Word. I love the lost. You take the Word to them, and when they are saved and you get acquainted with them and know them, you will love them, too.”
Since Jonah wrote the book, I think it is reasonable to say that after this experience, Jonah left the dead gourd vine and went down to where the living were walking the streets of Nineveh, and I think that he rejoiced with them that they had come to a saving knowledge of God. My friend, what a message this is! Why don’t you get involved in getting the Word of God out to people? Don’t wait for some great feeling to sweep over your soul. Don’t wait to be moved by a little picture of an orphan. There are so many people waiting to be motivated by things that are emotional. Take the Word of God to them because God loves them; and if you’ll do that, I will guarantee that you will learn to love them also.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Judah. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975.
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Micah
INTRODUCTION
It is important to know something about the man Micah as well as his message. His name means “who is like Jehovah?” The word has the same derivation as Michael (the name of the archangel) which means “who is like God?” There are many Micahs mentioned in the Scriptures, but this man is identified as a Morasthite (Mic. 1:1), since he was an inhabitant of Moresheth-gath (Mic. 1:14), a place about twenty miles southwest of Jerusalem, near Lachish. He is not to be confused with any other Micah of Scripture.
Micah prophesied during the reigns of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (see Mic. 1:1), who were kings of Judah. However, his prophecy concerns Samaria and Jerusalem. Samaria was the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel, while Jerusalem was the capital of the southern kingdom of Judah. Although he was a man from the southern kingdom, a great deal of his prophecy had to do with the northern kingdom. He spoke to the nation during the time that the northern kingdom was being attacked by Assyria. Although the southern kingdom was attacked also, it was the northern kingdom that actually was carried away into Assyrian captivity.
Micah was a contemporary of three other prophets: Isaiah, Hosea, and Amos. It is possible that he was a friend of Isaiah, and his prophecy has been called that of a miniature Book of Isaiah. There are many striking similarities between the two. For many people, Micah is the favorite of the minor prophets. It is one of the most remarkable books as to style. If you appreciate beautiful language, if you appreciate poetry, and if you appreciate literature, you will appreciate Micah. The writing is pungent and personal. Micah was trenchant, touching, and tender. He was realistic and reportorial—he would have made a good war correspondent. There is an exquisite beauty about this brochure which combines God’s infinite tenderness with His judgments. There are several famous passages which are familiar to the average Christian, although he may not recognize them as coming from Micah. Through the gloom of impending judgment, Micah saw clearly the coming glory of the redemption of Israel, which makes this a remarkable book.
Micah pronounced judgment on the cities of Israel and on Jerusalem in Judah. These centers influenced the people of the nation. These were the urban problems that sound very much like our present-day problems. Micah condemned violence, corruption, robbery, covetousness, gross materialism, spiritual bankruptcy, and illicit sex. He well could be labeled “the prophet of the city.”
The theme of Micah is very important to understand. Customarily, Micah is considered a prophet of judgment. That seems to be true since in the first three chapters there is a great emphasis on judgment. However, although the first three chapters are denunciatory, the last four chapters are consolatory. His great question is found in one of the loveliest passages of Scripture. “Who is like unto Thee?” that is, unto God. We find that Micah emphasizes that theme as he goes along. In the first three chapters: Who is like unto God in proclaiming—that is, in witnessing? In chapters 4 and 5: Who is like unto God in prophesying, in consoling? In chapter 6: Who is like unto God in pleading? Finally, in chapter 7: Who is like unto God in pardoning? This is what makes Micah a wonderful little book. The main theme of the book is God’s judgment and redemption—both are there. The key verse, to me, is Micah 7:18 which says, “Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.”
God hates sin, but He loves the souls of sinners, and He wants to save them. Judgment is called God’s “strange work.” It is strange because He does not like to judge. But since He is a holy God and hates sin, He must deal with any rebellion. He couldn’t do otherwise. But He still loves the souls of sinners; He wants to save them, and He will save them if they come to Him in faith.
This little book can be divided in an interesting way. The more natural division of the prophecy is to note that Micah gave three messages, each beginning with the injunction, “Hear” (Mic. 1:2; 3:1; 6:1). The first message is addressed to “all people,” and the second message is addressed specifically to the leaders of Israel. The third message is a personal word of pleading to Israel to repent and return to God.
Now let me refer briefly to the attack upon the unity of this book by the German higher critics of many years ago. They made the same attack which they made upon the prophecy of Isaiah, which has been well answered by conservative scholarship. Therefore we will not waste time by delving into it. I find it interesting that Jeremiah quoted from Micah, which reveals the importance of Micah in his day. “Micah the Morasthite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and spake to all the people of Judah, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Zion shall be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of a forest” (Jer. 26:18). Of course, the people paid no more attention to Jeremiah than they had to Micah, and what Micah had prophesied did happen to Jerusalem exactly as he said it would.
Many folk, especially young preachers who want to give an exposition, have asked me how to begin. I would say, not only to young preachers but to everyone who wants to study the Bible, first of all, get a grasp of the message of an entire book. What is it all about? What is the author trying to say? What is the main message? To get this information you must outline the book. In Micah we find that the message is, “Who is like God in proclaiming, in prophesying, in pleading, and in pardoning?” That is how the Book of Micah is divided.
OUTLINE
“WHO IS A GOD LIKE UNTO THEE?”
I. Proclaiming Future Judgment for Past Sins, Chapters 1–3
A. Prophet’s First Message Directed Against Samaria, Reaches to Jerusalem, Chapter 1
B. Prophet’s Second Message Describes Specific Sins, Chapter 2
C. Prophet’s Third Message Denounces Leaders for Sins, Chapter 3
II. Prophesying Future Glory Because of Past Promises, Chapters 4–5
A. Prophecies of Last Days, Chapter 4
B. Prophecy of First Coming of Christ Before Second Coming and Kingdom, Chapter 5
III. Pleading Present Repentance Because of Past Redemption, Chapter 6
IV. Pardoning All Iniquity Because of Who God Is and What He Does, Chapter 7
CHAPTER 1
Theme: The prophet’s first message; directed against Samaria, reaches to Jerusalem
The first three chapters, as I have indicated in the Introduction, are denunciatory.
In every chapter of this remarkable little book there will be a striking statement—sometimes in a single verse, sometimes in many verses as in this first chapter.
The word of the Lord that came to Micah the Morasthite in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah, which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem [Mic. 1:1].
Let me repeat, Samaria was the capital of the northern kingdom. The city was built originally by Omri, king of Israel, and was the seat of idolatry. It was made famous—or infamous—by Ahab and Jezebel who built there a temple to Baal. The city stood in a very lovely location, but it lies in ruins today. I have pictures of it, which I took while on a trip to Israel. The desolate ruins bear mute testimony to the accuracy of Micah’s prophecy concerning Samaria.
“Micah the Morasthite” means that he was a native of Moresheth of Gath, which is southwest of Jerusalem. Although he was in the kingdom of Judah, he prophesied to both kingdoms, but his main message was directed to the northern kingdom. I have often wondered about that. His contemporary, Isaiah, was a prophet to the southern kingdom; and perhaps, since Micah was probably a younger man, he felt that Isaiah could take care of the southern kingdom while God directed him to speak to the northern kingdom. You will never misunderstand Micah, because he makes it very clear to whom he is speaking.
THE PROPHET’S FIRST MESSAGE
Hear, all ye people; hearken, O earth, and all that therein is: and let the Lord God be witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple [Mic. 1:2].
“Hear, all ye people” means all people. That includes you wherever you are today. Micah has a message for us. As with all the prophets, although speaking into a particular situation which has long since disappeared, his message is relevant for our day because certain principles are laid down. Micah gives a philosophy of human government. He deals with that which is false and that which is true authority in government. This would be a good book for both Republicans and Democrats in Washington to consider. It wouldn’t hurt them to look at God’s philosophy of government because, very candidly, their form of government is not working today. The reason it cannot work properly is because it was originally put together by men who, although some of them were not Christians, had a respect and reverence for the Bible. They felt that the great principles stated in the Bible were worth following, and therefore they wove them into the warp and woof of our government. It will never work in the hands of godless men. Frankly, that is our problem. Actually, the form of government is not the important feature, although we think it is. Let me give you an example: when Cromwell was a dictator in England, they had about the best form of government they could possibly have had. Don’t misunderstand me, I am not recommending a dictatorship, but it is good if you have the right dictator. When Jesus comes to reign on this earth, my friend, He is going to be a dictator and the right kind of dictator. The character of the ruler is of utmost importance. It makes no difference if there is a monarchy, a limited monarchy, an autocracy, a democracy, or a representative form of government; if the right men are in charge, it will work. I hope that I am getting it over to you that I am not talking politics, but I am speaking of a philosophy of government and am attempting to pinpoint our current problem. We need men in government who have character. The concern of the American people is whether or not their government leaders have TV personalities. We are more interested in charisma than character. Micah deals with this matter in the third chapter: “The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean upon the Lord, and say, Is not the Lord among us? none evil can come upon us” (Mic. 3:11). Micah puts his finger on the fact that they had false prophets, false religion, and false leaders.
“Hearken, O earth, and all that therein is.” Since most of us are on this earth, he means all of us.
“And let the Lord God be witness against you.” Micah is calling God as a witness to the thing which he is going to say.
“The Lord from his holy temple.” The Lord was in His holy temple, in His heaven, then as now.
The Lord will come down in judgment—
For, behold, the Lord cometh forth out of his place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth [Mic. 1:3].
This language is absolutely beautiful, although it is frightful in many ways.
“Tread upon the high places of the earth.” You recall that the high places were the locations of idol worship. Idols were set up in groves upon the hills and mountains. Also in that day the cities were situated on elevated places. Both Samaria and Jerusalem were built on mountains. The Lord Jesus mentioned that a city that is set upon a hill cannot be hid, and the city has a tremendous influence upon the area around it (see Matt. 5:14). When the city is the seat of government, it has a tremendous influence not only upon the immediate area but often upon the entire world. That is the case of many great cities in the past and present. Also cities are centers of great sin. For these reasons God is coming down upon them in judgment—He will “tread upon the high places of the earth.”
And the mountains shall be molten under him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, and as the waters that are poured down a steep place [Mic. 1:4].
“The mountains shall be molten [melted] under him, and the valleys shall be cleft.” This is definitely a picture of volcanic action and of earthquakes. We find this same language in the Scriptures from Judges through Habakkuk. For example, Psalm 18:7–10: “Then the earth shook and trembled; the foundations also of the hills moved and were shaken, because he was wroth. There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, and fire out of his mouth devoured: coals were kindled by it. He bowed the heavens also, and came down: and darkness was under his feet. And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly: yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind.” Although this language is highly figurative, it is a tremendous, actual, exact picture of what took place.
This raises a question about what or who controls the weather and natural forces. Well, God is the One who controls nature and earthquakes and volcanoes and weather. I believe that God judges nations and that He judges peoples, and these things are warnings. I have always felt that the Great Depression of the 1930s and the dust storms in the midwest were warnings from God. But America didn’t listen to God. Then we entered World War II, and we have not recovered from that yet. God is still moving in the affairs of this world.
I think of Turkey, especially along the west coast, and the ruins of the great cities like Ephesus and Pergamos which at one time were the very lifeblood of the Roman Empire. Now they are lying in ruins. Why is it that there is no great population but only little towns there today? Well, you may say, it is earthquake territory. You are right. It is interesting that man always flocks to earthquake territory. That is true in California where I live. I have seen people come out here by the millions. We are ready for an earthquake, let me tell you. The greatest population of the Roman Empire was in modern Turkey, and look what happened to it. Historians tell us that an earthquake destroyed the cities and caused the people to flee. That was the judgment of God, you see.
God makes it clear here about His judgment—
For the transgression of Jacob is all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel. What is the transgression of Jacob? is it not Samaria? and what are the high places of Judah? are they not Jerusalem? [Mic. 1:5].
“For the transgression of Jacob …and for the sins of the house of Israel.” You see, he is speaking to both kingdoms and their capitals—Samaria of Israel and Jerusalem of Judah (or Jacob).
“What is the transgression of Jacob?” Rather, who is responsible for the transgression of Jacob? The answer is: “Is it not Samaria? and what are the high places of Judah? are they not Jerusalem?” The prophet places the blame on the capital cities, Jerusalem and Samaria. Jerusalem was the place where they were to worship God. Were they worshiping Him there? Well, yes, they would go to the temple, but they also were going to the high places where idolatry and the grossest forms of immorality took place. And God says that it is for these things He is going to judge these two great cities because of their tremendous influence over the nations of Israel and Judah.
This has, I believe, an application to my own nation because we have a philosophy of government that is wrong. As we have seen, it is not the form of government that is wrong; it is the people who head it up who are wrong. I do not know that there is too much difference between having one godless dictator or having a whole godless Senate and a whole godless House of Representatives. The founders of our nation formed three branches of government because they had had a bad experience with old King George back in England, and they knew they could not trust men. Their theory was that the three branches of government could watch each other. Well, in our day all three need watching. Why? Because it takes the right kind of men for any government to function properly.
The problem in Micah’s day was that Samaria and Jerusalem had become corrupt, and God was going to judge them. What about my own country? It is my personal opinion that America has gone over the hill. The United States does not appear in the prophecies of the end times for one of two reasons: either it will have disappeared as a nation or it will no longer be a world power. We had a marvelous opportunity to lead the world following World War II. So what did we give the world? We gave it rock music, hippies, the new morality, a love of pleasure, and a love of affluence. And today the United States of America is on the way down. This is distressing to me because I love my country, and I hate to see a godless outfit take over and spoil this nation which I do believe was founded under God for a very definite purpose. It is a government under God that Micah is espousing. This is God’s philosophy of government, you see.
Now we come to the first striking statement, and it is the longest one. It goes through the remainder of the chapter, from verse 6 to verse 16. It is a miniature of the great destruction that will come in the last days. We will return to the subject of judgment during the last days when we come to the fourth chapter of Micah; but, here in the first chapter of Micah, it is a local judgment in which Assyria will destroy Samaria. I wish I could show you some of my pictures of Samaria. At one time it was a lovely city. It was a city of great influence and culture. It was a city of great promise, but today it lies in dust and ashes.
Therefore I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard: and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I will discover the foundations thereof [Mic. 1:6].
“I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard.” That is what it is today. I saw a little vineyard planted by Arabs growing right in the ruins of one section of Samaria. There are other places where you can find an orchard planted in the ruins and different kinds of trees which were planted here and there.
“I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley.” I have stood on the acropolis, the very highest place in Samaria, and have looked down the steep embankment. Do you know what is down there? There are all kinds of pillars and stones that formerly had been hewn out and used in buildings. They have been rolled down, down into the valley. I can’t think of anything more literal than this fulfillment of “I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley.”
“And I will discover [uncover] the foundations thereof” I would like to show you the pictures I took of the foundations which were there in the time of Ahab and Jezebel. Also I have pictures of the later foundations which, were built by the Romans. God has uncovered them all, and they are all there in ruins for you to take a good look at today. The foundations reveal that there had been a tremendous city there, but it has long since gone out of business.
And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces, and all the hires thereof shall be burned with the fire, and all the idols thereof will I lay desolate: for she gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return to the hire of an harlot [Mic. 1:7].
“And all the graven [carved] images thereof shall be beaten to pieces!” When I was there, I asked my guide, “Are there any images around here?” His answer was, “No. There is no evidence of idolatry although we know that there was idolatry here” Let me remind you that the high places which are mentioned were places where idols stood and where the basest kind of worship took place. For example, in the worship of Molech, the idol formed a red-hot oven where children were actually offered. What an awful thing that was! And the grossest forms of immorality were carried on in connection with idol worship. In other words, religion and illicit sex were very much the same thing. It is abroad again today in Satan worship and outgrowths of the occult.
“And all the hires thereof shall be burned with the fire.” The word hires is very interesting. It refers to the costly vessels that had been given to the heathen temples. My guide told me that, in the ruins of the palace of Jezebel, archaeologists have found remains of quite a few smaller ivory vessels which were evidently jars to hold perfume and some larger ones to hold wine. There has been a great deal of excavation done there.
“She gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return to the hire of an harlot.” Sex was at the heart of these idolatrous rites. In Corinth, for instance, they know today that in the worship of Aphrodite upon the Acropolis, there were a thousand “vestal virgins,” who were nothing in the world but prostitutes. Sex was a part of the religion. A man had to pay when he went into one of their places of worship. Whether in temples or out-of-doors, they were brothels. It was all done in the name of religion. This was true among the Phoenicians; it was true among the Philistines; and Israel had adopted their religions.
It is quite interesting that contemporary thought is returning to that viewpoint. The so-called “new morality” is as old as the worship of Molech and of Baal and of other heathen religions of antiquity. This is one reason I insist that religion has not been a blessing to the world. If you want to see what religion has done, go to India. There religion has kept a wonderful people in a pitiful state. The people are absolutely impoverished and bound by the fetters of religion. Christianity, of course, is not a religion; Christianity is a Person. The Lord Jesus made that clear when He said, “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (John 8:36). He can deliver you from things that are sinful, and He can also deliver you from the bondage of religion.
The last part of the verse says, “she gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return to the hire of an harlot.” Micah is saying that the hires will go right back and be used for sin again. Some of these vessels were apparently used again in Roman times. It was Herod who rebuilt that city. He liked the location; it was a delightful place to live, but it also has been destroyed and is in ruins today. Heathen worship was the main sin. It was number one on the sin parade, but Micah is going to mention some other sins, too.
LAMENTATION OF MICAH
The remainder of the chapter is Micah’s lamentation. He is deeply affected by Israel’s sins and their consequences. Micah is not just a paid preacher; he is a prophet called of God. He is very much like Jeremiah and Hosea in that he had a tender heart. We tend to think of all the Old Testament prophets as being hard-nosed like Elijah and Ezekiel. You may remember that, when God commissioned Ezekiel, He warned him that He was sending him to an impudent and hardhearted people. But, He said, “I am going to make your head harder than theirs.” There was a need for hardheaded prophets, and these men could speak right out; but many of God’s prophets were very tenderhearted, and Micah was one of them. Listen to him—
Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked: I will make a wailing like the dragons, and mourning as the owls [Mic. 1:8].
“I will go stripped and naked.” When a man removed his outer garments, it meant that he was in deep mourning and deep trouble.
“I will make a wailing like the dragons [jackals], and mourning as the owls [ostriches].” If you have ever heard a wolf or a hyena howl at night, you know it is a mournful and terrible sound. Job uses this same expression: “I am a brother to dragons [jackals], and a companion to owls [ostriches]” (Job 30:29). I did not know that ostriches mourn until several years ago when my wife and I were visiting the San Diego Zoo. We were walking around when we heard a mournful sound. It was a very plaintive and pitiful sort of a sound. At first I thought an animal had been trapped or hurt in some way. As we continued our walk, we met a man and I asked him, “Do you know what is making that sound?” He replied, “It’s the ostriches.” I thought the man was pulling my leg. I didn’t even thank him for the information because I thought he was kidding. But soon we walked around a bend in the road, and there were the ostriches. They were all standing there, just looking around. I didn’t see any reason for their mourning, but they were making the most mournful sound I have ever heard. Micah said that he would mourn like the ostriches. He would wail like they did.
In other words, the message that this man was giving to the people was affecting him just as the message that Jeremiah gave affected him. This is another example of the type of man God wants to deliver a harsh message. It must be a man with a tender heart if the message is to be harsh. Why? Because before God judges a people, He wants them to know how He feels; so He sent the weeping prophet Jeremiah and then this weeping prophet Micah. When the people listen to his message, then to his mourning and wailing, they understand how God feels about their sin. God is not vindictive. Although He takes no delight in judgment, He must judge sin. If you will turn that over in your mind a little, my friend, you will recognize that God cannot permit evil and wrong to be done to one of His creatures without His judging the guilty party. He would not be God if He did not give justice to His creatures. When evil is done and sin is committed, God is going to move in judgment. It takes Him a little while to get around to it; but, when He moves, nothing can stop Him.
For her wound is incurable; for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem [Mic. 1:9].
“Her wound is incurable.” The nation had passed over an invisible line from which there was no possibility of returning. While I do not know where that line is, I do know it exists. And when an individual or a nation passes over that line, there is no possibility of reclamation. It is not that God is not merciful and gracious, but the individual or the nation is so bent to sin and has turned a deaf ear to God for so long that there is nothing left but judgment. The wound is incurable. They will no longer hear God.
This disturbs me, because I wonder if my own country may have passed over that line. All I know is that they are not hearing the voice of God and do not want to hear it. In spite of the fact that there is a tremendous reception today for the Word of God, I sometimes wonder how deep it is. Are the hearing of the Word of God and obedience to the Word of God synonymous? I actually know of folk who are living in sin or have lived in sin and have never repented of it, yet speak of loving the Word of God! Is it possible that they have stepped over that invisible line and that there is nothing left for them but judgment?
“For her wound is incurable; for it is come unto Judah; he is come unto the gate of my people, even to Jerusalem.” The Assyrian army under Sennacherib came down from the north and mowed down the northern kingdom. They got as far south as the walls of Jerusalem, and the king Hezekiah was afraid that they were going to take the city; but God instructed Isaiah to tell the king that Jerusalem would not be invaded but that this was a warning to them. Well, Judah heeded the warning for awhile, but it wore off and they turned back to their idol worship and their sin. The day came when God had to judge Judah as He had judged Israel.
Now we are given a series of names of ten different urban centers that were affected by Samaria and Jerusalem. Not all of these places are on the map, but the list begins in the north with Samaria and moves south toward Jerusalem and beyond Jerusalem. The meanings of the names reveal a play upon words.
Declare ye it not at Gath, weep ye not at all: in the house of Aphrah roll thyself in the dust [Mic. 1:10].
“Declare ye it not at Gath.” The name Gath means “weep-town.” God is saying, “Weep not at Weep-town.” Gath belonged to the Philistines, the inveterate enemies of Israel, and He is saying, “Don’t let them know that judgment is coming upon you.”
“In the house of Aphrah roll thyself in the dust.” Aphrah means “dust-town.” To put dust on the head was the sign of the deepest grief. The site of this town is not known, but the thought seems to be that the people were to lament in their own territory.
Pass ye away, thou inhabitant of Saphir, having thy shame naked: the inhabitant of Zaanan came not forth in the mourning of Beth-ezel; he shall receive of you his standing [Mic. 1:11].
Saphir means “beauty-town.” Believe me, the inhabitants passed away and also the town itself so that the site of it is absolutely unknown. Beauty-town would be no longer beautiful—“having thy shame naked.”
“The inhabitant of Zaanan came not forth in the mourning.” Zaanan means “march-town. ” March-town didn’t march. The site of this town is also unknown to us.
For the inhabitant of Maroth waited carefully for good: but evil came down from the Lord unto the gate of Jerusalem [Mic. 1:12].
“The inhabitant of Maroth waited carefully [anxiously] for good.” The name Maroth means “bitterness.” They waited for a good report, for good news, but it was a bitter report—“evil came down from the Lord unto the gate of Jerusalem.” The Assyrians were marching to the very walls of Jerusalem.
O thou inhabitant of Lachish, bind the chariot to the swift beast: she is the beginning of the sin to the daughter of Zion: for the transgressions of Israel were found in thee [Mic. 1:13].
Lachish was “Horse-town.” There were great stables of horses there. It is a city southwest of Jerusalem, over near the Philistine country, the place where idolatry was first introduced into the southern kingdom of Judah. Apparently Lachish was the link of idolatry between Israel and Judah.
“Bind the chariot to the swift beast” is a reference to the horse, and we now know that this is the place where horses were kept which were used in the worship of the sun. You will recall that even the Greeks had their Apollo driving a chariot across the sky in connection with their worship of the sun. God is condemning Lachish because she introduced this idolatry into Judah, the southern kingdom.
Therefore shalt thou give presents to Moresheth-gath: the houses of Achzib shall be a lie to the kings of Israel [Mic. 1:14].
“Moresheth-gath” was, of course, the hometown of Micah; it was in the southern kingdom of Judah.
“The houses of Achzib shall be a lie to the kings of Israel.” Achzib means “lie-town.” Lie-town, as did all these other towns, lived up to its name. The inhabitants were given over to lies. The name Achzib is the Hebrew word for a “winter brook” or a “lie.” The reason for this is that the brooks in Israel are very much like the brooks in Southern California. In fact, a friend of mine was riding with me one day when we crossed over the Los Angeles River. In the winter, during the wet season, this river can really go on a rampage, but in the dry season there is not much more than a trickle of water in it. As we crossed the river, my friend said, “That’s a good place for a river.” I replied, “It sure is, and in the winter there is a river there.” In Israel there are many dry river beds like that. But a flash flood out in the desert can transform them into raging torrents. Now you can see why achzib means a “winter brook” or a “lie.” And the town of Achzib was Lie-town because they had promised help to the northern kingdom, but they actually gave no help at all. “The houses of Achzib shall be a lie to the kings of Israel.”
Yet will I bring an heir unto thee, O inhabitant of Mareshah: he shall come unto Adullam the glory of Israel [Mic. 1:15].
Here is a suggestion that help is coming to Israel but not at this time. It is only a faint suggestion that “the glory of Israel” is the heir in the line of David, and the Lord Jesus Christ is the only one who fits this description. One of His names is Faithful—He is faithful and true, and He is coming to deliver them. He will not come from Lie-town, that’s for sure. However, in Micah’s day Israel was deceived, greatly deceived, and no help came to them when the Assyrian army came down from the north and overran their land.
Now Micah calls upon Israel to mourn as a nation—
Make thee bald, and poll thee for thy delicate children; enlarge thy baldness as the eagle; for they are gone into captivity from thee [Mic. 1:16].
When Assyria invaded Israel the first time, they took the young people into captivity, and the people are called upon to mourn because of that. Making themselves bald was an indication of grief. Although in the Mosaic Law they were told not to trim their beards nor shave their beards, now because of the sin that had come into the nation they are told to express their grief in this manner.
Isaiah, who was a contemporary of Micah, had something to say about this custom. In Isaiah 15:2 we read, “He is gone up to Bajith, and to Dibon, the high places [of idolatry], to weep: Moab shall howl over Nebo, and over Medeba: on all their heads shall be baldness, and every beard cut off.” This verse describes deep mourning and wailing. They had lost their children, you see. This is the judgment of God upon them.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: The prophet’s second message describes specific sins
THE PROPHET’S SECOND MESSAGE
In this chapter Micah describes the specific sins of the people. Judgment came upon these people because they had gone into idolatry with all that that implies. Idolatry in that day represented gross immorality, and the wages of the harlots ran the “high places.” Prostitution was the source of funds for their religion since sex was associated with idolatry. We find that the same thing is true today in the occult and in Satan worship. I think there is a connection between the occult of today and the idolatry of Micah’s day. Sex plays a very prominent part in both of them. They are a revelation of man breaking God’s commandment. Sexual sin and idolatry seem to go together. They destroy the home and destroy the sweet and tender relationship between a man and a woman in marriage. When sex is kept within the marriage relationship, it can become the sweetest and most precious thing on earth. When a nation moves sex out of that context and encourages illicit sex in the name of religion or “new morality,” it is evidence of the fact that the nation is in decline and is actually on its way out.
The sins which Micah will denounce in this chapter are sins against one another, sins against mankind, while in the first chapter their sins were in their relationship with God. You see, when a man is not right with God, he cannot be right with his fellowman. And when a man is right with God, he can be (although he doesn’t always choose to be) right with his fellowman. We have had an illustration of this in the lovey-dovey movement which started several years ago with the “flower children” in the San Francisco area. Because they were far from the Lord, the movement lapsed into gross immorality, and it wrecked the lives of many young people. My friend, when you are not right with God, you will not be right with other people.
Chapter 2 is not going to be pretty. You will not find it to be the most beautiful chapter in the Word of God. But it reveals the sin of a nation, which caused its destruction. It is well for us as God’s people and also for our nation to listen to Micah and to wake up.
Woe to them that devise iniquity, and work evil upon their beds! when the morning is light, they practise it, because it is in the power of their hand [Mic. 2:1].
Although this may include the practice of illicit sex, it primarily refers to evil of other sorts. When they go to bed at night, they don’t go to sleep but lie there and devise and plan iniquity—and chances are they are engaging in it at the same time. I have had some experience with folk like this. A wife complained to me bitterly that when her husband comes home, he doesn’t leave his work in the office but brings it with him. And when he goes to bed at night, he lies there conniving what he will do the next day. No wonder the wife was contemplating divorce.
“When the morning is light, they practise it, because it is in the power of their hand.” That is, they are able to execute what they have planned. It is also true in our contemporary society that the sinner and the ungodly are successful. The wealth of my own country is not in the hands of the godly today—although it was at one time. Money means power, and the ungodly are able to carry through that which is wrong. This is the chief reason that my nation is in its present predicament. The real problem is not an energy shortage nor the incapability of this or that political party. The root of the problem is that power is in the hands of the ungodly. This is the same sin which brought Israel down. Micah, as we have already noted, presents a philosophy of human government which God follows. If you doubt this, read the history of the fall of great nations. When wealth and power get into the hands of a few ungodly people, God moves in judgment.
Micah is still speaking of those in his day whose lives were characterized by doing evil—twenty-four hours a day. Now he is being specific—
And they covet fields, and take them by violence; and houses, and take them away: so they oppress a man and his house, even a man and his heritage [Mic. 2:2].
“They covet fields, and take them by violence.” We have an example of this being done by Israel’s royalty in the case of Ahab and Jezebel. In 1 Kings 21 we have the record of King Ahab coveting the vineyard of Naboth. Like a spoiled brat, he wanted it, although he didn’t make a move to get it. However, his wife Jezebel was a sinner who believed in action. She immediately set about getting the vineyard by eliminating Naboth. So what the heads of government practiced, those down below began to practice. The wealthy began to seize the fields that they coveted because they had the money and the power to do it.
My, how that method is being used in our contemporary society! The little businessman doesn’t stand much of a chance for survival in the culture we have produced. The big operators are in control, and they frankly say that they are in for the profits. But sometimes the word profit is a synonym for covetousness. And this was the great sin of Israel.
I have never understood why any man would want more than one million dollars. I have always thought that if I had that much money I would never want any more. It seems, however, that when a man gets one million dollars, he desires two million dollars. With two million dollars he can’t eat any more. He can’t sleep any more. He can’t indulge himself any more—he can only drink so much, and he can only sin so much. A million dollars will enable a man to do all that he wants, but men want to continue to get richer and richer and richer. The old bromide “The rich get richer and the poor get poorer” is the story of mankind. And Micah is speaking into that situation.
Notice that evil men will covet fields and houses and take them by violence. God not only gave the Land of Promise to the nation Israel and put them in it, but He also gave each tribe a particular portion of the land. Then He gave each individual a particular plot in the tribe to which he belonged, and that plot was his heritage. Then God instituted certain laws so that a man could not lose his land forever. During the Year of Jubilee every mortgage was canceled, and every bit of property was returned to its original owner. However, the Year of Jubilee only came every fifty years. If you lost your land the second year after Jubilee, you would have to wait forty-eight years to reclaim it. You could get very hungry in that length of time! Even though God had made laws to protect the poor, the rich always found ways to get around them, of course. All through the Scriptures we see that God is on the side of the poor. As Abraham Lincoln used to say, “God must love poor people because He made so many of them.” And the Lord Jesus Himself experienced the poverty of this earth.
Therefore thus saith the Lord; Behold, against this family do I devise an evil, from which ye shall not remove your necks; neither shall ye go haughtily: for this time is evil [Mic. 2:3].
This is a very interesting verse. God has said, “I condemn you because you lie on your beds and plot evil.” Now He says, “I am going to plot evil against you.” What does He mean by that? Was God actually going to do that which was evil? No, God intended to punish the evildoers, which was right, but from their viewpoint it was wrong because they wouldn’t like that. They would call it evil.
Today even some Christians condemn God for permitting certain things to take place. In other words, they are saying that God is doing evil. Well, God beat them to it; He said that He would do evil from their viewpoint. If they continued sinning, He would stop them with judgment. In fact, He said to Israel, “I devise an evil, from which ye shall not remove your necks.” God intended to put around those necks the chains of bondage. And the people of Israel were led captive into Assyria, one of the most brutal nations that has ever been on the topside of this earth. God adds, “Neither shall ye go haughtily: for this time is evil.” How haughty and proud they had been!
My own nation is presently in this same position. In many countries that I have visited—South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia—I have found that Americans are not loved, and we haven’t been loved for many years. Why? Because we have been haughty and proud. Yet we had the temerity after World War II to tell the world that we were going to lead it to peace! We thought the American dollar would solve the problems of the world. Well, we have gotten this world into a mess, haven’t we? And American diplomacy has been nothing to boast about since World War II. Why has our record been so poor? My personal opinion is that the judgment of God is already taking place. I love my country, and it breaks my heart to see it continue to fall into the hands of the godless rich. Let me repeat that it is not the method of government but the character of the men who govern that makes a nation great.
In that day shall one take up a parable against you, and lament with a doleful lamentation, and say, We be utterly spoiled: he hath changed the portion of my people: how hath he removed it from me! turning away he hath divided our fields [Mic. 2:4].
Great confusion was coming and “doleful lamentation”—a very unusual expression in the Hebrew language. It probably would not be possible to translate into English exactly what Micah was saying. There was no hope at all—“We be utterly spoiled [destroyed].”
Therefore thou shalt have none that shall cast a cord by lot in the congregation of the Lord [Mic. 2:5].
There have been various interpretations of this. Perhaps it means that there will be no more worship of God in that place.
Prophesy ye not, say they to them that prophesy: they shall not prophesy to them, that they shall not take shame.
O thou that art named the house of Jacob, is the spirit of the Lord straitened? are these his doings? do not my words do good to him that walketh uprightly? [Mic. 2:6–7].
This was a time when God cut off the flow of the spirit of prophecy. Why? Because the people wouldn’t hear it, and there came a famine of the Word of God.
“Are these his doings?” God has told them that He, too, is plotting evil—that is, what they call evil, because it is going to be a judgment against them.
“Do not my words do good to him that walketh uprightly?” Though the message is harsh, God’s people will accept it, and they will obey it. This is not a delightful passage like Psalm 23 or John 14, but God gives it just as much prominence. In fact, He put it in the second chapter, rather than in the fourteenth or the twenty-third, so we would not miss it.
Even of late my people is risen up as an enemy: ye pull off the robe with the garment from them that pass by securely as men averse from war [Mic. 2:8].
God is saying that, although they are His people, they have become His enemies, and one of the evidences of this is the way they treat the poor. God always insists upon justice for the poor. His charge is: “Ye pull off the robe with the garment from them.” A man’s robe was what he slept in. In other words, they would take a man’s bed out from under him. That was how far they were willing to go to rob the poor.
The women of my people have ye cast out from their pleasant houses; from their children have ye taken away my glory for ever [Mic. 2:9].
“The women of my people have ye cast out from their pleasant houses” probably refers to unprotected widows who had inherited homes from their husbands.
“From their children have ye taken away my glory for ever.” Even the young children were deprived of what God had given to them. And they would grow up in rebellion. In our day the rebellion of youth is, in my opinion, permitted by God to try to shake us out of our lethargy.
Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest: because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction [Mic. 2:10].
They were attempting to solve their problems and to be at rest without being at peace with God. “Because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore [great] destruction.” Because of the pollution of their sin and their heartless oppression, the land would cast out its inhabitants.
If a man walking in the spirit and falsehood do lie, saying, I will prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink; he shall even be the prophet of this people [Mic. 2:11].
This is biting sarcasm. God is saying, “The kind of prophets you want are those who will approve of your sins.” My friend, in our day many people do not want the preacher to say that drinking is wrong and that drunkenness is bad. Even in our churches many pastors are approving of social drinking. They insist that we are living in a new day, and, since we are not under the Mosaic Law, we can do these things. While it is true that we are under grace, there is one sure thing: if you love God, you are going to keep His commandments, and He certainly does condemn drunkenness. The false prophets in Micah’s day were not condemning the sins of the people. They were popular preachers, saying what the people wanted to hear.
PROMISE TO THE REMNANT
The message of judgment which Micah has been delivering has been very harsh, but here at the close of the chapter is a very beautiful little prophecy which shines like a ray of sunshine that breaks through the dark clouds on a stormy day.
I will surely assemble, O Jacob, all of thee; I will surely gather the remnant of Israel; I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah, as the flock in the midst of their fold: they shall make great noise by reason of the multitude of men [Mic. 2:12].
You have noticed, I am sure, that when God speaks to them of their sin, He addresses them by the name Jacob. So when He uses that term in this verse, the implication is that He is going to show mercy to them, not because of their worthiness or because of some fine character trait, but because of His own grace.
“I will surely assemble, O Jacob, all of thee.” This was not fulfilled after the Babylonian captivity, and it has not been fulfilled in their recent return to their land because He says that He will assemble “all of thee.” At the present time, there are more of the nation Israel in New York City than there are in whole land of Israel. Also, there is a great company still in Russia and in other countries of the world. So God has not yet assembled all of them according to this prophecy.
“I will surely gather the remnant of Israel.” Now for the remnant He uses the name Israel. God has always had a faithful remnant out of the nation, and actually He has never had more than the remnant. There never has been a time when it could be said that 100 percent of the nation had turned to God. And it was always for the sake of the remnant that God was gracious to the nation. In the future day that is coming, even in the Great Tribulation Period when we are told that all Israel shall be saved, who is meant? Well, it is all of Israel which belongs to that company of 144,000. The Book of Revelation makes it clear that they will be sealed (sealed, I believe, by the Holy Spirit of God) and will be able to survive the Great Tribulation. But that will be only a remnant of the nation. After all, there are probably three million Jews in Israel and probably twelve million in other lands, so that 144,000 could be nothing more than a remnant.
“I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah.” Bozrah was a place of many flocks of sheep because of the excellent pasture lands. When God brings His people together like the sheep of Bozrah, the Twenty-third Psalm will be fulfilled: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures …” (Ps. 23:1–2).
“They shall make great noise by reason of the multitude of men.” The great noise will be due to the fact that a great number will return to the land. When God returns the nation to their land, it does not mean that all of them are going to be saved by any means; but it will be a tremendous event. Since what we have seen of the return of Israel to the land has caused such great rejoicing among prophetic teachers, think what it will be in this future day!
The breaker is come up before them: they have broken up, and have passed through the gate, and are gone out by it: and their king shall pass before them, and the Lord on the head of them [Mic. 2:13].
“The breaker is come up before them.” The “breaker” is the one who clears the way, removes the obstacles, and leads them. I believe this refers to their entering the millennial kingdom when the Lord Jesus Christ will be the one to lead them, as He will have returned to the earth at that time. This verse refers to Him as the Breaker, their King, and the Lord (Jehovah).
CHAPTER 3
Theme: The prophet’s third message denounces leaders for their sins
THE PROPHET’S THIRD MESSAGE
Micah denounces the leaders of Israel for their sins—first, the princes; second, the prophets, who were the spiritual leaders; and last, all the leaders of Jerusalem, including the princes, the prophets, and the priests.
SINS OF THE PRINCES
This section begins with the call to hear, as does every major division of the Book of Micah.
And I said, Hear, I pray you, O heads of Jacob, and ye princes of the house of Israel; Is it not for you to know judgment? [Mic. 3:1].
“Hear, I pray you, O heads of Jacob.” He is speaking to the leadership of the nation.
“Is it not for you to know judgment?” What does he mean by this? Well, he is addressing the rulers of Israel who were the judges and magistrates. When the people were found guilty of a crime, they were brought before these men for judgment. Now they certainly should know what judgment and justice are. The same thought is expressed in the New Testament: “Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things” (Rom. 2:1). “The same things” does not mean identical but similar things. An example of this is found in 2 Samuel 12. The prophet Nathan came before King David and told him about a rich man in his kingdom who had great flocks of sheep. However, when he needed meat to serve his guest, instead of taking a lamb from his own flock, he took a poor man’s little ewe lamb—the only lamb he owned—and roasted it for his guest. When David heard this, he stood up, hot with anger, and pronounced judgment upon the man who would do such a thing. He could see the injustice of it; yet he himself had done a similar thing. And Nathan said to David, “…Thou art the man…” (2 Sam. 12:7). David accepted the judgment and confessed his guilt before God. It is amazing, friend, how we can see another man’s sin but overlook our own. This is the reason God says to these leaders in Israel, “You have judged others for their misdeeds, but you are doing the same things.”
This charge is certainly applicable to our day also. My feeling is that the reason many judges in our land have been so lenient with criminals and have not wanted the death penalty is that they are bothered by a guilt complex themselves. I have a notion that many times when a judge on the bench hears a case of an offender who is brought before him and hands down a light sentence, it is because it salves his own conscience to do so. It is almost a joke when a group of congressmen investigate the wrongdoing of someone in politics. Probably every one of them sitting there judging the other fellow has a skeleton in his own closet. It takes men of character to judge fairly, you see.
This is exactly what Micah is saying to the leadership in his day, “Is it not for you to know judgment?” You are not acting in ignorance; you have had experience in this. You have judged men who were guilty; now you are guilty.
Who hate the good, and love the evil; who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones [Mic. 3:2].
“Who hate the good, and love the evil.” It is difficult for a judge who had been at a cocktail party the night before and had become a little tipsy himself to sentence a man the next day who has killed somebody because he was driving while drunk. No wonder the judge lets him off easy. I know what I am talking about, my friend, because my mother was killed by a drunken driver right here in Pasadena. I didn’t feel that I should press charges, but when I was called in as a witness, I told the court, “All I ask is that justice be done.” And, believe me, he got off with a light sentence. As I looked at that judge, I had the feeling that he had a pretty bad conscience.
In Micah’s day the leadership actually hated the good and loved the evil. Folk like that are not fit to be in positions of leadership then or now. If it is discovered that a man in a high position in government—a congressman, a senator, or a judge—is unfaithful to his wife, is he fit to make laws relative to marriage? I don’t think so. The present breakdown in morality goes back to the lawmakers. And God puts the blame on the leadership of the nation Israel in Micah’s day. As we have seen before, God is presenting in this little Book of Micah a philosophy of human government, the basis of which is men of good character in positions of leadership.
“Who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones.” He uses a vivid illustration of their barbarous conduct against the poor.
Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them; and they break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron [Mic. 3:3].
In other words, they are like unfeeling human cannibals in their treatment of the poor. They are unprincipled and merciless. May I say that a godless man is the last man I want to sit in judgment upon me in any matter. And, very frankly, I am thankful that I don’t have to stand before you in judgment, even if you are a Christian. And you ought to be delighted that you will not have to stand before me in judgment. I believe we will fare better in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ than we would if we were judged by mankind. My case has already been appealed to Him, and I will not have to stand before any man to be judged. It is comforting to know this.
Then shall they cry unto the Lord, but he will not hear them: he will even hide his face from them at that time, as they have behaved themselves ill in their doings [Mic. 3:4].
Who is the prophet talking about? He is talking about the leaders in Israel. As long as they had been in their high positions, they had had no regard for the human side, and they had had no real sympathy or love. Now they are in trouble because a power greater than they has come down upon them.
“Then shall they cry unto the Lord, but he will not hear them.” These leaders are going to cry out to God. Isn’t that interesting? We all cry out to God in times of real trouble. I have been rather amused at times—I shouldn’t be, but I can’t help it—when I hear of the trouble that is coming upon us today and somebody says, “May God help us!” That is interesting because they bowed Him out of His universe many years ago. God isn’t mentioned much today, except in profanity, but every now and then I find people saying, “May God help us.” Well, my friend, I don’t know whether He will hear you or not, because in Micah’s day He said to the people who had ignored Him and lived godless lives that He would not hear their cry for help. In fact, He said that He would hide His face from them. My friend, we are living in a period of the silence of God. It does not look as if God is doing much to alleviate the present world situation. Yet His grace is still abundant, and He is rich in mercy to those who will bow before Him and accept His Son as Savior.
SINS OF THE PROPHETS
Thus saith the Lord concerning the prophets that make my people err, that bite with their teeth, and cry, Peace; and he that putteth not into their mouths, they even prepare war against him [Mic. 3:5].
The false prophets were like vicious animals or like serpents with forked tongues and fangs that would poison—actually, they were worse than that because they used smooth words to comfort the people, assuring them that peace was coming.
The futile effort of man to achieve peace ought to alert us to the fact that man by his own resources cannot bring peace to the world. Just wanting it and saying often enough that it is coming and voting for it will not bring peace. Again Micah makes it very clear that it is not a surface problem. It is not that folk don’t want peace. The problem is that the human heart is wicked, and Isaiah, a contemporary of Micah, wrote, “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked” (Isa. 57:21). In fact, Isaiah repeats this fact three times in the last part of his prophecy. The great climax to which he came in each of those three times was that the real problem was the wickedness of the human heart.
When I make the statement that we cannot have peace in our day, I generally get two or three letters from well-meaning folk. They write lovely letters that chide me for being pessimistic. They insist that we should continue to try to bring peace in the world. They are sincere and their argument sounds good, but it is one of the most false teachings abroad that man can make peace in his way. I want peace as much as anyone, but I want to go at it God’s way. First of all, the individual must know what the peace of God is. How are they going to know it? “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). It is not possible to have peace with your fellow man until you have peace with God. The human heart cannot be trusted; it is desperately wicked (see Jer. 17:9). You and I do not know how bad we really are. We can sink lower than any other creature on earth. One of the proofs that mankind has not descended from animals is that man can sink lower than animals—animals don’t go out and get drunk or beat their mates or abuse their offspring. The human race must have the peace of God in their hearts before they can bring peace to their world.
In Micah’s day the false prophets were prophesying peace, while in the north Assyria was getting ready to come down upon them. In our day efforts are being made in certain sections of the world to get people to sit down at a peace table and settle their differences without going to war. Yet for about six thousand years of recorded history, mankind has gone to war and still fights—one nation against another nation, one tribe against another tribe, one family against another family, and one individual against another individual. Why do we do this? We know that it is not to the advantage of either side. But we do it because we are alienated from God and in rebellion against Him. We won’t face up to the real problem, but we listen to the smooth words of false prophets who predict peace. Because they do this sort of thing, God pronounces upon them the calamities which are coming—
Therefore night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a vision; and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall not divine; and the sun shall go down over the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them [Mic. 3:6].
“Therefore night shall be unto you.” As we see in the other books of the prophets, darkness always speaks of judgment. It speaks of judgment in two different ways: the direct intervention of God in the punishment of the offender and also in the silence of God in not giving any new revelation to man.
“Ye shall not have a vision”—that is, God will not reveal any new truth to you.
“It shall be dark unto you.” The judgment which is coming to them is called darkness; there will not be any light from the Word of God. There will be a cessation of prophesying.
In the New Testament the apostle Paul made reference to this in I Corinthians 13:8: “Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail….” The English word fail is the Greek ekpipto, meaning “to fall off or away.” Prophecies will fail in two different ways: (1) they will be fulfilled; and (2) God will no longer reveal anything new. There was a hiatus of approximately four hundred years between the Old Testament and the New Testament in which God was silent. The sun had gone down. Malachi, the last prophet, prophesied that the sun would come up again—“But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings… ” (Mal. 4:2). Malachi would not have prophesied of the sun arising if the night had not been coming, and it did come. The people of Israel entered the long night of four hundred years until the coming of Christ. This is the same picture that Micah presents.
At the present time the United States has moved into the same position as that into which Israel had moved in Micah’s day. It is easy for the very sophisticated historians to characterize as narrow-minded and bigoted the men and women who first came to settle in this country. Well, they were imperfect human beings, but even those who were not Christians had a knowledge of and a reverence for the Word of God. Both Harvard and Yale universities were founded to train ministers so that the people in this country would not be in the darkness of ignorance concerning the Word of God. Well, I tell you, their light has gone out, hasn’t it? The very places that were supposed to be great educational centers and great lights for this country turned away from God a long time ago. The night is upon us today. At the universities we have had some of the worst riots this nation has ever seen. They have been the very hotbeds of darkness. It is at the university where the worship of Satan originated, and that is where it is being propagated. I have a newspaper clipping telling about a professor who is now involved in the worship of Satan and who indulges in the occult. We are in a period of time, it seems to me, when the sun of revelation has gone down. When I speak of revelation, I am talking about the illumination of the Word of God. The very centers which should be giving light from the Word of God are not doing it anymore. In fact, they are rejecting and turning their backs on God and turning to the occult. This is what Micah is talking about when he says, “Therefore night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a vision; and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall not divine; and the sun shall go down over the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them.”
Then shall the seers be ashamed, and the diviners confounded: yea, they shall all cover their lips; for there is no answer of God [Mic. 3:7].
Micah is saying that there shall be such gross darkness that those who are false prophets will make fools of themselves because of the fact that their prophecies will not come to pass. You will recall that this was the thing Ahab discovered, only he discovered it too late. All of the false prophets told him to go and fight in the war. Only one prophet, God’s man, told him that if he went to war he would not come back but would be slain. That true prophet was Micaiah. It was too bad Ahab didn’t listen to him, because Ahab went to war and was slain, just as Micaiah said (see 1 Kings 22:1–28).
God’s men tell it like it is, and they tell the truth. My friend, there is no use trying to cover up the sins in the church. It has become revolting to hear of the many men who are classed as religious leaders, yet are involved in reprehensible conduct, and who, under the guise of being Christians, are prospering.
We need to read again Hebrews 12:6: “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.” Why does the Lord do that? He does it because He doesn’t want us to be illegitimate. He says to us, “I chasten you and I discipline you so that you can know and the world can know that you are My child.” Did you know that William the Conqueror actually signed his name William the Bastard because he was illegitimate? I am of the opinion that many church members could sign their names the same way. You might be able to say, “I am a deacon in the church, I am a Sunday school teacher, I am a leader in the church, or I am a preacher,” but you would have to write under your name what William the Conqueror wrote under his name when he signed it. You would have to admit, “I am really not a legitimate child of God. I have not really been born again. I do not really know Jesus Christ as my personal Savior. I do not love Him. I do not seek to serve Him. I am not interested in His Word at all.”
In Micah’s day the false prophet was in that same position. He was speaking smooth words to comfort the people. The people had itching ears, and the prophet would scratch them, you see, by saying what they wanted to hear. Then they in turn would scratch the ears of the prophet by telling him how wonderful he was. “My, what a great preacher you are because you say such nice things. Everything must be all right.” They were living in luxury, but the level of immorality was frightening.
Now notice that Micah is very careful to separate himself from that group.
But truly I am full of power by the spirit of the Lord, and of judgment, and of might, to declare unto Jacob his transgression, and to Israel his sin [Mic. 3:8].
It took intestinal fortitude to be an unpopular preacher delivering a message the people hated, but Micah could say, “I know that the Spirit of God is leading me to say what I am saying.” It is wonderful to be in that position, my friend.
SINS OF THE LEADERS OF JERUSALEM
In this final division, Micah turns specifically to Jerusalem. Heretofore he has been speaking to the northern kingdom of Israel; but now he bundles together the prophets, the princes, and the priests of the southern kingdom, and he pronounces judgment upon all of them.
Hear this, I pray you, ye heads of the house of Jacob, and princes of the house of Israel, that abhor judgment, and pervert all equity [Mic. 3:9].
He says, “Listen to me, I have something to say to you.” Then he details their sins.
They build up Zion with blood, and Jerusalem with iniquity.
The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean upon the Lord, and say, Is not the Lord among us? none evil can come upon us [Mic. 3:10–11].
“The heads thereof judge for reward …the priests thereof teach for hire …the prophets thereof divine for money.” What is the thing that they all have in common? Greed, covetousness. My friend, that was the worst kind of idolatry even in the day of idols! Today we don’t have an idol sitting around—at least I hope you don’t. While it is true that superstition is gaining ground and multitudes of folk are following the horoscope, we still have not reverted to the base idolatry that existed in Micah’s day; yet our covetousness is idolatry. Micah brings into focus Israel’s real sin: idolatry, since covetousness is idolatry. The judges were judging for reward; the priests were teaching for hire; and the prophets were divining for money. They were all doing it for what they could get out of it for themselves. They did not take God into consideration, nor did they take the people into consideration. They were willing to walk over them. No wonder the charge was made: “You eat them up like cannibals because of your greed and love of money.”
When the leadership of a nation—both civil and religious—is evil, no form of government will work. This is Micah’s message to us.
Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest [Mic. 3:12].
This is a prediction that for their sins there will be a complete desolation of the city of Jerusalem. Jeremiah quotes Micah as having said this (see Jer. 26:18), which is a confirmation of the prophecy. The destruction did take place when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem. In the first chapters of the Book of Nehemiah, we see the significance of it. When Nehemiah went back to Jerusalem, he found it in a mess. It was nothing but debris, ashes, rubble, and ruin. It seemed like a hopeless task to rebuild the city. The Talmud, which is a Jewish writing, records the fact that at the destruction of Jerusalem by Rome in a.d. 70, an officer of the Roman army (Rufus, by name) actually plowed up the foundations of the temple with a plowshare. Many scholars reject that tradition, although the Jewish historian Jerome also noted it, as did the Jewish philosopher Maimonides. Personally, I think the tradition is accurate. Both Nebuchadnezzar and Titus the Roman were certainly capable of doing a thing like that. Whether or not that particular tradition is accurate, Jerusalem even today bears the scars of the accurate fulfillment of Micah’s prophecy.
CHAPTER 4
Theme: Prophecies of the last days
The little prophecy of Micah could be compared to a Jewish day in that it goes from evening to morning. It opens in the darkness of night—the first three chapters pronounce judgment, as we have seen: “Who is a God like unto thee” (Mic. 7:18) in proclaiming future judgment for past sins? But even in the darkness of judgment there was a ray of light which broke through momentarily. Now we have come to a new section, in which Micah prophesies future glory. This we will see in chapters 4 and 5. There will also be a little judgment in this section, but in the main it is glorious light with every now and then a cloud passing across the brightness of the sun.
PROPHECIES OF THE LAST DAYS
But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow unto it [Mic. 4:1].
This is a remarkable passage of Scripture and may sound familiar to you because it is similar to the second chapter of Isaiah. Micah, you may recall, was a contemporary of Isaiah, and through the years scholars have been trying to determine if Micah copied Isaiah or if Isaiah copied Micah. Candidly, I feel that such debate is a waste of time, because nobody has the answer to it. I Would rather look at it this way: Since the Holy Spirit was the author, He was able to say the same things through Isaiah and through Micah; and the reason He said it twice was because of its importance. Therefore, we should look at this section very carefully.
Notice that this fourth chapter opens with the little conjunction “but,” which is a connective that contrasts it to the last verse of chapter 3: “Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest.”
“But in the last days.” Micah is moving now beyond the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and the destruction under Titus the Roman, and beyond all other destructions, to the last days. In the Old Testament, “the last days” is a technical term with a very definite meaning. Our Lord Jesus called it “the tribulation, the great one” (see Matt. 24:21) we designate it as the Great Tribulation Period, which begins “the last days.” Then after the Tribulation (which will be a brief period of approximately seven years), the Lord Jesus Christ will return to the earth. In fact, His coming will end the Tribulation Period, and He Himself will establish His kingdom upon the earth. So “the last days” embrace the Tribulation, the return of Christ to the earth, and the millennial kingdom of Christ. Therefore, when Micah says “in the last days,” he has moved out and beyond all local situations, and he is looking way down into the future. The darker it became in Israel, the brighter the future appeared. And this is true for all of us. I am told that if you go far enough down in a well, you can see the stars. And when Israel hit bottom, God let them see the stars, the light out yonder in the future.
“The mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains.” The word mountain is used both literally and figuratively. Daniel uses it in a figurative way when he says, “Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth” (Dan. 2:34–35). That stone pictures Christ who is coming. “The stone … became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.” The mountain Daniel is talking about is Christ’s kingdom, which is to be established here upon the earth. That is the spiritual interpretation. We have no right to spiritualize a passage unless there is scriptural authority for doing so, and we do have it for this. However, I would not want to rob it of its literal sense, because the fact is that the city of Jerusalem is located upon a hill. Not only does Scripture make that clear, but all you have to do is to take a look at it. Micah is talking about Jerusalem, as we shall see. And the millennial kingdom will be centered there. Jerusalem will be the capital of the earth.
“And people shall flow unto it.” The word flow indicates spontaneous movement—from the desire in their hearts. Right now—as I am writing this—the flow is in the opposite direction. However, the way world conditions are changing, it could be different by the time you read this. But the point is that this prophecy of Micah’s is not being fulfilled today and will not be fulfilled until the Messiah comes.
And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem [Mic. 4:2].
Here is another chapter, among the many chapters in the prophetic books of the Bible, which makes it clear that the present return of the Jews to the land of Israel is not a fulfillment of prophecy. In this day in which we live the nations of the world are not going to Jerusalem to hear from the Lord! Neither is the Word of the Lord going forth from Jerusalem. I could supply you with the names of several Christian missionaries in the city of Jerusalem who themselves are Jewish, but who have been persecuted for presenting Christ and the Word of God. Believe me, the Word of God is not flowing from Jerusalem!
My friend, all the current sensationalism which declares that prophecy is being fulfilled in that land just produces an itch in what I call baby Christians. They want the bottle to be warm and sweet; and, therefore, it is nice to hear that we are seeing a fulfillment of prophecy, which means that the end is just around the corner. Some folk are even setting dates for our Lord’s return. Well, nobody knows. Although I think we are drawing near to the end, I have no inside information from the Lord to confirm it, and certainly there is nothing in His Word to confirm it. I wish these sensational speakers who major in prophecy would read all the prophecies throughout the Bible. If they would do that, it would be quite obvious to them that prophecies like Micah gives us here are not now being fulfilled. The Word of God is not going out from Jerusalem today. For example, no Bible society is printing Bibles in Jerusalem and sending them out to the ends of the earth! To circulate the New Testament from that place would be utterly impossible. The Word of God is not going forth from Jerusalem as Micah said it would do. The wonderful prophecies in this chapter will be fulfilled during the millennial Kingdom when Christ Himself is reigning in Jerusalem. Then the heads of the capitals of the world—Beijing, Berlin, London, Washington—will be going to Jerusalem to be taught by Christ Himself of His ways!
And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more [Mic. 4:3].
“And he shall judge among many people.” This again is the Lord Jesus Christ, the Messiah, when He returns to the earth the second time to reign. Imagine the nations of the world bringing their disputes to Him for arbitration! The things mentioned in this verse cannot come to pass until He does come.
“They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks.” This verse appears on the building of the United Nations. Believe me, it doesn’t belong there! If those boys have beaten their swords into plowshares, it only means that they have a bigger instrument with which to beat each other over the head. And if they are turning their spears into pruninghooks, they are not using them to catch fish but to gouge other nations, especially those that are weaker than they are. This verse certainly is not being fulfilled by the United Nations! They are really knocking each other out there, and there is very little agreement. It will not be fulfilled until Christ comes.
“Nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” Obviously, we have not come to this position and will not until the Prince of Peace is ruling. Because He is not ruling in our day, we are not to beat our swords into plowshares; we are to keep our powder dry. This is not the time to disarm. Certainly everyone who wants peace would like to see our armaments cut back and our tax dollars going to something else, but as long as we are living in a big, bad world—not of make-believe but of reality—we need to be armed. The Lord Jesus said, “… a strong man armed keepeth his palace …” (Luke 11:21). Does he keep it by turning the other cheek? To read about turning the other cheek, you must read the Sermon on the Mount, and remember that it is the King who is speaking and He is referring to the time when He will be reigning upon the earth. When He is reigning, we can get rid of all our protection. We can even take the locks off our doors—but until then I not only have one lock on my door, I have two locks. We are living in that kind of world. These prophecies that Micah is giving are not for the present hour; they are for the last days. Let’s put them in their proper context.
But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid: for the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it [Mic. 4:4].
“They shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid.” Do you want to tell me that this verse is being fulfilled in Israel today? In our day they are absolutely afraid. Why? Because they are not there according to fulfilled prophecy.
“For the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it.” God Himself has said this. God says that when He puts them in the land, they will live in peace and prosperity.
For all people will walk every one in the name of his god, and we will walk in the name of the Lord our God for ever and ever [Mic. 4:5].
The American Standard Version has a much better translation of this verse: “For all the peoples walk every one in the name of his god; and we will walk in the name of Jehovah our God for ever and ever.” The thought is that in the past they walked after their own gods, but in the future they are going to walk in the name of Jehovah, our God.
In that day, saith the Lord, will I assemble her that halteth, and I will gather her that is driven out, and her that I have afflicted [Mic. 4:6].
“In that day” reminds us that He is still speaking of the millennial kingdom.
“Will I assemble her that halteth.” Who is this whom God describes as halting, driven out, and afflicted? It is the nation Israel. Notice that He says, “That I have afflicted.” It looks as if God takes the blame for that which has happened to the nation Israel.
I had a conversation with a Jewish man in front of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem several years ago. He was one of the Jews who had come out of Nazi persecution alive, although he had spent time in a concentration camp. He said that he had become an atheist. He asked, “Where was God during the time of our trouble? Why didn’t He deliver us?”
I told him, “To tell the truth, I think God was around. Maybe you would like to blame Him for the trouble you had.”
He replied, “I certainly do. If there is a God, He would have responded to us.”
I said, “No, because you folk had an opportunity to know Him and obey Him way ahead of the rest of us. When your nation had a knowledge of the living and true God, my ancestors were heathens. One tribe was in Germany, and the other tribe was in Scotland. They were dirty, filthy, ignorant pagans, but you had the light. Finally some of your people brought the light to my people, and I’m grateful for it. But God has made it very clear in your own writings, your own books, that when you have a knowledge of the true and living God, you cannot turn your back on Him without being punished. If you will read your writings, you will find that not only can you blame Him for your trouble, but He is also not through with you as a nation. He intends to regather you. By that time you will have learned (and obviously you have not learned it yet) that this is God’s universe and that you cannot reject the knowledge of Himself that He has given you without suffering His judgment.”
My friend, our own nation is coming to this same position and condition, and it alarms me.In this land of ours there is a growing ignorance of the Word of God. Even worse than that, the Word of God is being ridiculed and made light of. A comedian says, “The Devil made me do it.” This is simply not true. You don’t do evil because the Devil made you do it. You do evil because you have an old nature that is as mean and as alienated and as far from God as it can possibly be. Also I hear it flippantly said, “I’ll tell God on you!” Well, of course, you don’t have to tell Him about somebody else’s sin. He already knows it, and He knows yours as well. My friend, we cannot make light of Him and reject Him without experiencing His judgment. In Micah’s day He took the blame for afflicting Israel, and He has not asked me to apologize for Him or to try to explain away that statement. This ought to serve as a warning to us as a nation.
And I will make her that halted a remnant, and her that was cast far off a strong nation: and the Lord shall reign over them in mount Zion from henceforth, even for ever [Mic. 4:7].
“I will make her that halted a remnant.” Never throughout the long history of Israel did 100 percent of the nation worship God. Always only a remnant was faithful to Him. God always preserved a remnant. Actually, it was a remnant of those which came out of Egypt that entered the land. Practically the entire generation that came out of Egypt died in the wilderness. It was their children who entered the land. God preserved a remnant. Even in Elijah’s day God had a faithful remnant. Elijah was very pessimistic. He cried, “Lord, I only am left” (see I Kings 19:10). But God told him, “You aren’t the only one; I have seven thousand in these mountains who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” Because they were hiding from Ahab and Jezebel, Elijah didn’t know about them (And I am of the opinion that in our day there are more believers than we think there are. There are many believers like those seven thousand. Although we don’t hear about them, they are true believers.) Also, there was a remnant of believers at the coming of Christ; although the leaders of the nation rejected Him and had Him crucified, there was a remnant that received Him. Later, on the Day of Pentecost, a great company turned to Christ; yet it was a remnant. It always has been a remnant. Coming down to our day, there is a remnant even in the church that bears His name. Although I have made the statement that I think there are more believers in our world than we realize, it is also true that in the church there is only a remnant of true believers in Christ.
Many of us would be surprised if we knew how few church members were genuine believers even though they are quite active in Christian circles and in Christian service. Many people in our affluent society have become church members. We are living in a period that has produced a lot of pseudo-saints. They are not genuine by any means. They have not been born again. The Book of Hebrews makes it very clear that “… whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth …” (Heb. 12:6). And every son whom He receives, He is going to put through the fire. He is going to test him. If you have some metal which you think is gold, you can take it to the assayer’s office. He will put the metal under heat so that you will find out whether what you have is gold or something else. And God puts the heat to those who are His own. The day of persecution is going to come to church members, and it will reveal quickly who are the true believers and who are not. God has a remnant in the church today.
Also in our day there is a remnant of believers among the people of Israel—probably more than we realize. In every nation there is a remnant of true believers, although they may not be identified with a local church. Unfortunately, the actions of some church members are shutting the door to a great many believers. Yet God always has His faithful remnant. The word remnant in Scripture is very important; don’t just rush over it.
In Micah’s day God is saying that of the afflicted ones He will make a remnant; He will regather them and make them “a strong nation: and the Lord shall reign over them in mount Zion from henceforth, even for ever.”
And thou, O tower of the flock, the strong hold of the daughter of Zion, unto thee shall it come, even the first dominion; the kingdom shall come to the daughter of Jerusalem [Mic. 4:8].
“O tower of the flock, the strong hold of the daughter of Zion.” God is probably addressing the land itself, informing it that its former dominion under David and Solomon will be restored, the far greater kingdom of the Messiah shall come. This has not happened yet; the kingdom has not come. If the people of Israel are back in their land for anything, they are back there for the Great Tribulation Period. The kingdom is still in the far future.
THE NEAR FUTURE
At this point a cloud passes over the sun. A great many Bible scholars believe the next two verses refer to the Babylonian captivity.
Now why dost thou cry out aloud? is there no king in thee? is thy counsellor perished? for pangs have taken thee as a woman in travail.
Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail: for now shalt thou go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and thou shalt go even to Babylon; there shalt thou be delivered; there the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies [Mic. 4:9–10].
This is so specific that I feel it could refer to nothing else but the Babylonian captivity which was coming to the southern kingdom. When Micah directs his remarks to the “daughter of Zion,” he refers to the southern kingdom of Judah. The word that interests me here is travail. Frankly, I can’t speak about travail firsthand. One half of the human family does not know what it is to travail in birth. Only the women know about that. The only thing I know about birth pangs is what I saw my own wife go through and what I have been told by others. Birth pains are frightful. They are something no person could bear for a long period of time. It has to be temporary.
The picture Micah gives us here is that of Nebuchadnezzar taking Jerusalem. He came to that city three times, and the third time he destroyed the temple area, left it in wrack and ruin, leveled the city, and burned it. The suffering of the people of Judah is described as a woman in travail, a woman with birth pangs. This had to be a brief period or the nation would not have continued to exist. That kind of trouble could not go on forever because the people could not have endured it. It would have been too frightful, too terrible. For this same reason the Great Tribulation Period must be brief. The Lord Jesus Christ made that clear: “And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened” (Matt. 24:22).
“Thou shalt go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and thou shalt go even to Babylon.” When Nebuchadnezzar captured the city, the remaining inhabitants fled and tried to live in the fields. Eventually they were taken captive to Babylon.
Let me call your attention to the fact that Micah in these two verses is looking beyond the Assyrian captivity of Israel to the later captivity of Judah by Babylon. However, in the next breath he predicts deliverance: “There shalt thou be delivered; there the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies.” Although they shall be captives in Babylon, God will deliver them from there. We know from history that God did deliver them by the hand of Cyrus (see Isa. 44:28; 2 Chron. 36:22–23). The point that Micah is making here is that the travail and suffering of God’s people will end in joy.
THE DISTANT FUTURE
Now in this closing section Micah moves ahead to the far distant future, the time of the Great Tribulation and specifically to the final war, the War (not the battle) of Armageddon.
Now also many nations are gathered against thee, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion [Mic. 4:11].
“Many nations are gathered against thee”—the mention of many nations makes it clear that Micah has moved away from the Babylonian invasion and is speaking of something else here. The many nations gathered against Jerusalem are mentioned by several other prophets. For example: Joel 3; Zechariah 12 and 14; Ezekiel 38 and 39 all refer to the War of Armageddon during the Great Tribulation Period.
But they know not the thoughts of the Lord, neither understand they his counsel: for he shall gather them as the sheaves into the floor [Mic. 4:12].
“They know not the thoughts of the Lord, neither understand they his counsel.” They do not know what God is going to do. They are coming against Israel blindly, unaware that God is bringing them there for judgment.
Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion: for I will make thine horn iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass: and thou shalt beat in pieces many people: and I will consecrate their gain unto the Lord, and their substance unto the Lord of the whole earth [Mic. 4:13].
“Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion.” The nations of the world are as sheaves for the threshing floor, and Israel will do the threshing. Today Israel is a weak nation and absolutely dependent upon other nations, but in that day they are going to be dependent upon the Lord. Psalm 75:6 says, “For promotion cometh neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south.” Psalm 75:7 goes on to say, “But God is the judge: he putteth down one, and setteth up another.” In that day help for Israel will not come from the north (Russia), or from the south (Egypt), or from the west (Europe or the United States), or from the east (China and the Arab countries). Their help will come from the Lord who made heaven and earth.
These final three verses look forward to the war which concludes the Great Tribulation Period, the War of Armageddon.
CHAPTER 5
Theme: Prophecy of the first coming of Christ
This chapter continues the subject begun in chapter 4: prophesying future glory because of past promises. In chapter 4 we saw prophecies regarding the last days; now we shall see prophecies regarding the first coming of Christ.
Now gather thyself in troops, O daughter of troops: he hath laid siege against us: they shall smite the judge of Israel with a rod upon the cheek [Mic. 5:1].
In the Hebrew Scriptures this verse concludes chapter 4. Franidy, I feel that it belongs there, not here, and that it continues the thought of chapter 4 verse 9 regarding the Babylonian captivity. You will recall that Micah projects the horrors of the Babylonian invasion right on down to the “last days,” that is, to the Great Tribulation Period and the War of Armageddon. Now in the verse before us, he again picks up the thought of the Babylonian invasion.
“He hath laid siege against us” refers, I believe, to the siege of the Babylonian army against Jerusalem.
“They shall smite the judge of Israel with a rod upon the cheek.” There are those who take the position that the “judge” refers to the Lord Jesus Christ. However, in the Gospel record we read that they smote Him with their hands, not with a rod. Neither was Christ smitten in any siege. He was not smitten by a foreign enemy but by His own people. I do not believe that this can refer to the mistreatment of Christ at His first coming.
It seems obvious to me that the “judge of Israel” refers to the last king of the Davidic kingdom, Zedekiah. In 2 Kings 25:7 we read, “And they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon.” I believe that Micah is referring to the shameful treatment which Zedekiah received at that time. It denotes what looks to be the very end of the Davidic line. However, Zedekiah was not in the direct line. You will recall that Jehoiakim rebelled against the king of Babylon. He stood against him at first; then Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, took Jehoiakim into captivity. Then Jehoiachin was put on the throne. Later, he too was taken captive. In 2 Kings 24:15 we read, “And he carried away Jehoiachin to Babylon, and the king’s mother, and the king’s wives, and his officers, and the mighty of the land, those carried he into captivity from Jerusalem to Babylon.” This was the Davidic line which was carried into captivity, and out of this line came both Joseph and Mary, the mother of the Lord Jesus. Then Nebuchadnezzar put Zedekiah (the uncle of Jehoiachin) on the throne at Jerusalem. When he rebelled against Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar became tired of fooling with the line of kings at Jerusalem; so he took Zedekiah, slew all of his sons before his eyes, and carried him into captivity.
You might assume from this devastating experience that the Davidic line had come to an end and that the promise God made to David, that one was to come in his line who would reign forever, could never be fulfilled.
This brings us to a remarkable verse that is in contrast to all we have been considering.
PROPHECY OF THE FIRST COMING OF CHRIST
Now this verse is part of the Christmas story; and, if you are not reading this during December, you may feel that you have chosen an inappropriate time. However, we can be almost sure that Jesus was not born on December 25. That day was chosen to try to identify His birth with the winter solstice. But it is more likely that He was born in the spring, because in December the shepherds would not be out on the hillsides with their sheep. The sheep would be sheltered in the caves which are located all along that area. Around a.d. 532 a calendar was set up, which is a reasonable facsimile of the one we use today. It was set up incorrectly for the number of days in the year, and that is why we have a leap year every now and then. In 1752 the calendar was jumped ahead eleven days. George Washington was not born on February 22; he was actually born on February 11. Therefore, a person could not be sure that Jesus Christ was born on December 25 even if all of the other circumstances fit into it. This raises a question about observing the Sabbath day, too. Which day is the Sabbath day? Actually, it is not important, nor is the exact day of Jesus’ birth important. The time of the year is immaterial. It is the place that is all important. Christ was born in Bethlehem. That is the historical fact. This fact has been authenticated by history.
But thou, Beth-lehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting [Mic. 5:2].
“But” is a little conjunction that presents the other side of the coin. “But thou, Bethlehem.” In spite of what happened to Zedekiah and the Davidic line—which went into captivity and finally returned to the land of Israel as peasants—the one in David’s line is coming.
“But thou, Beth-lehem Ephratah”—since there were two Bethlehems, the word ephratah, meaning “fruitful,” is added to distinguish between them. Micah named the place where Christ was to be born seven hundred years before He was born there. After seven hundred years, with so many intervening events, there was little likelihood that one in the line of David could be born in Bethlehem. It was almost entirely out of the question. The odds were against it. No members of the family of David were living in Bethlehem any longer. They were scattered. The Dispersion had driven them from the land. There was one family in the line of David living in Nazareth; yet Bethlehem must be the place where the Son of God was to be born, according to Micah. This prophecy was the sole basis on which the scribes directed the wise men to Bethlehem. The scribes quoted from the prophecy of Micah because they believed that it was the place where He would be born, although they didn’t believe it would be fulfilled at that time.
The circumstances which led up to the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem are so familiar to us that we may not realize how remarkable they were. The record in Luke’s Gospel gives us some of the details: Caesar Augustus signed the tax bill which moved Mary out of Nazareth. If that little donkey on which Mary rode had stumbled and Mary had fallen, Jesus would probably have been born somewhere along the route. But—I say this very carefully—that little donkey could not have stumbled, because seven hundred years earlier Micah had written that Jesus would be born in Bethlehem. The little donkey got her there on schedule; it was timed from eternity. It was more punctual and precise than any jet plane could be in our day.
“Out of thee shall he come forth unto me.” The words unto me indicate that this One was coming to do the will of the Father and to accomplish His plan.
“Whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.” His birth, the Incarnation, has to do with His humanity. He clothed Himself in humanity when He came to Bethlehem. But His existence was before His birth.
Isaiah, a contemporary of Micah, verifies this: “… Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel” (Isa. 7:14). And he has more to say of this coming one: “For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given …” (Isa. 9:6). When Isaiah wrote “unto us,” he was not thinking of the United States; it was Israel that he had in mind. “A child is born”—that’s His humanity. “A son is given”—not born, because this speaks of His divinity. The “child” was born in Bethlehem, but the “Son” was “from everlasting.”
The psalmist mentions this: “Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world. even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God” (Ps. 90:2). The Hebrew language expresses this very vividly: “from the vanishing point in the past to the vanishing point in the future, thou art God.” Just as far back as you can go in your thinking, He is God. He came out of eternity. He is the eternal Son of God.
In Proverbs 8:23 we find, “I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.” “Set up” in this verse means “anointed” and could read, “I was anointed from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was.” The next two verses say, “When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth” (Prov. 8:24–25). Before there was any creation, He was God; yet into creation He came, at the appointed time, into a little out-of-the-way town, Bethlehem.
The Lord Jesus said, “I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father” (John 16:28). His goings forth have been of old. He is the everlasting God. He told the Pharisees, “… Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). Christ appeared many times in the Old Testament. Go back to the creation. In John 1:3 we read concerning Christ, “All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.” He was the Creator. In Colossians 1:16 we read this about our Lord, “For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him.” In the Garden of Eden He was the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. He was the articulation of God. He was the Word of God. He was the communication from God to man. We find Him in pursuit of man throughout the Old Testament. He appeared to Moses in the burning bush. He said, “I have come down to deliver you.” He was the Redeemer. You see, what Micah is saying here is of tremendous significance. Although He was born in Bethlehem almost two thousand years ago, His goings forth have been from old, from everlasting.
We have been considering His preincarnation; now let’s look again at His incarnation, His humanity. When God came to Bethlehem, He got something He never had before, and that was the name of Jesus. He received a humanity, and Jesus was His human name. He was Jehovah. That is the name of deity. He is Jesus now, and He is a Savior. He came out of Bethlehem to save. Remember, the angels said to the shepherds, “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11). Matthew 1:23 says, “Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.” But His name was to be Jesus. He can’t be Jesus unless He is Emmanuel, which means “God with us.” He must be a man to take our place, to be our representative, to die a substitutionary death.
In the books of the prophets are many predictions about the coming of the Messiah which are totally unrelated and seem even to contradict each other. How could they all come to pass? Although Bethlehem was designated as Christ’s birthplace, connected with His birth we are told that there will be weeping in Ramah, a place north of Bethlehem. Also, He is to be called out of Egypt, and He is to be called a Nazarene. It seems utterly impossible for all of these prophecies to be true. How can they all fit into place? Well, Matthew gives the account and, without any strain on the circumstances, all of these things come together normally and naturally—let me change that to supernaturally. God was overruling.
As you can see, Micah 5:2 is a very remarkable verse, and we have only stayed on the surface of it.
Now we come to an interval which takes place between the time of Christ’s rejection and the time of His return as the King to rule on this earth.
Therefore will he give them up, until the time that she which travaileth hath brought forth: then the remnant of his brethren shall return unto the children of Israel [Mic. 5:3].
You may think that this verse still has reference to the birth of Christ. Well, it is true that it speaks of the fact that Mary travailed, but you can’t read this passage without realizing that it also refers to the nation of Israel. It speaks not only of their worldwide dispersion—they were scattered by the judgment of God—but of their travail. The Great Tribulation Period is the travail through which the nation must pass. “Then the remnant of his brethren shall return unto the children of Israel.” The Jews will be regathered from their worldwide dispersion.
And he shall stand and feed in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God; and they shall abide: for now shall he be great unto the ends of the earth [Mic. 5:4].
Here the Lord Jesus is depicted as the Shepherd who feeds His flock. He is the Shepherd to the church, and He is also the Shepherd to the nation Israel. The One who was born in Bethlehem, the One who was rejected, will feed His flock. I can’t think of anything that sets Him forth more wonderfully than the figure of the shepherd. It speaks of His care, His protection, and His salvation. He is the Good Shepherd who will lay down His life for the sheep (see Ps. 22); He is the Great Shepherd who keeps His sheep even today (see Ps. 23); and He is the Chief Shepherd who is coming in glory (see Ps. 24). His entire ministry is set forth under the office of a shepherd.
And this man shall be the peace, when the Assyrian shall come into our land: and when he shall tread in our palaces, then shall we raise against him seven shepherds, and eight principal men [Mic. 5:5].
“The Assyrian,” as we find in the prophecy of Isaiah, sets forth the enemies that shall come up against the nation Israel in the last days. In Micah’s day the Assyrian was brutal, and he did take the northern kingdom into captivity.
“Then shall we raise against him seven shepherds, and eight principal men.” The two numbers seem to denote the fact of fullness and that God will make adequate provision for them. These two numbers carry that meaning in other instances (see Prov. 6:16; Eccl. 11:2).
And they shall waste the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod in the entrances thereof: thus shall he deliver us from the Assyrian, when he cometh into our land, and when he treadeth within our borders [Mic. 5:6].
“They shall waste the land of Assyria with the sword” continues the prediction of the last days when “the Assyrian” represents the confederacy of nations which will come against Israel at the end of the Tribulation Period. Israel, strengthened by their Shepherd, will not only repulse the attack but will carry the battle into enemy territory.
It is interesting to see how Micah completely sets forth Christ: first, as the One to be born in Bethlehem. When He was born on earth, He came in humility. We need to note that He humbled Himself (see Phil. 2:5–8). We don’t humble ourselves; sometimes some other people humble us, but Christ humbled Himself. There was an emptying on the part of Christ. Of what did He empty Himself? Not His deity. That little baby, reclining so helplessly on His mother’s bosom, could have spoken this universe out of existence. He is God of very God and man of very man, but He limited Himself. Self-limitation was something that He took willingly. We do not limit ourselves willingly. In fact, we expand ourselves. We are aggressive. We want to win. We want to be on top. Man is self-assertive. He is self-centered. He is selfish. But Jesus Christ is the Shepherd. He was born not in a royal city or in the capital, but in the insignificant town of Bethlehem—and in a stable. That is no place for a king to be born! When Christ came to earth, He emptied Himself of His glory. Second, Micah indicates that He is the eternal one “whose goings forth have been from … everlasting.” Third, Micah depicts Him as the Shepherd who came to die for His sheep and to watch over His own. And finally, when He comes again, He will be the Chief Shepherd, coming in might and power and glory to deliver His people.
And the remnant of Jacob shall be in the midst of many people as a dew from the Lord, as the showers upon the grass, that tarrieth not for man, nor waiteth for the sons of men [Mic. 5:7].
The dew and rain refer to the blessing the people of Israel will be among the nations.
And the remnant of Jacob shall be among the Gentiles in the midst of many people as a lion among the beasts of the forest, as a young lion among the flocks of sheep: who, if he go through, both treadeth down, and teareth in pieces, and none can deliver [Mic. 5:8].
This certainly does not depict the people of Israel in our day. Israel has been in a precarious position for years. But God promises that in the future, when Israel is obeying the Lord and is in fellowship with Him, He will make them the head and not the tail of the nations (see Deut. 28:13).
Thine hand shall be lifted up upon thine adversaries, and all thine enemies shall be cut off [Mic. 5:9].
In that day God is going to give them victory over their enemies.
And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord, that I will cut off thy horses out of the midst of thee, and I will destroy thy chariots [Mic. 5:10].
Now, just in case an amillennialist is applying this to some other time, Micah wants to make sure you realize that this will come to pass “in that day,” which is still future.
And I will cut off the cities of thy land, and throw down all thy strong holds [Mic. 5:11].
This is thought to mean that God will remove all the things on which Israel had leaned for support—horses and chariots and fortified cities. They won’t need them anymore, for their Messiah is bringing peace to earth.
And I will cut off witchcrafts out of thine hand; and thou shalt have no more soothsayers:
Thy graven images also will I cut off, and thy standing images out of the midst of thee; and thou shalt no more worship the work of thine hands [Mic. 5:12–13].
He is going to get rid of idolatry and false religion. They will worship only the living and true God.
And I will pluck up thy groves out of the midst of thee: so will I destroy thy cities [Mic. 5:14].
As we have seen, the “groves” were places of idol worship.
And I will execute vengeance in anger and fury upon the heathen, such as they have not heard [Mic. 5:15].
“The heathen” are the nations who are persecuting His people. The Messiah will bring blessing and peace to the remnant of Israel and to the remnant of the other nations of the world who turn to Him, but He will “execute vengeance in anger and fury upon the heathen”—this, I believe, refers to the Great Tribulation Period.
CHAPTER 6
Theme: Pleading present repentance because of past redemption
Chapter 6 begins Micah’s third and final message to the nations of the world and to Israel in particular. Although chapters 6 and 7 are one message, I have taken the privilege of dividing these last two chapters and of making a major division out of each one of them.
PLEADING PRESENT REPENTANCE BECAUSE OF PAST REDEMPTION
Hear ye now what the Lord saith; Arise, contend thou before the mountains, and let the hills hear thy voice [Mic. 6:1].
This section begins as the other major sections of this book have begun: “Hear ye now what the Lord saith.” This is a call not only to the northern kingdom, but again I take it that it is also a call to the entire world to “hear.” God will now register His complaint against Israel. God has a contention with His people Israel, and from it we can learn great lessons.
“Arise, contend thou before the mountains, and let the hills hear thy voice.” This is an expression that we find several times in the writings of the prophets. This is actually a call to nature, a call, it says, to the mountains and to the hills. But I believe that there is also an application here that we see elsewhere in Scripture, too. A mountain represents a great kingdom, and a hill represents a lesser kingdom. I would say, therefore, that this is a call not only to nature but also to the nations of the world. In other words, here is a message which is applicable to all the nations of the world.
Hear ye, O mountains, the Lord’s controversy, and ye strong foundations of the earth: for the Lord hath a controversy with his people, and he will plead with Israel [Mic. 6:2].
“Hear ye, O mountains, the Lord’s controversy”—the nations of the world are to hear. “And ye strong foundations of the earth”—that is, the great peoples and nations of the world which have been in existence for thousands of years and yet have been far from God. God now gives a message to them.
“For the Lord hath a controversy with his people, and he will plead with Israel.” God has a controversy with His people, and He is actually calling them into court.
Then God does a very startling and surprising thing. When He goes into court, instead of immediately lodging a charge against them, He says, “What am I guilty of?” Can you imagine this condescension of Almighty God to little man down here on this earth!
O my people, what have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied thee? testify against me [Mic. 6:3].
In other words, God is saying to them, “Why have you turned from Me? Why have you rejected Me? What have I done to you?” We find this question again in the prophecy of Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament. After their captivity, the people returned to the land and became very blasé, very sophisticated. They forgot about the Babylonian captivity. The city of Jerusalem had been rebuilt, and they were enjoying prosperity again. When Malachi spoke to them, they said, “Well, to tell the truth, this going through the religious rituals is very boring indeed, and it’s wearisome.” I would more or less agree with them in that, but the problem was not with God—the problem was with them. Micah is going to be very specific here as to the real problem.
God had asked the people to testify against Him and to tell Him what He has done. Now He is going to tell them what He has done to them. What is it that God has done? Has He been ugly to them? Has He mistreated them? Did He take them down to the land of Egypt and leave them there and forget about them? He could have done that. He didn’t have to deliver them out of the land of Egypt, but He did deliver them. Listen to Him—
For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of servants; and I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam [Mic. 6:4].
“For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of servants.” They had been slaves, and God says, “I redeemed you. I didn’t do you wrong. I didn’t harm you, but I redeemed you. You were slaves, bending under the yoke of the taskmaster down in the land of Egypt, and there was no one to deliver you. You were not an attractive people; you were a slave people. You had dropped down to the lowest level of humanity, but I loved you and redeemed you out of the house of servants.”
“And I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.” God says, “I gave you leadership to lead you out of the land—Moses, Aaron, and Miriam.” It is interesting that Miriam is mentioned here. I would like to call to the attention of the women’s liberation movement the fact that God did not pass them by. Miriam was one of the leaders out of the land of Egypt. She was on a par with Aaron, but she was not on a par with Moses because Moses was the one that God had chosen. Actually, at one time, Miriam wanted to lead a rebellion against her own brother. When the people got out into the wilderness, Moses really took charge, for he was leading under God. But Miriam said, “Who is he to tell me anything? I remember when he was a little, bitty fellow and Mother and I took him down to the river and put him in the bullrushes because he would have been put to death by Pharaoh. I stayed at a distance, and I watched over him. Who does he think he is to tell me what to do?” I guess Miriam was the first women’s liberationist that we ever had. But she was a leader, and she was chosen of God. I have a notion that she had a real ministry with the women of Israel. Can you imagine the problems that would arise with the women and children on that wilderness march? There would be problems that Moses would not know too much about. So Miriam must have been a great help.
The people of Israel in Micah’s day complained that they were weary, tired of worshiping God. They said, “After all, what has He done for us?” So God went back and recited their history. God is pleading from His heart with these people—
O my people, remember now what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal; that ye may know the righteousness of the Lord [Mic. 6:5].
What we have here is the reminder of a very wonderful incident that goes back to the time when the children of Israel were ready to pass into the Promised Land. They had had to go all the way around Edom because Edom would not let them through their land. God led them around Edom, and then they came to Moab. The king of Moab at that time was Balak. Balak wanted to curse the children of Israel, and he hired the prophet Balaam who was a lover of money. Balaam was a hired preacher; yet he was a prophet who seemed to have information from God. God certainly spoke through him, but God finally judged him.
Balaam was called in by Balak to curse the children of Israel. “Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal.” Shittim was the last camping spot before they entered Moab after Balaam began his ministry against them. Gilgal was the first place they camped when they got into the Promised Land. I will not go back over each of the prophecies which Balaam gave but will only say that each time he could not curse Israel—God would not let him curse Israel.
Balak took Balaam up to a mountain, and as he looked down at the camp of Israel, Balaam said, “How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed? …” (Num. 23:8). God was not doing them evil; God was on their side. Now, if you had gone down into the camp, you would have found that they were not perfect—God was dealing with them and with their sin down there—but no enemy on the outside was going to find fault with them. The children of Israel did not know that there was an enemy trying to curse them and that God was protecting and defending them. Even old Balaam had to say, “How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed? I am not able to do it.” God did not permit them to be cursed (see Num. 22–24).
The wonderful thing for the child of God today is that we are told that we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the Righteous One (see 1 John 2:1). God deals with His children personally. I know that He has dealt with me and has done so severely. I am confident that the cancer which I had was a judgment of God upon me. I accept it as that from Him, and I thank Him for hearing prayers for my healing. But I am also very thankful that I have an Advocate, Jesus Christ the Righteous, who defends me. He is on my side; He is my Advocate. He is the one who says that I am His child, that I am in the family of God. He is not going to let anyone on the outside curse me.
May I say to you, this ought to answer the superstitious and wild views that are circulating today that God’s children can be demon possessed. However, I do believe that the Devil can oppress the child of God and give him a whole lot of trouble. He can certainly deceive you and make life miserable for you, but no demon is going to possess you if you are truly God’s child—because you have an Advocate. It does not matter who you are; if you are a child of God, He’s on your side, and He is defending you. When it seemed like the whole world had turned against him at one time, John Knox said, “One with God is a majority.” I am on the side of the majority. How about you? That is the important question.
God is telling His people here, “I have defended you. I defended you even when Balaam attempted to curse you.” Balak got disgusted with Balaam as he took him to the top of four mountains one by one, and Balaam could not curse Israel. But he did give some awful advice to Balak. He said, “Since you can’t curse them, and you can’t fight them, join them.” It’s the same old story, “If you can’t fight’em, join’em.” Balaam told the king of Moab, “Go down and intermarry with them.” And that is exactly what happened—and that introduced the idolatry of Moab among the people of Israel. All of this happened because of the advice of a false prophet.
I want to say something very carefully at this point. Today we are getting a whole lot of so-called marriage counseling from false “prophets.” I hear a great deal of it secondhand. My friend, much of it doesn’t happen to be scriptural. I know that it is based on pulling out a little verse here and a little verse there, and you can build quite a case that way. But may I say that the only thing which is going to make a marriage work is love. If you can look at her and say, “I love you,” and she can look back at you and say, “I love you,” then, my friend, the Word of God will give you all you need to solve your problems.
God reminds Israel that He is a righteous God, but He was defending them. He was on their side. And it is wonderful to have God on our side today.
In each chapter of this book we have found a wonderful, unusual passage, and we are coming now to another in verses 6–8 of this chapter. The liberals delight especially in verse 8, saying, “This is what pure religion is. This is the greatest statement in the Old Testament.” I rather agree with the liberals that it is a great statement, but I do not agree with them in the interpretation of it.
God has pleaded with these people to come back to Him, to repent of their gross negligence and sins, and to turn to Him. He has cited His redemption of them in the past, how He redeemed them out of the land of Egypt and brought them through the wilderness. Now the people have four questions that they ask, and they are good questions. The answer to them is all-important.
This is a very important passage of Scripture, because it has been used and abused by the liberals today probably more than any other passage. This is a wonderful section, but we need to be very careful to keep it in the context of what Micah is talking about here, especially as it relates to the Old Testament as a whole.
I am confident that every person who believes in a god wants to ask the question, “How am I going to approach him?” Unless you are an atheist, that has to be a question which would cross your mind. The pagan nations of the past and the heathen of the present have asked that question, and they have answered it. The pagan viewpoint is first of all revealed in their idols—they’re horrible looking. Their viewpoint is also revealed in the fact that when trouble comes they think he’s angry, and they’ve got to do something to appease him. Today that is even the viewpoint of the pagan and heathen in my own sophisticated, civilized country. The children of Israel here ask a question, and it is a legitimate question, one that the average man would ask.
Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God? shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old? [Mic. 6:6].
The people’s first question is: “Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God?” In other words, “What is wrong with God? Why is He displeased with us? We’re going through the rituals and the liturgy and the rites of religion. We are going through an outward form, and it is the form which He gave us to go through.” But God had also given them a relationship with Himself which they had lost.
Again, the question is: “Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the high God? What can I bring to God? What can I give Him? He’s way up yonder—I’m way down here. How am I going to reach Him? How am I going to communicate with Him? How am I going to make contact with Him? How will I please Him? And—how will I be saved?” The Philippian jailer, who was as pagan as they come, asked, “What must I do to be saved? How can I be right with God?” This is a good question. There is nothing wrong with the question.
The people’s second question is: “Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a year old?” God had required sacrifices of them. God had given them, in the first part of the Book of Leviticus, five offerings which they were to make, which were to be their approach to Him. So they asked the question, “Will it be adequate simply to go through the form of religion?” Man’s reasoning always degenerates down to one thing: “I have to do something for God. He wants me to do something.” May I say, this probably reveals the proud heart of man more than anything else. We want to do something for God. We feel very warm on the inside when we are generous and make a gift. The unsaved man says, “I go to church; in fact, I’m a church member. I give generously to the church. When they ask me to do something, I do it. I’m a civilized man; I don’t go around hitting people on the head. I’m considered a pretty good Joe. I’m a fellow that everybody likes. Now what in the world does God want of me? Shall I do something else? I feel like I should do something.”
You see, we have the whole thing backwards. We ask, “What must I do to be saved?” The people came to the Lord Jesus and asked, “… What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?” And the Lord Jesus said, “…This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent” (John 6:28–29). He is saying, “…Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved …” (Acts 16:31). That is the only work that God is asking you to do—believe. Faith is just about the opposite of works. Saving faith produces works, but it certainly does not originate salvation. Your works have nothing to do with your salvation. This is the second question of the children of Israel, and it is the normal question of man.
The people now ask a third question—
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? [Mic. 6:7].
“Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil?” Now that is really being generous! In other words, they ask, “Is it because we haven’t done enough for God? Should we do more for God to try to please Him?” We hear the same question asked today. Years ago I used to play volleyball with a wealthy man who was a member of the YMCA with me in Nashville, Tennessee. It was near Christmastime, and he told me, “I want you to know what my religion is. I believe in being generous. Every Christmas I give my employees a bonus, and I give to this cause and that cause and the other cause. I give to my church, too. Now what else could God ask of me?” In other words, “I go the second mile. I’m a big spender as far as the Lord is concerned. I’m doing all this—what else could He ask me to do?” This is the question: Is it that we need to be very generous in what we do? Is that our problem? Many folk express it this way: “Well, maybe I’m not doing enough. I just don’t feel like I’m right with God. I don’t seem to be doing enough.” These are sincere people; but because they are not saved, although they are church members, they feel that they need to do a little bit more than they are doing.
This line of thinking is something that the liberal preacher can work on; he can use a psychological approach. He can say, “Now look here, you folk are not doing enough.” And so the fellow digs down a little deeper in his pocket, especially if he is a man of means, and says, “I’ll give a little bit more. God will be tickled to death with that. My, He is sure going to be pleased with me.” Just like Little Jack Horner, man becomes pleased with himself and with what he does—
Little Jack Horner
Sat in the corner,
Eating of Christmas pie:
He put in his thumb,
And pulled out a plum,
And said, “What a good boy am I!”
There are a lot of church members who are pulling out a plum and saying, “God surely must want to pat me on the head for what I am doing!”
The fourth question the people of Israel ask is going the limit: “Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?” This was very meaningful to these people because they were surrounded by pagan peoples who in their worship of Molech and Baal offered human sacrifices. There were instances when even Israel turned in this direction. Two of the most godless kings of the southern kingdom indulged in human sacrifices—old Ahaz and old Manasseh. These two godless men offered their own children as burnt offerings, but is that what God would ask?
I want to make it very clear that God never asked these people to offer a child as a human sacrifice. God did require that they give to Him the firstborn male of everything that was born to them, whether it be a cow, a sheep, an ox, or their son. But God made it very clear to them that He did not require human sacrifice.
There are many passages of Scripture on this, but I will have to confine myself to just a few which I feel are ample to illustrate my point. In the eighteenth chapter of Numbers, God gave to the people certain regulations and told them what He required of them. We read there, “Every thing that openeth the matrix in all flesh, which they bring unto the Lord, whether it be of men or beasts, shall be thine: nevertheless the firstborn of man shalt thou surely redeem, and the firstling of unclean beasts shalt thou redeem” (Num. 18:15). God claimed the firstborn, you see. God required that the firstborn male child belonged to Him, but redemption money, silver, was to be taken and paid for that firstborn. In other words, God would not accept a human sacrifice, and He also would not accept the sacrifice of an unclean animal. I think that is interesting—man is unclean.
We have the practice today of dedicating our children to the Lord, and I think that that is a very fine thing to do. It has been my privilege to dedicate several thousand children in my days as a pastor. Some of them have turned out wonderfully well. One mother brought her son to me at a seminary where I was speaking, and she said, “Dr. McGee, you dedicated him when he was an infant.” I thank the Lord that he has turned out well, but I have also dedicated some who have wound up in some of our best jails. It is nice to dedicate your child to the Lord, but that does not guarantee that he will turn out well.
In the Old Testament, God said, “You’re to redeem the child, put up redemption money for him. I will not take him now.” Why? He is like that unclean animal; he’s unclean. That is the reason that a woman who had brought a child into the world was unclean—she had brought an unclean thing into the world. David said, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Ps. 51:5). God doesn’t want a child until he is redeemed. We are going to have to wait until our child has received Jesus Christ as his Savior; when he does that, God can take that child and use him. God will not take him and use him until then.
In Exodus we read, “Sanctify unto me all the firstborn, whatsoever openeth the womb among the children of Israel, both of man and of beast: it is mine” (Exod. 13:2). But then in Leviticus we find: “And thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Molech, neither shalt thou profane the name of thy God: I am the Lord” (Lev. 18:21). In other words, God said, “Do not offer a human sacrifice. Do not take your child and offer him as a human sacrifice. You would profane Me if you did that.”
People say to me, “I surely hope that your little grandson is going to follow in your footsteps and become a preacher. I am praying that he will do that.” I do not mean to be coldhearted, but I do not pray that way about my grandsons. In the best way that I can as a grandfather, I lift them to the Lord, and I have told the Lord that first of all I want them to be saved. Then I pray that the Lord will use them in whatever way He wills. If it is His will for one of them to be a pharmacist and roll pills, that would tickle me to death. If it is the Lord’s will for one to dig ditches, I’m going to be for that. You and I cannot take a little child who has our fallen nature and force him into Christian service. It simply won’t work; that’s not the way it is done, if you please.
He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? [Mic. 6:8].
Verse 8 is the joy and delight of liberals because they think that it presents a works religion, that it teaches that man can be saved by his works. What Micah is doing here is answering the questions of many sincere people in the northern kingdom of Israel who were in darkness, who had not been taught the Word of God. They wanted to know how to come before God. They wanted to know whether they should bring burnt offerings, whether they should bring many offerings, and whether they should offer even their own children as human sacrifices. Micah answers all of these questions: None of these things does God require. External religion without an internal experience, without reality on the inside, is absolutely valueless. There must be a rebirth, a new nature given to the individual. Externalities are not important—God never begins there. If you want to know what God takes delight in, what He requires of man, this verse will tell you. I want us to consider this verse carefully and in detail. Mr. Liberal, I insist that you interpret this accurately, and when you do, you will find that you are not saved by your good works because you do not have any good works.
“He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good.” We notice first of all that this is addressed to man. This means not only the man in Israel but also the man in the United States, not only the person of the seventh century b.c. but also the person of the twentieth century a.d. This is for mankind.
These are the three things that God requires: (1) You are “to do justly”—that is, you must have a righteousness to present to God, you must be a righteous person. You are to be just in your dealings with your fellow man; you are to be honest and true. (2) You are “to love mercy.” You are not only to love the mercy of God but also to be merciful in your own dealings with others. And (3) you are “to walk humbly with thy God.”
How are you going to do these things, brother? Can you do them in your own strength? Do you think that you can do them without God’s help? Do you think that you can do them without God’s salvation? If you do, (I’m going to say something very strong, but I’m far enough away from you that you cannot hit me), you are a hypocrite! Don’t tell me that you live by this moral code without the power of God. You cannot, for the very simple reason that all of these are the fruit of the Holy Spirit. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law” (Gal. 5:22–23). All three of these things which Micah lists are the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer. None of us has any one of these things in his life today.
Let’s turn to the New Testament and see what is said there concerning this. Listen to a man who lived under the Law. In the fifteenth chapter of Acts, when the apostles were deciding whether the Gentiles would have to keep the Law in order to be saved, Simon Peter stood up and said, “But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they” (Acts 15:11). Why did he say that? Because he had just said in Acts 15:10, “Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?” Simon Peter said, “I lived under the law” (and I don’t think he ever got very far away from it even after he was saved), “yet I did not measure up to it.”
God has made this very clear through the words of the apostle Paul also: “For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you …” (Rom. 8:5–9, italics mine).
My friend, how does the Spirit of God dwell in you? The Lord Jesus said, “… Ye must be born again” (John 3:7). You must be born again by receiving Christ. “But as many as received him, to them gave he power [the right, the authority, the exousian power] to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name” (John 1:12).
In Romans 3:9–18 the apostle Paul sets before us the condition of man. He brings man before the judgment bar of God and shows that he is guilty. Then Paul takes man into the clinic of God and shows that he is sick, sick nigh unto death—in fact, he is “… dead in trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1, italics mine). No man, therefore, whoever he is, can present these things to God. God requires righteousness, but we cannot meet that standard. Paul says, “… There is none righteous, no, not one” (Rom. 3:10). Someone says, “Well, that is in the New Testament.” My friend, all that Paul is doing in this section of Romans is quoting the Old Testament. In Psalm 14:1 we find, “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.” This is what God says about you. But God also says that He requires righteousness. How are you going to be able to present it to Him, my friend?
Paul goes on to say in Romans 3:11: “There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.” In other words, there is none that acts even on the knowledge that he has. Do you, if you are not a Christian, really live up to your ideals? Have you attained the goal that you have set? Have you come to the plateau in life where you are satisfied with your living? May I say to you, none of us even act on the knowledge which we have—“there is none that seeketh after God.” Again, this idea is found in the Old Testament in Psalm 14:2–3: “The Lord looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.”
I could multiply from the Old Testament such statements again and again. Righteousness is what God requires, but the Old Testament makes it very obvious that we cannot present our righteousness to God—because we don’t have any. Since God requires righteousness, there must be a change in the life because there is none righteous. We are told that Jesus was “… delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:25, italics mine). The Lord Jesus was raised for our righteousness, that we might have righteousness, that by the Spirit of God we might produce righteousness in our lives.
The “love of mercy”—we do not have that in our human hearts. We are dead in trespasses and sins. Paul says, “They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one” (Rom. 3:12). This is the picture of man; this is the way that man is today. The same point is presented to us by Isaiah: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isa. 53:6). Evidently, “us all” have iniquity, or Isaiah would not have made a statement like that.
Therefore, let’s not be hypocritical when we come to this verse in Micah that tells us that we are to walk humbly with our God. None seeketh after God; instead, we want to come to Him our way.
I want to say this in all kindness, but I trust that it might startle some and awaken them out of their condition today. If you believe that your church membership or your character or your good works are going to get you to God, then may I say that you are bypassing God’s way. The Lord Jesus said, “… I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). If you can get to God by this route presented here—by doing justly, by loving mercy, and by walking humbly with God—and you can do that on your own, when you get to heaven, you can tell God to move over. You can tell Him that you want to share His throne with Him, that you got there by yourself, that you didn’t need Him since you are your own god. But, my friend, God says that He does not share His glory with another, and I do not think He will share His throne with you. So why don’t you come God’s way and not man’s way?
Doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God are things which God requires. Who are you kidding when you claim that you do these things in your natural state? My, how verses like this, when held up to the human family, show us what we really are like! Some commend themselves for being polite and nice folk, especially on Sundays when they seem so genteel and loving—and yet they have never come to God His way. How can you continue on and on in a hypocrisy like that? Why not be honest with God? Just come right out with it, go to Him, and tell Him that you are a sinner. He already knows it, but it would be nice if you told Him. Instead of climbing onto a psychiatrist’s couch and talking to him, talk to God. Tell Him the thing that is wrong with you. Tell Him about your hangups. Tell Him about the sin in your life. God wants to save you, my friend. God wants to forgive your sins and give you the righteousness of Christ.
Having presented to these people what God requires, Micah is now going to show them how far they have fallen short of it. The reason that God will judge them is because of their willful and continual sinning.
The Lord’s voice crieth unto the city, and the man of wisdom shall see thy name: hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it [Mic. 6:9].
“The Lord’s voice crieth unto the city.” We have seen that Micah has been directing his prophecies largely to the urban areas, to the cities. His writing reveals that he is a very sophisticated writer. He was in the know; he belonged to the upper echelon. He is in contrast to Amos who said, “I’m no prophet. I’m just a gatherer of sycamore fruit. I’m a farmhand, just a country boy who has come to town.” But Amos happened to be God’s man. Micah is God’s man too, but a different type of man from Amos—he is crying to the city.
“And the man of wisdom shall see thy name: hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it.” The rod is for judgment. We read in the second psalm, “Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel” (Ps. 2:9). The rod represents the judgment of God. Judgment is coming upon this nation. The man of wisdom—that is, the man in that day who believed God and who would listen—would recognize that judgment was coming upon the nation and would act accordingly. The voice of God is lifted, and He speaks forth in judgment. The man is a wise man who sees the dealings of God which reveal His righteous character as well as the fact that He is longsuffering, patient, and will pardon iniquity. But God also punishes, and the rod is the badge of His authority as the judge who will judge.
There was still sin in the nation, and Micah is now going to reveal these sins specifically; he is going to spell them out.
Are there yet the treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and the scant measure that is abominable? [Mic. 6:10].
“Treasures of wickedness” refers to the wealth they had accumulated in their unjust dealings.
Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances, and with the bag of deceitful weights? [Mic. 6:11].
Many of these people were coming into the temple, bringing a sacrifice, going through the outward ceremony, and saying that they were doing justly and loving mercy. But what were they doing during the week? God says, “Shall I count them pure with the wicked balances?” I tell you, the butchers in that day were weighing their thumbs—and some butchers had thumbs worth several drachmas! Businessmen were dishonest in their business dealings. He says, “And with the bag of deceitful weights?” They were absolutely crooked. They were avaricious, they were covetous, and they were greedy; yet they tried to pass themselves off as religious folk.
For the rich men thereof are full of violence, and the inhabitants thereof have spoken lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth [Mic. 6:12].
The rich were guilty of violence; they were liars. They were deceitful—you could not believe them.
Is this not a picture today of my own nation? Is this not a picture of this wonderful land in which you and I live? We cannot believe the news media today. We cannot believe the politicians, no matter what their party affiliation. It’s a day when it is difficult to believe businessmen. It is difficult to believe those in the military leadership. We are living in a nation today where most of us little folk are confused—we don’t know whom to believe. This was the situation in Israel in Micah’s day, and God did not approve of it. In fact, this is one of the things that brought the nation down and brought the judgment of God upon them.
I want to say this very carefully but clearly because I love my country and I hate to see what is happening to it today. I have taught for years that the United States would have to go down at the end of this age for the very simple reason that we are not mentioned in Bible prophecy. We are a world power today, but will we be tomorrow? It seems that we are going down very fast. At the time that I am writing this, things look very dark in this land. An energy crisis has come upon us. It didn’t come suddenly; it has been coming for many years. A few of us have been crying out that America is going to be judged. We are apparently moving into that orbit today. Many warned years ago after World War II that oil should have been brought out of the Middle East at that time and that we should never have used our own reserves. But because of greed (it was called “good business” because it was making money), we went into an age of affluence and plenty, and we really left God out. And He is pretty much left out of our national affairs today. There has been no mention, at the time that I am writing this, that we need to turn to God in this emergency in which we find ourselves.
The northern kingdom of Israel in Micah’s day was in the same condition in which we are today, and God brought judgment upon them. Although they were His chosen people as a nation, He brought judgment upon them.
Therefore also will I make thee sick in smiting thee, in making thee desolate because of thy sins [Mic. 6:13].
In effect, God says, “First of all, I am going to start taking the oil away from you, but I’m not going to stop there. You’re going to find that you will run short on many things before I am through judging you.”
Thou shalt eat, but not be satisfied; and thy casting down shall be in the midst of thee; and thou shalt take hold, but shalt not deliver; and that which thou deliverest will I give up to the sword [Mic. 6:14].
God says in effect, “You will no longer be able to enjoy all of these things that you have enjoyed, all these little goodies that you have had. Shortages and eventual famine will come. Attempts to remove your wealth to a safe place will be fruitless—the enemy will get it.”
Thou shalt sow, but thou shalt not reap; thou shalt tread the olives, but thou shalt not anoint thee with oil; and sweet wine, but shalt not drink wine [Mic. 6:15].
The enemy would take them from their land—take them to Assyria as captives.
God intended to cut them down but to cut them down gradually. That, of course, would give them an opportunity to turn to Him. The next chapter will make it clear that God would have pardoned them anytime that they would have turned to Him. But, my friend, you must turn to Him, for God will judge sin.
The people of Israel were going through the externalities of religion, but internally they were far from God. There was dishonesty in their business dealings. There was impurity in their lives. There was violence. There was lying and deceit. Every kind of flagrant sin was committed. And God cannot bless a people or a nation that engages in these things.
For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of the house of Ahab, and ye walk in their counsels; that I should make thee a desolation, and the inhabitants thereof an hissing: therefore ye shall bear the reproach of my people [Mic. 6:16].
A question would naturally be asked by a new reader of this: “Who in the world is Omri, and who in the world is Ahab? I have never heard of them before. Why is God saying what He is saying about them?” Such a question demonstrates the need for a different approach to the study of the Old Testament which I have for many years thought would be most helpful. I would suggest that when you study the historical books of the Old Testament, also consider the prophetic book or books that correspond to the same time period as the historical book. For example, that would mean that Micah should be studied along with the historical account of the reigns of Hezekiah in the southern kingdom and of Ahab and Jezebel in the northern kingdom. If the historical books were considered along with the prophetic books, they would give you a complete picture. I had hoped to introduce this approach when I was head of the English Bible department at the Bible Institute of Los Angeles years ago, but I never got around to it.
However, if we will now turn to the historical book of 1 Kings, it will shed some light on this verse here in Micah. Omri was one of the kings in the northern kingdom; in fact, he was one of the meanest. Omri and Zimri, then Tibni, reigned as rival kings until both died, and Omri prevailed to rule over the entire northern kingdom. In 1 Kings 16:24 we read: “And he bought the hill Samaria of Shemer for two talents of silver, and built on the hill, and called the name of the city which he built, after the name of Shemer, owner of the hill, Samaria.” That city is called Samaria to this day, and the ruins of the city which Omri built are still there. But Omri is not really the one who developed the city. After the death of Omri, Ahab came to the throne. We read further: “So Omri slept with his fathers, and was buried in Samaria: and Ahab his son reigned in his stead.… And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him” (1 Kings 16:28, 30). Now that was something, let me tell you, but one of the reasons he was able to do that was because he had a great little helper in his wife, Jezebel. “And it came to pass, as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he took to wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Zidonians, and went and served Baal, and worshipped him” (1 Kings 16:31). Ahab and Jezebel made the worship of Baal the religion of Israel!
“The statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of the house of Ahab.” Instead of following the statutes of the Lord, they followed the statutes of Omri and Ahab. They rejected the Word of the Lord and walked in their counsels instead. Now in Micah’s day, almost two hundred years later, the effect and influence of their evil reigns are apparent.
We see the same effect evident in our own day. The leadership of any nation, if that nation is to prosper under God, must be godly. People like to criticize Queen Victoria and the Victorian Era in England—even the English ridicule it. However, I think it should be said that that happens to have been the greatest period in their history—that is when they had an empire. Victoria was Empress of India; she ruled an empire. Today Great Britain has really been cut down to size, for their leadership since then has not been what it should have been.
When Princess Anne was married, I rejoiced in watching the ceremony. Tears came into our eyes as my wife and I watched it on television, for in the ceremony there was a restoration of the sacredness of marriage. Since that example came from the leadership, I am sure that it had an influence.
My own country has not had a very good example set by either the White House or the Congress in a long, long time. My lifetime pretty much spans this century, and may I say, the example emanating from Washington has not been good. As a result, gross immorality has spread throughout this nation. I do believe, because of this verse here, that God would say that He holds the leaders of our nation during this century responsible for plunging the country into gross immorality through the example which they have set.
Micah presents God’s philosophy of government. This is not being taught in any of our universities—that is part of our problem also. As a result, we’re not really getting the facts, and our nation continues to decay and deteriorate. We will continue to do so unless a great revival should come to our land, but there is certainly no evidence at the present time that it will come.
CHAPTER 7
Theme: Pardoning all iniquity because of who God is and what He does; closing prayer; God’s answer; paean of praise
PARDONING ALL INIQUITY BECAUSE OF WHO GOD IS AND WHAT HE DOES
In the first nine verses of chapter 7, the prophet Micah confesses that God is accurate in His complaint against Israel. The charge and the accuracy of it touch the heart of the prophet. He is not unfeeling. He is moved and motivated by the judgment which is coming upon his people. We have in this first section, therefore, a soliloquy of sorrow, a saga of suffering, a wail of woe, an elegy of eloquent grief.
Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grapegleanings of the vintage: there is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the firstripe fruit [Mic. 7:1].
Micah begins in a very personal way—he says, “Woe is me!” He is not only very personal, but he is also affected a great deal by God’s message which he has relayed, just as Jeremiah was. He is overwhelmed by it. He is grieved by it. He finds no delight in saying these things. There is no fun today in my saying things that are rather pessimistic about the United States. A great many people will not agree with me about them. They will rebuke me for not being patriotic and for not showing a love for my country. My friend, I love my country as much as the normal American loves his country. I find no joy in saying these things. I wish that I could make an announcement to say, “Friends, a great revival is breaking out across this land!” That would be good news, and that would be wonderful, but I just have to say along with Micah, “Woe is me!”
“For I am as when they have gathered the summer fruits, as the grapegleanings of the vintage: there is no cluster to eat: my soul desired the firstripe fruit.” Remember that in Scripture the vine is used to picture the nation Israel. Micah’s contemporary, Isaiah, is the one who enlarged upon this and set this forth (see Isa. 5). He said very clearly that Israel is the vine and the vine is Israel. Micah looked about at his nation and said, “I’ve looked for a good cluster of grapes, and there are none on the vine. I desired the firstripe fruit, and there was none. The vine is not producing fruit.”
Micah is going to deal now with the specifics—
The good man is perished out of the earth: and there is none upright among men: they all lie in wait for blood; they hunt every man his brother with a net [Mic. 7:2].
It is not safe to walk on the streets of our country—today lawlessness abounds. It does seem that the good man is perished; yet there are a lot of wonderful people left in this nation of ours. I am sure there were godly people left in Israel also, but Micah is speaking generally. The good man is not the ideal, and he’s not the one in the majority. “The good man is perished out of the earth.”
That they may do evil with both hands earnestly, the prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward; and the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire: so they wrap it up [Mic. 7:3].
“That they may do evil with both hands earnestly.” They are not satisfied to do evil in just a minor way with one hand—they are going at it with both hands. Believe me, doing evil really kept them busy.
“The prince asketh, and the judge asketh for a reward.” They were doing evil for a reward. They were not only willing to stoop to do the thing that was wrong, but they did it also because of greed and covetousness on their part. “The prince…and the judge”—there was crookedness in government, you see. You would expect the prince and the judge to rule justly and righteously, but that was not the picture.
“And the great man, he uttereth his mischievous desire.” The writers of our literature are clever writers today. I watch a great deal of television in order to keep up with what is going on in this world. I find that everything that is presented by our writers has a little hook in it. There’s that little hook of liberalism, that little hook of immorality, that little hook of ridicule of the things we have considered sacred in this country. And it is all done in the name of the sacred cow of the freedom of the press and the freedom of speech. But there is very little freedom of religion today, unless it is weird and way out in left field somewhere and not that which is Bible-centered and Bible-anchored. We need a bibliocentric thrust in this nation of ours today.
The best of them is as a brier: the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge: the day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh; now shall be their perplexity [Mic. 7:4].
Even the best people were like a brier—you had to be careful. You can get stuck with a brier, you know, if you’re not careful with it. That was the condition of even the best people in Micah’s day—you couldn’t depend on them. “The best of them is as a brier: the most upright is sharper than a thorn hedge.”
Our writers are clever and sophisticated today, but we have no geniuses writing, just clever boys. They write clever plays. They say clever things. They write clever articles. But there are no geniuses. They write nothing of depth, nothing that is actually worthwhile. I believe that God will do with our contemporary culture what He did with Israel in that day and what He did later on with the Greek and Roman cultures. He simply wiped them off the face of the earth. Why preserve it? What is being done today that has eternal value? Oh, my friend, what a parallel there is here, and how accurate Micah is!
“The day of thy watchmen and thy visitation cometh; now shall be their perplexity.” The Lord Jesus said, “And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring” (Luke 21:25). In other words, one thing that would characterize the end of the age is perplexity of nations, confusion of nations. The biggest sign that we are near the end of the age is not found in Israel. Israel is not a sign. We are living in the church age today. We don’t need to look for a day, we need to look at a weather report: the sea and the waves roaring, the storms breaking upon the earth, and the nations seething—that is the picture that God’s Word presents of the nation in the last days.
Micah has been telling out the difficulty that these people were having, the sin that was in their lives. The lovely statement that was made back in Micah 6:8 was: “He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?” The people just were not doing it, and they found that they could not do it. As Peter said, “We were under the yoke of the law. Our forefathers didn’t keep it, and we cannot keep it today” (see Acts 15:10). Yet there are a great many people going to church, thinking they are saved by their own good works and are acceptable to God on the basis of what they do. There is no hypocrisy like that kind of hypocrisy! The people living back yonder under the Law might be excused for thinking that, but we have an open Bible which makes clear to us that we are saved only by the grace of God.
Trust ye not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide: keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom [Mic. 7:5].
This reveals something of the awful condition that existed in that day, and it has been true pretty much of all the so-called civilizations of this world. It is a big, mean world outside. We need to recognize this, especially if we are to take a stand for God. The Lord Jesus said, “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth:I came not to send peace, but a sword” (Matt. 10:34). As long as there is evil in the world, there will be a conflict and a war between that which is of the flesh and that which is of the Spirit, between light and darkness, between good and evil.
I generally get up very early in the morning because I like to do my studying at home early. I get up while it is still dark, and my study is where I can look out toward the east. It is interesting to watch how the darkness wrestles with the light until finally the sun comes bursting over the horizon and the darkness then vanishes. There is always that period of dawn when it would seem that the darkness is wrestling with the light. The same thing takes place in the evening at dusk when again darkness wants to take over. There is that kind of a spiritual struggle going on in the world.
The Lord Jesus went on to say in Matthew, “For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household” (Matt. 10:35–36). You will not be able to trust your own family. Micah says, “Trust ye not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide: keep the doors of thy mouth from her that lieth in thy bosom.” Over the years I have heard of many such instances—and it works both ways, of course—when a wife has not been able to trust her husband, and a husband has not been able to trust his wife.
We live in a day when the word of man seems to carry less value than it ever has before. You cannot believe what you read, and you cannot believe what you hear on radio or on television. The child of God should test everything. I say this very candidly: test every radio program you listen to by the Word of God. Test my Bible-teaching broadcast; test them all. You will be wise if you do this because the human nature is not to be trusted.
For the son dishonoureth the father, the daughter riseth up against her mother, the daughter in law against her mother in law; a man’s enemies are the men of his own house [Mic. 7:6].
Notice that this is exactly what the Lord Jesus said will come, and it had come in Micah’s day also. When this sort of a situation arises, it is a day of decadence, a day of deterioration, a day of decay. It is a day that is very dark, by the way. We live in a day like that. We have gotten to the place where government is having to watch everything. But who is going to watch government? They need watching also. Whom can you trust? In whom can you believe today? We are living at a very sad time in the history of the world. This verse reveals the condition of that day of Micah’s grief. This is not something to boast of, not something to rejoice in. It is something to be deplored, something which should grieve your heart and my heart.
Therefore I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation: my God will hear me [Mic. 7:7].
We see here the confidence and the assurance and the faith of Micah. He knows that God is going to hear him, and he knows that God will work this thing out. The Lord Jesus said that there would be distress of nations, the sea and the waves would roar, and the nations of the world would be in great turmoil. But it does not matter how dark it is today and how high the waves are rolling—these things ought not to disturb the child of God, they ought not to detour us. For the Lord Jesus said, “Men’s hearts [will be] failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken…. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh” (Luke 21:26, 28). Micah says, “Therefore I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation: my God will hear me.” These are the days when God’s children need to stay very close to God, and we need to stay close to the Word of God.
Rejoice not against me, O mine enemy: when I fall, I shall arise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light unto me [Mic. 7:8].
This is a great principle that we find running through the Scriptures. Though God’s man may fall, God will raise him up. When we sit in darkness, the Lord shall be a light for us. God’s people, again may I repeat this, must stay close to the Word of God in dark and difficult days.
Now in verse 9, on behalf of his people, Micah makes a confession to God, or as The New Scofield Reference Bible has labeled it, “submission to the Lord.” There is sweet submission here and, in spite of the darkness, there is on his lips a praise to God. He has just said to the enemy, “Don’t you rejoice against me. God is going to lift me up, and then I will be able to rejoice. Though I sit in darkness, the Lord is going to be a light unto me.” Micah had the confidence that God would deliver him and would deliver his people.
I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against him, until he plead my cause, and execute judgment for me: he will bring me forth to the light, and I shall behold his righteousness [Mic. 7:9].
Micah is making a public confession of the sin of the people. What confidence this man has! He submits himself to the will of God. That should be the position of every child of God in this dark hour in the history of the world. What is it that we should do? Well, there is one thing that is sure: God has permitted all things to happen, and He is still in control. Therefore we should submit ourselves to God. We should confess our sins and keep our accounts with God right up to date and make sure that we have settled every account with Him. This is the thing that is all-important.
Notice that Micah says, “I will bear the indignation of the Lord.” Why? “Because I have sinned against him.” My friend, we as a nation have sinned. You have sinned; I have sinned. We have gone along with this affluent society and have accepted its comforts. We have rather smiled at the lack of integrity that there is in public life, and we have shut our eyes to the gross immorality that is around us. It is time that some of us are confessing our sin.
“Until he plead my cause, and execute judgment for me.” God will use the “rod” of Assyria to punish His children for their sins, but afterward He will restore them and bring them “forth to the light.” Then they will “behold his righteousness”—they will realize that God was just in punishing them.
Then she that is mine enemy shall see it, and shame shall cover her which said unto me, Where is the Lord thy God? mine eyes shall behold her: now shall she be trodden down as the mire of the streets [Mic. 7:10].
God will ultimately triumph, but the thing that is tragic is that, because of the sins of the people, they must be judged. Their enemy asks the question: “You boasted of the fact that you serve God, but where is He? Why doesn’t He help you? Why doesn’t He deliver you? You have said that He would.” Well, the enemy could not see the righteousness of God. He did not see that God was dealing with His people in a righteous way by judging them.
After God restores His people, He will punish the nations that abused them and attempted to annihilate them—then they shall “be trodden as the mire of the streets.”
Since the Assyrian captivity lay ahead of the people of Israel, the “enemy” is interpreted as the nation of Assyria; yet the following two verses indicate that a later and final enemy is also in view.
Micah has predicted the destruction of Israel’s enemies and now turns to Israel’s restoration. The nation of Israel is likened to a vineyard in several passages of Scripture. Notice especially Isaiah’s song of the vineyard (see Isa. 5:1–7). The walls Micah speaks of are the walls around a vineyard.
In the day that thy walls are to be built, in that day shall the decree be far removed [Mic. 7:11].
In the early days of their history, the people of Israel were sent by God down to Egypt to become a nation. Then God hedged them into the land of Palestine, gave them the Law, made them a peculiar people, and kept them from intermarrying with other folk. Then, because of their sin, God sent them into Assyrian and Babylonian captivity. They had a ministry to the world, both at the time of the containment and then again when they were scattered throughout the world.
In that day also he shall come even to thee from Assyria, and from the fortified cities, and from the fortress even to the river, and from sea to sea, and from mountain to mountain [Mic. 7:12].
As we have seen in chapter 4, during the millennial kingdom all nations shall come to Zion—even their former enemy, Assyria. “And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem” (Mic. 4:2).
However, Micah reminds them that before this time of blessing, punishment lies before them.
Notwithstanding the land shall be desolate because of them that dwell therein, for the fruit of their doings [Mic. 7:13].
You see, the land and the people are pretty well tied together. That land was not always desolate as it is today. When the blessing of God comes upon the people, it will also come again upon that land—but it has not yet come upon them.
CLOSING PRAYER
Now Micah in a very wonderful way commits his people to the Shepherd’s care—
Feed thy people with thy rod, the flock of thine heritage, which dwell solitarily in the wood, in the midst of Carmel: let them feed in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old [Mic. 7:14].
“Feed thy people with thy rod, the flock of thine heritage.” In Micah 6:9 the rod was a rod of judgment; here it is a rod of comfort. “…thy rod and thy staff they comfort me” (Ps. 23:4). I think it simply refers to the staff of the shepherd which could be used in two ways: it could be used to protect and help the sheep, and it could also be used to discipline the sheep. “Feed thy people with thy rod”—God disciplines us, and He instructs us.
“Which dwell solitarily in the wood, in the midst of Carmel: let them feed in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.” These are great grazing lands up in the north and across the Jordan River.
Micah has come to God in beautiful submission and in confession of sin—confession of his sins and of the sins of the people. The prophets always identified themselves with the people in any confession of sin. (We do it a little differently; we like to confess the sin of the other fellow while we try to leave ours out.)
GOD’S ANSWER
God gives an answer to the prayer of the prophet. There has always been some question as to what this passage makes reference to, but it is the consensus of most expositors that it looks to the future and to the day when the Lord Jesus will come to set up His kingdom.
According to the days of thy coming out of the land of Egypt will I shew unto him marvellous things [Mic. 7:15].
God led Israel out of Egypt by miracle, but He did not bring them out of Babylon by miracle. No miracles are mentioned in connection with that, although their return to the land was a wonderful thing. It was the deliverance out of Egypt that was miraculous, and God says here that that will be the pattern for the day when He again brings them into the land. We have not seen anything like that in their present-day return to the land. We ought to recognize, therefore, that God has not yet fulfilled this prophecy.
The nations shall see and be confounded at all their might. they shall lay their hand upon their mouth, their ears shall be deaf [Mic. 7:16].
When God begins again to move them back into the land, the world will stand in amazement, just as the peoples round about them did at the time of their exodus from Egypt. You remember the confession of the harlot, Rahab: “For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red sea for you, when ye came out of Egypt; and what ye did unto the two kings of the Amorites, that were on the other side Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom ye utterly destroyed. And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in any man, because of you: for the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath” (Josh. 2:10–11). The word has gotten around as to how God had taken care of His people.
They shall lick the dust like a serpent, they shall move out of their holes like worms of the earth: they shall be afraid of the Lord our God, and shall fear because of thee [Mic. 7:17].
This refers to the godless nations which have attempted to destroy Israel. In that day when He comes to deliver Israel, “they shall be afraid of the Lord our God, and shall fear because of thee.”
PAEAN OF PRAISE
Micah waxes eloquent now, and he asks a question—
Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy [Mic. 7:18].
We will discuss this verse at length in a moment, but Micah goes on here to say that because of who God is, this is what He will do—
He will turn again, he will have compassion upon us; he will subdue our iniquities; and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old [Mic. 7:19–20].
Israel’s sin put them out of the land temporarily, but God will make good His promises in spite of their sin. Their sin does not cancel out God’s promises and God’s covenant with these people any more than a child of God loses his salvation when he sins. His sin means that he is going to the woodshed for a good whipping if he doesn’t confess it and get it straightened out; but if he will come back to God, God will graciously pardon him. The prodigal son did not get a whipping when he came home to his father; he got his whipping in the far country. And you can be sure of one thing: God’s child will never be able to get by with sin. We see that again and again in Scripture.
Now let’s come back to this marvelous statement that we have here: “Who is a God like unto thee.” I want to make a very startling statement: There is something that God has not seen but which you see every day. Perhaps you didn’t know that you could see something that God cannot see—but that is a true statement. It may sound rather impertinent for me to say that; it may sound irrelevant, irreverent, or inappropriate; it may even sound flippant or facetious. It may sound to you like I am making a parody or a pun, a riddle or a rhyme, a trick or a treat, but I want to assure you that this is a serious and sober subject with a sensible and Scriptural answer. The prophet here asks a profound question: “Who is a God like unto thee?” And it demands a thoughtful answer. The very nature of the question suggests an answer to an enigmatic subject.
This is not the first time in Scripture that this question has been asked, by the way. It was asked in that wonderful song sung by Israel after they crossed the Red Sea. In Exodus 15:11 we read, “Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?” The people had just come out from Egypt where there were many gods. Egypt was absolutely—if I may use the slang expression—lousy with idols; they had many gods and many lords. The ten plagues in Egypt had been leveled at their various gods—that was God’s strategy in it all. And then again at the end of the forty years of the wilderness march, Moses said, “There is none like unto the God of Jeshurun, who rideth upon the heaven in thy help, and in his excellency on the sky. The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them” (Deut. 33:26–27). This question was again asked by Solomon in 1 Kings 8:23, “Lord God of Israel, there is no God like thee, in heaven above, or on earth beneath, who keepest covenant and mercy with thy servants that walk before thee with all their heart.” The psalmist exclaimed: “Who is like unto the Lord our God, who dwelleth on high, Who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven, and in the earth!” (Ps. 113:5–6).
This question is asked in Exodus, Deuteronomy, Kings, Psalms, and in other passages which I have not cited, but now let’s answer it. The answer was suggested by my statement at the beginning: God has not seen something which you see every day. What is it that God has not seen? My friend, God has not seen His equal. “Who is a God like unto thee?” God has never seen His equal, but you and I see our equals every day.
There are many ways in which God is alone, in which God is unequaled. Only one of them is suggested by our passage here in Micah, but because this is such a profound question and one that is so basic to this book, I want to look at this subject closely: Who is a God like unto our God?
1. The God of the Bible is the Creator. The God of the Bible is the Creator, but the gods of the heathen are creatures. The apostle Paul wrote: “Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things” (Rom. 1:21–23). They worshiped the creature rather than the Creator.
Isaiah, Micah’s contemporary, wrote concerning the heathen who make images from trees: “He burneth part thereof in the fire; with part thereof he eateth flesh; he roasteth roast, and is satisfied: yea, he warmeth himself, and saith, Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire: And the residue thereof he maketh a god, even his graven image: he falleth down unto it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Deliver me; for thou art my god” (Isa. 44:16–17). Isaiah went on to say, “Remember these, O Jacob and Israel; for thou art my servant: I have formed thee; thou art my servant: O Israel, thou shalt not be forgotten of me” (Isa. 44:21). God is the Creator.
You may say, “But we don’t have idols today.” The Book of Micah has been dealing with a form of idolatry of which Israel was guilty and of which we are guilty also: covetousness is idolatry. Secularism, materialism, that to which you give yourself is your god. That which takes your time and your money is your god. It can be pleasure, it can be sex, it can be money—whatever you are giving yourself to, my friend, is your god. It does not matter what church you might belong to, whatever you are giving yourself to is your god.
With biting irony, God asks the question through the prophet Isaiah: “To whom will ye liken me, and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be like?” (Isa. 46:5). He is the Creator—you cannot make a picture of Him. “They lavish gold out of the bag, and weigh silver in the balance, and hire a goldsmith; and he maketh it a god: they fall down, yea, they worship. They bear him upon the shoulder, they carry him …” (Isa. 46:6–7). The supreme question is this: Is your religion carrying you, or are you carrying it? Many people say to me, “Oh, I find Christian work extremely boring. It is hard; it is difficult.” If you are finding it that way, then I would suggest that you give up what you are doing—quit teaching your Sunday school class, quit singing in the choir, and do not be an officer in the church. If it is burdensome to you, He does not want you to do it. He doesn’t want you carrying Him around—He wants to carry you. He wants to carry all of His children. Somebody said to me the other day, “Why in the world don’t you retire? You are in your seventies now, you’ve been in the pastorate for forty years, and you’ve given your time to teaching the Bible on radio. Why don’t you retire?” Do you want to know something? I would rather teach the Word of God than eat ice cream any day. I’d rather do this than eat a chicken dinner. My friend, God has been carrying me for a long time, even though I think I have been a heavy load for Him.
So God is unique; He is the Creator, and He carries us. “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth” (Gen. 1:1)—and it is blasphemy to go beyond that. You cannot go beyond Him— “… from everlasting to everlasting [from the vanishing point to the vanishing point], thou art God” (Ps. 90:2). He is the Creator.
2. The God of the Bible is holy and righteous. This is something that is very important to this little Book of Micah and to all sixty-six books of the Bible. God is a holy and righteous God. The gods of the heathen are little, they’re contemptible, they’re base, they’re ignoble, they’re shabby, they’re evil, they’re mean, and they’re ugly—just think about the heathen images which you have seen. The gods of the Greeks on top of Mount Olympus were simply man’s projection of himself. They were the enlargement of mankind. What did they do? They acted like overgrown children with overgrown faults and sins; they were spiteful and vengeful. The gods of the heathen are not pretty, my friend.
What a reflection and slur upon God! Have you ever noticed how many times in Scripture we read of “the beauty of holiness”? Oh, my friend, our God is beautiful—He is the beautiful one. Remember that He said to His people, “… thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself …” (Ps. 50:21). He says, “I am not like you. You are sinful; you stoop to do low, mean things. I am holy; I am righteous.” In Isaiah God says, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways …” (Isa. 55:8).
God is holy, and He says that He hates sin. He is angry with sin. He gets wrought-up over it, my friend. And the wrath of God must be revealed against sin. That is the reason judgment must come. There is no escape from it; there is no way out. The judgment of God is something that is going to come to pass.
Again the little Book of Micah has real application to my own nation today. This country has really been shaken in the past ten years. Consider this whole century and the things which have actually shaken this world in which you and I live. It is not the same world I was born into. I never dreamed that I would live to see the things which have taken place in my own days. What is back of all this? Well, our God is a holy God, and He reveals His anger against sin—He will judge it. I know that a judgment day is coming in the future for sinners who will not accept Christ, but God is moving today, and I believe that we are experiencing the anger of God.
A godless nation, a nation which rejects God, must bear the consequences. We must also recognize that as individuals you and I are sinners and must come to God. This is what it means to “walk humbly with thy God.” You do not come to Him boasting of what you have done. You come to Him confessing. “I’m a sinner, and I need Your salvation.” You must accept His salvation, recognizing that you could not go to heaven in your own righteousness. Anselm, one of the great thinkers of the eleventh century, wrote, “I would rather go to hell without sin than go to heaven with sin.” That’s a great statement. That will shake you, my friend. In this day of “weak tea” theology, we need to hear strong statements like this.
3. The God of the Bible pardons iniquity and delights in mercy. Verse 18 says, “Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.” Here is where our God is wonderfully and amazingly different. He has no equal here; there is no one even in His neighborhood.
“… who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?” (Exod. 15:11). What are some of the wonders that God does? Read Exodus 33:18–19: “And he said, I beseech thee, shew me thy glory. And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy.” God said, “Moses, I’m going to do this for you, not because you are Moses and the leader of My people, but I’m doing this because I am gracious, because I show mercy, and I do it for everybody.” All you have to do is come to Him and claim His mercy, friend; He is just that good, and there is none like Him.
Again in Exodus we read: “And the Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord, And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty …” (Exod. 34:5–7). My friend, how wonderful He is! God does not clear the guilty “Wrong is wrong, from the moment it happens till the crack of doom,” says the hero of the play, The Great Divide. All the angels in heaven working overtime cannot change that by a hair. But God can forgive the sinner and clear him of all charges because His holiness has been satisfied by Christ’s vicarious death.
God’s forgiveness is set forth in the Scripture by many figures of speech. I would like to mention just a few of them. His forgiveness is like a debt which has been paid. In Isaiah He says, “I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins” (Isa. 43:25). Peter said, “Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out …” (Acts 3:19). On His ledger I am in debt, because there it is written, “… the wages of sin is death …” (Rom. 6:23), and “… in Adam all die …” (1 Cor. 15:22). God’s forgiveness is set forth in Scripture as the healing of a disease. Jeremiah writes, “Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings …” (Jer. 3:22). And in Isaiah 61:1 He has promised to “… bind up the brokenhearted….” Finally, God’s forgiveness is pictured as the cleansing of a pollution, a contamination. The Scriptures tell us that “… according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost” (Titus 3:5). And we read also, “… the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:7). How wonderful our God is!
How does God forgive? God is different for there is none like Him in forgiving. His forgiveness is very different from yours and mine. If you step on my toe in a crowd, you turn to me and say, “Pardon me, will you forgive me?” I say, “Sure,” but I’m thinking that, of course, you ought to give me the money to renew the shoeshine you have just ruined! But I say that I forgive you. Another example is a letter that I received some time ago from a man who confessed that he had been talking about me behind my back. Now he had found out that he was wrong, and he asked me to forgive him. I told him, “Don’t ask me for forgiveness. Simply get it straightened out with the people you talked to and with the Lord.” That’s all I asked of him, because I had never known about it before I received his letter. Human forgiveness is pretty easy to come by.
However, God never forgives until the debt is paid. And on the Cross Christ paid the debt. He redeemed us. We are sold under sin. We today have offended the holiness of God. We are in debt to Him. We have a disease, and God is not going to take the disease of sin into heaven. But Christ paid our debt, and Christ is the One who will forgive us. He cleanses us, and He makes us acceptable in God’s sight so that we might go to heaven someday.
“Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.” Isn’t He a wonderful God? He is someday going to restore Israel to the land, not because they are wonderful, but because He is wonderful. And, my friend, I am going to heaven someday, but I am not going there because I am good or righteous—I am not. I’m going to heaven because Jesus died for me. I’m going because the debt has been paid, and there is no God like my God.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Judah. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975. (Obadiah, Joel, Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk.)
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Nahum
INTRODUCTION
As I come to each new book and chapter of the Bible, some folk kid me that I always say it is the greatest book or chapter. Very candidly, I must say that the little Book of Nahum is not the greatest in the Bible, but it is a great book, and it is in the Word of God for a very definite purpose. I dare say that very few people have ever heard a sermon from the little Book of Nahum. This book has received some attention from those who speak “the wild utterances of prophecy mongers,” as Sir Robert Anderson calls them. These sensationalists would have us believe that Nahum prophesied of the automobile when in the second chapter he says that “The chariots shall rage in the streets” (Nah. 2:4). That, of course, has no reference at all to the automobile, as we will see when we come to it.
What we do have in the Book of Nahum is a remarkable prophecy, but one which seems very much out-of-date. To begin with, we know very little about Nahum personally, and he has just one theme: the judgment of Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian Empire. This is all his prophecy is about, and it has already been fulfilled; so how can this book be meaningful to us today? How can it fit into our common and contemporary culture? Does Nahum have a message for us? The remarkable thing about the Word of God is that no matter where we turn we find a message for us. Some is specifically directed to us, but all of it is for us—that is, it has a message for us.
The writer is Nahum, and his name means “comforter,” but the message that he gives is one of judgment. How in the world can Nahum live up to his name? How can he be a comforter? Well, it is owing to how you look at the judgment. If it is a judgment upon your enemy, one of whom you are afraid, one who dominates you, then judgment can be a comfort to you.
Nahum is identified in the first verse of the book: “The burden of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite.” Who is an Elkoshite? Well, there are several possible identifications of the city of Elkosh. (1) There was a city of Elkosh in Assyria, a few miles north of the ruins of Nineveh. Nahum could well have lived there and prophesied to Nineveh, as Daniel did to Babylon later on. Very candidly, I do not think that is true; I believe that the content of the book reveals that Nahum did not go to Nineveh. I do not think he was there, nor was he ever called to go there. (2) Another explanation which is offered is that there was a village by the name of Elkosh in Galilee. Jerome recorded that a guide pointed out to him such a village as the birthplace of Nahum. I had that pointed out to me also when I was over there. However, the first time this was ever pointed out was a thousand years after Nahum lived, making such a view largely traditional. Also, Dr. John Davis gives the meaning for Capernaum as “the village of Nahum.” If Capernaum is a Hebrew word, then this is the evident origin, and we have no reason to believe otherwise. Nahum was either born there, or he lived there as a boy. (3) Also, down in Judah there was a place called Elkosh. Elkosh seems to have been a common name. We have certain place names in this country of which you will find one in practically every state. You will find a city of the same name in California, in Texas, and then maybe way up in Connecticut. Evidently, Elkosh was a common name like that.
It is the belief of many that what actually happened was that Nahum was born up in the northern kingdom of Israel—which would explain his great attachment to the northern kingdom—but that he later moved down to Elkosh, a place in the south of Judah. He probably went down there as a lad and was raised in the southern kingdom.
The man who wrote this prophecy evidently knew something about Sennacherib’s attack upon Jerusalem. It seems to be an eyewitness account that is given in the first chapter. When Sennacherib, king of Assyria, invaded Judah during the reign of Hezekiah, Nahum was probably an eyewitness. This would mean that Nahum was a contemporary of both Isaiah and Micah, and this is the belief of some Bible expositors. I personally have not decided on any definite date at all. There are many dates which have been assigned to this book and this prophet. Dates are suggested anywhere from 720 b.c. to 636 b.c. by conservative scholars. It seems reasonable to locate Nahum about one hundred years after Jonah. He probably lived during the reign of Hezekiah and saw the destruction of the northern kingdom of Israel, and he was greatly moved by that, of course.
Nahum sounds the death knell of Nineveh. He pronounces judgment by the total destruction of Assyria, Nineveh being the capital of that nation. Nahum maintains that God is just in His judgment of this nation.
Actually, I like to study the little Books of Jonah and Nahum together because it was between 100 and 150 years before Nahum appeared on the scene that Jonah went to Nineveh with a message from God. When God told Jonah to go to Nineveh and to bring a message there, a remarkable thing happened—the entire city turned to God—100 percent. Frankly, there has never been anything quite like it in the history of the world. We simply do not seem to have anything else that could compare to an entire city, 100 percent, turning to God. How far-reaching it was in the nation I do not know, but certainly Nineveh as the capital city had a tremendous effect upon the nation, and there was a great turning to God in that day.
The question naturally arises: How did it work out? Did it last? Did this nation become a godly nation? And the answer is no—they didn’t. In time the revival wore off. In time they went back to their paganism. In time they became as brutal as they had been before. This nation had had a message from God, but now here comes Nahum with another message. I do not think that Nahum actually went to Nineveh. I believe that this man lived in the southern kingdom of Israel, and I don’t think he left there. But if God sent Jonah to Nineveh, why did He not send Nahum? Well, God’s methods vary. God certainly is immutable—He never changes—but He does change His methods at times. He sent Jonah to Nineveh because Nineveh was a great, wicked city, but they were totally ignorant of God. When the message was brought, the city turned to God, all the way from the king on the throne to the peasant in the hovel. As a result, God spared the city. Now 100 to 150 years have gone by, and the city has relapsed and returned back to its old way. Why doesn’t Nahum go? Because they have already had the light, and they’ve rejected it.
The Lord Jesus spoke about light that is rejected. He said, “…If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” (Matt. 6:23). How can light be darkness in anyone? Light that is darkness is the rejection of the Word of God. There are more Bibles in this country of ours than any other book; it is the best selling, but least read, book. Assyria was a nation that had had light, but what was the net result? “If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!”
Assyria had had light—God had sent a message to them—and for awhile they turned and served the living and true God. It was a revival in the common sense of the term. It was wonderful, but it didn’t last. Isn’t that really the history of revivals? At the same time that France had a revolution, England had a revival under the Wesleys and Whitefield. There was a great turning to God, but how did England make out? Well, look at her today. At that time they were a first-rate nation. They were number one among the great nations of the world, but they are not number one today. They aren’t number two; they aren’t even number three. They are way down on the list today. What happened? They departed from the living and true God.
The first time I visited England, I asked my guide to take me to the cemetery across from Wesley’s church where Wesley is buried. The guide had difficulty. He and the driver talked it over, looked at the city map, and finally wound their way through the streets of London until we arrived at the place. The guide said to me, “This is the first time I’ve ever brought anyone here. I think I will put it on our route and will bring people here when we take tours. I didn’t know it was here.” England had forgotten John Wesley. They had forgotten the great revival that took place under him. As a result, she has sunk down to a very low level for a nation which has had such a tremendous history. Those of us who had ancestors in the British Isles—whether in England, Wales, Scotland, or Ireland—have to bow our heads today in shame. We feel like weeping when we think of the greatness of that nation and how at one time they listened to the voice of God. How like Nineveh! When Nineveh was no longer listening, Nahum said, “I’m not going over there. I’m not going to waste my time because there is no point in it. They have passed the point of no return.”
And has this nation of mine come to that place today? This little book has a message for us, my friend. Quite a few years ago I cut out this little clipping which reads:
A United States Senator has stated that the average life of the great civilizations of the world has been about 200 years. He goes on to say that these civilizations have progressed (if that’s the right word) through the following stages:
from bondage to spiritual faith
from spiritual faith to courage
from courage to liberty
from liberty to abundance
from abundance to selfishness
from selfishness to complacency
from complacency to apathy
from apathy back to bondage
The Senator points out the interesting fact that the United States of America will be 200 years old in 12 years. which of the above stages do you think we’re in? How much longer is our civilization going to last?
This nation has now passed its two-hundredth anniversary. Think about this for just a moment. Where are we today? Are we a nation of abundance? Yes, but the Lord is beginning to cut us short. “From abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency”—is that a Picture of us today? “From complacency to apathy”—there is an apathetic condition in our nation today. The next step, according to the senator, is “from apathy back to bondage.”
This is the picture that is given of Nineveh, and this is the message of Nahum. A great world power, Assyria, with Nineveh as its capital, had a message from God. They turned to God and served God for a period of time. I do not know how long they served Him, but after 100 to 150 years had gone by, they were right back where they were before. Now God is going to judge them. The question arises: Is He right in doing it? Nahum will say that He is not only right in doing it, but that He is also good when He does it. Some folk think the Book of Nahum should be called “Ho hum”! However, Nahum is a thrilling book to study because it reveals the other side of the attributes of God. God is love, but God is also holy and righteous and good. And God still moves in the lives of nations; therefore, this book speaks right into where we are today.
OUTLINE
I. Justice and Goodness of God, Chapter 1:1–8
II. Justice and Goodness of God Demonstrated in Decision to Destroy Nineveh and to Give the Gospel, Chapter 1:9–15
III. Justice and Goodness of God Exhibited in Execution of His Decision to Destroy Nineveh, Chapters 2–3
A. Annihilation of Assyria, Chapter 2
B. Avenging Action of God Justified, Chapter 3
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Justice and Goodness of God
The little Book of Nahum is a remarkable prophecy. The prophet has just one theme, the judgment of Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian Empire, but we will find that he also has a meaningful message for us today.
The burden of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite [Nah. 1:1].
“The burden of Nineveh”—burden means “judgment,” as it is also used in the prophecy of Isaiah. Earlier, Jonah had brought a message to Nineveh which revealed the love of God, and now the message of the Book of Nahum reveals the justice of God—the two go together. Although God will judge a nation, He is still love, and He still loves—you cannot escape that. The thing which makes the judgment of God so frightful is the fact that God does not do it as a petulant person. He doesn’t do it in a vindictive manner whatsoever. He does not do it in a spirit of revenge or of trying to get even. He does not judge because He has become angry for a moment in a sudden emotional outburst. God judges because He is just. He still loves, but He is just. Since He is just in His dealings, He must deal with sin even in the lives of those whom He loves.
Nineveh was a city that God loved—He told Jonah that. Jonah wanted the city destroyed, but God said, “And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?” (Jonah 4:11). God wanted to spare the city and the people who were in it, many of whom were little children. And God had spared Nineveh, but now judgment is going to fall upon this great city—this is Nahum’s message. Jonah, almost a century and a half before, had brought a message from God, and Nineveh had repented. However, the repentance was transitory. God has patiently given this new generation opportunity to repent (see v. 3), but the day of grace now ends and the moment of doom comes. In Nahum 3:19 we read, “There is no healing of thy bruise; thy wound is grievous: all that hear the bruit [news] of thee shall clap the hands over thee: for upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually?” In other words, Nineveh has come to a place where there is no healing for her people.
I believe that for a nation and for an individual it is possible to continue in sin until you cross over a mark. I do not know where that mark is—I don’t pretend to be able to say when this takes place—but there is such a place. When you pass over that mark, it is not that the grace of God cannot reach you but that you cannot reach God for the simple reason that you have come to the place where you are hardened and in a state of unbelief which cannot be changed. This can be true of a nation, and it can be true of an individual.
As you consider the things which are happening today, you are apt to be discouraged. I am sure that many of God’s people are disturbed today. I believe that this is the reason we have had such an interest in prophecy. The wilder the prophetic teachers are, the more popular they seem to be. They are coming up with all kinds of interpretations. The explanation is that God’s people, ignorant of the Word of God, are desperately reaching out because of the things which are happening today. The Lord Himself said, “Men’s hearts [will be] failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken” (Luke 21:26). We are at that state for sure; we’ve come into that particular orbit today. These things are disturbing to us, but, my friend, let us understand that God is still running the affairs of this world. He is still in charge. It hasn’t slipped out from His hands. God is not sitting on the edge of His throne, biting His fingernails. He is not nervous today about what is happening. God is carrying out His plan and purpose, and He is overruling the sin of man. This should be very comforting to the child of God in this day.
Assyria had served God’s purpose and is now to be destroyed. The destruction of Nineveh, according to the details given in this written prophecy, is almost breathtaking. This is a message, therefore, of comfort to a people who live in fear of a powerful and godless nation: God will destroy any godless nation. All you need do is to pick up your history book and start reading at the beginning of written history. You will find that every great world power went down, and they went down at a time when they were given over to wine, women, and song. When a nation reaches that place, you can be sure that it is on the skids and will soon pass out into the limbo of the lost. That is where all the former great nations of the world are today.
Where is the United States today? We are on the way down, my friend. It is a nice ride while we are having it. Dr. J. Gresham Machen said years ago, “America today is going downhill with a godly ancestry.” America, which has had a godly ancestry, is going downhill on a toboggan. And Dr. Machen added, “God pity America when we reach the bottom of the hill.” How close are we to the bottom of the hill? I’m no prophet nor the son of a prophet. I’m just a poor preacher, and all I can say is that it seems to me like we’re getting very close to the bottom of the hill. The reason that the Book of Nahum is such a remarkable prophecy is that it speaks right into our own situation today.
“The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite.” This is all that is known of the writer of this book, and I have discussed this at some length in the Introduction. Nahum was apparently born in the northern kingdom of Israel, and that was his native country; but he moved to the southern part of Judah sometime when he was very young. He had a great concern for the northern kingdom, and he apparently was alive when it was carried away into captivity by Assyria. His message is of the judgment that is coming upon Nineveh.
God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth, and is furious; the Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies [Nah. 1:2].
Jealous, according to Webster’s dictionary, means “exacting exclusive devotion.” God is a jealous God, and He demands that His people worship Him alone. When any people, no matter who they are, turn to idolatry or turn to sin (all that which is contrary to God), and when they give themselves to it, God is jealous. I hear folk say, “Well, there is just a little bit of difference between the jealousy of God and the jealousy of man.” There is not as much difference as you think there is, my friend. In Exodus 20:3–6 we read: “Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.”
God loves you. It does not make any difference who you are, you cannot keep Him from loving you. You can, however, get into a place where you will not experience the love of God. When you put up an umbrella of sin, the sunshine of God’s love will not fall on you, but it is still there for you. You can put up the umbrella of indifference. You can put up the umbrella of turning your back upon Him and not doing His will. There are several different umbrellas you can put up that will keep the love of God from shining upon you, but you cannot keep Him from loving you.
Since God loves you, He is actually jealous of you. That means that He wants you. Actually, God doesn’t want what you possess. We preachers are always asking you for what you have. I wish that I didn’t ever have to mention giving—frankly, I don’t like to. If God’s people would just give enough to cover our radio broadcasting expenses, you would never hear me mention it. But God doesn’t want what you’ve got—He wants you. And He’s jealous when you give yourself, your time, and your substance to other things. When you give yourself to sin, God is jealous.
I once heard a woman say, “I have a very wonderful husband. He’s not jealous of me.” Well, I don’t think that what she said was a compliment at all. We’re living in a day when people are supposed to be broad-minded, especially about this matter of sex. They argue that it’s all right for a woman to give herself to the first man who comes along. May I say to you, my friend, if you are that type of woman, you will never get a good husband because the good husband is one who is going to love you and want you above everything else. And he won’t want to share you with anybody. If you say that you don’t have a jealous husband, I feel sorry for you, because you do not have a good relationship.
God very frankly says, “I’m a jealous God. I want you. I don’t want to share you with the sin of the world and with the devil’s crowd and with idolatry. I don’t want to share you—I want you to belong to Me.” There is nothing wrong with God’s saying that He is jealous, and Nahum says, “God is jealous.” I’m glad that He is.
Any good wife will say, “I don’t want to share my husband with anybody else. He is mine. He belongs to me.” This is something which is pretty important today but which the world has forgotten. It is no wonder that in Southern California we have more divorces than marriages. Of course that is what has happened, because people are playing a little game. You used to find the harlots in the brothels; but today it is called “consecutive harlotry,” which means that you take one partner at a time, live with him for a little while, and then move on to another. It adds up to the same thing, however. My friend, if you are going to be loved, and if you love, there will be a measure of jealousy in the relationship—there has to be if it is a real love.
“The Lord revengeth; the Lord revengeth, and is furious.” The correct translation is not “revengeth,” as it is in our Authorized Version—rather, it should be avengeth. There is a great difference between the two words. “… Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” (Rom. 12:19). God says to you and me, “Don’t you indulge in vengeance because, to begin with, you will never exercise it in the right way. Turn it over to Me. I handle it without any heat of anger. I handle it in justice. I will do the right thing. And I know all the issues and side issues—I know everything about it.”
The Lord avengeth; and, whether we like it or not, anything God does is right. We need to get that fixed in our minds and, on the other end of the stick, we need to recognize that you and I are just little creatures who really don’t know very much—even the smartest ones don’t. Frankly, I hate to say this, but I have quit listening to newscasts and talk programs on which they interview some egghead who is supposed to know something. I’ve discovered that most of these folk, as far as knowing what really is going on in this world, are ignoramuses who are just talking. We ought to recognize that we don’t know much and that whatever God does is right. If you don’t think so, you are wrong. God is not wrong—you are wrong. I wonder if you are willing to take that position. If you’re not, my friend, you’re in trouble as far as God is concerned because there are many things He is not going to tell you or me about. He is simply going to go ahead and do them. He is running this universe His way. Oh, I know that we get a few power-hungry human beings, but they don’t hang around long. Hitler didn’t last long and and neither did Mussolini nor Stalin. The others who are on the front page of our newspapers today will be in obituary notices in a few days—it won’t be long. May I say to you, God is still on the throne, and He is still running things.
God is “furious.” God does not take any delight in the sin of man. God hates sin, and He is furious at it. “The Lord will take vengeance on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies.” God is glorified when He judges a nation, as we see especially in Ezekiel 38–39. When Assyria went down, God was glorified in that. They were a brutal, hated, sinful nation, and God brought them down to wrack and ruin and into the debris and dust of the earth. He is glorified when He does things like that. Maybe you don’t like it, but the Word of God says that that is the way He moves. I would suggest that you get yourself reconciled to the way God does things, because that is the way they are going to be done.
In verse 3 Nahum puts down a great principle by which God not only judged Assyria (and Nineveh, the capital, in particular), but also the way that God judges the world and will judge the world in the future.
The Lord is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet [Nah. 1:3].
“The Lord is slow to anger.” Nahum makes this very clear. You see, God had sent Jonah to Nineveh to tell them that they were to be destroyed because of their awful sin. They were known as probably the most brutal people in the ancient world, and God said that judgment would come to them. But the entire city of Nineveh repented and turned to God at that time. Obviously, the message of Jonah penetrated the entire empire, and there was a great change. We would say that a great revival rose up. However, it didn’t last very long. It has been characteristic of the great waves of revival which have come that they have never lasted permanently. The Wesleyan revival had tremendous impact upon England and this country, as well as side effects upon other nations, but it was of brief duration. There has been some carry-over from it, of course, even down to the present hour. This is true also of the great revivals under Moody in this country, when entire cities moved toward God. Nahum says that God is slow to anger, but this great city of Nineveh has now turned back to its old ways. One hundred years after Jonah, Nahum comes to say, “The clock has struck twelve, and time has run out. There is no longer any delay. Judgment is coming.”
“The Lord… will not at all acquit the wicked.” The justice of God is seen in His judgment because He is slow to anger. It took Him one hundred years to get around to executing judgment against this city, and He is just and righteous in doing it. He is not going to let the wicked off. Never will He let the wicked off unless they turn to Him. Unless they accept Christ as their Savior because He paid the penalty for their sins, they will have to be judged for their sins. God is not going to let them off—He is just and righteous.
You see, the forgiveness of God is different from our forgiveness. When somebody does us wrong, we say, “I forgive you”—and that’s it. A penalty has not been paid. Our forgiveness is generally for something that is just a trifle, although it could be a matter of some importance. But when God forgives, the penalty has already been paid. God is the Judge of this earth. He is not only its Creator, He is not only running it, but He is also the moral ruler of this universe. And God is not a crooked judge. You cannot slip something under the table to get Him to let you off easy. You cannot tell Him that you belong to a certain family, that your father is very influential and will be able to get you off. Nor can you say you are wealthy and will see that the Judge loses His job, nor that you will pay Him just a little extra to be lenient with you. You cannot deal with God like that.
God must judge the wicked, and we are all told that the heart of man is desperately wicked—not just a little wicked, but desperately wicked (see Jer. 17:9). You and I do not really know the depths of the iniquity that is in our hearts; we do not know what we are capable of. Now God cannot acquit the wicked; therefore, if we are going to be acquitted, someone must pay the penalty. That is the reason He has provided a Redeemer for us. When an individual or a nation turns its back on God’s redemption provided now in Christ, then judgment must follow—there is no other alternative.
“The Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.” God today moves even in nature. The storms which come are under His control, and they serve His purpose. So-called Mother Nature doesn’t really have anything to do with it. Mother Nature does what He tells Mother Nature to do. Our God is the Creator, and He is the Redeemer, and He is also the Judge. He’s running things, friend. Just leave it in His hands, and rest in Him today because He is good, He is gracious, and He is the Savior.
He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and drieth up all the rivers: Bashan languisheth, and Carmel, and the flower of Lebanon languisheth [Nah. 1:4].
“He rebuketh the sea, and maketh it dry, and drieth up all the rivers.” God had already shown His power to do this—He dried up the Red Sea and the Jordan River.
Bashan, Carmel, and Lebanon are the three fertile areas in that land. Carmel is actually the valley of Esdraelon, and Megiddo was the main city there. This is one of the most fertile spots on the topside of the earth. When you go farther north, along the coast of Lebanon all the way from Beirut down to the ruins of old Tyre, you see beautiful country. In the spring of the year, you can see the fruit trees blooming and in the distance the Anti-Lebanons covered with snow. The fruit trees—apricots, peaches, cherries, bananas, and citrus fruit—everything is grown there, and the land is very fertile.
Nahum says that a drought is to come. I am sure there are many of you who remember the dust storms in this country in the 1930s. I have always felt that those storms were a judgment from God. If there had been any kind of a revival at that time, I am confident we would never have had to fight World War II or to have been involved in all that we have since then. But unfortunately, that judgment from God carried no message for this country at that time.
The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell therein [Nah. 1:5].
He is the Creator, and He’s also the Preserver of this universe—He’s the One who holds it together.
“The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt” refers, of course, to earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. You can hold Him responsible for anything that takes place, for the floods and the earthquakes that come. But don’t hold Him responsible for the people who are killed at that time, because man has been given an intelligence which tells him that he ought not to build too close to a river due to the danger of a flood. Maybe those of us who live here in Southern California ought to listen to Him. We are told that an earthquake is coming, and that is probably true. The San Andreas fault runs very close to where I live, but if an earthquake comes and a loved one of mine is slain by it, I am not going to cry out to God that He is the one who killed him. No—God is not responsible. We would be responsible. We know better. We probably ought to move to another location; but very frankly, my entire family likes Southern California, so we’re going to stay right here and take the chance. God does control nature, but you cannot say that He is to blame when these great tragedies take place. Man is responsible for them. He ought not to get too close to a river, and he ought to stay away from where he knows there are going to be earthquakes.
Who can stand before his indignation? and who can abide in the fierceness of his anger? his fury is poured out like fire, and the rocks are thrown down by him [Nah. 1:6].
Man has learned that you cannot stand up against nature. Victor Hugo wrote three great novels. He wrote Les Misérables to show that society is the enemy of man; he wrote The Hunchback of Notre Dame to show that religion is the enemy of man; and he wrote The Toilers of the Sea to show that nature is the enemy of man. Well, it is owing to how man approaches each of these. Religion has been an enemy of man. Society is the enemy of man—this civilization today is no friend of grace, I can assure you of that. It is true that nature can be an enemy of man, but it can also be his friend. The issue is that if you are going to try to fight against nature, you’re fighting a losing battle. This is what Victor Hugo tried to show in his novel.
“Who can stand before his indignation? and who can abide in the fierceness of his anger?” This question was directed to the people of Nineveh who had rejected the mercy of this all-powerful God. Do you have the answer to that question? I’d like to ask that of you if you are unsaved. Maybe you are depending upon your own righteousness and goodness. Do you really believe that you can stand in the presence of a holy God who absolutely hates sin and intends to judge it? Are you able to stand in His holy presence?
The very brilliant Oxford don, C. S. Lewis, wrote a story in which he tells about a bus trip that was run from hell to heaven. It was the sort of tour in which those who were in hell could take a bus trip to heaven. The bus was filled and, when it arrived in heaven, the driver parked the bus in a parking lot (I’m sure there is plenty of parking space up there). The driver told everyone on the bus, “At four o’clock this afternoon, the bus is going to leave and head for home.” Home just happened to be hell. And at four o’clock that afternoon, the bus was filled—everyone was back. The bus driver told them, “If you want to stay, you can stay.” Why didn’t they stay? It was because they had found out they had no place in heaven. One of the great saints of the past put it this way: “I would rather go to hell without sin than go to heaven with sin.”
“Who can stand before his indignation?” If you don’t have a Savior, how are you going to stand as a sinner in the presence of a holy God? Do you think that you’ve got a chance? You don’t have a ghost of a chance, my friend. You cannot stand there without a Savior. To be able to stand in His presence is what it means to be accepted into the beloved and to be in Christ. This is a tremendous principle that Nahum is putting down here. God must judge sin. There is something radically wrong with God if He doesn’t judge sin.
Nahum’s description of the power and the anger of God was to reassure the people of Judah of the protection of their all-powerful God when Assyria would invade their land.
The Lord is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and he knoweth them that trust in him [Nah. 1:7].
“The Lord is good.” Let’s keep that in mind. Remember that the psalmist said, “O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so…” (Ps. 107:1–2). If the redeemed don’t say so, nobody’s going to say so. So I am going to say so: God is good. God is good, friend—that’s wonderful to know. I do not know who you are, where you are, or how you are, but I do know that God loves you and He wants to save you. If you are not saved, it is simply because you will not come to Him, for He can save you and He will save you. God is good—that is an axiom of Scripture and an axiom of life. “The Lord is good.”
“A strong hold in the day of trouble.” Are you having any trouble? Do you want to get to a good shelter? The Lord is that shelter which you need.
“And he knoweth them that trust in him.” I’m very happy that I’m not going to get lost in the shuffle, that I won’t get lost in the multitudes. As I travel from city to city, I sometimes think that everyone has moved to the West Coast. I get on one of our freeways here, and I think, My, how many people there are! But then I go back to Dallas, Texas, and I think that everyone has followed me from California to Texas! The crowds are everywhere. I go to Florida or to New York City and it seems the people have followed me there. I have never seen such crowds in my life! I went to Europe several years ago an found that the people were there also! The multitudes which are in the Orient almost shock us. And in Egypt, in the Arab countries, and in Turkey there are multitudes of people. It causes me to think, My, I hope the Lord remembers that my name is Vernon McGee and that I have trusted Him. I am very happy that the Scripture says, “He knoweth them that trust in him.” My friend, He doesn’t need a computer to record your name. Actually, He has you written on His heart; He’s written your name on the palms of His hands He knows you—He knows those who have trusted Him.
But with an overrunning flood he will make an utter end of the place thereof, and darkness shall pursue his enemies [Nah. 1:8].
The Lord will overwhelm and destroy the Assyrians. “An overrunning flood” pictures a river that is overflowing its banks and causing devastation as it moves. It is believed that this refers to the invading army of the Babylonians which overcame Nineveh. The Greek historian Ctesias of the fifth century b.c. records that the Babylonian army was able to invade Nineveh when the Tigris River suddenly overflowed and washed away the floodgates of the city and the foundations of the palace.
“Darkness shall pursue his enemies” raises a question in my mind regarding the place of permanent punishment. There is more said in Scripture about darkness being the lot of the lost than there is about fire. Darkness is mentioned here—“and darkness shall pursue his enemies.” Even the Lord Jesus used the term: “But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Matt. 8:12; see also Matt. 22:13). Literal fire could only affect the physical, never the spiritual. But, oh, the fires of a conscience that has been suddenly alerted to the awful thing one did in rejecting Christ and in not doing the things he should have done. Think of the darkness of a lost eternity! Think of not being able to see where you are going at all. Darkness, to me, is a better and more fearful description of hell than fire is. That may be a new thought for you, and I would urge you to pursue it in the Word of God.
GOD’S DECISION TO DESTROY NINEVEH AND TO GIVE THE GOSPEL
What do ye imagine against the Lord? he will make an utter end: affliction shall not rise up the second time [Nah. 1:9].
“What do ye imagine against the Lord?” Nahum puts this question directly to the Assyrian invaders. In effect he is asking, as Dr. Charles Feinberg has stated it, “Can you cope with such a God as Israel has?”
“He will make an utter end”—that is, the Assyrian power will be completely destroyed. It will give you a better understanding of this to read the fulfillment in the historical account in Isaiah 37.
“Affliction shall not rise up the second time.” In other words, Nineveh will not be given a second chance. They have had their last chance. They’ve crossed over that invisible line—I do not know where it is, but it is there somewhere, and you can step over it in your rejection of God. This does not mean that the grace of God could not reach you but that you can no longer reach it after you have come to that particular point.
For while they be folden together as thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry [Nah. 1:10].
“For while they be folden together as thorns” probably describes the Assyrian army, which presented such a united front that they seemed like entangled thorns—impossible to break through.
“While they are drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.” God would completely destroy them. The fulfillment of this is recorded in Isaiah 37:36–37.
I would say this especially to young people today: Make your decision for Christ while you are young and have a sharp mind. You can keep playing around with intellectualism (which I tried in college and almost got detoured), or you can play around as many are doing with drugs and alcohol, but Nahum says that the day will come when you will stumble around like a drunkard. If you stumble around like a drunkard, you cannot make a decision. A man who had been drinking called me the other night from back East. I refused to talk with him. I told him, “The liquor is speaking and not you. When you are willing to sober up, call me, and I’ll be glad to talk with you, but I will not talk to liquor.” May I say to you, Nineveh had reached the place where they could make no decision.
Along with the other minor prophets, Nahum makes a contribution to God’s philosophy of government and His manner of dealing with individuals and with nations. The point Nahum is going to make is that whether you believe it or not, whether you can understand it or not, God is just and God is good when He judges a nation or an individual. God is still the God of love. He loves the lost. He is, as the apostle John tells us, “… the propitiation [the mercy seat] for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:2).
Men are lost because they are sinners, and they are saved because they accept the overture of salvation that God extends to them. God will get that invitation to any individual on the topside of this earth who will accept it. I have come to believe that we may see a turning to God. I do not mean in great numbers, but I believe there will be a turning to God in response to the invitation given to every people on the topside of this earth. It looks to me right now that radio broadcasting will be the means of bringing that invitation to the unreached.
Nahum is going to be very extreme in what he says. God is going to judge Nineveh, and He is just and righteous in doing it. But God is love also. His judgment is actually an act of His love—that is very difficult for us to comprehend, but it is absolutely true.
There is one come out of thee, that imagineth evil against the Lord, a wicked counsellor [Nah. 1:11].
Nahum says now that there had come up against Judah this enemy—the enemy is Assyria with its capital city of Nineveh. I think that there is agreement among all conservative Bible expositors that the invader that is spoken of here as “a wicked counsellor” was Sennacherib, the king of Assyria. This invasion by Sennacherib is recorded three times in Scripture: in 2 Kings 18–19; 2 Chronicles 32; and also in Isaiah 36–37. When God says something three times, we ought to stop, look, and listen. When He says it once, that should be enough. When He says it twice—sometimes He says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you”—it is extra important. But when He repeats something three times, you can just put it down that it is all-important.
Nahum is referring now to this wicked counselor who had come against Jerusalem. We read in the historical accounts that Sennacherib sent Rabshakeh against Jerusalem with the great army of Assyria. Rabshakeh threatened Hezekiah, the king of Judah, and Hezekiah was almost frightened to death by it all. I think that poor man probably couldn’t sleep at night during that period of time. However, Hezekiah went into the temple and called upon God, and then the prophet Isaiah brought the message that Rabshakeh would not even shoot an arrow into the city of Jerusalem. Instead, he had to withdraw because of Assyria’s campaign against Egypt in which Sennacherib needed his reinforcements. Then God Himself destroyed the army of the Assyrians! Assyria was greatly feared in Judah since during that period they had taken the northern kingdom of Israel into captivity and had dealt with them in a very brutal manner.
Thus saith the Lord; Though they be quiet, and likewise many, yet thus shall they be cut down, when he shall pass through. Though I have afflicted thee, I will afflict thee no more [Nah. 1:12].
This is a rather remarkable verse, and we do not want to miss the point that is here. This expression, “Though they be quiet, and likewise many,” does not quite make sense to me. What is it that God is saying here?
I know most of the men who worked as editors on The New Scofield Reference Bible, and all of them are just as human as you and I are. They are subject to mistakes and not one of them, as far as I know, feels that their notes were inspired. However, every now and then, they have really put in a helpful note. Their note on this verse is an example of how archaeology has confirmed many things in Scripture that we would not have known or understood otherwise, thus revealing the accuracy of the Word of God. The New Scofield Reference Bible (pp. 950–951) uses the following note on verse 12:
In the context the expression “quiet, and likewise many,” although a literal translation of the Hebrew, does not seem to make much sense. Actually the Hebrew here represents a transliteration of a long-forgotten Assyrian legal formula. Excavation in the ruins of ancient Nineveh, buried since 612 b.c., has brought to light thousands of ancient Assyrian tablets, dozens of which contain this Assyrian legal formula. It proves, on investigation, to indicate joint and several responsibility for carrying out an obligation. Nahum quotes the Lord as using this Assyrian formula in speaking to the Assyrians, saying in effect, “Even though your entire nation joins as one person to resist me, nevertheless I shall overcome you.” As the words would have been equally incomprehensible to the later Hebrew copyists, their retention is striking evidence of the care of the scribes in copying exactly what they found in the manuscripts, and testifies to God’s providential preservation of the Bible text.
Therefore, you can see that God used an Assyrian legal formula in expressing what He wanted to say. He was talking about Assyria, and He wanted them to understand what He was saying. When we look at this verse in light of what archaeology has discovered today, God was saying something that made sense to the Assyrians although it does not make sense to us today. When the Hebrew scholars later came along, they didn’t know what this meant either, but they translated it literally into English because they believed in the plenary, verbal inspiration of the Scriptures. Thank God for that!
This leads me to say that this is one of the reasons I cannot approve of a lot of these so-called modern translations. They are not translations at all because many of them were done by men who do not believe that the Bible is the Word of God. Other men, although they believe it is the Word of God, have wanted to put it into a form that modern man could understand. I rather disagree with that method. I am very happy that The Living Bible calls itself “a paraphrased text.” I would say concerning The Living Bible that it is a bad translation, but in many places it is a marvelous paraphrased text. If you will treat it as a paraphrase, that’s fine, but do not believe that you are getting the literal text of Scripture.
This passage here in Nahum reveals that, although you might not understand something in Scripture, God says, “You take it as I have given it to you, and you will find out someday what it means—that is, if you will work and study hard enough.” The trouble is that we are trying to make the Word of God like pabulum, and we are trying to spoon-feed a bunch of babies who are too lazy to really study the Word of God. Although I certainly am one who is accused of making the Word of God simple, I do believe that there ought to be a real reverence for the text of Scripture. I’m no Bible worshiper, I’m no bibliophile, by any means, but I do believe that there should be a reverence for the text of Scripture.
I have spent time on this verse because it contains this expression that I did not understand until this archaeological discovery was made. Archaeology has done a great deal of work yonder at the ancient city of Nineveh. The tell of Nineveh, across the Tigris River from the modern city of Mosul, was first excavated in the 1800s.
For now will I break his yoke from off thee, and will burst thy bonds in sunder [Nah. 1:13].
This seemed impossible in the day when Nahum wrote it because the nation of Assyria was to continue for a long time yet. But God said at that time, “I am going to break the yoke of this nation.”
He also said:
And the Lord hath given a commandment concerning thee, that no more of thy name be sown: out of the house of thy gods will I cut off the graven image and the molten image: I will make thy grave; for thou art vile [Nah. 1:14].
What God says to Nineveh is harsh. He says, “I’m going to bury you.” Nikita Khrushchev wasn’t the first one who used that expression; he said that to the people of the United States, and it seemed very terrifying to us, naturally. Actually, Khrushchev was using a biblical expression, but he didn’t know it. God said to Nineveh, “I’m going to bury you, and when I bury you, you’ll go out of business as a nation.” When was the last time you saw an Assyrian running around? There are not many, and they have no nation today. God said to them, “I’ll bury you,” and that is what He did.
He also said, “I’m going to get rid of your gods, that is your idolatry.” It was the Medes and the Babylonians who eventually came and destroyed the city of Nineveh in 612 b.c. The Assyrian idolatry was destroyed by the Medes who were a monotheistic people and did not worship idols. They were really iconoclasts, and they broke up the idolatry of Assyria.
Behold upon the mountains the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace! O Judah, keep thy solemn feasts, perform thy vows: for the wicked shall no more pass through thee; he is utterly cut off [Nah. 1:15].
God is saying through Nahum, “Don’t leave Me. Don’t withdraw from the Mosaic system. Don’t give it up, because I intend to destroy your enemy and to send to you the Messiah, who will bring tidings of great joy.”
Nahum says this in reference to Assyria, and you will find that Isaiah actually uses the same expression in Isaiah 52:7, where it is amplified: “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; that bringeth good tidings of good, that publisheth salvation; that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth!” Isaiah spoke this in reference to the destruction of Babylon as he wrote to the southern kingdom of Judah. Nahum, writing to the northern kingdom, says the same thing but concerning Assyria. Then notice that Paul quotes this in his Epistle to the Romans: “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!” (Rom. 10:13–15).
I think Nahum was the first to say this and then Isaiah. Finally, Paul quotes Isaiah and makes a different application of it in the section of his epistle that refers to Israel, that is, in the dispensational section of Romans. Paul is arguing there that God is not through with the nation Israel and that in the future there will again come to them the good tidings of great joy. But it is also a worldwide message that is applicable to today. Paul writes, “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved” (Rom. 10:13).
But how will people hear without somebody bringing the message to them? The messengers must be sent, and I believe that God will do the sending. Isaiah wrote, “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings …” (Isa. 52:7). That’s not because they have beautiful feet, but because they have come to bring the message of the gospel. They may have traveled by boat, or they may have come by plane, or they may have come by radio, but they have come bringing the message. In our radio ministry we believe that the gospel should begin here at our own Jerusalem, and therefore we are attempting to continue to reach this country with the Word of God as well as we can. But we want also to go right to the ends of the earth via radio. Very frankly, I want my feet to be beautiful, and I want my feet to be “… shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace” (Eph. 6:15). I want to walk all over this earth by radio, and I want to reach out to folk with the Good News today.
This is a marvelous way in which the Spirit of God uses Scripture. You get a good course in hermeneutics (the methods of interpretation of Scripture) when you read the little Book of Nahum. Nahum tells you how to interpret the Word of God. He has already shown us that we are to take it literally whether we understand it or not. There is an explanation, and the trouble is not with the Word of God; the trouble is with us when we do not understand it. Then we have also seen that God made direct interpretation of this Scripture to one nation at one time, to another nation at another time, and it now has a worldwide application today.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Execution of God’s decision to destroy Nineveh
In chapters 2–3 we are going to see the justice and goodness of God exhibited in the execution of His decision to destroy Nineveh. God didn’t just talk about destroying Nineveh—God did it, and He did it in a very remarkable way.
ANNIHILATION OF ASSYRIA
In chapter 2 Nahum prophesies a frightful judgment upon Assyria, and history testifies to its literal fulfillment. God has made it very clear in chapter 1 where He says, “I will make thy grave; for thou art vile” (Nah. 1:14); in other words, He says to Assyria, “I’m going to bury you.” And, believe me, that is exactly what happened.
He that dasheth in pieces is come up before thy face: keep the munition, watch the way, make thy loins strong, fortify thy power mightily [Nah. 2:1].
This refers to the Medo-Babylonian forces that came against Assyria and destroyed it in 612 b.c. under the leadership of Cyaxares and Nabopolassar. It is very interesting that Nahum, with biting sarcasm, tells Assyria, “You sure had better fortify yourself” The Assyrians spared no one, and they thought that their capital was impregnable and that they could withstand any kind of a judgment. But God is saying to this nation, “You are going to be destroyed.”
For the Lord hath turned away the excellency of Jacob, as the excellency of Israel: for the emptiers have emptied them out, and marred their vine branches [Nah. 2:2].
Nahum is saying that the time has come for Assyria’s judgment because God has completed the judgment of His own people and intends to restore them. The mention of both “Jacob” and “Israel” is a reference to both the southern kingdom of Judah and the northern kingdom of Israel. “The emptiers” are the enemies of God’s people, especially the nation of Assyria. The “vine branches” is probably a symbol of the nation of Israel (see Ps. 80:8–16).
This chapter is Nahum’s detailed prophecy, which today is an accurate, historical record of what took place about one hundred years after Nahum. It speaks of the finality of the judgment of God upon the nation of Assyria; it speaks of the fact that Assyria would never make a comeback. Assyria never did make a comeback, and she never will. According to the Word of God, Babylon will resurge as well as some other nations. But Assyria, one of the great powers in the ancient world, will not make a comeback—God makes that very, very clear.
The capture of Nineveh is described here in rather lurid terms. This passage reveals just how terrible it was, and you could write over this chapter, “… whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal. 6:7). Assyria had been a very brutal nation, one of the most brutal nations the world has ever seen. For example, one of the things which the Assyrians did to an enemy was to bury him out in the desert sand right up to his chin. Then they would put a thong through his tongue and leave him out in the hot blazing sun, first to go mad, and then to die. That was one of the “nice little things” the Assyrians came up with. They also had several other little surprises for their enemies. It is said that when the Assyrians were on the march, in many places an entire community which lay in the line of their march would commit suicide rather than fall into the hands of brutal Assyrians. They were dreaded and feared in the ancient world. We find here in the Book of Nahum that Assyria is again beginning to move, but now their movement is in retreat. They are no longer the aggressor, but the Medes and the Babylonians are coming up against them.
The shield of his mighty men is made red, the valiant men are in scarlet: the chariots shall be with flaming torches in the day of his preparation, and the fir trees shall be terribly shaken [Nah. 2:3].
“The shield of his mighty men is made red.” This does not mean that their shields were made red with blood as some have suggested. The Assyrians were especially fond of the color of red, or scarlet. In all of their art, the color red is frequently found, and they evidently were very much interested in it. They made everything red. Some scholars believe that they used copper shields and that the reflection of the sunlight on the copper appeared red. Why did they do this? It is believed that they did this to frighten their enemies. As you well know, in warfare you intend to do as much bluffing as you do fighting. You want to frighten your enemies as much as you possibly can.
In World War II, when the United States issued a warning before the atom bomb was dropped, the Japanese thought that America was bluffing. That was one time when we were not bluffing, but they did not pay any attention to our warning at all. Today there are many who are using the crying towel, who flagellate this nation, declaring that we are guilty of this awful thing. I personally do not feel that our nation should go into sackcloth and ashes because of what we did at that time. It was an awful, horrible thing, but after all, war is a very awful, horrible thing. Our boys were being slain, and we were not winning the war by any means. The dropping of the bomb was what brought the war to an end, and my feeling is that we were justified in it. But I am also very frank to say that we see God’s principle working out here in the Book of Nahum, that this enemy who was so brutal reaped exactly what they sowed. I do not think it will be any different with the United States. We happened to be the first ones to drop an atom bomb, and I am not sure that God is going to forget that.
The whole point is that in warfare you do attempt to bluff your enemy, and that is probably the reason the Assyrians used the color red. “The valiant men are in scarlet”—again we have the color red, you see. The Assyrians had uniforms which were red.
“The chariots shall be with flaming torches in the day of his preparation, and the fir trees shall be terribly shaken.” This refers to the armor that was on the chariots and the way in which they were built. The Assyrian chariots were not built of wood like the chariots you see in the museum in Cairo, Egypt. The Egyptians used a great deal of wood in building their chariots, but apparently the Assyrians were the ones who got the latest model in chariots. They were sort of the General Motors of chariot building.
The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall justle one against another in the broad ways: they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings [Nah. 2:4].
Verse 4 will illustrate to us a method of interpretation of Scripture which is entirely wrong. Let me just say that Nahum is talking here about the battle between the chariots of the Assyrians and the chariots of the enemy. What happened was that when the enemy came against Assyria, they faced the well-defended city of Nineveh. Diodorus Siculus, a Greek historian, tells us that Nineveh had fifteen hundred towers, each of which was two hundred feet high. But at the time of the siege, the Tigris River rose up and flooded, and it took out an entire section of the wall of the city. The river did what the enemy could not do—it breached the walls of Nineveh. Then the enemy was able to come in and penetrate the city itself. They opened the canals used for irrigation and thus flooded the palace. This is the way in which the enemy was able to take the city. The breach in the wall was so great that the chariots of the enemy could get in, and what is described in verse 4 is nothing in the world but the chariot battle which took place at that time.
There is a type of interpretation of prophecy which I deplore, and I regret that at the present hour we see so much of it. For example, there are those who say that this verse is a prophecy of the automobile! That is what Sir Robert Anderson calls “the wild utterances of prophecy mongers.” There is a great interest in prophecy today because great world events and world crises are taking place. But we need to recognize that we can become fanatical and go overboard concerning prophecy. I believe it was Winston Churchill who said, “A fanatic is one who cannot change his mind, and he won’t change the subject.” Some folk today are just dwelling on prophecy (after all, it is a limited subject), and they become fanatical in their interpretations.
My friend, this prophecy has nothing in the world to do with the automobile. I do not think you could even make that kind of application of it for the very simple reason that automobiles don’t rage in the streets. To tell the truth, sometimes the drivers rage when they get tied up in traffic, but the automobiles don’t rage. Sometimes an automobile manages to stay right where it is and not move at all when it gets a vapor lock! And automobiles do not “justle one against another in the broad ways.” Actually, when one jostles against another, it means you have a wreck. One New Year’s Eve, as I was out on the freeways of Southern California with a friend, we saw one wreck after another—apparently there were quite a few drunk drivers out that evening. The point is that automobiles don’t jostle one against another.
What is Nahum talking about when he says, “The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall justle one against another in the broad ways”? Well, if you have ever been in a museum which had some of the Assyrian relics, you have perhaps seen that on the chariot wheels, that is, on the hub of the wheels, there was a sharp blade. It was like a sword or a sickle, a very dangerous instrument which extended out from the wheel. The one driving the chariot would go up as close as he could get to the enemy, and this very sharp instrument would cut off the wooden wheel of the enemy’s chariot. It would put a chariot out of business right away if you could cut off the wheel on one side. That is the jostling together that Nahum mentions here, and it hasn’t anything to do with the automobile!
“They shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings.” The chariots moved very fast in that day, although in our day it would seem very slow. The Assyrians had developed the art of fighting by chariot to a very fine degree, and the enemy had picked that up so that when they clashed in the broad ways of the city and outside the city, the battle was a frightful, horrible thing. That, my friend, is all that Nahum is talking about here.
I believe that you can make moral and spiritual applications from the Word of God, but I don’t think that you can take this prophecy and interpret it in a literal way for our day. Do you see what a remarkable book Nahum is? We have here another great principle for interpreting the Word of God. For example, when you read in Isaiah, “… therefore shalt thou plant pleasant plants, and shalt set it with strange slips” (Isa. 17:10), you cannot interpret that to mean the orange trees which today abound in that land. The natural habitat of the orange tree is the land of Israel. In fact, that whole area grew oranges way back even in the days of Solomon. When Solomon speaks in the Song of Solomon of dwelling under the apple tree, the “apple” referred to is actually a citron fruit, probably an orange tree (see Song 2:3). My point is that we cannot take Scriptures that have an interpretation for a different people at a different time and try to bring them up-to-date and interpret them for our own day.
I want to mention again that the little Books of Jonah and Nahum go together. What you have in the Book of Jonah is actually not a prophecy but rather an account of Jonah’s missionary activity in the city of Nineveh when the total population turned to God and God spared them from judgment. But time went by, and they departed from the Lord again. One hundred years after Jonah, God raised up Nahum, and his entire message is directed against Nineveh. What we have, therefore, in the Book of Nahum is a very vivid prophecy of the total annihilation of this city. The city was so completely destroyed that it was not until 1850 that the site of Nineveh was located and excavated. A great deal has been learned about the city of Nineveh and the Assyrian civilization through that excavation.
He shall recount his worthies: they shall stumble in their walk; they shall make haste to the wall thereof, and the defence shall be prepared [Nah. 2:5].
The destruction of Nineveh came about when the Medes came against the city under Cyaxares. Babylon at that time was not the greatest kingdom, but they did join with the Medes in this battle.
The king of Assyria depended upon his military leaders, but because of their fear, they stumbled and fell in their march. Of course, the defense of the city’s wall was of primary importance in the battle.
The gates of the rivers shall be opened, and the palace shall be dissolved [Nah. 2:6].
Nahum prophesies here that the Tigris River will be turned into the city. At the time this campaign was carried on, the heavy rains in that area caused the Tigris River to reach flood stage. The floodwaters took out a section of the wall, and the city became like a pool of water. “The gates of the rivers shall be opened, and the palace shall be dissolved.” I think that the foundations of the palace were swept out and that the water absolutely brought the palace down. Secular history tells us that part of the city wall was taken out. About two and one-half miles of the wall of Nineveh was right along by the side of the Tigris River. The city was situated well above the normal flow of the river, but with the river at flood stage, it took out a whole section of the wall, and the enemy was able to enter the city. In other words, the overflowing river made the breach that the enemy was attempting to make themselves. It would seem as though the Lord cooperated in the destruction of the city. The floodgates were opened, and even the palace was brought down by the flooding. We are told that the enemy opened the irrigation ditches and the palace was completely inundated with water.
And Huzzab shall be led away captive, she shall be brought up, and her maids shall lead her as with the voice of doves, tabering upon their breasts [Nah. 2:7].
Huzzab literally means “it is decreed.” This verse should read, “And it is decreed, she shall be led away captive, she shall be brought up, and her maids shall lead her as with the voice of doves, tabering [or, beating] upon their breasts.” I used to hunt doves in Texas as a young fellow. Late in the afternoon, we would hunt down where a dam had been put up and there was a body of water used for the watering of cattle—we called it a tank in those days. The birds would come there late in the afternoon, and as we would come up over the embankment, we’d be able to get a good shot at the doves. They would all take flight, and the flapping of their wings would be like the sound of beating upon your chest. This is the picture that is given to us here by Nahum. The beating upon their breast was just like the noise made by doves taking flight. The dove’s call, by the way, is a mourning noise, and that is the reason it is called the mourning dove. I have been told that that mourning noise is actually the love call of the dove.
But Nineveh is of old like a pool of water: yet they shall flee away. Stand, stand, shall they cry; but none shall look back [Nah. 2:8].
“But Nineveh is of old like a pool of water.” The flood had entered, and the city became like a lake.
“Stand, stand, shall they cry; but none shall look back.” The command was given to them to hold their ground, but when they saw the flood coming in along with the enemy, they decided it was time not to listen to their commanders but to turn and run away as fast as possible.
Take ye the spoil of silver, take the spoil of gold: for there is none end of the store and glory out of all the pleasant furniture [Nah. 2:9].
“Take ye the spoil of silver, take the spoil of gold.” The enemy is invited to take the spoil of silver and to take the spoil of gold. “For there is none end of the store and glory out of all the pleasant furniture.” The city of Nineveh was very wealthy and highly ornate. The palaces were beautiful, and the people lived in luxury because of the success they had had in warfare. You see, the Assyrians had brought in booty from all of the great nations of that day—even the southern kingdom of Judah was paying tribute to them at that time—so that the city had become very wealthy.
She is empty, and void, and waste: and the heart melteth, and the knees smite together, and much pain is in all loins, and the faces of them all gather blackness [Nah. 2:10].
“She is empty, and void, and waste.” Assyria had brought in booty from everywhere else and had gathered it all in one place, but their enemies came in and took it all out.
“And the heart melteth, and the knees smite together.” When your knees smite together, it means that you are afraid, it means there is fear in your heart. This is what happened to the Assyrians.
“And much pain is in all loins, and the faces of them all gather blackness.” This was a time of great fear and dread because the Assyrians knew that they were hated by the world of that day. All their neighbors hated them because of their brutality. Now vengeance was being taken out upon them. Instead of the blood being all drawn from their faces, Nahum says that “the faces of them all gather blackness.” I take it that this means that they were putting on sackcloth and throwing ashes upon their heads.
Where is the dwelling of the lions, and the feedingplace of the young lions, where the lion, even the old lion, walked, and the lion’s whelp, and none made them afraid? [Nah. 2:11].
Both Assyria and Babylon used the lion as the symbol of their empires. Nahum could be referring here to the actual lions which the Assyrians had there, or he could be referring to their strong young men because the lion was the symbol of the strength of the kingdom. The whole point is that, whether it is the literal lions or the strength of their army, they are gone—they’ve left, or they’ve been killed.
The lion did tear in pieces enough for his whelps, and strangled for his lionesses, and filled his holes with prey, and his dens with ravin [Nah. 2:12].
Whether these were the literal lions or the Assyrian army, they had once been well-fed-. but now all of that is ended. They no longer have anything to eat because all has been taken away by the enemy.
Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young lions: and I will cut off thy prey from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more [Nah. 2:13].
“Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord of hosts.” God doesn’t say that very often. He says it only here and to Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38 and 39. Many of us believe that the reference in Ezekiel is directed to modern Russia. That is pretty much established today by conservative scholarship. No one but a liberal who disregards facts and evidence would say that that passage does not refer to modern Russia. God says there to Russia, “I am against you,” and He sets down a pattern for us. Russia has had the gospel; actually, they had it before we did. But today communism is opposed to God. It is atheistic; its basic philosophy is that it is opposed to God. But God beat them to the draw. He said to them long before they appeared as a nation, “I am against you.”
Here in Nahum He also says, “I am against you,” and He is talking to Nineveh. They were a people who had had a personal messenger from God (Jonah), and they had turned to the living God, but now they have turned from Him. When you have had the light and you reject it, the Lord Jesus put it like this: “… If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” (Matt. 6:23). In other words, if the light is shining right into your eyes and you say you cannot see, that means you are blind. This reminds me of the story of a young man who was in a mine explosion together with other men. The rescuers got to them as quickly as they could, taking away all of the wreckage and debris between those on the outside and the trapped miners. When they got through to them, the first thing they did was to turn on a light. But this young man stood there after the light came on and said, “Why don’t they turn on the light?” everybody looked at him in amazement because they knew then that the explosion had blinded him. But, you see, as long as they were in darkness, nobody could tell that he was blind. He couldn’t tell it himself because he thought the lights were still out. “If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!”—it means you are blind. This is the picture that Nahum gives to us. The Assyrians had had light, but they rejected it; and when you reject light, your responsibility is greater.
“I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young lions.” Again, this could be literal lions or the young men, but I believe it refers to their young men because the lion was the symbol of the strength of the nation.
“And I will cut off thy prey from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more be heard.” This is a note of finality. One hundred years earlier God had graciously saved Nineveh when they repented and turned to Him; but time has marched on, they have lapsed into an awful apostasy, and God is now going to judge them. He says to them, “I’m against you. I’m going to bring you down. I will annihilate you, and you will never appear again.” This ought to be a message today to those who have completely turned their backs upon God: it means total judgment.
CHAPTER 3
Theme: Avenging action of God justified
In chapter 3 Nahum gives the cause for and justifies God’s destruction of the city of Nineveh. Nineveh’s destruction is an example of the fact that “…whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal. 6:7). This is also true of a nation. You will find that in many ways God deals with individuals and nations in a very similar manner.
Many literary critics have found in this third chapter one of the most vivid descriptions of the destruction of a city that is imaginable. You will not find anything in any language more descriptive than this.
Woe to the bloody city! it is all full of lies and robbery; the prey departeth not [Nah. 3:1].
We are given here a picture of the internal condition of the city of Nineveh. “Woe to the bloody city!” Nineveh, as the capital of Assyria, was known in the ancient world to be very brutal, very bloody. They were feared and dreaded by other nations. The army of the Assyrians, although it actually moved rather slowly, was just like a hurricane which devours everything in its pathway. As I mentioned before, at times an entire community would commit suicide rather than suffer the brutal attack of Assyria.
“It is all full of lies.” Assyria was a nation which could never be depended upon. She was not faithful to fulfill the promises which she made to other nations to help them and protect them.
What better description could you have even of our own country right now? I feel that we are given very few facts but a great deal of propaganda today. This is true not only of Washington, D.C., and the news media but of all areas of our society. This is true of our government regardless of which party the information comes from. My opinion of our two-party system is that what we have is Tweedledum and Tweedledee—you can pick either one of them. At one point in my life I thought I needed to change from one party to the other, and I did change. But now I need another change, not back to where I came from but to be free of this whole thing in which I am fed nothing in the world but propaganda and never given the truth. The one thing that is needed today is the truth.
One of the reasons God judged the city of Nineveh was that it was “all full of lies and robbery.” These things characterized the life of the city. Likewise, our homes today are not safe. I was recently in the home of friends in Louisville, Kentucky. They are lovely folk, and they have a very lovely southern home in which they have some beautiful antiques. Do you know that they have had to put bars on their windows and double and triple locks on their doors! Where do you think we live today? We say that we live in a nation of law and order—but it hasn’t been that. What an apt description this verse is of the United States! When I first began to study this, I felt like asking Nahum, “Are you talking about us? You’re giving a vivid description of Nineveh, but it is also a picture of my own nation.”
The Books of Jonah and Nahum reveal that God deals with gentile nations and that He did so back in the days of the Old Testament. They also show that the government of God moves in the governments of men. God today will overrule the sin of man. He will overrule a nation. As you come down through history, you see great civilizations, one after another, crumbling in the dust and the debris of the ages. Why? Because God judged them, friend—that is the reason why. The United States is no pet of God. We’re not something special. We think we are. We can boast of the fact that right now we are the strongest nation in the world, but even that might be questionable today. We live in a security that may be a false security, because God brings great nations down, and He makes that very clear here.
The noise of a whip, and the noise of the rattling of the wheels, and of the prancing horses, and of the jumping chariots [Nah. 3:2].
Nahum gives a graphic description of these chariots. They are like armored tanks—they were the tanks of the ancient world. As they came inside the city, you could hear the noise of the whip as the driver whipped up his horse. You could hear the rattling of the wheels and the noise “of the prancing horses, and of the jumping [bounding] chariots.” The Chariots were leaping over everything, especially dead bodies.
The first two verses of this chapter describe the internal condition of Nineveh. Lies and robbery marked the culture and the climate of the city. This is the reason they acted as they did on the outside toward their enemies—their brutality, their total unconcern for other nations, their lording it over others. The very cause for their methods is that internally they were wrong. You see, man does not become a sinner because he sins. He sins because he is a sinner. Fundamentally, on the inside, man is a sinner, and that accounts for his actions. I am sure that many people in that day said of the Assyrians, “These people are uncivilized!” Inside the city, it was full of lies and robbery. That which did not characterize our nation years ago (there was a great deal of it, but it wasn’t the predominant thing)—lies and robbery—just happens to characterize the internal condition of our nation today. Why? Because we are highly civilized? No. It is because we are sinners. My friend, we are sinners.
The horseman lifteth up both the bright sword and the glittering spear: and there is a multitude of slain, and a great number of carcases; and there is none end of their corpses; they stumble upon their corpses [Nah. 3:3].
The number of the dead was unbelievable. I tell you, if a well-placed bomb were dropped somewhere in this country, we would probably see the same sort of thing. There are nations who may pretend to be friendly but who would not hesitate for five seconds to drop that bomb on this country if they thought they could get by with it. And I’m beginning to think that they believe they can get by with it.
We have in verses 3–4 that which characterized the external conditions of Nineveh. They had been a brutal and cruel enemy, and they were now reaping what they had sown.
Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the wellfavoured harlot, the mistress of witcherafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witcherafts [Nah. 3:4].
“Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the wellfavoured harlot.” The city of Nineveh is here likened unto a harlot. She was the one whom all the nations played up to. Note the shame of this city. God likens her to a harlot, a “wellfavoured harlot,” suggesting that all the world courted her.
“The mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts.” Witchcraft is mentioned twice here. This is a reference to the occult. Don’t for one moment think that the idolatry of the ancient world was meaningless. The apostle Paul called an idol “… nothing in the world …” (1 Cor. 8:4), but back of the idol is Satan, and back of idolatry is that which is satanic. I do not need to labor this point today. If you are not acquainted with what is happening today in the world of the occult, then you have not been to Southern California. It is not happening just among a bunch of down-and-outers or a bunch of criminals or in the underworld. The occult is active on our college campuses today and in the best sections of our cities. People are given over to witchcraft today. It is amazing how many people will buy their horoscope, which they will then follow. Many folk carry amulets, good luck pieces, charms, little dolls, and all that sort of thing. This is growing by leaps and bounds in a materialistic age and culture, which thought it had graduated from such things, but now we find there has been a return to it. This is exactly what the great city of Nineveh had turned to, and God says that He is justified in judging the city because of its harlotry and witchcraft.
The Book of Revelation tells us that when we come to the end of this age, the organized church will become a harlot, engaging in this type of thing. I am of the opinion that we can see a movement in that direction even now. All of this is very dangerous today. I know a very fine Pentecostal preacher who preaches the Word of God and believes in speaking in tongues and in healing. He expressed to me that there is a real danger in the tongues movement. He said, “Not only does our group speak in tongues, there are those today in the occult who are also doing it. In my own church, we are being very careful about this sort of thing.” This man is a spiritually enlightened man, and he is rather reluctant to engage in “tongues” speaking. I would put up a warning to you today, friend: just because a thing seems to have a mark of the supernatural on it does not mean it is scriptural. You had better examine it very carefully to see whether it is scriptural. If it is supernatural and not scriptural, it is not of God. And there is only one other fellow who is in the business of the supernatural other than God, and that is Satan. Satan will ape God and imitate Him in every way that he possibly can.
God is giving to us the reason He judged Nineveh. He is justifying His actions in destroying this city. Now He makes this very remarkable statement—
Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord of hosts; and I will discover thy skirts upon thy face, and I will shew the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame [Nah. 3:5].
“Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord Of hosts.” This is the second time that God says this to Nineveh. He also says this to Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38–39. We believe that definitely refers to Russia. When I graduated from seminary, I would not accept that Ezekiel 38–39 referred to Russia. So I decided to make a study of it on my own, and I now have several reasons why I am confident that it is Russia which is mentioned there. Russia is a nation which wasn’t even in existence in Ezekiel’s day, but God said to them, “I am against you.” Well, we now know why He said that—they are an atheistic nation.
Assyria was a nation to whom God said, “I am against you,” not because they were atheistic but because they were polytheistic. Assyria was given over to idolatry—back of the idol was the occult, back of the idol was witchcraft. Witchcraft has become a reality to many today. Men are finding that there is a reality to it. And it is those in the upper echelon who are making this discovery. I have been told on rather good authority, from those who are in our capital of Washington, that it is amazing and alarming to see the number of people there who appeal to fortune-tellers and to horoscopes in an attempt to interpret the future. Men want to know the future. But God said to Nineveh, a city greatly involved in the occult, “I am against thee.”
“I will discover thy skirts upon thy face.” In other words, “I am going to uncover thy skirts from thy face.” We live in a day of a great deal of nudity. With their tongues in their cheeks, men try to call it art to present that which is salacious and sinful and suggestive. There is a great display of the nude by both men and women today. The Assyrian civilization had sunk pretty low but not as low as we have. They did not display the human body—they were not given over to that. It was a disgrace for a woman to be displayed nude. God speaks here of the shame that He is going to bring upon Nineveh. He says, “I will uncover thy skirts from thy face. I am going to pull your skirts up over your face. You have been a harlot, and I’m going to reveal you and all of the lurid details.” Believe me, that was a real disgrace for them.
“I will shew the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame.” That is what God said He would do to this nation. Assyria went down, my friend. A great nation, a great civilization, with all its riches and power, went down into the dust never to rise again. God said that is what He would do to them.
And I will cast abominable filth upon thee, and make thee vile, and will set thee as a gazingstock [Nah. 3:6].
God says to Nineveh through Nahum, “I am going to bring you down. I’m opposed to you. I will expose you to the world for what you are.” The excavations which have brought to light this great civilization reveal that all of this is quite accurate. And the Book of Nahum just happens to be a vivid prophecy which was given long before this actually took place. This is something quite amazing, is it not?
All of this description which is given here is something I do not want to pass over lightly because it has such a tremendous application for us today and is such an apt picture of the present day. The Book of Nahum reveals God’s method in dealing with the nations of the world. I do not think He has changed His method, and if He hasn’t, we are in trouble, and I mean deep trouble, my friend. We ought to be praying for our nation.
God calls this city a harlot, saying that He is absolutely going to display all of the shame and filth and vileness of this great civilization and make it a gazingstock, a spectacle, to the world. Such was the end of the great Assyrian Empire.
And it shall come to pass, that all they that look upon thee shall flee from thee, and say, Nineveh is laid waste: who will bemoan her? whence shall I seek comforters for thee? [Nah. 3:7].
In other words, God says, “Where in the world will I get people to come and mourn over this city? Nobody will mourn over it. Nobody will weep over it. There will be no mourners there.” That is a very sad situation, a very sad one indeed. Several funeral home directors here in Pasadena became my personal friends over the years and would sometimes call me to conduct a funeral. One of the saddest experiences that I ever had was the funeral I conducted for a dear old man. He was a Christian who had come out here from the East with his wife for the sake of her health. She had died, and then he became bedridden, and people forgot about him. When he died, I guess many didn’t even recognize his name. When I went down to conduct the funeral, there wasn’t anybody there. Nobody came—to me it was the saddest thing. I knew the funeral director pretty well, and I went to him and said, “Get all your office workers and come on in there. We’re going to have a funeral service.” He rounded up everyone that he could and brought them in. We had about a dozen folk. So I brought a gospel message, a message of hope for the Christian. It was wonderful to be able to say, “Jesus died for our sins, and He rose again for our justification.” But it was sad to have a funeral service like that, where no friends attended. God said that there were not going to be any mourners at the funeral of Nineveh. Nahum prophesied that the whole world would rejoice in that day, and they did. When God said this through Nahum, no one would have believed it unless he had believed God and accepted it by faith, but it came to pass just as God said it would.
Art thou better than populous No, that was situate among the rivers, that had the waters round about it, whose rampart was the sea, and her wall was from the sea? [Nah. 3:8].
“Art thou better than populous No?”—No-Amon was what we know as Thebes, the great capital of upper Egypt. Dr. Charles Feinberg’s books on the minor prophets are very excellent—I know of none better. I would like to quote from his book, Jonah, Micah and Nahum (p. 147), in which he describes the city of No-Amon:
It was the capital city of the Pharaohs of the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Dynasties, and boasted such architecture as the Greeks and Romans admired. The Greeks called it Diospolis, because the Egyptian counterpart of Jupiter was worshipped there. It was located on both banks of the river Nile. On the eastern bank were the famous temples at Karnak and Luxor. Homer, the first Greek poet, spoke of it as having 100 gates. Its ruins cover an area of some 27 miles. Amon, the chief god of the Egyptians, was shown on Egyptian relics as a figure with a human body and a ram’s head. The judgment of this godless and idolatrous city was foretold by Jeremiah (46:25) and Ezekiel (30:14–16). No-Amon was situated favorably among the canals of the Nile with the Nile itself as a protection. The Nile appears as a sea when it overflows its banks annually. Nineveh can read her fate in that of No-Amon, for she is no better than the mighty Egyptian capital.
God is saying to Nineveh that the city of Thebes should have been an example to the Assyrian Empire. The Assyrians were the ones who had destroyed Thebes, a great city which had seemed impregnable. It seemed that no one could take it, but the Assyrians did take it and destroy it. This should have been an example to the Assyrians. God had judged Thebes, and He is here justifying the fact that He will also judge Nineveh. The government of God moves in the governments of men in this world today.
“Art thou better than populous No, that was situate among the rivers….” “Rivers” is used in the plural to mean a great deal of water. When the Nile River would overflow at the flood season, it looked like the ocean. “That had the waters round about it, whose rampart was the sea, and her wall was from the sea?” Thebes was built so that at the flood season it would not be flooded at all. Rather, the water provided a natural protection for the city.
Ethiopia and Egypt were her strength, and it was infinite; Put and Lubim were thy helpers [Nah. 3:9].
These were the allies of Thebes which were located around her. The city of Thebes, at one time the capital of the Egyptian Empire, felt that it could never fall because there was a big desert on both sides, the Nile River was a protection, and they had allies to the north and to the south. How could anybody get to them? But the Assyrians did. The Assyrians, in turn, felt that they were impregnable in their day. And today we feel that we have enough atomic weapons and other sophisticated hardware to defend ourselves. My friend, when God’s time comes, we will go down. Our best defense today simply does not happen to be in the area of military weapons. Our best defense would be a return to God and to a recognition of Him in our government. I am not impressed by what I see in Washington. They have a little prayer breakfast and then, I’m told, some of them step outside and cuss up a storm! Some men make a profession of being Christians, and yet their language is so vile you cannot even listen to it. What hypocrisy there is today! Is God going to let us off? Are we something special? I think not. Our best defense today would be once again to have men of character in government—even if they were not Christians, if they would at least espouse the great morality set forth in the Word of God. That is the thing that built our nation. I am not greatly impressed with some of our founding fathers. I do not think, for example, that Thomas Jefferson was a Christian, but I will say that he had a respect for the Word of God. He believed in the morality of the Word of God. When we despise and contradict that morality as we do today, God cannot bless us as a nation, and I do not think He will.
Yet was she carried away, she went into captivity: her young children also were dashed in pieces at the top of all the streets: and they cast lots for her honourable men, and all her great men were bound in chains [Nah. 3:10].
This is what Assyria had done to Thebes, and now chickens are coming home to roost. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal. 6:7).
Thou also shalt be drunken: thou shalt be hid, thou also shalt seek strength because of the enemy [Nah. 3:11].
The Assyrians will try to fortify their courage by getting drunk, but that is not going to help them a bit.
All thy strong holds shall be like fig trees with the firstripe figs: if they be shaken, they shall even fall into the mouth of the eater [Nah. 3:12].
I used to have a fig tree in my yard. When the figs were ripe, all you had to do was just touch a branch, and they all would come tumbling down. This is what Nahum says to Nineveh here: “All your defenses are like that. The minute the enemy comes, he is going to break right through them.”
Behold, thy people in the midst of thee are women: the gates of thy land shall be set wide open unto thine enemies: the fire shall devour thy bars [Nah. 3:13].
I believe that the thought here is that the men were acting like women. The men were very womanly. Or this could mean that women were actually the ones in the positions of authority. Frankly, I do not think God is for the women’s liberation movement which we have today. I still believe that woman’s place is in the home. I feel very frankly that the church is at fault in using women in too many offices in the church. A woman’s first place is not to teach a Sunday school class. She is to raise her own family—that is her place. Women are being taken away from their homes by church work and every other kind of work. Unless she is forced to work for a living because her husband has passed on or is unable to work, I do not believe a woman’s working is justified. I know that I will get reactions for saying this, but I am saying it because I think that this is one mark of the disintegration and downfall of civilization.
Draw thee waters for the siege, fortify thy strong holds: go into clay, and tread the mortar, make strong the brickkiln [Nah. 3:14].
At the last minute, the Assyrians would get busy making bricks to fortify themselves. They would heat up water, which they would carry to the top of the city wall. They would then pour a bucket of the scalding water down upon the fellow who was scaling the wall. He was through scaling the wall, I can assure you of that—he would soon find himself back on the ground.
There shall the fire devour thee; the sword shall cut thee off, it shall eat thee up like the cankerworm: make thyself many as the cankerworm, make thyself many as the locusts [Nah. 3:15].
Nahum prophesies that they will try to bring in reinforcements but that they will not help.
Thou hast multiplied thy merchants above the stars of heaven: the cankerworm spoileth, and flieth away [Nah. 3:16].
Each year their national wealth increased, for they were great merchants, but all of that was going to come to an end.
Thy crowned are as the locusts, and thy captains as the great grasshoppers, which camp in the hedges in the cold day, but when the sun ariseth they flee away, and their place is not known where they are [Nah. 3:17].
When the time came, the leaders would manage to escape, that is, for a little while anyway.
Thy shepherds slumber, O king of Assyria: thy nobles shall dwell in the dust: thy people is scattered upon the mountains, and no man gathereth them [Nah. 3:18].
The leadership of Assyria disintegrated to the place where they no longer attempted to lead the nation.
I trust that I will not be misunderstood because I am not discussing politics, certainly not from any party viewpoint. (As far as I am concerned, I am disgusted with both of the major political parties in this nation of ours.) I believe that one of the great evidences of our disintegration and deterioration as a nation is the lack of leadership that exists on the national level, the state level, the county level, and even at the city and community levels. There is a lack of real leadership at all levels. It seems that the one with the big mouth and the big talk is the one who is elected. And it seems that the rich man is the one elected. Abraham Lincoln could not run for the office of president today—he wouldn’t have enough money. God says that the lack of leadership, along with the other things He has mentioned, is what brought Assyria down.
What God has said in this chapter concerning Assyria fits our nation like a glove. One glove fits Assyria—and that’s been fulfilled. The other glove fits the United States. But are we listening to God today? No. No one to speak of is paying any attention. Certainly the leadership of our nation is not. The tragedy of the hour is our retreat from God and our rejection of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, the Savior of the world.
Listen to God’s final words to Nineveh. He says this with a note of finality and of dogmatism. This makes your spine tingle. It is frightening indeed—
There is no healing of thy bruise; thy wound is grievous: all that hear the bruit of thee shall clap the hands over thee: for upon whom hath not thy wickedness passed continually? [Nah. 3:19].
The Assyrian people had sinned and sinned and sinned—it was a way of life with them. When people want to point a finger and say that God is wrong, that God permits evil and does nothing about evil, God says to them, “I do do something about it.” My friend, you can look around today at the many injustices in our world, but God is doing something about them. God is just and righteous. He was a God of love even when He destroyed Nineveh and wiped it clean like a dish. It disappeared off the face of the map and off the face of the earth—and God took full responsibility for it’s judgment.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Freeman, Hobart E. Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1973.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Judah. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975. (Obadiah, Joel, Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk.)
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Habakkuk
INTRODUCTION
Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah have a great deal in common. Each one gives a different facet of the dealings of God with mankind. They show how the government of God is integrated into the government of men. They also show God’s dealings with the individual.
Another similarity is the fact that they come from approximately the same time period. In fact, they all could have been contemporaries, and the possibility is that they were. (It is difficult to nail down the specific dates of the prophets—and of many of the other Old Testament books. The reason, of course, is that the exact dates are not important.) At least we know that all three prophets fit into the period between the reigns of Kings Josiah and Jehoiakim, which would also be the time of the prophet Jeremiah. The northern kingdom had already gone into captivity, and the southern kingdom was right on the verge of captivity. After Josiah, every king in the southern kingdom was a bad king. Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah all fit into that period of decline.
Although there are similarities, these books also differ from each other. Nahum dealt only with Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian Empire. Nahum showed that God is just, righteous, and a God of love; yet He was absolutely right in judging that city.
Habakkuk approaches the problem from a little different viewpoint. He is a man with questions. He is disturbed about God’s seeming indifference to the iniquity of His own people. Habakkuk asks God, “Why don’t You do something?” In our day a great many folk feel as Habakkuk did. They are asking, “Why doesn’t God do something? Why doesn’t He move into the affairs of men and stop the violence and injustice and suffering?”
God answered the question for Habakkuk by informing him that He was preparing a nation, Babylon, to punish Judah and to take her into captivity—unless she changed her ways. Well, if you think Habakkuk had a problem before, you can see that he really had a problem then! Habakkuk asked, “Why will You use Babylon—a nation that is definitely more wicked, more pagan, and more given over to idolatry than Your own people—to punish Judah?” God reveals to Habakkuk that He was not through with Babylon but would judge her also. This is God’s method.
This book is very important in its relationship to the New Testament. It is generally conceded that the three great doctrinal books of the New Testament are Romans, Galatians, and Hebrews, all of which quote from Habakkuk. In fact, Habakkuk 2:4 is the background of their message: “The just shall live by his faith.” So this little book looms upon the horizon of Scripture as being important. Don’t let the brevity of it deceive you. Importance is not determined by how much you say but by what you say.
The name Habakkuk means “to embrace.” Dr. Charles Feinberg (Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, p. 11) described Martin Luther’s striking definition of this name:
Habakkuk signifies an embracer, or one who embraces another, takes him into his arms. He embraces his people, and takes them to his arms, i.e., he comforts them and holds them up, as one embraces a weeping child, to quiet it with the assurance that, if God wills, it shall soon be better.
Habakkuk told us nothing of his personal life, even of the era in which he lived. I call him the doubting Thomas of the Old Testament because he had a question mark for a brain. His book is really unusual. It is not a prophecy in the strict sense of the term. It is somewhat like the Book of Jonah in that Habakkuk told of his own experience with God—his questions to God and God’s answers. We could say that Habakkuk was born in the objective case, in the pluperfect tense, in the subjunctive mood. We write over him a big question mark until, in the last chapter and especially in the final two or three verses, we can put down an exclamation point. This book is the personal experience of the prophet told in poetry, as Jonah’s was told in prose.
Habakkuk was an interesting man, and he has written a lovely book with real literary excellence. The final chapter is actually a song of psalm of praise and adoration to God, a very beautiful piece of literature.
The closing statement in the book, “To the chief singer [musician] on my stringed instruments,” reveals that this book is a song. That little note was put there for the director of the orchestra and the choir. The final chapter of the book is a psalm of beauty. In fact, the entire prophecy is a gem. It has been translated into a metric version by A. C. Gaebelein (The Annotated Bible, pp. 214–219). Delitzsch wrote, “His language is classical throughout, full of rare and select turns and words.” Moorehouse wrote, “It is distinguished for its magnificent poetry.”
This little book opens in gloom and closes in glory. It begins with a question mark and closes with an exclamation point. Habakkuk is a big WHY? Why God permits evil is a question that every thoughtful mind has faced. I think that this book is the answer to that question. Will God straighten out the injustice of the world? This book answers that question. Is God doing anything about the wrongs of the world? This book says that He is. In my opinion it is possible to reduce the doubt of Thomas in the New Testament, of Habakkuk in the Old Testament, and of modern man into the one word: Why? It is the fundamental question of the human race. When we reduce all questions to the lowest common denominator, we come to the basic question: Why?
You can see that the message of Habakkuk is almost the opposite of the message of Nahum. In the Book of Nahum God was moving in judgment, and the question was: How can God be a God of love and judge as He is doing? Here in Habakkuk it is just the opposite: Why doesn’t God do something about the evil in the world?
The theme of Habakkuk is faith. He has been called the prophet of faith. The great statement of Habakkuk 2:4, “the just shall live by his faith,” has been quoted three times in the New Testament: Romans 1:17; Galatians 3:11; and Hebrews 10:38.
OUTLINE
I. Perplexity of the Prophet, Chapter 1
A. First Problem of the Prophet, Chapter 1:1–4 Why does God permit evil?
B. God’s Answer, Chapter 1:5–11 God was raising up Chaldeans to punish Judah (v. 6).
C. Second Problem of the Prophet (greater than first), Chapter 1:12–17 Why would God permit His people to be punished by a nation more wicked than they? Why did He not destroy the Chaldeans?
II. Perception of the Prophet, Chapter 2
A. Practice of the Prophet, Chapter 2:1 He took the secret problem to the secret place.
B. Patience of the Prophet, Chapter 2:2–3 He waited for the vision.
C. Pageant for the Prophet, Chapter 2:4 The great divide in humanity: One group, which is crooked, is flowing toward destruction; the other group, by faith, is moving toward God. This is inevitable.
D. Parable to the Prophet, Chapter 2:5–20 The application is self-evident from the vision. The Chaldeans, in turn, would be destroyed. God was moving among the nations.
III. Pleasure of the Prophet, Chapter 3
A. Prayer of the Prophet, Chapter 3:1–2 The prophet, who thought God was doing nothing about evil, now asks Him to remember to be merciful. Was he afraid that God was doing too much?
B. Program of God, Chapter 3:3–17 God rides majestically in His own chariot of salvation (v. 8).
C. Position of the Prophet, Chapter 3:18–19 He will rejoice (v. 18). He has come from pain to pleasure.
CHAPTER 1
Theme: The perplexity of the prophet
The burden which Habakkuk the prophet did see [Hab. 1:1].
“The burden” means the judgment. Actually, this is not Habakkuk’s question, but rather it is the Lord’s answer. The answer of God is really the prophecy of the Book of Habakkuk. The Lord’s answer is judgment which Habakkuk called, as did the other prophets, “the burden.”
FIRST PROBLEM OF THE PROPHET
Habakkuk’s first problem is this: Why does God permit evil?
O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear! even cry out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt not save! [Hab. 1:2].
“O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear!” Habakkuk is telling God that He is refusing to answer his prayers. He cries out in a night of despair as he sees violence among his people. And God is doing nothing and saying nothing. This is the elegy of Habakkuk. As we shall see, the book concludes with a paean of praise and a note of joy.
My friend, if you have a question, my feeling is that you ought to take it to the Lord as Habakkuk did. If you are sincere, you will get an answer from God.
Why dost thou shew me iniquity, and cause me to behold grievance? for spoiling and violence are before me: and there are that raise up strife and contention.
Therefore the law is slacked, and judgment doth never go forth: for the wicked doth compass about the righteous; therefore wrong judgment proceedeth [Hab. 1:3–4].
Here is his big question: Why does God permit this evil to continue among His own people—the iniquity, the injustice, the strife, and contention?
This is both an old question and a new question. It is one which you could ask today. Let’s look at it in detail.
Habakkuk, as I suggested in the Introduction, probably wrote sometime after the time of King Josiah, the last good king of the southern kingdom of Judah. After Josiah there was Jehoahaz, a bad one who didn’t last more than three months; then Jehoiakim came along and reigned eleven years, and he was a bad one. It was a time of disintegration, deterioration, and degradation in the kingdom. There was a breaking down of the Mosaic Law, and the people were turning away from God. The question was: Why was God permitting this evil?
While I was in a Bible conference in the East several years ago, I talked with two young professors, one from Vanderbilt University and the other from Missouri. They both were Christians and brilliant young men. They told me that the godless professors would use this method to try to destroy young people’s faith in the integrity of the Word of God. They would begin like this: “You do not believe that a God of love would permit evil in the world, do you? Do you think a loving God, kind in heart, would permit suffering in the world?”
The enemy, you will recall, used that same method with Eve, as recorded in Genesis 3. He said something like this: “Do you mean to tell me that God does not want you to eat of that tree? Why? That tree has the most delicious fruit of any tree in the garden, and if you eat it, your eyes will be opened, and you will become like God. I can’t believe that a good God would forbid your eating of that tree. I just can’t understand it!” He was destroying, you see, her confidence in the goodness of God. That is always where the enemy starts.
Habakkuk’s question fitted into the local situation of his day. People were getting by with sin, and God was seemingly doing nothing about it. His question was, Why doesn’t God judge the wicked? Why does God permit evil men and women to prosper? And isn’t that a good question in our day? I’m sure that many of God’s people have asked, “Why doesn’t God judge the evil in our nation today? Why does He permit the rich to get richer? And why is it that the average person is having to bear the burden of taxation and inflation? Why doesn’t God do something about it?” Is this your question?
That was the psalmist’s question in Psalm 73:2–3: “But as for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had well nigh slipped. For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.” As he looked around, he saw that the ones who were prospering were the wicked! It almost robbed him of his faith. Why wasn’t God doing something about it?
The people of Judah apparently felt that they were God’s little pets and that He would not punish them for their sins. Probably the first time they did something evil they were apprehensive, wondering if God would punish them. When He did nothing, they assumed that He hadn’t noticed or didn’t care. The writer of Ecclesiastes says in chapter 8 verse 11: “Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil.”
I can remember when I was a boy and swiped my first watermelon. It was in the summertime, and a storm was coming up. By the time I had pulled a watermelon off the vine and had started to the fence with it, there was a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder the like of which you can only have in southern Oklahoma! I thought the Lord was judging me right there and then for what I had done. But the day came when I discovered that it wasn’t judgment from God and I could do that sort of thing without fear.
Human nature does not change. The sins which were committed undercover in the backyard are now done openly in the front yard. Does that change the fact that sin is wrong in the sight of God and that He is going to judge every sin? No, God has not changed His standards or His procedures. Even though His execution against an evil work is not performed speedily, His judgment is sure to come eventually.
In our day very few people believe in the judgment of God. They feel like Habakkuk did when he saw his nation getting worse and worse until sin was flagrant and God was doing nothing about it. Don’t you feel that way about conditions as they are? Is God doing anything about it today? It doesn’t look as if He is. He even let a group of theologians up in New England come up with the idea a few years ago that God was dead. What they actually meant was that there is no God and there has never been a God. What made them arrive at such a conclusion? It is because they don’t see Him interfering in the affairs of men today. But isn’t He interfering? Isn’t God overruling in the affairs of mankind today? He permitted us to go through a period of affluence, and folk became careless—even God’s people became careless. Now we are in such a state that we wonder how much longer we are going to survive as a nation.
Habakkuk was a man with a very tender heart, and he hated to see lawlessness abounding and going unpunished. He hated to see the innocent people being threatened and exploited and destroyed. He was asking, “God, why aren’t you doing something about it?”
Well, God had an answer for him, and He has an answer for you if this is your question.
GOD’S ANSWER
Behold ye among the heathen, and regard, and wonder marvellously: for I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe, though it be told you [Hab. 1:5].
“Behold ye among the heathen,” or better, “Behold ye among the nations.” God is challenging Habakkuk to open his eyes and look about him, to get a world view of what He is doing. One great crisis after another has taken place. The great Assyrian Empire in the north has been conquered, and Nineveh, its capital, has been destroyed. On the banks of the Euphrates River, a kingdom is arising which already has won a victory over Egypt at Carchemish. Nebuchadnezzar is the victor, and he is bringing Babylon to the fore as a world power. God is saying to Habakkuk, “Behold ye among the nations—you think I’m not doing anything? I am not sitting on the fifty-yard line watching this little world. I am very much involved.” He is not involved to the extent that He is subject to it and has to make certain plays because they are forced upon Him. God is moving in a sovereign way in the universe. He is doing something about sin—“Behold ye among the nations, and regard, and wonder marvellously.”
“For I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe, though it be told you.” God is saying, “When I tell you what I am really doing, it is going to be difficult for you to believe it. Instead of doing nothing, I am doing a great deal.” In fact, Habakkuk is going to ask God to slow down when he finds out what God is doing.
“For I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe, though it be told you” is quoted by Paul in the great sermon he gave in Antioch of Pisidia. (I have always felt that this is one of the greatest sermons Paul preached, and yet it is receiving very little attention in our day.) It is recorded in Acts 13. Now notice these words: “Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man [the Lord Jesus Christ] is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: And by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses. Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets; Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish: for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you” (Acts 13:38–41). As you can see, Paul is quoting from Habakkuk 1:5. It is an amazing application of this verse. Paul is saying that God has provided a salvation, and He didn’t do it (as Paul said elsewhere) in a corner. At the time of the Crucifixion, Jews from all over the world were in Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. They carried the word everywhere that Jesus of Nazareth had died on a cross, and it was rumored that He was raised from the dead. Also, Jews from all over the world were back in Jerusalem for the celebration of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came upon the little group of believers. Multitudes were saved at that time and in succeeding days. When that news went out, the Roman world ignored it at first. Paul is telling them that God has worked a work in their days, “a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you.”
Today the world asks, “Why doesn’t God do something about sin?” My friend, God has done something about it! Over nineteen hundred years ago He gave His Son to die. He intruded into the affairs of the world. And He says that He is going to intrude again in the affairs of the world—yet today the world goes merrily along picking daisies and having a good time in sin. But God is moving. It is marvelous how Paul used Habakkuk 1:5.
And in Habakkuk’s day God was moving. In spite of all the lawlessness, the war, and the sin in all the nations, God was overruling and moving in judgment.
Now God is specific in what He was doing—
For, lo, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, which shall march through the breadth of the land, to possess the dwellingplaces that are not theirs [Hab. 1:6].
God is saying to Habakkuk, “Look around you. Down there on the banks of the Euphrates River, a nation is rising which will become the first great world power.” (We can check with Daniel on that because Babylon is the head of gold, and it is the lion of Daniel’s visions.) Babylon was number one on the parade of the great nations of the world.
“To possess the dwellingplaces that are not theirs.” God is telling Habakkuk that the Babylonians are going to take the land of Judah away from them. It was a shock to Habakkuk to hear this.
A “bitter and hasty nation” is a good description of the Babylonian Empire. They were bitter, hateful, and hotheaded, marching for world conquest. They actually took the city of Jerusalem three times, and the third time they burned it to the ground. The Babylonians were a law unto themselves. They considered themselves the superior race, the dominant race, and did not recognize anyone as being equal to them.
They are terrible and dreadful: judgment and their dignity shall proceed of themselves [Hab. 1:7].
“Their dignity shall proceed of themselves”—that is, they rely upon themselves. They have great self-confidence and are great boasters. These qualities are evident in Nebuchadnezzar, the founder of this great empire. In the Book of Daniel we find that Nebuchadnezzar suffered from a form of insanity, egomania, called hysteria by modern psychiatry. It was, sort of a manic-depressive psychosis. The time came when he didn’t even know who he was. In fact, he went out and ate grass like an animal.
Their horses also are swifter than the leopards, and are more fierce than the evening wolves: and their horsemen shall spread themselves, and their horsemen shall come from far; they shall fly as the eagle that hasteth to eat [Hab. 1:8].
What a picture this is! The Babylonians used the cavalry as probably no other nation has used it. The Egyptians used chariots, and the Assyrians had the latest model in chariots. Now the Babylonians have a different method, the cavalry.
“More fierce than the evening wolves.” I remember the hungry wolves in west Texas when I was a boy. After the snow had fallen, my dad warned us to be careful when we went outside. If there were a pack of wolves, it would be necessary to shoot one of them. Then when the blood began to flow, the pack would turn on the wounded wolf and devour him so that we could escape.
“They shall fly as the eagle that hasteth to eat.” The Babylonian army would come like hungry animals and ferocious birds and seize upon their prey. That was the story of the Chaldeans, the Babylonians.
They shall come all for violence: their faces shall sup up as the east wind, and they shall gather the captivity as the sand [Hab. 1:9].
“They shall come all for violence.” God’s people had been engaging in violence, but they hadn’t seen anything yet. Wait until the Babylonians get there. God is going to give them a good dose of violence! You see, chickens do come home to roost—“… whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal. 6:7).
“Their faces shall sup up as the east wind” has also been translated as “the set of their faces is forward.” In both translations the thought seems to be that the enemy will be formidable and irresistible in its advance.
“And they shall gather the captivity as the sand.” Nebuchadnezzar led his forces against Jerusalem three times. At the final attack, he burned the city and also the temple and took the survivors into captivity. The Babylonians had only one purpose in view, which was to capture as many nations and as many peoples as possible and make slaves of them. This is what happened to the southern kingdom of Judah.
And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them: they shall deride every strong hold; for they shall heap dust, and take it [Hab. 1:10].
“And they shall scoff at the kings, and the princes shall be a scorn unto them.” They were confident in their own strength and in the power of their heathen gods. As the Assyrians before them, they were arrogant as they marched through the earth.
“They shall deride every strong hold; for they shall heap dust, and take it.” They had only to cast up bulwarks to capture walled cities; and, when the cities surrendered, they took the inhabitants into captivity.
Then shall his mind change, and he shall pass over, and offend, imputing this his power unto his god [Hab. 1:11].
This is exactly what Nebuchadnezzar did. In Daniel 4:30 we read the words of this man: “The king spake, and said, Is not this great Babylon, that I have built for the house of the kingdom by the might of my power, and for the honour of my majesty?” He was lifted up with pride. He was an egomaniac. He trusted completely in himself with no trust in God. And we have a few of those around today—trusting in self rather than in God. In my own nation there is a lack of humility. And, as in Nebuchadnezzar, it is a form of insanity. Each political party—not one, but all of them—boasts about what it can do or has done. They point the finger of guilt at the other party and at those holding office. Well, I agree they should repent, but my feeling is that everyone who is at the other end of the pointing fingers should also repent. Our big problem in America is that we depend upon our own strength, our own power, and our own ability. I turn off certain television programs because I am tired of listening to individuals boasting of their accomplishments, which are not very much. It reminds me of that scriptural suggestion of a mountain travailing. What did it bring forth? Another mountain? No, it brought forth a mouse! Although the boasting of great men today sounds like a mountain, what they have accomplished is about as big as a mouse.
In these verses God is saying to Habakkuk, “You think I am doing nothing about the sin of My people, but I am preparing a nation down yonder on the banks of the Euphrates River, and if My people do not repent, I’m going to turn the Babylonians loose.” My friend, they came, and the record indicates that their destruction of Jerusalem was fierce and terrible. Some of the things they did when they took the people of Judah captive were almost unspeakable.
SECOND PROBLEM OF THE PROPHET
Now when God says that He is going to use the Babylonians to judge His people, this raises another question in Habakkuk’s mind. If you think he had a question before, he really has a question now.
Art thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One? we shall not die. O Lord, thou hast ordained them for judgment; and, O mighty God, thou hast established them for correction [Hab. 1:12].
This was Habakkuk’s problem: Since the Babylonians were even more wicked than the people of Judah, why would God choose a more wicked nation to punish a nation which was comparatively less wicked? This would not be the first time God had used such a method. In Isaiah 10:5 the Assyrian is called the rod of God’s anger. In other words, God used Assyria like a whip in order to chastise the northern kingdom. After God had used Assyria for the chastisement of Israel, He judged Assyria for her own sins.
We find the same thing repeated here. God is going to use a wicked nation, Babylon, to chastise His people. When He is through with that chastisement, He will judge Babylon God did just that. He moves in the affairs of men.
But the problem remains: How can a holy God use a sinful nation to accomplish His purposes?
This may be a new thought for you. You probably have heard it said—even from some pulpits—that God would never let Russia overcome the United States because we are the fair-haired boys, the good guys, the fine people. We are the ones who send missionaries to godless nations. God would never use Russia to chastise us. My friend, if you believe the Bible, you will see that God’s method is to use a sinful nation to judge a people who are less sinful. If we could see what God is doing today behind the scenes, I am sure it would terrify us. I believe He is actually moving against our nation. Why? Because at one time our nation had a knowledge of God, superficial though it may have been. The Bible was once held in reverence. Very few people knew much about it, but it was respected. In our day the Bible is ignored and absolutely rejected by the nation. They may take an oath by placing their hand upon it, but they neither know nor care to know what is between its covers. Will God allow our nation to continue in its godlessness and in its flagrant sins? I don’t think so. Will God use a godless nation to chastise us? Well, that was Habakkuk’s question. Why would God, who is a holy God, use a pagan, heathen people to chastise His people?
Listen to Habakkuk’s eloquent complaint. “Art thou not from everlasting, O Lord my God, mine Holy One?” God has come out of eternity; He is the eternal God. “O Lord my God, mine Holy One”—Habakkuk says, in effect, “You are a Holy God. How can you use a nation like Babylon? Word has come to us that there is a great nation rising down there on the banks of the Euphrates River, but I never dreamed that You would use them against us! They have been friendly to us.” When King Hezekiah was sick, they sent ambassadors to him, and he gave them the red-carpet treatment, showing them all the treasures of the kingdom. Of course, the ambassadors made note of that because they would be coming back one day to get the gold. But Habakkuk didn’t realize all that. He never dreamed that God would use Babylon to chastise Judah. He didn’t understand why a holy God would use such a method.
Then he says, “We shall not die.” He was right about that. This goes back to the promises of God to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. God made promises to Moses and to Joshua and to David. He gave promises to the prophets who had appeared on the scene before Habakkuk. God had said that He would never let the nation perish. “We shall not die.”
That is a good statement, by the way, to drop down upon our amillennial friends who believe that God is through with the nation Israel. God is not through with them; God has an eternal purpose with them, just as He has with the church which He is calling out of this world. And, thank God, the child of God today can say, “We shall not die.” The Lord Jesus Christ came to this earth to die—He said He did—to die in your stead and in my stead. He said, “I am the resurrection and the life,” and He came back from the dead. He “… was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:25). The Lord Jesus said to the two weeping sisters of Lazarus, “… I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead [think of that!], yet shall he live.” When Habakkuk said, “We shall not die,” he was right; they wouldn’t. “And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?” (John 11:25–26, italics mine). This is the message of the gospel. It is something for you and me to believe. Of course, someday you are going to die physically, but are you dead now spiritually? If you are, you will be dead in trespasses and sins for the rest of eternity, and that means eternal separation from God. God is a holy God, and He is not going to take sin to heaven. But He has promised that if we will trust His Son, He will give us eternal life. God says, “If you will believe that you are a sinner, that you don’t deserve salvation and can’t work for it, then I offer it to you as a gift. And by My grace you can be saved. You will receive eternal life. He that hath the Son hath life.” My friend, do you have the Son today? If you do, you have life, eternal life, and you will not die.
When Habakkuk said to God, “We shall not die,” he was on the right track, but he just couldn’t understand (as many of us can’t understand) some of the performance of God in this world. God had told Habakkuk earlier that he needed to get a perspective of it. You and I have a tremendous advantage in our day because we have the perspective of history. We can look back to Habakkuk’s day and even beyond to the very beginning of the human family. We have a very good perspective of God’s dealing with the nations of this world and of God’s dealing with the nation Israel. Also, God is dealing today with His church that is in the world.
God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform. He has told us that His ways are not our ways, that His thoughts are not our thoughts. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa. 55:8–9).
My friend, do not be disturbed if you are not thinking as God thinks. You are not God. Unfortunately, many folk try to take His place. They are trying to work for their salvation, thinking that their character and their good works will merit them salvation. They expect God to pat them on the head someday and say, “You were certainly a nice, sweet little boy down there.” Yet, actually, they were corrupt sinners, alienated from the life of God, with no capacity for God whatsoever. If you come to the Father, you will come His way, or you are not going to get there. We need to recognize this, my friend. We are a nation of proud people who need to be deflated as a pin deflates a balloon. Instead of blaming everyone else for the problems in our nation, or the problems in our church, or the problems in our home, we should fall on our knees before God and confess our own sins—“not my brother, nor my sister, but it’s me, oh, Lord, standin’ in the need of prayer.”
This was the condition of the nation of Judah in the days of Habakkuk. He said to God, “We shall not die.”
“O Lord thou hast ordained them for judgment.” Here is Habakkuk pointing his finger at Babylon. “They are the bad guys, and we are the good guys.” It is amazing how quickly we can change our point of view. For years I went out to Flagstaff, Arizona, to the Southwest Bible and Missionary Conference. I always enjoyed being out there with the opportunity it offered to have fellowship with the Indians. It was there I learned a good example of man’s way of looking at things. One of the young Indian pastors said to me, “You know, Dr. McGee, in the old days when the Indians would raid a village and kill some of the whites, it was called a massacre. But when the whites raided an Indian village and destroyed all the Indians, it was called a victory.” It is interesting how we always class ourselves with the good guys.
“O mighty God, thou hast established them for correction.” In other words, Habakkuk is saying, “Lord, it really isn’t us who are bad after all. They are the mean fellows. They are the ones You should judge and correct.” Has he forgotten that he went to the Lord and asked the Lord why He wasn’t doing something about the evil among His own people? Habakkuk had pointed out that the people were flaunting the Law and were ignoring God, paying no attention to God’s commands. Habakkuk had accused God of not doing anything about the situation. Has he forgotten that?
Now here is Habakkuk’s argument—
Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity: wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he? [Hab. 1:13].
“Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity.” That is a true statement. A holy God cannot look upon evil and iniquity. That is the reason no one can go to heaven with his sin on him. That is why we must all have the forgiveness for our sins. We all need the cleansing power of the blood of the Lamb. We must be given a new nature. We must be born again. Even Nicodemus, a very religious man, needed to be born again and to receive a new nature. Religion will not wash away sin. It is the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ who died and rose again that will wash away sin. God cannot look on iniquity, and He never will look on iniquity. That is why there is no entrance into heaven for you until your sin has been dealt with.
You see, when God forgives you, it is because the penalty for your sin has been paid for by His Son. God is not a sentimental old gentleman who doesn’t have the heart to judge little man down here on this earth. God is a holy God who will not look upon iniquity. Your sin will have to be confessed and forgiven before you can be accepted by Him.
“Wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously.” Habakkuk says, “You can’t trust those Babylonians. They are sinners and a bunch of crooks!” He was right. They were. But God was going to use them to accomplish His purpose.
This is frightening to me. Don’t ever get the idea that God cannot use a godless nation to chasten another nation. I speak now from the point of view of a white man and an American. For years the white man in all the great nations of Europe ruled the world through those great, proud nations. Then America became one of the leading nations of the world. God humiliated us in the war with Vietnam. He is humiliating us in our dealings with the Middle East. All they need to do is turn off the supply of oil, and suddenly we take a nose dive. God deals with the nations of the world in interesting ways. I watch what has been happening in the world with a great deal of interest. I have come to the conclusion that God is still moving among the nations of the world today. You and I may be frightened as we contemplate what lies ahead, but God is not frightened. He is still in charge. Nothing is out of His control. He is still running this universe.
“Wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he?” Habakkuk said the wrong thing here. It is not “the man that is more righteous than he” because none are righteous. He should have said, “the man who is a greater sinner than he.” But God didn’t say that He was going to punish on that basis. God is going to use the Babylonians to punish His people.
This brings us to one of the most eloquent sections of the Word of God.
And makest men as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping things, that have no ruler over them?
They take up all of them with the angle, they catch them in their net, and gather them in their drag: therefore they rejoice and are glad.
Therefore they sacrifice unto their net, and burn incense unto their drag; because by them their portion is fat, and their meat plenteous [Hab. 1:14–16].
“And makest men as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping things, that have no ruler over them” refers to the callousness with which the Babylonians handled their enemies, treating them as fish of the sea or as creeping things in the soil which have no defense.
The angle and the net and the drag represent the armies and the weapons used by the Babylonians to carry on their military conquests.
God also uses the catching of fish as a figure of speech, but He catches fish to save them, not to destroy them. You remember that the Lord Jesus said to some of His own disciples who were fishermen, “You have been catching fish and that’s fine, but I am going to give you a job of catching men” (see Matt. 4:19). My friend, to me the greatest business in the world is to be a fisherman, and that is all I claim to be. We are to fish for men in our day.
“Therefore they sacrifice unto their net, and burn incense unto their drag.” The Babylonians were pagans, of course, and gave no credit to the true and living God for their successes.
There are fishermen here in Southern California who think that they get a good catch because their priest has blessed the fishing fleet. That has nothing in the world to do with it, my friend. The reason that you can get plenty to eat is that God is good, and that is the only reason. God is good, and He is the one who provides.
Shall they therefore empty their net, and not spare continually to slay the nations? [Hab. 1:17].
Habakkuk is asking God, “Are You going to permit them to go on into the future, destroying people after people?” God’s answer is, “No. I’m going to send Judah into captivity in Babylon as a chastisement, a judgment for her sins, but then I will judge Babylon.” My friend, God did exactly that, and in our day Babylon lies under the dust and rubble of the ages. It is a silent but eloquent testimony that God does judge evil.
Now let’s translate this interrogation of Habakkuk into the times in which we live. Why does God permit evil? Well, He permits it because He is long-suffering. He is not willing that any should perish, and He has provided a cross, a crucified Savior, so that no one needs to perish. This He did at the first coming of Christ.
Habakkuk’s second question is, “Why does not God judge the wicked?” God will answer that at the second coming of Christ, because at that time He will judge sin. All we need is a perspective to see the answers to these two questions. Christ came the first time to wear a crown of thorns and to die upon a cross. The next time He comes, He will wear a crown of glory and will hold the scepter that will rule the earth.
To make a personal application of this, we ask the question, “Why does God permit this trial to happen to me?” I do not know what the answer is for you, but God has an answer.
Several years ago I stayed in a motel in Siloam Springs, Arkansas, at a location where I could throw a rock into the state of Oklahoma. My dad is buried over there. When I was a boy of fourteen, I stood by his grave and wept. He had been killed in an accident at a cotton gin. After the funeral service was over and everyone had gone, I rode back on my bicycle to his grave. I wept and cried, “Why, oh God, did You take him?” Time has gone by, and today I have an answer for that. I know now that it was God’s method of dealing with a boy who would never have entered the ministry otherwise.
Actually, what right do we have to question our Maker? What right does little man have to look into the face of heaven and demand, “Why do You do this?” Well, to begin with, it is none of our business. It is God’s business. This is His universe, and He is running it to please Himself. We are to trust Him.
I can remember when I was a little boy in Oklahoma, we lived in an area that had many tornadoes. In the night my dad would pick me up, and I would begin to cry and ask, “Where are we going?” He would take me down to the storm cellar where it was dark and damp and not very comfortable. He would put me on a pallet, and in the morning I would awaken and be safe and secure. When I was a crying little boy, my dad didn’t explain tornadoes to me. He simply protected me from them. All I knew was that I trusted my dad. After my dad died, I learned more and more to trust my Heavenly Father. There are times He has done things to me that He hasn’t explained. He took my first child, and I really had a question about that. Do you want to know something? I still have a question mark about it. But I do know this: He has the answer. Someday He will tell me the answer. In the meantime, I’ll trust Him.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: The perception of the prophet
In chapter 1 we saw the perplexity of the prophet. Now the prophet has learned that God has answers for his questions. He answered his first question, which raised a bigger question, but God has an answer for that also.
My friend, if you have a question, don’t smother it in pious phraseology. I often hear people say, “Oh, I’m trusting the Lord,” when they are not trusting Him; they are questioning Him every step of the way. There is no sin in questioning the Lord. Just go to Him and tell Him that you don’t understand. This is what Habakkuk did.
PRACTICE OF THE PROPHET
I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what he will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved [Hab. 2:1].
Habakkuk says that he is going to the watchtower to wait. (When he says, “watchtower,” he doesn’t mean that he is going to read a magazine!) Prophets are compared to watchmen in several of the books of prophecy. For instance, in Ezekiel it was, “Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel: therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me” (Ezek. 3:17). The prophets were watchmen who were to prophesy to the nation, and God would hold them responsible for giving out His warning. In a walled city the watchman was the one who watched for enemies during the night; if he was faithful, the city was safe. But if he should betray the city or fail to sound the alarm when an enemy approached, the city was in deep trouble. So Habakkuk, God’s prophet, says that he is going to the watchtower to wait for a message from God.
“I … will watch to see what he will say unto me.” Habakkuk is saying, “I’m going to the watchtower, and I’m going to wait patiently, because I know that God has an answer. I don’t know what it will be, but I know He has an answer and He will give that answer in due time.”
“And what I shall answer when I am reproved.” The word reprove here is not the best translation of the original word: Habakkuk did not expect God to rebuke him or, to use the common colloquialism, “bawl him out” because he was questioning God’s ways. Habakkuk felt that God would give him the right answer so he would understand God’s ways. And he was willing to wait for it.
God often delays. He moves slowly in all that He does. God intends to give Habakkuk an answer, but it will come in His own time. We are the ones who are in a hurry; God is not. For example, sometimes we hear Christians speak of the “soon coming of Christ.” Can you show me in the Bible where that is found? I have never found it. Jesus said, “Behold, I come quickly …” (Rev. 22:7, italics mine). He didn’t say He was coming soon. It has now been over nineteen hundred years since He spoke those words, and that could hardly be called soon. He said He would return quickly, because the things that are mentioned in Revelation, which will happen just before he returns to earth, are going to happen quickly. The thing which will introduce the last seven years before Christ comes to establish His kingdom will be the Rapture of the church. When the church leaves the earth, events will move quickly—like a trip-hammer, one blow right after another. Christ will come quickly. He will come right on schedule. We are not to look for the soon coming of Christ but the imminent coming of Christ.
Neither will Christ “delay” His coming, as I hear some pious brothers say. The Lord is coming on His schedule—not mine nor yours. He will not delay. But we must remember that the Lord is long-suffering. He is patient. He is not willing that any should perish. And in Habakkuk’s day there was a company of people down yonder in Babylon whom God was going to save. That seventy-year captivity of the children of Israel was going to be a glorious time for God because He was going to reach even the heart of Nebuchadnezzar, king of the Babylonians!
Habakkuk says, “I’m going to retire now to my watchtower. I don’t have the answer, but I’m going to wait for an answer from God.” And, my friend, you and I are to walk by faith and not by sight. In 2 Corinthians 5 the apostle Paul speaks of the time when our bodies will be put into the grave. The day will come when Christ will call us and raise up our bodies from the grave. In the meantime, when we are absent from the body, we are present with the Lord. When we leave these bodies, we are going to be at home with the Lord. There is an interval of time between the burial of our bodies and the resurrection of our bodies. The Lord moves slowly as judged by the way we look at things. That is why Paul interposes here, “For we walk by faith, not by sight:” (2 Cor. 5:7). Do you have questions which have not been answered? I do. But I have learned, as I did as a little boy when my dad picked me up and carried me to the storm cellar, that my Heavenly Father also has reasons for the things He does in my life. Although I don’t always understand them now, I know that He has the answer, and someday He will give it to me. We need to trust Him.
PATIENCE OF THE PROPHET
And the Lord answered me, and said, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it [Hab. 2:2].
God is saying, “Write it so that those folk in the twentieth century—especially that fellow, McGee, who will have some questions [and I think He had you in mind also]—will have an answer from Me during the days when they will be walking by faith.”
“That he may run that readeth it.” We sometimes get that turned around and make it say, “That he who runs may read it.” That is not what God is saying. He says that we need to have a road map with us. We need to know where we are going. We need to know a great deal about the way so that, after we have read it, we may run. That is, the one reading it was to run to tell it forth; he was to be the messenger of God’s Word.
My friend, there are many folk today who are trying to preach and trying to teach God’s Word without adequate preparation. They need to do more reading before they start running. I remember when I wanted to enter into the ministry, I thought I would skip part of my college training and bypass seminary and go immediately to a Bible school and then start preaching. I thank God for a marvelous, wonderful pastor who told me to get all the training I could get. Learn to read before you start running. Before you begin to witness, be able to give a reason for the hope that is in you.
For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry [Hab. 2:3].
“For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak.” There is no better way to explain this than to quote a note on this verse in The New Scofield Reference Bible (p. 954):
To the watching prophet comes the response of the vision (vv. 2–20). Three elements are to be distinguished: (1) The moral judgment of the Lord upon the evils practiced by Israel (vv. 5–13, 15–19). (2) The future purpose of God that “the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” (v. 14). That this revelation awaits the return of the Lord in glory is shown (a) by the parallel passage in Isa. 11:9–12; and (b) by the quotation of v. 3 in Heb. 10:37–38, where the “it” of the vision becomes “he” and refers to the return of the Lord. It is then, after the vision is fulfilled, that “the knowledge of the glory,” etc. shall fill the earth. But (3) meantime, “the just shall live by his faith.” This great evangelical word is applied to Jews and Gentiles in Rom. 1:17; to the Gentiles in Gal. 3:11–14; and to the Hebrews especially in Heb. 10:38. This opening of life to faith alone, makes possible not only the salvation of the Gentiles, but also makes possible a believing remnant in Israel while the nation, as such, is in blindness and unbelief (see Rom. 11:1 and 5, notes), with neither priesthood nor temple, and consequently unable to keep the ordinances of the law. Such is the Lord! In disciplinary government His ancient Israel is cast out of the land and judicially blinded (2 Cor. 3:12–15), but in covenanted mercy the individual Jew may resort to the simple faith of Abraham (Gen. 15:6; Rom. 4:1–5) and be saved. This, however, does not set aside the Palestinian and Davidic Covenants (see Dt. 30:3 and 2 Sam. 7:16, notes), for “the earth shall be filled,” etc. (v. 14), and the Lord will again be in His Temple (v. 20). Cp. Rom. 11:25–27.
My friend, you can depend on the fact that someday God will give us the answers to all of our questions. That is going to be a great day! I am not interested in heaven’s golden streets, but I am very interested in learning the answers to a great many questions that puzzle mankind in our day. In the meantime, we are to walk by faith.
PAGEANT FOR THE PROPHET
This brings us to one of the most important verses in the Scriptures. It is the key to the little Book of Habakkuk. And, actually, it gives the key to the three great doctrinal epistles in the New Testament that quote this verse: Romans 1:17; Galatians 3:11; and Hebrews 10:38.
Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith [Hab. 2:4].
“The just shall live by his faith.” There have been many ways of attempting to sidestep the tremendous impact of this verse. Some have attempted to interpret “faith” as faithfulness or right dealing—the just shall live by his faithfulness. However, this verse gives us the two ways which are opened up to mankind.
Notice that the verse mentions two groups of individuals which are in the world: (1) the lifted-up or puffed-up soul; and (2) the just man who is living by his faith. In other words, you could call them the lost and the saved, those who have trusted God and those who have not believed God. Or you can call them the saints and the ain’ts—that makes a sharp division also.
You remember that verse 1 told us that Habakkuk has gone to his watchtower to wait for the answer of God. It will be God’s great message which will explain His dealings with individuals and with nations. So here in verse 4 we have a great principle that God has laid down. Actually, it is an axiom of the Bible.
You will remember that when you studied geometry, you accepted certain axioms which were self-evident and you didn’t have to prove. For example, a straight line is the shortest distance between two points. And there are certain statements in the Scriptures which are great axioms. This is one of them: “Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him.”
“His soul which is lifted up is not upright in him” describes a group of people who are proud. Either they are attempting to work out their own salvation, or they are just living for today with the philosophy of “eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die.” They have no real goal in life. “His soul … is not upright in him.” He is wrong. He is going down the wrong pathway. “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (Prov. 14:12). You know, I am sure, many folk in this group of humanity. They have a lifted-up or puffed-up soul. They are lifted up with pride. As they meander along their way, picking daisies as they go, they move as on a slow-moving river and will finally arrive at the sea of destruction. That is their end. The Scriptures seldom enlarge upon the fate of the lost, but our Lord Jesus followed them through when He told of the rich man and Lazarus (see Luke 16). When Lazarus died, he was carried to paradise; when the rich man died, he went to hades. He went, as it was said of Judas, to his own place. If you go through life like this, your end will be the same.
“The just shall live by his faith” describes the second group of the human family. They are flowing down the river of life toward the city of God and toward full knowledge—“… then shall I know even as also I am known” (1 Cor. 13:12, italics mine). Between the moment of salvation and the then, the saved ones will walk by faith. We may not have the answers to our questions now, but God will give them to us when we arrive in His presence.
Now because Habakkuk 2:4 is quoted in the New Testament and is actually the key to the Epistles of Romans, Galatians, and Hebrews, let’s look at these quotations more carefully.
In the Epistle to the Romans, the emphasis is upon justification by faith for salvation. “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:16–17, italics mine). The point here is that “the just,” the one who has been justified by faith, shall also live by faith. And that is the great message of the Epistle to the Romans.
In the Epistle to the Galatians, the quotation is this: “But that no man is justified by the law in the sight of God, it is evident: for, The just shall live by faith” (Gal. 3:11, italics mine). The emphasis is a little different here, for we find in Galatians 2:20, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” While in Romans the emphasis was on justification by faith for salvation, in Galatians the emphasis is not only on faith that saves, but on a faith by which you live throughout life.
In the Epistle to the Hebrews, the quotation from Habakkuk 2:4 is this: “Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him” (Heb. 10:38). Here the emphasis is upon the word live—“the just shall live by faith.” And in the following chapter, we read of men and women who lived by faith—the emphasis is upon living.
When Habakkuk looked into the future, he asked, “Why, God?” Now from our vantage point, we can look back into history and see the answer to Habakkuk’s question. God sent His own people into captivity because it served the purpose of chastisement for their sins. And now we see His greater purpose: it enabled Him to bring the Savior into the world—in the fullness of time.
Again I want to draw your attention to Paul’s great sermon at Antioch of Pisidia: “But he, whom God raised again, saw no corruption. Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: And by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses. Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets; Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish: for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you” (Acts 13:37–41). Therefore, Paul shuts them in to only one way to God—faith. The message is: “… Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3–4).
And what are we to do? We are to accept Him as our Savior. We are to trust Him and walk by faith—not by law. I am disturbed when I see so many folk today who are attempting to put believers back under the Ten Commandments or under some little legal system that they have worked out, such as rules and regulations for the family—for the husband and for the wife and for the child. Oh, my friend, if you have been saved by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, love Him. Loving Him will work out your problems. Loving Him will enable you to walk in the Spirit; and walking in the Spirit, you will be filled with the Spirit, and you will have joy in your heart. You will be a better husband or a better wife or a better child. You will be a better employee or a better employer. Wherever you are, you will be a better person if you walk by faith, and one of these days you will walk right into His presence and be with Him throughout eternity.
Habakkuk was a man of faith. He said, “I’ll go to my watchtower and wait for God’s answer. I am trusting the One who does have the answer.” You see, “… without faith it is impossible to please him; for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him” (Heb. 11:6). And the “just shall live by his faith.” My friend, today God is asking you to come to Him, and the only way you can come to Him is by faith. The man of faith receives life by faith, he walks by faith, and he moves into eternity by faith—not by his own ability but on the strength and the ability of Another.
Let me repeat that Habakkuk 2:4 gives the two ways which are opened up to mankind. Our Lord Jesus put it like this: “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matt. 7:13–14).
The broad way is actually like a funnel. It is very wide at the place where you enter, but it narrows down so that the follower ends up in only one place—destruction. That is the story of the unbelieving sinner. It is like going down a canyon. I have experienced this when I have been hunting out here in the West. You can start out in the desert in a very wide, open spot. Soon you enter into a canyon; and, as you go deeper and deeper into the canyon, the floor of the canyon gets narrower and narrower. That is the picture here. The entrance is wide, but the end narrows down to destruction.
The strait gate, or the narrow gate, is also an entrance into a funnel. In this case, the gate or entrance is very narrow. Jesus Christ said, “… I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). That entrance is narrowed down to one person. He is the way. He doesn’t just show us the way; He is the way. “He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life” (1 John 5:12). You either have Christ, or you don’t have Him. You either trust Him, or you don’t trust Him. Your salvation has nothing in the world to do with going through a ceremony or making pledges or going forward in a meeting or in joining a church. Your salvation is dependent upon your relationship with Jesus Christ. That is the reason it is a narrow gate. God has given to the world just this one way. The issue is what you will do with Jesus Christ who died on the cross and rose again. That is why Jesus said, “…strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it” (Matt. 7:14).
This gate is also like a funnel. You enter in at the narrow gate—Christ is the way. But as you enter, it doesn’t narrow down even more. No, it widens out. Jesus said, “…I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). Oh she freedom and liberty He gives to those who are His own!
Let me give an example. Alcohol addiction and drug addiction can look like a broad road of liberty, but they end in the narrow canyon of destruction. My dad used to say, “I can drink, or I can let it alone.” He died when I was fourteen. He was a heavy drinker, but he was never an alcoholic. When I was a boy, I would talk to him about his heavy drinking and ask why he didn’t give it up. He would say, “Son, I can give it up any time I want to.” Do you know what his problem was? He didn’t want to. Had he lived longer, I am confident the day would have come when he would have found himself in a very narrow canyon with only one alternative, and that would be to take another drink.
Now the Christian who went in the narrow gate by trusting Christ as his Savior never gets to the place where it narrows down. He really is living. If you really want to live, come to Christ.
PARABLE TO THE PROPHET
Now how about the other crowd—those whose soul “is not upright in him”? The following “woes” are directed to them and refer primarily to the plundering Babylonians who would conquer Judah. These “woes” are just about as systematic and orderly as anything you will find in Scripture. They are presented in five stanzas of three verses each.
Yea also, because he transgresseth by wine, he is a proud man, neither keepeth at home, who enlargeth his desire as hell, and is as death, and cannot be satisfied, but gathereth unto him all nations, and heapeth unto him all people [Hab. 2:5].
“Yea also, because he transgresseth by wine.” He is talking about the Babylonians. At that moment Babylon was not the great nation that it became later at the time of Daniel.
The first charge is that they transgressed by wine and were proud. “Neither keepeth at home”—they longed to go forth and conquer. “But gathereth unto him all nations, and heapeth unto him all people.” They were inflamed with an ambition for conquest. They were never satisfied but kept attacking nation after nation, gathering spoil and captives. Babylon became the first great world power. They wanted to rule the world. That has been the ambition of a great many nations of the world. I am afraid that after World War II the United States got that insane notion also. We stuck our nose into the affairs of other countries when we should have kept our nose at home where it belonged. This has been the fallacy of the nations of the world, and it was the fallacy of Babylon. They were lifted up with pride and felt they were capable of ruling the world.
Notice that God mentions their sin of drunkenness. This issue comes up several times in the writings of the prophets: in Amos, Joel, Nahum, and now Habakkuk. Nahum makes it clear that drunkenness brought down the kingdom of Assyria. Amos tells us that it was drunkenness that caused God to send the northern kingdom into captivity. Now Habakkuk says that it is drunkenness that will cause God to destroy Babylon. In other words, drunkenness works out its own destruction. Drunkenness characterized Babylon. Read Daniel 5, which tells of Belshazzar’s great feast. That was the night that Babylon fell. Why? They were drunk! It was a night of revelry and drunkenness. They felt perfectly safe and secure in their fortified city.
Drunkenness brought down Rome also. On our tour to Bible lands, I have taken groups of people to a place many of them had never heard of. It is Ostia, about fifteen miles from Rome, down by the Tiber River on the seacoast. The ruins at Ostia reveal that there the Romans gave themselves over to revelry and drunkenness—those were the things that brought them there. It was the playground of the Romans.
And drunkenness will destroy our own nation. As I travel across this country, I stay in many of the hotels, motels, and inns where conventions are in progress. As I have observed them, they are times of great revelry and drinking. Recently in Dallas, Texas, there were two conventions going on at one time while we were there. On the way to the service in the evening, we would pass two big rooms where cocktail parties were in progress. Now these were the conventions of two reputable companies in this country, but that was the way they carried on their business. How long will a nation last that has millions of alcoholics?
Here in the little Book of Habakkuk, God says that drunkenness has led to pride and has made you like “hell” or sheol—you want to gobble up everything. The Book of Proverbs puts it this way: “The horseleach hath two daughters, crying, Give, give. There are three things that are never satisfied, yea, four things say not, It is enough: The grave…” (Prov. 30:15–16). The grave is sheol, and it is first on the list. Habakkuk uses the same expression, “who enlargeth his desire as hell [sheol]”—continuing to expand their borders, moving out, never, never satisfied.
Now God spells out the five woes upon Babylon.
Shall not all these take up a parable against him, and a taunting proverb against him, and say, Woe to him that increaseth that which is not his! how long? and to him that ladeth himself with thick clay! [Hab. 2:6].
The first woe is a taunting proverb against Babylon because they were seizing by force that which was not theirs.
“Shall not all these take up a parable against him.” The “all these” probably refers to the nations that have been victims of Babylon’s aggression.
“To him that ladeth himself with thick clay!” A better translation is “and maketh himself rich with loans,” which makes more sense. It is one thing to buy property and pay for it, but it is another thing to take it by force. God is pronouncing a woe against this nation for wanting more and taking that which does not belong to them.
You see, God has planned that man by the sweat of his brow is going to make his living. And, my friend, if you are not earning your living by the sweat of your brow, somebody else is doing it for you. Babylon wanted somebody else to do the work, and then they by force would take it away. That is the first woe—God is going to judge Babylon for that, and He is just and righteous for doing it.
Shall they not rise up suddenly that shall bite thee, and awake that shall vex thee, and thou shalt be for booties unto them? [Hab. 2:7].
“And thou shalt be for booties unto them?” is the principle that whatever a man sows, that shall he also reap. God is saying, “You take it away from somebody, then somebody else will take it away from you.” The fact is that when Media-Persia became a great nation, they took Babylon. By night the River Euphrates, which flowed through the city of Babylon, was cut off and the water diverted into other channels, leaving a dry riverbed through the city. And Gobryas, the Median general, marched his army along that riverbed into the city and took it by surprise.
Because thou hast spoiled many nations, all the remnant of the people shall spoil thee; because of men’s blood, and for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell therein [Hab. 2:8].
Man is bloodthirsty, and man is covetous.
The second woe is for their covetousness and their self-aggrandizement—
Woe to him that coveteth an evil covetousness to his house, that he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil!
Thou hast consulted shame to thy house by cutting off many people, and hast sinned against thy soul.
For the stone shall cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber shall answer it [Hab. 2:9–11].
Covetousness was a sin of Babylon along with drunkenness. Their covetousness was an evil kind of coveting. They wanted that which did not belong to them. God tells us we are not to covet our neighbor’s property or our neighbor’s wife or our neighbor’s wealth.
“That he may set his nest on high, that he may be delivered from the power of evil!” This is likening Babylon to an eagle who feels that his nest is absolutely impregnable.
“Thou hast consulted shame to thy house …and hast sinned against thy soul.” Babylon brought the judgment of God upon itself by its covetousness and bloodshed. Even the stones would cry out against them. Contrast this to the time in the life of the Lord Jesus when the religious rulers tried to silence the crowd who were singing hosannas to Him. He said, “… I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out” (Luke 19:40).
The third woe has to do with murder and pillage, slaughter and violence—
Woe to him that buildeth a town with blood, and stablisheth a city by iniquity! [Hab. 2:12].
This was the method of destruction that built Babylon. They became rich by warfare.
My friend, if you stand back and look at the history of mankind, you come to the conclusion that he must be insane the way that he has lived on this earth. And, actually, he is insane—insane with a sinful nature so that he can’t even direct his path. He thinks he is right in what he does. People have never waged war without thinking they were doing the right thing. We see here God’s condemnation of Babylon, but it can be stretched out and brought up to date and fitted like a glove on any modern nation you choose.
Behold, is it not of the Lord of hosts that the people shall labour in the very fire, and the people shall weary themselves for very vanity? [Hab. 2:13].
This verse could be translated: “Behold, is it not of the Lord of hosts that the peoples shall labor only for fire, and the nations shall weary themselves for nothing?” Think of the futile efforts that have been made by the great nations of the past. Instead of building up, they have spent more time in tearing down. Look at Greece, for instance, and their marvelous, wonderful pieces of architecture, the statues, the art, and literature; but actually, the Greeks spent more time in destruction. If you follow the march of Alexander the Great as he crossed over into Asia, you will notice that he did nothing in the world but destroy one city after another, one great civilization after another. That was the thing that marked him out. And that is the thing that marked out Babylon, the nation about which Habakkuk is prophesying.
For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea [Hab. 2:14].
This is the far-off goal toward which God is moving. This will be fulfilled when the Lord Jesus Christ returns to the earth (see Isa. 11:9).
Woe unto him that giveth his neighbour drink, that puttest thy bottle to him, and makest him drunken also, that thou mayest look on their nakedness! [Hab. 2:15].
This is actually a little different from the drunkenness mentioned in verse 5. There God says, “He transgresseth by wine.” Here He says, “Woe unto him that giveth his neighbour drink, that puttest thy bottle to him, and makest him drunken also, that thou mayest look on their nakedness!” The tragic thing is that liquor is something that leads to gross immorality. It leads to the breaking down of morals. It leads men to commit sins they otherwise probably would not commit—dishonesty and many other sins.
Drunkenness is an alarming problem in many of our large corporations today. I have talked with a man here in Southern California who holds a very responsible position in a large corporation and with another man who is connected with one of the big banks in our state. They both tell me that their corporations have employed certain officials whose business it is to watch for any of their men who are beginning to drink too much. They have many ways of discerning this. They will even talk to his wife and have him followed at night if certain things begin to show in his work—if he is late to work or perhaps doesn’t even show up for work. Because some of these men are brilliant men, good men, the company officials will go to them, confront them with their drinking problem, and offer to help them to give it up. But notice how crazy this is: on one hand, these companies have cocktail parties where their men get drunk, and on the other hand, they have a process for drying them out! That is sort of like running a hospital where you bring in healthy people, give them disease germs, and then treat them for the disease they get! Man becomes sort of a guinea pig in this crazy world in which we live today. So many illogical things are being done even by large corporations.
This is the condemnation that is here brought against Babylon. God says to them, “You are making drunkards. Not only are you drinking yourselves, but you are also making drunkards of others.”
Again may I refer to an authority, a man and his wife who are working with young people who are caught up in the drug culture. They tell me that many of these young people have come out of homes where cocktails are served. If Mama and Papa are going to have cocktails and live their lives, why can’t Junior have his drugs? I would like to have a good answer for that because Junior has asked that question of me. I don’t have an answer for him because I think Mama and Papa are responsible for his going into this drug culture. I believe that behind the problem of drugs has been drunkenness. Drunkenness is the thing hat has brought this to pass in our nation today.
I know that these things are not being said today, and I know that it does not make me very popular to say them. But I don’t think Habakkuk was too popular himself—certainly not down in Babylon when this word percolated down there. But they found out that God condemns drunkenness and that God condemns making drunkards of others.
Notice that drunkenness leads to gross immorality—
Thou art filled with shame for glory: drink thou also, and let thy foreskin be uncovered: the cup of the Lord’s right hand shall be turned unto thee, and shameful spewing shall be on thy glory [Hab. 2:16].
Drunkenness leads to gross immorality. It leads to divorce. It leads to the breaking up of homes. It leads to a life of sin. I have come to the place in my own life that I have lost respect for men in government. These fellows talk so big about honesty, and they talk so big and brave about helping the poor, while it is a well-known fact that many of them are actually alcoholics who drink like fish. May I ask you, how can we have respect for government when this sort of thing is all out in the open? Yet they ask us to respect them, to look up to them, and to give them our support. It makes me bow my head in shame to see what is happening in this great land of ours. My friend, Habakkuk spelled it out here years ago. God says, “The reason I will bring Babylon down is because of these sins.”
For the violence of Lebanon shall cover thee, and the spoil of beasts, which made them afraid, because of men’s blood, and for the violence of the land, of the city, and of all that dwell therein [Hab. 2:17].
Violence is another of the fruits which comes from drunkenness. You see, all kinds of immoralities spring from drunkenness. The drug culture, the gross immorality, the prevalence of divorce—all of these sins that are abroad in our land today—have come out of drunkenness.
The fifth woe is God’s condemnation of the greatest sin of all—
What profiteth the graven image that the maker thereof hath graven it; the molten image, and a teacher of lies, that the maker of his work trusteth therein, to make dumb idols?
Woe unto him that saith to the wood, Awake; to the dumb stone, Arise, it shall teach! Behold, it is laid over with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in the midst of it [Hab. 2:18–19].
Actually, drunkenness is not the greatest sin.The greatest sin is idolatry, false religion, turning to an idol instead of turning to God.This is the worst sin of all.
In the Book of Judges a great principle of government is presented, a principle which is also stated very clearly in the prophecy of Isaiah. All of the subsequent prophets simply bear out and apply this principle which has already been stated. The principle is this: There are three steps in the downfall of a nation. First of all, there is religious apostasy. The second step is moral awfulness. And the third step is political anarchy. These are the three steps by which nations pass off the stage of human history. That has always been the way it has moved. You see, the primary problem never was political anarchy. The primary problem never was moral awfulness. As bad as these are, the root problem goes back to religious or spiritual apostasy, a turning away from the living and true God.
This is the thing which has happened to my nation today, and I am not the only one who is saying this, by any means. A prominent professor of history has made the statement that the American dream is vanishing in the midst of terrifying realities and visible signs of decadence in our contemporary society. Clinton Rossiter, at one time a professor of American history at Cornell University, said that in our youth we had a profound sense of national purpose that we lost over the years of our rise to glory. James Reston of the New York Times (and I don’t think anybody has ever called him a conservative) has said that in public they talk about how optimistic and wonderful the future is, but that the private conversations of thoughtful men in Washington are quite different. It is his opinion that for the first time since World War II, one begins to hear of doubts that mortal man is capable of solving or even controlling the political, social, and economic problems that life has placed before him. This is the picture and this is the story of the downfall of nations, and it alarms me. This great principle, which this man Habakkuk has again restated in the Word of God, was fulfilled in the nation of Babylon.
The downfall of a nation begins in idolatry; it begins in turning away from the living and true God. We would like to think that idolatry has gone out of style, that no one today in this country is bowing down to an idol. That, of course, is not true. Many a man today is worshiping the almighty dollar. Many a man worships sex. Many a man worships pleasure. Many a woman has given her virtue in order to become a famous star or in order to be promoted. May I say to you, anything that you give yourself to, anything that takes all your time or energy, anything that takes all of you is what you worship. That, my friend, is your god, that is your idol, and that is what God condemns. God says that He is a jealous God. God says, “I made you. I created you. I have redeemed you. And I want you.” When a man turns his back on God, he is doing the worst thing any man can possibly do.
But the Lord is in his holy temple: let all the earth keep silence before him [Hab. 2:20].
Personally, I believe this looks to the future when the Lord Jesus Christ will come to the earth. When He is in His temple down here, the whole earth will be silent before Him. All of the noise, all of the clamor, all of the protest, all of the confusion will disappear at that time. But it is also true that it applies to today. The reason we are having all these difficulties and problems down here is that, although He is yonder in heaven, although the Lord is in His temple, man does not bow before Him and recognize Him. It would be a wonderful thing if we could just have a week of silence. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone in Washington, D.C., would keep his mouth shut for a week? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all of us preachers on radio would keep our mouths shut? Wouldn’t it be a wonderful thing if everyone who is doing so much talking would just keep quiet and wait before almighty God?
“The Lord is in his holy temple: let all the earth keep silence before him.” But the second psalm opens with a question mark—Why? Just like Habakkuk’s questions, the psalmist asks, “Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?” (Ps. 2:1). Why all the clamor? Why all the protest? Because they are far from God. The nations have forgotten that God today is in His heaven. Browning was wrong when he said that God is in His heaven and all’s right with the world. God is in His heaven, but all is wrong with the world because man is not rightly related to God. Our problem today is a problem of man’s relationship to God. My friend, there is only one alternative, there is only one way out: “The just shall live by his faith” (v. 4).
CHAPTER 3
Theme: The pleasure of the prophet
As we come to the third chapter of Habakkuk, a tremendous change has taken place in the life of this man Habakkuk. When we get to the end of this chapter, we will see that this man has made a right about-face. The book opened in gloom—Habakkuk has a question mark for a brain, and he has questioned God. But now it closes in glory with a great exclamation point. It closes on a high note of praise, and you will not find any more confident faith than that which is expressed in the last part of this book.
We can divide this chapter into three very definite sections. In the first two verses, we have the prayer of the prophet. We have the program of God in verses 3–17, and then we have the position of the prophet in verses 18–19.
PRAYER OF THE PROPHET
A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet upon Shigionoth [Hab. 3:1].
Shigionoth is a word having to do with music. Some think it might have been some sort of a musical point used to indicate to the musician the way the piece was to be played. Others think it was a musical instrument. We also find this word in the Book of Psalms (the singular form, shiggaion, is used in the title to Psalm 7). We know it has to do with music, and Habakkuk’s prayer is Hebrew poetry. It is a song of high praise.
What a change has taken place in the life of Habakkuk! His glorious experience on the watchtower and his patient waiting for an answer from God have brought him into a place of real faith and have opened his eyes to something he was not conscious of before. Therefore, this chapter is his song. I would call it a folk song; it’s a happy song. It is to be played with a stringed instrument, according to the last sentence of this chapter, which says, “To the chief singer on my stringed instruments” (v. 19). I suppose that this is a little notation which Habakkuk put there to indicate how this song was to be sung. Perhaps he is telling the soloist to get with it, that this was something to be sung with a stringed instrument. Aren’t most of the folk songs today sung with a stringed instrument? You and I may not like these stringed instruments and what is coming from them, but nevertheless, stringed instruments are used for folk singing. Apparently, that is what we have here in this chapter, but it was on a much higher plane than the music I hear today.
I do not choose to listen to our modern music, but I often have to hear it. It is amazing that we hear so much about freedom of speech, but what about freedom of hearing? I’d like to have my ears protected today. Just because some vile person insists upon his freedom of speech, my ears are offended because I have to listen to singing that I don’t care for. I am forced to hear at least a segment of a dirty song—in my judgment, it is a dirty song—but he’s got to have his liberty. We today don’t consider that we ought to have a little freedom of our ears and not have to listen to a lot of the junk that is being passed around.
O Lord, I have heard thy speech, and was afraid: O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy [Hab. 3:2].
Habakkuk’s song is a wonderful song. I do not think this would be offensive to anyone’s ears. It is a beautiful prayer. Habakkuk says, “O Lord, I have heard thy speech.” In other words, God has answered him. God has said to him, “Now look here, Habakkuk. I want you to stay in your watchtower, and I want you to walk by faith. I want you to trust Me. You think that I am not doing anything about the sins of My people, but I am. I am preparing a nation, the Chaldeans, or the Babylonians, and they are going to be used as I used the Assyrians against the northern kingdom of Israel—they were the ‘rod of mine anger.’ But when I am through with the Babylonians, I am going to judge them, and I will judge them on a righteous basis.” God’s judgment of Babylon was spelled out in chapter 2 in the five woes, the great national sins which brought that nation down. God was moving to bring Babylon down.
The very interesting thing is that Habakkuk now reverses himself. He says, “I’ve heard Your speech, and I am afraid.” What is he afraid of? Well, he had thought that God wasn’t doing anything. Now he is afraid the Lord is doing too much!
Notice what Habakkuk says: “O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years make known; in wrath remember mercy.” He says, “Lord, I didn’t think You were working. I didn’t think that You were doing anything, but I see now that You are moving in judgment. And since You are moving in judgment, remember to be merciful even to the Chaldeans, and be merciful to Your people.” Before, Habakkuk had been calling down fire from heaven not only upon his own nation who had departed from God but also upon the Chaldeans. Now he is saying, “Lord, don’t forget to be merciful.” Well, God is merciful, and God is gracious. He is not willing that any should perish.
It does look today as if God is not doing anything, but if you and I could ascend to the watchtower of Habakkuk, if we could learn that the just shall live by his faith, if we could have a living faith in God and see what is moving behind the scenes and see the wheels that are turning, I think that we would be as surprised as this man was. I am not sure but that we, too, would cry out to God for mercy. A great many Christians today have thrown up their hands about the conditions in our own country—they’ve just given up. We all feel that way at times, don’t we? But, may I say to you, God is moving today in judgment, and somebody needs to cry out to Him and say, “Oh, Lord, in wrath, as You are moving in judgment, don’t forget to be merciful to us. We need Your mercy.” This great nation of ours needs the mercy of God today. Since World War II, we have been on an ego trip. We have really had a flight of pride, of being the greatest nation in the world, and now even our little gas buggies have been slowed down. We feel almost helpless today. What would we do in the time of a major crisis? Suppose we were attacked from the outside, how much gasoline would there be? How much of the many other chemicals that are so needed would there be? How long would we really last? It is my belief that God is moving in judgment, and we need to ask Him to be merciful to us. Shakespeare has Portia say in The Merchant of Venice (Act IV, Scene i):
The quality of mercy is not strain’d
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest.
We need His mercy. We talk about showers of blessing—what we need today are showers of mercy from Almighty God.
What a reversal has taken place in the thinking of this man Habakkuk. At first he said, “You are not doing anything, Lord. Why don’t You do something? Why do You let them get by with their sin?” Now God has let Habakkuk see that He is doing something, and Habakkuk cries out for the mercy of God. If we really knew how much God is moving in judgment, I am of the opinion that it would bring America to her knees before Almighty God.
Let us move on down into this very wonderful prayer. Habakkuk’s prayer is actually a recital of what God has done in the past history of the people of Israel. In view of the fact that He has done it in the past, He intends to do it again in the future—that is the thought here. You can depend upon God’s continuing to do what He has done in the past. Paul wrote about this to us as believers—in fact, this is my life verse: “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6). My friend, has God begun a good work in you? He has brought you up to this present moment, has He not? He has begun a good work in you, and you can be sure He will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ, until He takes you out of this world and you will be in His likeness. This is our confidence, and this is the great confidence of this psalm of Habakkuk.
PROGRAM OF GOD
In this section I believe there are three men in the background. However, none of them is mentioned by name, because this is not a psalm about what any man has done; it is a psalm about what God has done through men. Therefore, the men are not mentioned by name. Many scholars see only two men here. But I believe that we have Abraham (vv. 3–6), Moses (vv. 7–10), and Joshua (vv. 11–15). However, there are many who feel that Moses is the only one mentioned in verses 3–10.
God came from Teman, and the Holy One from mount Paran. Selah. His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise [Hab. 3:3].
Teman is in Edom, and Paran is nearby in the Sinaitic Peninsula. Many think this is a reference to the time when the children of Israel came up out of the land of Egypt. However, you will recall that Abraham went down to Egypt even before that time.
Selah is a very interesting word which is also found in the Psalms. Its use here would indicate again that this is a psalm. There is a difference of viewpoint as to what selah means. Some believe that it marks a pause in the music, a breathing place. Some think it means that this is where the drums should come in and the music reach a high crescendo. Well, I’m not very musical—in fact, I am not musical at all. To me, I think of it as meaning, “Stop, look, and listen.” At all the railroad crossings when I was a boy a cross was put up which said, “Stop, Look, and Listen.” That is what I think selah means. God is saying, “Now sit up and take notice. Be sure to hear this.” The singer is to really let go and the drummer to really pound the drums at this point. Selah is to call attention to what has been said. Whether this verse speaks of Abraham or Moses is unimportant because God was present with both of these men.
We have a marvelous, wonderful picture here of the glory of God: “His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise.” Well, that hasn’t taken place quite yet. But certainly, as far as Abraham was concerned, there was praise in his heart. And for the children of Israel when they came out of Egypt, at first, at least, there was praise in their hearts. Of course, they became complainers and whiners during the rest of the journey.
“His glory covered the heavens.” We need to be impressed today as believers with the glory of our God. How majestic, how powerful, how wonderful is our God!
And his brightness was as the light; he had horns coming out of his hand: and there was the hiding of his power [Hab. 3:4].
“And his brightness was as the light; he had horns coming out of his hand.” These “horns” are spokes of light, rays of light. As you know, when the sun comes up, rays of light shoot up from it. This is the picture we are given of His approach. I think that when the Lord Jesus comes back to take His church out of this world, a glory will be present that was not present when He was born in Bethlehem. That will also be true when He comes to the earth to establish His kingdom.
“And there was the hiding of his power.” In other words, the glory of God so covered Him that you could not see Him. The very glory of God obscures the glory of God, if you please. Oh, the majesty of His person! This is something which believers need to recognize and respect.
Before him went the pestilence, and burning coals went forth at his feet [Hab. 3:5].
This could apply to the time of Moses in Egypt and the ten plagues; but it also could apply to Abraham who went down to Egypt because there was a famine, a pestilence, in the land.
He stood, and measured the earth: he beheld, and drove asunder the nations; and the everlasting mountains were scattered, the perpetual hills did bow: his ways are everlasting [Hab. 3:6].
“He stood, and measured the earth.” Remember that God said to Abraham, “I am going to give you this land,” and He measured it out to him. God has made the statement that He has lined up the nations of the world according to the way He gave that land to Abraham. That is an amazing thing, by the way.
“He beheld, and drove asunder the nations; and the everlasting mountains were scattered, the perpetual hills did bow: his ways are everlasting.” Oh, the ways of our God are past finding out! This is a marvelous psalm, my friend.
I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction: and the curtains of the land of Midian did tremble [Hab. 3:7].
“I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction”—Cushan is Ethiopia. “And the curtains of the land of Midian did tremble.” You will recall that this man Moses went down into the land of Midian for a time. It is believed now by some scholars that Moses, as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, probably led a campaign into Ethiopia. That, of course, is not really a matter of record but rather the belief of some scholars. We do know that he “… was mighty in words and in deeds” (Acts 7:22).
Was the Lord displeased against the rivers? was thine anger against the rivers? was thy wrath against the sea, that thou didst ride upon thine horses and thy chariots of salvation? [Hab. 3:8].
This is a reference to the children of Israel crossing the Red Sea and crossing the Jordan River. God opened up the waters for them. This is highly figurative, beautiful language, by the way. It is Hebrew poetry, and it speaks of the fact that God was not angry with the rivers because they blocked the way; rather, He merely opened up the Red Sea and let the people cross over, as He did again later with the Jordan River.
Thy bow was made quite naked, according to the oaths of the tribes, even thy word. Selah. Thou didst cleave the earth with rivers [Hab. 3:9].
“Thy bow was made quite naked, according to the oaths of the tribes, even thy word. Selah.” God was making good His covenant, His promise, to His people. Believe me, “selah” means that you need to pound those drums again, drummer. This should wake them up and cause them to listen to what God has to say.
“Thou didst cleave the earth with rivers.” Have you ever stopped to think how God has sliced this earth with rivers? The rivers are like great slices down through the earth. What a highly figurative but accurate picture is given to us here!
The mountains saw thee, and they trembled: the overflowing of the water passed by: the deep uttered his voice, and lifted up his hands on high [Hab. 3:10].
When Moses went up to receive the Law on top of Mount Sinai, the mountain trembled, and the children of Israel were so frightened that they actually did not want to come near it. They didn’t want God to speak to them at all—they were absolutely frightened.
These verses are a picture of how God through Moses delivered the children of Israel. First, God made a covenant with Abraham, and He made it good. Then God made a covenant with Moses that He would deliver the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt. He made that covenant good also, and He delivered them as He had said He would.
In verse 11 we come to Joshua. I think it is quite clear that Joshua is in the background here but, as I said before, the names of these men are not mentioned because the emphasis is upon the acts of God.
The sun and moon stood still in their habitation: at the light of thine arrows they went, and at the shining of thy glittering spear [Hab. 3:11].
“The sun and moon stood still in their habitation”—this immediately identifies this with Joshua.
“At the light of thine arrows they went, and at the shining of thy glittering spear.” In other words, the very shining of the sun was like a glittering spear.
Thou didst march through the land in indignation, thou didst thresh the heathen in anger [Hab. 3:12].
When God put His people in that land, He put them in there and removed the Amorites because of the sin in their lives. The Amorites who occupied the section in which Jericho was located were eaten up with venereal disease. God moved them out of that land because they would have infected the entire human family. It was almost a plague among them in those days.
Thou wentest forth for the salvation of thy people, even for salvation with thine anointed; thou woundedst the head out of the house of the wicked, by discovering the foundation unto the neck. Selah [Hab. 3:13].
There has been a question as to whether “thine anointed” refers to Israel or to the Messiah. Personally, I think it means the Messiah here. “Thou wentest forth for the salvation of thy people, even for salvation with thine anointed”—it is the Lord Jesus who is the Savior as well as the Anointed One, the Messiah.
“Thou woundedst the head out of the house of the wicked, by discovering the foundation unto the neck. Selah.” When the “anointed one” is mentioned here, the music is to reach the highest crescendo, what is called fortissimo. Here is where you need a good soprano and a good basso. This is great praise unto God for the salvation which He wrought for these people. He delivered them out of Egypt under Moses, and He brought them into the land through Joshua, but, these were all the acts of God.
Thou didst strike through with his staves the head of his villages: they came out as a whirlwind to scatter me: their rejoicing was as to devour the poor secretly.
Thou didst walk through the sea with thine horses, through the heap of great waters [Hab. 3:14–15].
This was God making good His promises, and this was His salvation to them.
We come now to the reaction of the prophet to all of this. I could only wish that I could do justice to the remainder of this little book and of this chapter. I know that I am totally inadequate to present it as it should be presented to you. This is one of the great passages of the Word of God. I wish that somehow I could convey to your heart something of the grandeur and the glory that is here.
When I heard, my belly trembled; my lips quivered at the voice: rottenness entered into my bones, and I trembled in myself, that I might rest in the day of trouble: when he cometh up unto the people, he will invade them with his troops [Hab. 3:16].
At the end of this book, Habakkuk now gives us his own personal experience. He opened the book, as we have seen, with his own personal experience. He tells now about his own physical reaction to all of this. Did you ever have that sinking feeling in the pit of your tummy when some crisis faced you or you came to some place in life where there was a great emergency? This was Habakkuk’s experience. He says, “When I heard, my belly trembled; my lips quivered at the voice.” Have you ever been so frightened that you could not speak audibly? I am sure that most of us have had an experience like that.
I had that kind of an experience as a young man when I was going to see a certain young lady. The girl who lived next door to her also had a young man who was keeping company with her. After this other young man and I would leave their homes in the evening, there apparently was a Peeping Tom who had found a place on the porch where he could look into both of their bedrooms at the same time. Each of these girls had a sister, so that there were two girls in each home. Apparently, he had been doing this for some time. One evening, the girls next door thought they saw him pass by their window, and so they called to the home where I was. Very foolishly, the girl brought me her father’s pistol, and I walked to the alley in the back where there was a high fence. I was walking back to the house, getting ready to tell the girls there was no use being afraid and that there wasn’t anybody back there. All of a sudden, a form appeared right above me on that fence. That fellow could have jumped down upon me, but he was so frightened at seeing me that he didn’t budge—and neither did I! I tried to raise the gun to shoot, and I thank God I was so frightened that I was not able to do it. I tried to talk, but I couldn’t say anything. The girl called her father and said, “He’s choking Vernon out there!” He wasn’t choking me—I was so scared I just couldn’t open my mouth. Instead of being a hero like I intended to be that evening, I turned out to be a very sorry one. That fellow, whoever he was, dropped down on the other side of the fence and started running. I set the gun on the fence because I couldn’t hold it steady, and I shot at him twice, but he was perfectly safe. I don’t think my shots got in his neighborhood at all! I remember that experience as a time when I felt what Habakkuk describes, but mine was only a chance encounter.
Habakkuk says, “Rottenness entered into my bones.” That means he couldn’t stand up—he had to hold on to something. “And I trembled in myself, that I might rest in the day of trouble.” He saw that God was going to move in judgment, and he knew that it was going to be a hard and difficult time.
Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls [Hab. 3:17].
Habakkuk says, “There will be no fruit on the trees, there will be no grapes, the livestock will be gone.” All of this will be a part of the judgment of God.
POSITION OF THE PROPHET
In spite of the impending judgment, Habakkuk is able to say—
Yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I Will joy in the God of my salvation.
The Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds’ feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places. To the chief singer on my stringed instruments [Hab. 3:18–19].
I want you to understand that God is our strength and our joy. God has not promised peace and prosperity in these days in which we live. So much is being promised to us today! I just threw into the wastebasket a magazine which comes from a so-called Christian organization and which told about all the things that you can get through prayer. The magazine promised that God will make you prosperous, that He will give you health, and that He will give you everything. My friend, God is not a glorified Santa Claus! But our God is moving in a very definite way. If you want an answer to your problems, Habakkuk gives you the answer here. That answer is simply this: God is the answer to your problems.
In the beginning of this book, Habakkuk came to God and said, “Why are You doing these things? Why are You permitting me to see evil? Why don’t You move?” God brought Habakkuk to the watchtower and let him see what He was doing, and now Habakkuk says, “I am going to walk by faith with God.” My friend, God is the answer to your problem today. I don’t know who you are or what your problem is, but God is the answer. You can have faith and confidence in Him. God has a purpose in your life, and He intends to carry it through. You can trust Christ, and, when you trust Him, you will find that He begins to work in you. He wants to conform you to His image—it is God’s intention to make you like Christ.
The apostle Paul writes: “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren” (Rom. 8:28–29). Regardless of the big words Paul uses, he simply means that God’s eternal purpose with you is to make you like Jesus Christ. Again, he writes in 2 Corinthians: “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (2 Cor. 3:18). My friend, God has a purpose for you. It does not matter who you are. To say that someone else has a greater purpose in life than you have is entirely wrong. You are as important in God’s plan and purpose as any individual who has ever lived on this earth or who ever will live on this earth. He wants to make you like Christ. We read in 1 Corinthians 15:47–49: “The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.” We are down here in these human bodies which have actually been taken out of the dirt; and God has made us human beings, but that is not His final purpose. We are earthy, but He wants us to be heavenly, and that is His goal for us.
Imagine that you live in the day of Michelangelo. One day you visit his studio, and you see there a rough piece of stone, which is dirty and polluted because it has come out of a dark and damp quarry. It is a hard piece of marble—crude, unyielding, cold, unlovely, and unsightly. But you come back in six months, and what has happened? Why, it has become a statue of David or of the archangel Michael. May I say to you, just as Michelangelo had a purpose for that crude piece of marble, God has a purpose for you and me today. We are earthy, but He has a heavenly purpose for us. You see, the ideal of the artist (who is the Holy Spirit) is to conform us to the image of Christ. The chisel He uses is the discipline of the Lord—“For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth …” (Heb. 12:6). And the hammer is the Word of God. And therefore we can say with the psalmist, “… I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness” (Ps. 17:15).
My friend, God is the answer to your questions. God is the answer to your problems. Therefore, it does not matter who you are or where you are; you can rejoice in Him, and you can rejoice in His salvation. You can say with Habakkuk, who was such a pessimist in the beginning, “I will joy in the God of my salvation.” This book opened in gloom, but it closes in glory. It opened with a question mark, but it closes with a mighty exclamation point. And it ends with his wonderful song. May you and I be encouraged today by the Word of God!
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Freeman, Hobart E. Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1973.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Judah. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975. (Obadiah, Joel, Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk.)
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Zephaniah
INTRODUCTION
Zephaniah identifies himself better than any of the other minor prophets. Habakkuk concealed himself in silence—we know nothing about his background—but Zephaniah goes to the opposite extreme and tells us more than is ordinary. He traces his lineage back to his great-great-grandfather, Hizkiah (whom we know as Hezekiah), king of Judah. In other words, Zephaniah was of the royal line.
Zephaniah located the time of his writing just as clearly as he did his identification: “in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah” (Zeph. 1:1). It was a dark day for the nation. According to the arrangement of the Hebrew Scriptures, Zephaniah was the last of the prophets before the Captivity. He was contemporary with Jeremiah and perhaps with Micah, although I doubt that. His was the swan song of the Davidic kingdom, and he is credited with giving impetus to the revival during the reign of Josiah.
The little Book of Zephaniah will never take the place of John 3:16 and the Gospel of John as number one in Bible popularity. The contents of this book have never been familiar, and I doubt that it has been read very much. I dare say that few have ever heard a sermon on Zephaniah. One Sunday morning several years ago, as I was about to preach on this book, I asked the congregation how many had ever heard a message on Zephaniah before. Out of the 2500–3000 who were present, only two hands were raised! Such neglect is not due to the mediocrity or the inferiority of this little book. If its theme were known, I think it would be very much appreciated because it has the same theme as the Gospel of John. John is called the apostle of love; and as we study this book, we will find that Zephaniah is the prophet of love. That may be difficult for you to believe, but let me give you a verse to demonstrate my point. You are acquainted with John 3:16, but are you acquainted with Zephaniah 3:17?—“The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.” This is lovely, is it not? However, Zephaniah is a little different from the Gospel of John, for this verse is just a small island which is sheltered in the midst of a storm-tossed sea. Much of this book seems rather harsh and cruel; it seems as if it is fury poured out. Chapter 3 opens in this vein: “Woe to her that is filthy and polluted, to the oppressing city!” (Zeph. 3:1). There is so much judgment in this little book; therefore, how can love be its theme? To find proof that love is the theme of this little book is like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack, but I will illustrate my point by telling you a mystery story. This may seem to be a very peculiar way to begin a study of Zephaniah, but it is going to help us understand this little book. The title of my story is—
THE DARK SIDE OF LOVE
It was late at night in a suburban area of one of our great cities in America. A child lay restless in her bed. A man, with a very severe and stern look, stealthily entered her bedroom and softly approached her bed. The moment the little girl saw him, a terrified look came over her face, and she began to scream. Her mother rushed into the room and went over to her. The trembling child threw her arms about her mother.
The man withdrew to the telephone, called someone, who was evidently an accomplice, and in a very soft voice made some sort of an arrangement. Hastily the man reentered the room, tore the child from the mother’s arms, and rushed out to a waiting car. The child was sobbing, and he attempted to stifle her cries. He drove madly down street after street until he finally pulled up before a large, sinister, and foreboding-looking building. All was quiet, the building was partially dark, but there was one room upstairs ablaze with light.
The child was hurriedly taken inside, up to the lighted room, and put into the hands of the man with whom the conversation had been held over the telephone in the hallway. In turn, the child was handed over to another accomplice—this time a woman—and these two took her into an inner room. The man who had brought her was left outside in the hallway. Inside the room, the man plunged a gleaming, sharp knife into the vitals of that little child, and she lay as if she were dead.
Your reaction at this point may be, “I certainly hope they will catch the criminal who abducted the little girl and is responsible for such an awful crime!”
However, I have not described to you the depraved and degraded action of a debased mind. I have not taken a chapter out of the life of the man in Cell 2455, Death Row. I have not related to you the sordid and sadistic crime of a psychopathic criminal. On the contrary, I have described to you a tender act of love. In fact, I can think of no more sincere demonstration of love than that which I have described to you. I am sure you are amazed when I say that. Let me fill in some of the details, and then you will understand.
You see, that little girl had awakened in the night with severe abdominal pain. She had been subject to such attacks before, and the doctor had told her parents to watch her very carefully. It was her father who had hurried into the room. When he saw the suffering of his little girl, he went to the telephone, called the family physician, and arranged to meet him at the hospital. He then rushed the little girl down to the hospital and handed her over to the family physician who took her to the operating room and performed emergency surgery.
Through it all, every move and every act of that father was of tender love, anxious care, and wise decision. I have described to you the dark side of love—but love, nevertheless. The father loved the child just as much on that dark night when he took her to the hospital and delivered her to the surgeon’s knife as he did the next week when he brought her flowers and candy. It was just as much a demonstration of deep affection when he delivered her into the hands of the surgeon as it was the next week when he brought her home and delivered her into the arms of her mother. My friend, love places the eternal security and permanent welfare of the object of love above any transitory or temporary comfort or present pleasure down here upon this earth. Love seeks the best interests of the beloved. That is what this little Book of Zephaniah is all about—the dark side of love.
In our nation we have come through a period when the love of God has been exaggerated out of all proportion to the other attributes of our God. It has been presented in such a way that the love of God is a weakness rather than a strength. It has been presented on the sunny side of the street with nothing of the other side ever mentioned. There is a “love” of God presented that sounds to me like the doting of grandparents rather than the vital and vigorous concern of a parent for the best interests of the child.
The liberal preacher has chanted like a parrot. He has used shopworn clichés and tired adjectives. He has said, “God is love, God is love, God is love” until he has made it saccharine sweet; yet he has not told about the dark side of the love of God. He has watered down love, making it sickening rather than stimulating, causing it to slop over on every side like a sentimental feeling rather than an abiding concern for the object of love.
However, I want you to notice that there is the dark side of the love of God. He deals with us according to our needs, my friend. The Great Physician will put His child on the operating table. He will use the surgeon’s knife when He sees a tumor of transgression or a deadly virus sapping our spiritual lives or the cancerous growth of sin. He does not hesitate to deal with us severely. We must learn this fact early: He loves us when He is subjecting us to surgery just as much as when He sends us candy and flowers and brings us into the sunshine.
Sometimes the Great Physician will operate without giving us so much as a sedative. But you can always be sure of one thing. When He does this, He will pour in the balm of Gilead. When He sees that it is best for you and for me to go down through the valley of suffering, that it will be for our eternal welfare, He will not hesitate to let us go down through that dark valley. Someone has expressed it in these lines:
Is there no other way, Oh, God,
Except through sorrow, pain and loss,
To stamp Christ’s likeness on my soul,
No other way except the cross?
And then a voice stills all my soul,
As stilled the waves of Galilee.
Can’st thou not bear the furnace,
If midst the flames I walk with thee?
I bore the cross, I know its weight;
I drank the cup I hold for thee.
Can’st thou not follow where I lead?
I’ll give thee strength, lean hard on Me!
My friend, He loves us most when He is operating on us, “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth …” (Heb. 12:6)—in other words, He child-trains, He disciplines us.
Under another figure, the Lord Jesus presented it yonder in the Upper Room to those who were His own. He said, in John 15:1–2: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth [prunes] it, that it may bring forth more fruit.” We must remember that the Father reaches into your life and mine and prunes out that which is not fruitbearing—and it hurts! But, as a Puritan divine said years ago, “The husbandman is never so close to the branch as when he is trimming it.” The Father is never more close to you, my friend, than when He is reaching in and taking out of your heart and life those things that offend.
It was Spurgeon who noticed a weather vane that a farmer had on his barn. It was an unusual weather vane, for on it the farmer had the words, GOD IS LOVE. Mr. Spurgeon asked him, “Do you mean by this that God’s love is as changeable as the wind?” The farmer shook his head. “No,” he said, “I do not mean that God’s love changes like that. I mean that whichever way the wind blows, God is love.”
Today it may be the soft wind from the south that He brings to blow across your life, for He loves you. But tomorrow He may let the cold blasts from the north blow over your life—and if He does, He still loves you.
It has been expressed in these familiar lines in a way I never could express it myself.
God hath not promised skies always blue,
Flower-strewn pathways all our lives through;
God hath not promised sun without rain,
Joy without sorrow, peace without pain.
God hath not promised we shall not know
Toil and temptation, trouble and woe;
He hath not told us we shall not bear
Many a burden, many a care.
But God hath promised strength for the day,
Rest for the laborer, light for the way,
Grace for the trials, help from above,
Unfailing sympathy, undying love.
—Annie Johnson Flint
Beloved, if you are a child of God and are in a place of suffering, be assured and know that God loves you. Regardless of how it may appear, He loves you, and you cannot ever change that fact.
Sweetness and light are associated with love on every level and rightly so, but this aspect does not exhaust the full import of love. Love expresses itself always for the good of the one who is loved. This is the reason that it is difficult to associate love with the judgment of God. The popular notion of God is that He is a super Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. One nature of His is expressed by love, and the other nature is expressed by wrath in judgment. These two appear to be contrary to the extent that there seem to be two Gods. The Book of Zephaniah is filled with the wrath and judgment of God (see Zeph. 1:15; 3:8), but there is the undertone of the love of God (see Zeph. 3:17).
Let me now tell you a true story to illustrate the dark side of love. One Mother’s Day, while I was still a pastor in downtown Los Angeles, I looked out over my congregation, and I could tell that there were many mothers present. They were dressed a little special for the day, and many of them were wearing corsages. But I also noticed one mother who did not look as happy as the others. There was a note of sorrow on her face, although she wore a beautiful orchid corsage, the biggest one I had ever seen. I knew that it came from her son in the East. He is a prominent businessman, and high up in government circles as well, but he is not a Christian. He turns a deaf ear to his mother’s pleadings. She prays for him constantly and asks others to pray for him. I recall that one Sunday morning she came to me, with tears streaming down her cheeks, and she said, “Oh, Dr. McGee, I pray that God will save my boy. I pray that He will save him even if He has to put him on a sickbed.” Then, almost fiercely, she said, “Even if He has to kill him, I pray that God will save him before it is too late!” Suppose a detective from the police department had been listening to our conversation. Would he have arrested her for making that statement? No. He could not have arrested her at all. What she said was not a threat but was actually a statement of love. Because she loved that boy, she was actually willing to give him up and to let him go down through the doorway of death if it would mean the salvation of his soul.
The little prophecy of Zephaniah presents the dark side of the love of God. He is a God of love, but He is also a God of judgment. Zephaniah opens with the rumblings of judgment, and you will not find judgment enunciated in any more harsh manner than it is in this book.
Two thoughts stand out in this brief book:
1. “The day of the Lord” occurs seven times in this little prophecy. Obadiah and Joel, the first of the writing prophets, were the first to use this expression. All of the prophets refer to it; and now Zephaniah, the last of the writing prophets, before the Captivity, brings it to our attention again. He uses it more than any of the other prophets. The actual phrase occurs seven times, but there are other references to it. This expression has particular application to the Great Tribulation Period, which precedes the kingdom; but the Day of the Lord also includes the time of the kingdom. The Great Tribulation Period is ended by the coming of Christ personally to the earth to establish the millennial kingdom—and all of that is included in the Day of the Lord. The emphasis in the Book of Zephaniah is upon judgment. Joel also opens his prophecy with a description of a great locust plague, which he likens to the Day of the Lord that is coming in the future. Joel says that the Day of the Lord is not light; it is darkness. It is on the black background of man’s sin that God writes in letters of light the wonderful gospel story for you and me.
2. “Jealousy” occurs twice in this book. God’s jealousy is on a little different plane from that of yours and mine. In our jealousy, we seek to do evil. God is jealous of those who are His own. He is jealous of mankind. He created him, and He has purchased a redemption for him, and made it possible for him to be saved. It is not His will that any should perish; He wants them saved—He is jealous for mankind. But when they don’t turn to Him, He is going to judge them. The thing which the Book of Zephaniah makes clear is that God is glorified in judging as well as He is glorified in saving. A great many people cannot understand how that is possible. Ezekiel 38–39 speaks of the time in the future when God will judge Russia. We read there, “And thou shalt come up against my people of Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes” (Ezek. 38:16). In other words, God is saying, “I intend to judge this godless nation, and when I do, I shall be glorified in that judgment.” That is a tremendous statement for God to make, and for a great many people, it is a bitter pill to swallow. But it might be well for us to learn to think God’s thoughts after Him, realizing that our thoughts are not His thoughts and our ways are not His ways at all.
OUTLINE
I. Judgment of Judah and Jerusalem, Chapter 1
II. Judgment of the Earth and of All Nations, Chapters 2:1–3:8
III. All Judgments Removed; Kingdom Established, Chapters 3:9–20
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Judgment of Judah and Jerusalem
The word of the Lord which came unto Zephaniah the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hizkiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah [Zeph. 1:1].
Zephaniah identifies himself as being of the royal family. Hezekiah, king of Judah, was his great-great-grandfather. Zephaniah prophesied during the days of the reign of Josiah, which was the period of the last spiritual movement that took place in the southern kingdom of Judah. There was a revival during that time—it wasn’t a great one, it didn’t last long, but there was a revival. Zephaniah knew something of the reigns of Amon, an evil king, and of Manasseh, also a terrible king. He saw that judgment was coming upon his nation and upon his people, and his message is a very harsh one.
I will utterly consume all things from off the land, saith the Lord [Zeph. 1:2].
This is certainly strong language. God says, “I intend to judge, and when I do, I will actually scrape the land. The land will be as if a dirt scraper had been run over it. Just as you wipe clean a dish, that is the way I intend to judge them.”
As we move further into this prophecy, we will recognize that this judgment covers more than just the land of Israel. It is a worldwide devastation that is predicted here. The Book of Revelation confirms this and places the time of this judgment as the Great Tribulation Period. During that period, this earth will absolutely be denuded by the judgments that will come upon it. This will occur right before God brings in the millennial kingdom and renews the earth.
I will consume man and beast; I will consume the fowls of the heaven, and the fishes of the sea, and the stumbling-blocks with the wicked; and I will cut off man from off the land, saith the Lord [Zeph. 1:3].
“I will consume man and beast”—all living creatures are included in this judgment. When I was in the land of Israel, I was told that they have a zoo somewhere up around the Sea of Galilee. They are making an effort to gather together the animals that were in existence in Bible days and to put them in this zoo. Obviously, as the population of Israel increases, the same thing will happen as has happened in the United States. Certain animal species will become extinct and disappear. God says that this is exactly what is going to happen when He judges that land. Many species—in fact, all of them—will become extinct at that time. This is to be a very severe judgment.
I will also stretch out mine hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place, and the name of the Chemarims with the priests [Zeph. 1:4].
“I will also stretch out mine hand upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem.” God now makes it clear that Judah and Jerusalem are to be singled out for judgment.
“I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place.” The thing that brings the judgment of God upon the land is very specific—it is idolatry. In the prophecy of Habakkuk, God mentions five woes He was going to bring upon the people because of certain sins which they had committed. Idolatry was the last one; it was the fifth woe. But here Zephaniah narrows it down and puts his hand on idolatry—that is, false religion.
The Scriptures, beginning with the Book of Judges, teach a philosophy of human government, which you will find was true of God’s people and which has been true of every nation. The first step in a nation’s decline is religióus apostasy, a turning from the living and true God. The second step downward for a nation is moral awfulness. The third step downward is political anarchy.
A great many people in the United States today think that our problem is in Washington, D.C.—I don’t think so. Another group of people feel that if people could be reformed, if we could get people to act nicely, not be violent and not steal, if we could just lift our moral standards, then that would solve our problems. Again, I don’t think that is the problem. Very frankly, I believe that the problem in this country is religious apostasy. The problem is out yonder with you and right here with me. The problem is that the church has failed to give God’s message. I am not talking about every church or your church necessarily. There are many Bible-teaching churches across this country which have wonderful pastors who are standing for God—and I thank God for them. But the great denominations, by and large, have now departed from the faith. They have come to the place where they no longer give an effective message to the nation. As a result, from this religious apostasy have flowed moral awfulness and political anarchy.
If you think that this is just the wild raving of a fundamentalist preacher, you are wrong. Let me quote an excerpt from an editorial in a major metropolitan newspaper a number of years ago. Speaking of the failure of the churches to present any spiritual message whatsoever, the editorial concluded:
This betrayal of Christ in the name of Christianity is one reason for the moral and spiritual malaise with which this country is afflicted. The melancholy fact is that the churches no longer influence the development of national character. People go to church mainly because of an impulse to participate in a service of worship, not because of any spiritual guidance they expect from the clergyman.
What a note of condemnation this is! This is true not just of our nation but of every nation.
The historian Gibbon concluded that there were five reasons for the decline and fall of Rome. Gibbon was not a Christian, but here is why he says Rome fell: (1) The undermining of the dignity and sanctity of the home, which is the basis of human society. (2) Higher and higher taxes; the spending of public money for free bread and circuses for the populace. (3) The mad craze for pleasure; sports becoming every year more exciting, more brutal, more immoral. (4) The building of great armaments when the great enemy was within; the decay of individual responsibility. (5) The decay of religion, fading into mere form, losing touch with life, losing power to guide the people.
The message of Zephaniah carries out this scriptural principle of human government, and he puts his finger right down on the sore spot in the southern kingdom of Judah—idolatry. Zephaniah saw what was happening. The people were now on the toboggan; they were on the way down and out, and judgment was coming. Idolatry is where every great nation has gone off the track. When a nation departs from the living and true God or when it gives up great moral principles which were based on religion, when it goes into idolatry, these factors eventually lead it into gross immorality and into political anarchy.
The interesting thing is that three kinds of idolatry, I believe, are mentioned to us here. “I will cut off the remnant of Baal from this place.” The first form of idolatry is the worship of Baal which was introduced into the northern kingdom by Jezebel whose father was the high priest of the worship among the Sidonians. In the southern kingdom, the worship of Baal was popularized and the altars of Baal were rebuilt during the reign of Manasseh. This is an instance which illustrates why it would be wonderful to study at the same time the corresponding portions of the prophetic and historical books of Scripture. At this point it would be helpful to read the background of the reign of Manasseh (see 2 Kings 21; 2 Chron. 33). No king ever departed as far from God as this man did. He reintroduced the worship of Baal, which was a very immoral form of worship. Along with the worship of Baal was worship of Astoreth. When the female principal is introduced in deity, you have gross immorality; and that, of course, came into the life of the nation during this period. Baal worship was a form, therefore, of nature worship and was very crude indeed. When Josiah became king (he was a good king), the first thing he did was to try to remove the worship of Baal.
“And the name of the Chemarims with the priests.”—Chemarims actually means “black priests”—they wore black garments. Have you noticed that those who engage in the worship of Satan today don black garments? It is quite interesting that it is not original with them. It comes all the way down from these idolatrous priests who wore black robes. Zephaniah says that these priests are to be judged.
And them that worship the host of heaven upon the housetops; and them that worship and that swear by the Lord, and that swear by Malcham [Zeph. 1:5].
“And them that worship the host of heaven upon the housetops.” Zephaniah now mentions the second form of idolatry that became prevalent in that land. It was more subtle and very dangerous indeed. Their housetops were flat—that is true even today in the land of Israel. It is the place where the family gathered in the evening. In fact, God gave a law about putting a banister, a railing, around the roof so that no one would fall off. Zephaniah says that the housetop became a place of worship, and you can see how idolatry was moving into the homes. It meant that actually every home was a little heathen temple where idolatry was practiced; idolatry was really reaching into the homes.
“Them that worship the host of heaven”—the sun, the moon, the stars. It was a worship of the creature rather than the Creator. They worshiped that which had been made rather than worshiping the Creator. This was the second form of idolatry which they adopted.
The worst, the most sophisticated and the most subtle of all the forms of idolatry, is the one that is mentioned next—“and them that worship and that swear by the Lord, and that swear by Malcham.” Malcham is the name for Molech, the god of the Ammonites. It was a worship in which they actually sacrificed their children. The subtlety of it was that at the same time they professed to worship the living and true God. They went to the temple. They said that they knew the Lord, that they believed in God. But they also worshiped Molech—they were doing both.
This is the subtle thing that is also taking place today. There are many so—called churches that by the wildest stretch of the imagination could never be called Christian churches. The true church is built around a person, and that person is Jesus Christ. The early church met together to worship and adore Him, to come to know Him, and to have fellowship around Him. Everything they did pointed to Jesus Christ. How many churches do you know of where Christ is not even mentioned? If He is mentioned, He is mentioned in a derogatory manner. In other words, His deity is denied. They deny that He is God. They do not worship Him, but they give lip service to Him. They talk about the teachings of Jesus and about what a wonderful man He was. They even call Him a “superstar”! But they deny everything that has been set down in the Scriptures for us as Christians. It is a castrated Christianity that is abroad today.
This is the kind of subtle idolatry that was coming up in the land of Judah in that day. People were still going through the rituals, still going to the temple on the Sabbath. I don’t think they came any other time, but they were there then. However, they were actually worshiping Molech. Molech was the god of the flesh. It was a fleshly worship—again, there was gross immorality. Likewise today, there are those who go to church—they have a churchianity but not a Christianity. They deny the great facts of the Christian faith. They practice immorality, or they practice things that are contrary to the Word of God. This is the picture of Judah in that day, and it is the subtlety of the hour in which we live. A great many people think that if a building has a steeple on it, a bell in that steeple, an organ, a big center aisle for weddings, a pulpit down front, and a choir loft, these make it a church. My friend, it may be one of the worst spots in town! It may be worse than any bar-room, any gambling establishment, or any brothel in town. This is the thing that is so deceptive. The thing that undermined the nation of Judah is that they pretended that they were serving the living and true God, but they were giving themselves over to Molech idolatry.
And them that are turned back from the Lord; and those that have not sought the Lord, nor inquired for him [Zeph. 1:6].
The people have turned completely from God. Two classes are mentioned: backsliders and those who were never saved.
Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God: for the day of the Lord is at hand: for the Lord hath prepared a sacrifice, he hath bid his guests [Zeph. 1:7].
“Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God.” The suggestion is, “Hush, hush. Don’t talk out. Don’t speak out. No protesting. You are in the presence of the living God.” There is a great lack of reverence for God today. This notion that Jesus is sort of a buddy, that God is the man upstairs, and that we can be very flippant when we speak of Him, is all wrong. May I say to you, our God is a holy God. If you and I were to come within a billion miles of Him, we would fall down on our faces before Him because of who He is. He is the great God, the Creator of the universe, and we are merely little creatures.
“Hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God.” Why? “For the day of the Lord is at hand.” This is the first mention of the Day of the Lord in this book. The Day of the Lord is presented here primarily as the time of judgment. If you want to fit it into God’s program, it is the Great Tribulation Period—that is when it begins. Today, you and I are living in the day of Christ, the day of grace. The Day of the Lord will begin when the church leaves this earth. Then God will begin to move in judgment.
Prior to that day, which is still in the future, there have been times which have been likened unto the Day of the Lord. When Nebuchadnezzar finally came and destroyed Jerusalem, burned it to the ground, and plowed it under, he left that land denuded. If you go to that land today, there are very few trees. Oh, I know that Israel has planted millions of trees, but you see barren hills everywhere. At one time those hills were all covered with trees and vineyards. It was a land of milk and honey, but it is not that today. There is still evidence of that which the enemy did. The Babylonians who came under Nebuchadnezzar were followed later by the Medo-Persians, then Alexander the Great, and finally the Romans. Enemy after enemy has come into that land. As a result, very few trees are left, and the land is almost completely denuded today. God made it very clear that that was what He was going to do—and He did it. The evidence is still there today. That judgment was for those people “the day of the Lord,” but it does not completely satisfy these prophecies. Zephaniah makes it very clear that the Day of the Lord is that day which is yet in the future and which will be consummated when Christ comes and establishes His kingdom here upon this earth.
With almost biting sarcasm, Zephaniah says, “For the Lord hath prepared a sacrifice, he hath bid his guests.” The guests are going to be the sacrifice, by the way, and the sacrifice is the judgment that is coming upon this nation.
And it shall come to pass in the day of the Lord’s sacrifice, that I will punish the princes, and the king’s children, and all such as are clothed with strange apparel [Zeph. 1:8].
The thought here is that the rulers had turned away from God. All you have to do is to refer to the time when Zedekiah reigned. He was the last of the kings, and he actually saw his own children killed right before his eyes, and then his own eyes were put out (see 2 Kings 24–25). That was surely harsh judgment, but they had had the warning from God. To these people, this was like the Day of the Lord.
In the same day also will I punish all those that leap on the threshold, which fill their masters’ houses with violence and deceit [Zeph. 1:9].
Dr. Charles Feinberg (Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, and Malachi, p. 48) writes, “What is referred to is the zeal with which the servants of the rich hastened from their homes to plunder the property of others to enrich their masters.” There were those who would take over the land and the homes of the poor. What was happening in that day was that the great middle class disappeared and you had the extreme rich and the extreme poor. The same thing is certainly happening in my own country today. God says to these people that He is going to judge them for this.
And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord, that there shall be the noise of a cry from the fish gate, and an howling from the second, and a great crashing from the hills [Zeph. 1:10].
“And it shall come to pass in that day”—this is clearly a reference to the Day of the Lord.
“That there shall be the noise of a cry from the fish gate.” The fish gate is what is known today as the Damascus Gate. It was the gate through which they brought the fish from the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River. It is located on the north side of the city of Jerusalem.
“And an howling from the second, and a great crashing from the hills.” The Damascus Gate today is down in a rather low place. If you are acquainted with Jerusalem, you know that the city is surrounded by hills. Zephaniah is saying that in any direction you would want to move, there will be this wailing of the people when the time of judgment has come upon them.
Howl, ye inhabitants of Maktesh, for all the merchant people are cut down; all they that bear silver are cut off [Zeph. 1:11].
Maktesh means “mortar”. There is supposed to have been a depression in the city of Jerusalem where the marketplace was situated. It was perhaps the cheesemakers’ valley. It was the valley that went alongside the temple where the Wailing Wall is today—which is a good place for it. “Howl, ye inhabitants of Maktesh, for all the merchant people are cut down; all they that bear silver are cut off.”
And it shall come to pass at that time, that I will search Jerusalem with candles, and punish the men that are settled on their lees: that say in their heart, The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil [Zeph. 1:12].
“And it shall come to pass at that time, that I will search Jerusalem with candles.” In other words, it is like taking a flashlight and going to look for an individual who is hiding in the dark. God says, “I intend to search out Jerusalem just like that. I will bring to light all the evil and the sin.”
“And punish the men that are settled on their lees.” This is an idiomatic expression that corresponds, I think, to our idiom today when we say, “Take it easy.” These people were taking it easy. They lived in an affluent society, and they were taking it easy. They did not believe they would be judged any more than people today believe that we are to be judged as a nation.
“That say in their heart, The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.” They are saying, “God’s doing nothing. God is not going to do anything about it.” Habakkuk’s question was, “Why don’t you do something about the evil, Lord?” God told him, “I am doing something.” And when Habakkuk was given a vision and saw what God was really doing, he cried out to God for mercy for the people. A great many people today say, “I’ll ignore God. He doesn’t do good. He doesn’t do evil.” They are absolutely neutral about God. This type of thinking, of course, is what led to the abominable theology that God is dead. Only a society like ours could have produced that kind of theology, because people in an affluent society say, “We don’t need God at all.” As a result, they think that He doesn’t do good, He doesn’t do evil, He doesn’t do anything. But they are greatly mistaken, and Zephaniah is going to make that very clear to us.
Therefore their goods shall become a booty, and their houses a desolation: they shall also build houses, but not inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, but not drink the wine thereof [Zeph. 1:13].
“Therefore their goods shall become a booty.” The goods which they took by plundering and pillaging and robbing are going to be taken away from them in just the same way as they got them.
“And their houses a desolation”—in other words, there would be ghost towns in Israel.
“They shall also build houses, but not inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, but not drink the wine thereof.” God had given a law to these people that when a man planted a vineyard, he was not to go to ward until he had eaten the fruit of that vineyard. Another law said that if a man married, he was to be excused from going to war for a year. Here God is saying that they are going to plant vineyards, but they are not going to drink the wine of them because they have sinned. They won’t be able to take time off from warfare. Neither will they be able to take time off when they get married because the enemy is going to come in like a flood.
The great day of the Lord is near, it is near, and hasteth greatly, even the voice of the day of the Lord: the mighty man shall cry there bitterly [Zeph. 1:14].
“The great day of the Lord is near.” This great Day of the Lord is the time of the Great Tribulation in the future. In Zephaniah’s day, after Josiah ruled, there never arose in the southern kingdom another good king. Every one of them was bad. Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, Zedekiah—every one of them was a corrupt king. Now judgment is going to come upon the nation and upon the people for their departure from God. But they are going to experience only a very small portion of what is in the future in the great Day of the Lord.
Zephaniah says, “It is near, and hasteth greatly, even the voice of the day of the Lord: the mighty man shall cry there bitterly.” In other words, the concept of the Wailing Wall would come into existence. And it is going to be there until after the Great Tribulation Period because Israel will never know peace until the Prince of Peace comes and they acknowledge their Messiah.
That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness [Zeph. 1:15].
Dr. Charles Feinberg is an excellent Hebrew scholar, and he calls our attention to many things that you and I would normally pass over. I would highly recommend to you his work on the minor prophets. There is a play upon words in this verse that Dr. Feinberg brings out which we miss in the English, of course: “The Hebrew words for wasteness and desolation—sho’ah and umesho’ah—are alike in sound to convey the monotony of the destruction.” But we do have in the English an alliteration that reveals something of it. It is a day of trouble, then distress, desolation, darkness, and thick darkness, so that there is a play upon words even in the English.
Zephaniah is speaking here of the harshness, the intensity of the judgment that is coming, and the question naturally arises: How can a God of love do a thing like this? We will find before we finish our study of this book that it is like the story I told in the Introduction of the father who took his little child to the surgeon to be operated upon. The picture can be presented in such a way that it looks like he is being cruel and harsh to bring her to the doctor who will plunge his knife into her. But actually, everything the father did was out of love for his little girl. Even the great day of wrath is a judgment of God, but it has in it the love of God. Regardless of what takes place, God is love. It is like the farmer who had on his barn the weather vane which said on it, GOD IS LOVE. The farmer explained it by saying, “Regardless of which way the wind blows, God is love.” That is true, my friend.
Even in judgment, God is still a God of love. And He judges because it is essential for Him to judge that which is evil. He does that because He has to be true to Himself, and He could not be good to His creatures unless He did that. If God is going to permit sin throughout eternity, if God does not intend to judge sin, if you and I are going to have to wrestle with disease and with heartbreak and with disappointment and with sorrow throughout eternity, I cannot conceive that He is a God of love. But if you tell me that God is going to judge sin, that He is coming in with a mighty judgment, and that He is going to remove sin from His universe, I’m going to say, “Hallelujah!” And I will believe that He is a God of love even when He does that.
A day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high towers [Zeph. 1:16].
When God gave to the nation Israel the trumpets that they were to blow on the wilderness march, there were several ways in which they were to be used. Having mentioned the different ways the two silver trumpets were to be used, the Lord says in Numbers 10:9, “And if ye go to war in your land against the enemy that oppresseth you, then ye shall blow an alarm with the trumpets; and ye shall be remembered before the Lord your God, and ye shall be saved from your enemies.” Zephaniah says here that it is “a day of the trumpet”; they are going to blow the alarm, but God does not intend to deliver them. Why? He intends to judge them. He intends to deliver them over to the enemy, not deliver them from the enemy. It is to be “A day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high towers.”
And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the Lord: and their blood shall be poured out as dust, and their flesh as the dung [Zeph. 1:17].
This is extreme judgment, I’ll grant you. But, you know, surgery today is extreme. After my doctor operated on me the first time for cancer, I was asking him about the operation. He told me, “I cut on you until there was almost a question as to which pile was McGee!” It’s a pretty harsh thing to cut on a fellow like that, but my doctor didn’t do it because he was angry with me. He didn’t do it even in judgment. He did it actually to save my life, and I believe that on the human level he did save my life by that severe method. May I say to you, God will judge, and He does it in an extreme way. He does extreme surgery, but He does it for the sake of the body politic.
Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s wrath; but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land [Zeph. 1:18].
It has been quite interesting that this nation in which I live has spent billions of dollars throughout the world trying to buy friends, trying to win friends and influence people. But we are hated throughout the world today—we are not loved. You cannot buy love; you cannot win people over with silver and gold. But in this country we still believe that money solves all the ills of this life, that money is the answer to all the problems. God says that when He begins to judge, “neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s wrath.”
“But the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land.” God removed them from the land. Why did He do that? He did that because He loved them. If He had not done it, it would have been necessary to exterminate totally succeeding generations. For the sake of the future generations—so not all would have to be slain—God had to move in and cut away the cancer of sin that was destroying the nation.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Judgment of the earth and of all nations
God has not only judged His own people, but God also judges the nations; and that is the subject of this chapter and through verse 8 of chapter 3. But God is gracious, long-suffering, and not willing that any should perish; therefore, He sends out a final call. Although you would think that He had reached the end of His patience, in the first three verses, we find Zephaniah sending out God’s last call to the nation of Judah to repent and to come to Him.
Gather yourselves together, yea, gather together, O nation not desired [Zeph. 2:1].
“Gather yourselves together.” They are to come together as a people, as Dr. Feinberg has stated it, “… to a religious assembly to entreat the favor of the Lord in order that by prayer He may turn away His judgment” (Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, and Malachi, p. 53).
“Yea, gather together, O nation not desired.” Their sin, of course, has caused God to bring judgment upon them. But it is not that He does not desire them; it is not because He does not love them. Judgment came upon them because of their sin. They were repugnant, they were repulsive; yet they were insensible to the shame of their sinful condition. Their sin had reached a very low stage, and they were dead to shame; they had no sense of decency at all. They were shameless in their conduct. We would say that they had no sensitivity to sin whatsoever. They sinned with impudence. They would sin openly and actually boast of it.
We have come to that same place as a nation today. Someone said to me not long ago, “Dr. McGee, you speak as if America is sinning more and is in a worse condition today than it ever was before.” I do not mean to imply that at all. However, I do believe that there was just as much sin when I was growing up as there is today, but the sin was carried on behind the curtain or in the backyard or someplace else where it could not be seen. It was not flaunted before the world. It was not boasted of. In other words, it was not shameless sin as it is at the present time. I heard a very beautiful young woman on a talk program on television boast of the fact that she is living with a man to whom she is not married. The others on the program congratulated her for her “courage” and “broad-mindedness.” Nobody called it shameless sin. Sin is right out in the open today. I don’t think there is more sin—it is just out in the open where you can see it. They sinned in my day, that’s for sure, but it was done under cover. It was done secretly, and there was a sense of sorrow for sin which we seem to have lost today. You and I do not know how repulsive our sin is to God. We spend very little time weeping over our sins.
Before the decree bring forth, before the day pass as the chaff, before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you, before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you [Zeph. 2:2].
God says, “Come together for prayer. Come together for repentance. Come together and turn to Me.” There is a note of urgency here. Zephaniah is saying to the people, “Do this before God begins to move in judgment, because when you pass over the line and God begins to move in judgment, you will find out it’s too late.”
One of the things that is needed today in my country is for someone whose voice is heard to call our nation to prayer and to repentance. My nation has almost reached the end of its rope. This is a great need, and that kind of prayer God will hear and answer.
Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger [Zeph. 2:3].
“Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment.” There has always been a remnant of those people who are true to God just as there is a remnant in the church today. I doubt that there are many churches—no matter how liberal they may be—who are without some members who are real believers. Now I don’t understand why they are there, and I don’t propose to sit in judgment on them, but there is a remnant within the liberal church today. God has always had a remnant in the world, and apparently He is speaking here to those who are the godly remnant in Judah.
“Seek righteousness.” The remnant also should be very careful of the way they live their lives. “Seek meekness.” They are not to be lifted up by arrogance and pride and self-sufficiency, for that was one of the great sins of the nation. This is also a danger among believers today. Someone has said that there is “a pride of race, a pride of face, and a pride of grace.” Some people are even proud that they have been saved by grace! They feel that that is something for them to boast about. They feel that they are the peculiar and particular pets of almighty God because of their salvation! My friend, we have nothing to glory in. The apostle Paul said that he had nothing to glory in, and believe me, if Paul didn’t have anything to glory in, I’m sure that none of us has. There is a danger of being proud of the fact that we are God’s children, but it ought rather to lead to meekness. He says here, “Seek righteousness, seek meekness.”
“It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger.” It is a glorious, wonderful thing to be hidden in the cleft of the rock and to be covered by His wings. God’s children need to recognize that, although they will not go through the Great Tribulation Period, they may experience a great deal of judgment and a great deal of trouble just as these people did. Judah did not go through the Great Tribulation, the great Day of the Lord, but they certainly were going through, as I like to put it, “the little tribulation period.” All of us are going to have tribulation to a certain extent in this life—we are going to have trouble. I heard the story years ago of a woman who was a maid and was complaining about her troubles. Apparently she had quite a few of them. When the lady of the house rather rebuked her for complaining, the woman replied, “When the good Lord sends me tribulation, I intend to tribulate.” I agree with her. I believe we ought to tribulate. Paul says that we groan within these bodies, but that does not mean we are in the Great Tribulation nor that there is a chance of our going through it.
We come now to a section, beginning with verse 4 and going on down to verse 8 of chapter 3, in which we see the judgment of the nations. This passage reveals that God judges all the nations of this earth. The God of the Bible is not a local deity. He is not one that you put on a shelf. He is not one that is local or national. It has been the great error of the white race when attempting to “Christianize” a people by bringing them the gospel, also to try to make them live as we live and to adopt our customs and our methods. Well, there are a lot of different people on the topside of this earth, and they are all people for whom Christ died. Our business is to get them to hear the gospel, to get the Word of God to them, and then let them work their Christian life into their own customs and into their own patterns of life. I am told that my ancestors in Europe were pagan, eating raw meat, and living in caves, and when the gospel was brought to them, it did a great deal for them. The early missionaries who came to my ancestors didn’t try to make them like they were. Apparently, the missionaries let them develop their own civilization, and we should do the same thing with others.
The God of the Bible is the God of this universe. He is the Creator of the universe and of mankind. And He is the Redeemer of mankind. Notice that He is going to judge these other nations, not just His own people. And He judges other nations for their sin. God has put up certain standards that have become worldwide. They have been written into the Ten Commandments, which God gave to Moses. All nations have a sense of right and wrong, although they may vary on what is right and what is wrong. A missionary was telling me about a tribe he had worked with out in the South Seas. They were headhunters; they were cannibals. But he said that they had a high sense of honesty. He told me that you could take your pocketbook with your money in it and put it down in the center of where the tribe dwelt and leave it there for a week, and nobody would touch it. But, of course, they didn’t mind eating their mother-in-law for dinner. (You would never know exactly what they meant when they said they had their mother-in-law for dinner—whether she came over to eat with them or whether they ate her!) But they did have a high sense of honesty, which is something I don’t think we have in my country today. A lady told me that she left her purse on the counter in a department store, and when she returned in less than a minute, the purse was gone with no trace of it anywhere. But, of course, that thief was not going to eat his mother-in-law for dinner that evening. Standards apparently vary, but God has given to the nations of the world certain standards. You find them in all the nations of the earth. No nation could be a civilized nation if it did not recognize some of these. But when a people depart from the living and true God, they go into the deepest kind of paganism and heathenism and reach a place where God gives them up.
God now begins His judgment of the nations—
For Gaza shall be forsaken, and Ashkelon a desolation: they shall drive out Ashdod at the noon day, and Ekron shall be rooted up [Zeph. 2:4].
Mentioned here are four of the cities of the Philistines which are going to be judged. Somebody might ask, “Why didn’t He mention Gath? It was a prominent place.” Well, at this time Gath was pretty much under the control of the southern kingdom of Judah. These four cities are to be judged—Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, and Ekron.
“For Gaza shall be forsaken, and Ashkelon a desolation.” It is interesting that Gaza is forsaken today, and Ashkelon is a desolation. There is a place called Ashkelon, but it is not over the ruins of the old city. The old one is right down by the sea. I have been there and have seen the ruins of the temple of Dagon that are there.
“They shall drive out Ashdod at the noon day.” Ashdod was driven out, and it was done at noonday. In that land, the people always take time off at noontime; that is, they have what is called south of the border a siesta. In some places in South America, you cannot get into a store from around twelve to two o’clock in the afternoon. You are just wasting your time if you try to go shopping because nothing will be open. You can get into a store at nine o’clock at night, but they take time for a siesta in the heat of the day. At Ashdod it’s pretty warm. Although it is by the sea, it gets very warm there in the summer. Zephaniah says that it will be destroyed and that they will be driven out at noonday. In other words, the enemy will take them off guard. Ashdod was completely obliterated. Israel possesses that territory today. They have built apartment building after apartment building, an oil refinery, and also a port there. It is one of the principal ports now. But in that day it was absolutely cleaned off. There are no ruins there at all.
“And Ekron shall be rooted up.” Ekron was rooted up; it was completely removed.
Woe unto the inhabitants of the sea coast, the nation of the Cherethites! the word of the Lord is against you; O Canaan, the land of the Philistines, I will even destroy thee, that there shall be no inhabitant [Zeph. 2:5].
“Woe unto the inhabitants of the sea coast.” All these places are along the seacoast.
“The nation of the Cherethites!” The Cherethites were people who came from the island of Crete, and they evidently were the Philistines. The word Philistine comes from the Hebrew word for migration. They immigrated to that country. This, by the way, ought to answer the question that some people, especially the liberals, have raised: “What right did Israel have to drive the Philistines out of their native land?” It was not their native land. Actually, Israel was there long before the Philistines were there. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and their offspring were in that land, and then they went down to the land of Egypt. In that interval, the Philistines came into that country.
“The word of the Lord is against you; O Canaan, the land of the Philistines, I will even destroy thee, that there shall be no inhabitant.” He says that they are to be judged. By the way, when was the last time you saw a Philistine? They have disappeared.
And the sea coast shall be dwellings and cottages for shepherds, and folds for flocks [Zeph. 2:6].
This took place, and this condition existed for over a thousand years—in fact, almost nineteen hundred years.
And the coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah; they shall feed thereupon: in the houses of Ashkelon shall they lie down in the evening: for the Lord their God shall visit them, and turn away their captivity [Zeph. 2:7].
This is God’s promise to His people that He will return them from their captivity to inhabit the land of Philistia, which was a part of the territory God had given to Abraham. I have pictures of Israelis lying on the beach at Ashkelon during a holiday. It is a beautiful, sandy beach on the Mediterranean Sea. This prophecy is a picture of a scene that can be demonstrated any day of the year, although it may change tomorrow. However, I do not consider what we see there today as a fulfillment of prophecy, because I believe that Israel will be driven from that land again before their final return under God.
Now He moves over from the west to the east and to the nations which were contiguous to the land of Judah—
I have heard the reproach of Moab, and the revilings of the children of Ammon, whereby they have reproached my people, and magnified themselves against their border.
Therefore as I live, saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Surely Moab shall be as Sodom, and the children of Ammon as Gomorrah, even the breeding of nettles, and saltpits, and a perpetual desolation: the residue of my people shall spoil them, and the remnant of my people shall possess them [Zeph. 2:8–9].
I have visited a few countries in my lifetime, and the poorest country that I have ever been in is the modern nation of the Hashimite Kingdom of Jordan. It occupies what was the land of the Moabites and the Ammonites. The modern capital there is Amman. You just do not find any more desolate country than that. All of this prophecy has been fulfilled in the past.
This shall they have for their pride, because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the Lord of hosts [Zeph. 2:10].
They are judged for their pride, and as you know, pride is the way the devil sinned at the beginning.
The Lord will be terrible unto them: for he will famish all the gods of the earth; and men shall worship him, every one from his place, even all the isles of the heathen [Zeph. 2:11].
God is going to judge the nations of the world because they have ignored Him. They have not recognized Him. “… when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things” (Rom. 1:21–23). This is the reason God will judge them.
Ye Ethiopians also, ye shall be slain by my sword [Zeph. 2:12].
Ethiopia is in Africa. You see, this is a worldwide judgment.
And he will stretch out his hand against the north, and destroy Assyria; and will make Nineveh a desolation, and dry like a wilderness [Zeph. 2:13].
“And he will stretch out his hand against the north, and destroy Assyria.” Ethiopia is in the south, but now we move to the north and find that Assyria also is to be judged. In Zephaniah’s day, Assyria was making quite a splash in the world.
“And will make Nineveh a desolation, and dry like a wilderness.” That is the way Nineveh is today. The modern city of Mosul is across the Tigris River from the site of old Nineveh, and it is a miserable place, so I’m told. Nineveh and all of that area is still a desolation.
And flocks shall lie down in the midst of her, all the beasts of the nations: both the cormorant and the bittern shall lodge in the upper lintels of it; their voice shall sing in the windows; desolation shall be in the thresholds: for he shall uncover the cedar work [Zeph. 2:14].
In other words, their buildings are to be torn down.
This is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly, that said in her heart, I am, and there is none beside me: how is she become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in! every one that passeth by her shall hiss, and wag his hand [Zeph. 2:15].
“Every one that passeth by her shall hiss.” People will hiss at Nineveh in the sense that it will be sort of an explosive expletive that comes from a person who is surprised: “Why, I thought that Assyria was a great nation and that Nineveh was a great city! Just look at it in desolation and ruin!” They hiss, and their breath is just blown out of them, as it were.
“And wag his hand.” They will simply shake their hands back and forth, being absolutely stupefied to see what has taken place through God’s judgment of the nations.
God has judged nations in the past, and God judges nations today. The Lord Jesus says that He will judge nations in the future. As we see in the Book of Habakkuk, God was moving in that day in a way that the prophet never suspected. And, my friend, God is moving in the nations of the world today. He has judged them in the past. He will judge them in the future.
CHAPTER 3
Theme: Judgment of the earth and of all nations; all judgments removed and the kingdom established
The first eight verses of this chapter conclude this section, which deals with the judgment of the earth and of all nations. By now you may be tired of listening to Zephaniah talk about the harsh, the extreme, the unmitigating judgment of God upon His people. This is probably the strongest language you will find in the Scriptures until you come to the language which the Lord Jesus used in Matthew 23. If you will read that passage in connection with this chapter, you will see that the Lord Jesus topped even Zephaniah in the extreme language of judgment, which He used. It is bloodcurdling, if you please.
We saw in chapter 2 that the judgment of God is worldwide, it is global in its extent, and it includes every nation on the topside of the earth. In verses 1–5 of this chapter, God returns to the judgment that is coming upon His people, and He is very specific. He reveals that the light which a person has will determine the extent of the judgment—in other words, privilege creates responsibility. Your responsibility is measured by the privilege that you have. I like to express it like this: I would rather be a Hottentot in the darkest part of Africa than to be sitting in a Bible-believing church today, hearing the gospel but doing nothing about it. I won’t argue about the judgment of the Hottentots in Africa, as that is not what we are talking about here, but I do know what God will do with a person of privilege, one who has had the opportunity of hearing the Word of God and has turned his back upon it. This is very extreme language that is used to express the judgment on Jerusalem, a judgment that is in ratio to her privilege—
Woe to her that is filthy and polluted, to the oppressing city! [Zeph. 3:1].
Jerusalem was the city in which the temple was located. The priests were there, and the scribes had the Word of God. When wise men came from the east, seeking the King of the Jews, the scribes had no problem in telling them where the Messiah was to be born, but they simply did not manifest any interest in checking to see if the wise men had any valid information about the Messiah. The scribes knew the letter of the Law, but that is all they knew. They did not know the Author of the Book, and they were far from Him. God’s condemnation of Jerusalem is on the basis of all the light they had.
“Woe to her that is filthy and polluted.” This matter of pollution is not something that is new today, but the pollution spoken of here is not physical pollution. This pollution is not on the outside of man; it is on the inside of man. The thing that is causing the pollution on the outside today is that man is polluted and filthy on the inside—that is, before God he is not right.
When a man gets right with God, he is not going to dump his garbage on another man’s property, and he is not going to fill a lovely, babbling brook with filth. The ones who are polluting this earth are the godless folk. For example, in one of the beach towns here in Southern California several years ago, there was a meeting of some hippies, a godless crowd. They met in a pasture to hold a protest meeting against pollution. They were decrying the pollution caused by the large factories with their smokestacks which pour out all the dregs and waste materials resulting from industrial production. Very candidly, I agree with them that that’s a terrible thing to have taking place. But the interesting thing is that after they held their protest meeting, the city had to spend two thousand dollars to clean up the pasture which those who were protesting pollution had polluted! May I say to you, pollution is on the inside, and when you are godless and wrong with God, you are certainly going to pollute this earth.
Man today is actually wrecking this earth that we are living on, and God’s condemnation of Jerusalem is that it is a polluted city, although it was a privileged city, a city that had glorious and wonderful opportunities. This is the picture of that city, but it is also a picture of mankind in general. Notice Paul’s verdict in Romans 3:16, “Destruction and misery are in their ways.” What a picture of mankind! Man has always left a pile of tin cans and rubbish wherever he has gone on the earth.
Why did God single out the city of Jerusalem? It was a privileged city. This city had the temple of God. It had the Word of God. Therefore, its judgment will be harsher than that of any other city.
God calls Jerusalem not only filthy and polluted, but He also calls it “the oppressing city.” It is the oppressing city because of the fact that she did not regard the rights of her people, especially of the poor. She did not consider them; she oppressed the poor.
This is something that I think is so hypocritical in my own government. I am not talking politics now, nor am I speaking of any one party because this is true of the whole structure that we have in Washington, D.C., today. Constantly our congressmen are coming up with programs to help the poor. It is interesting that it is always some rich senator who comes up with such a program. To begin with, he does not know how poor folk feel. He does not know our hardships. Such men have never experienced poverty, and their programs never help the poor; they help some bureaucrats but not the poor. I do not think the poor will ever be helped by any of the plans that men devise. Part of the problem is that the middle-class people are taxed to finance any such program. The middle class are the ones making it possible for the upper class to take our money to help the poor or the lower class. I personally would like to move into one of the other brackets—it would be more comfortable there today. God said that He would judge the city of Jerusalem for their oppression of the poor; so we know how He feels about our oppression.
God is not through with His judgment; He goes on to spell out their sin—
She obeyed not the voice; she received not correction; she trusted not in the Lord; she drew not near to her God [Zeph. 3:2].
“She obeyed not the voice.” She was disobedient to God. This city had heard the voice of God but had been disobedient to Him.
“She received not correction.” God had sent judgment. One hundred eighty-five thousand Assyrians outside the walls of Jerusalem scared the living daylights out of these people—they were frightened beyond measure (see 2 Kings 18–19). They had been partially judged, but God had let the judgment pass over. You would think that they would have learned their lesson and would have turned to God, but they didn’t. Likewise, there are many Christians today who suffer but never learn why God permits it. He never lets anything happen to His own unless there is a purpose back of it. This city, like many of us, “received not correction.” She did not learn the lesson.
“She trusted not in the Lord.” The city had no trust in Him at all but looked to something else. When the modern nation of Israel celebrated her twentieth anniversary, they displayed this motto: “Science will bring peace to this land.” My friend, the Bible says that the Messiah is the Prince of Peace, and He is the only one who can bring peace. But they don’t trust Him—they trust science. After that twentieth anniversary, believe me, Israel got into hot water. Science did not bring peace to that land, and my nation has not brought peace to them either.
“She drew not near to her God.” Today men are not running to God; they are running from Him as fast as they possibly can. What a picture this is of the city of Jerusalem!
Her princes within her are roaring lions; her judges are evening wolves; they gnaw not the bones till the morrow [Zeph. 3:3].
“Her princes within her are roaring lions.” God is now talking about the leadership of the nation; and, when you speak of judgment, you must talk about the leadership of any nation or city. In my country, when men are running for office, they are always telling us that they are going to think about us, they are going to help us, and they are going to do something for us. So far, as best I can tell, nobody has ever done anything, either from the city level, the state level, or the national level. Why? Because “her princes within her are roaring lions”—they make a big noise.
“Her judges are evening wolves.” We have a second meaning for wolf today, and I’m not sure but that the Lord included that thought here also. “Her judges are evening wolves”—in other words, they are willing to work day and night—not for the people but for themselves.
“They gnaw not the bones till the morrow.” These men are willing to get all they can. Dr. Charles L. Feinberg comments: “The judges of the people were filled with insatiable greed, devouring all at once in their ravenous hunger. They left nothing till the morning” (Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, and Malachi, p. 64). Many of the men who go into office in our country, promising to help us, have not helped us, but they have done well themselves. By the time they retire from office, many of these men have become well-to-do. This is the thing that God judges. Judah was a nation like ours that had the Word of God. That which is said of Jerusalem could apply to us also. If God spoke out of heaven today, He would have to say these same things concerning us.
Her prophets are light and treacherous persons: her priests have polluted the sanctuary, they have done violence to the law [Zeph. 3:4].
“Her prophets are light.” This does not mean that they give light! It means that they do not really give the Word of God, but they give a little smattering of psychology with a few Scripture verses put over it like a sugarcoated pill. That’s the sort of thing that is being dished out today. They do not talk about judgment or the need for sinners to come to Christ.
“Her prophets are … treacherous persons.” That is, they are racketeers, religious racketeers. Again, let me suggest that you read Matthew 23 to see if God has changed. You will find there the Lord Jesus’ denouncement of religious rulers.
“Her priests have polluted the sanctuary.” This is a terrible thing. How have they polluted the sanctuary? They have caused the world outside to lose respect for that which was sacred. By their lives, they brought disrespect upon the temple, upon the sanctuary. The same thing took place in Samuel’s day when old Eli was priest. Men no longer had respect for religion. And today men decry the fact that the church has lost its influence. I decry it also, but, very frankly, I do not think that the church deserves the respect of the outside world when we cannot and do not present to them a church that is holy and that is living for God.
“They have done violence to the law.” In other words, they did not interpret it accurately. In fact, they did violence to it by omitting the teaching of the Word of God. “The law” here means the total Word of God.
The just Lord is in the midst thereof; he will not do iniquity: every morning doth he bring his judgment to light, he faileth not; but the unjust knoweth no shame [Zeph. 3:5].
“The just Lord is in the midst thereof; he will not do iniquity.” God is not going to do evil. The minute that His people do evil while God does nothing, it looks as if God approves that sort of thing. However, God says that He intends to move in judgment—God will not do iniquity.
“Every morning doth he bring his judgment to light, he faileth not; but the unjust knoweth no shame.” The unjust simply continue on in sin with no shame at all that it is public knowledge.
We have now in verses 6–8 the picture of the Great Tribulation Period that is coming in the future, the great Day of the Lord which Zephaniah has talked about. Zephaniah moves from speaking of the city of Jerusalem to talking about the nations of the world in the last days. This is Armageddon, which ends with the return of Christ to earth.
I have cut off the nations: their towers are desolate; I made their streets waste, that none passeth by: their cities are destroyed, so that there is no man, that there is none inhabitant [Zeph. 3:6].
It has been my privilege to walk through the ruins of great civilizations of the past. Recently, I walked through the ruins of Ostia, the playground of the Romans. It is just fifteen miles from Rome, but not very well known. It will become well known later, as Rome is developing it, and it will become a tourist attraction. Ostia was where Rome lived it up. It was the Las Vegas of the Roman Empire. As you stand in the ruins of that city and see the stones of the Roman road which were worn by chariot wheels, it is difficult to think that those streets were once crowded and that that city was a great city in its heyday. God says here, “I’m going to make them desolate.” It’s very difficult to believe that Los Angeles could become that desolate, but it could. It is difficult to believe that New York City could become desolate, but it could.
I said, Surely thou wilt fear me, thou wilt receive instruction; so their dwelling should not be cut off, howsoever I punished them: but they rose early, and corrupted all their doings [Zeph. 3:7].
The warnings of judgment and the little judgment that did come had no effect upon them. Eventually that will bring down finally the great Day of the Lord, the final time of judgment, which is coming upon this earth.
Therefore wait ye upon me, saith the Lord, until the day that I rise up to the prey: for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them mine indignation, even all my fierce anger: for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy [Zeph. 3:8].
This earth which you and I are living on is moving toward a judgment. Although folk don’t believe it, they are moving to judgment. It is this judgment which will be initiated when the Lord Jesus Christ returns to this earth for His church. It begins then with the Great Tribulation Period and ends when He comes to establish His kingdom on this earth.
ALL JUDGMENTS REMOVED AND THE KINGDOM ESTABLISHED
We are now going to pass from the darkness to the day and to see the blessings which are in store. The storm is over as far as the little Book of Zephaniah is concerned. The book opens with dark forebodings and with ominous rumblings of judgment. The first part of this chapter, which deals with the judgment of the city of Jerusalem, is almost frightening to read. It is frightening when you come to that picture of the Great Tribulation Period when God will judge all nations when they are brought up against Jerusalem in that last day (see Zech. 14:1–3). We have seen two kinds of judgment in the Book of Zephaniah. There is God’s judgment of His own people, which is always chastisement. “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth …” (Heb. 12:6)—in other words, He child-trains, or disciplines, them. Then God must judge the unbelieving world also. This is the picture of judgment that is before us in this little book. The Book of Zephaniah is like a Florida hurricane, a Texas tornado, a Mississippi River flood, a Minnesota snowstorm, and a California earthquake all rolled into one.
As you read this book you might think that God hates His people and that He hates mankind in general; you might think that He is vindictive, cruel, and brutal, that He is unfeeling and unmoved. However, the little story that I told in the Introduction is the story that illustrates the message of Zephaniah. It is the story of the man who took a little child into the darkness of the night and rushed her away from home. It looked as if he were kidnapping the child. It was frightful when he turned her over to another man who plunged a knife into her abdomen. But when you know the whole story, you find that the man was the father of that little girl. His own precious little girl had been having attacks of appendicitis, and that night he picked her up and rushed her to the hospital to put her into the hands of the family physician. Everything was done in tenderness. We find today that our Great Physician takes His own, the ones He loves, and puts them on the operating table. Even in judgment, God is love. When He is judging the unsaved or when He is judging those who are His own, God is love.
Someday the final curtain is coming down on this world in which we live. Man’s little day will be over, and judgment will come for lost mankind. But God will restore His children, and we will find out that what we endured down here was actually a blessing in disguise. Let me tell you another little story, one that actually happened. It is the story of a boy who was away from home in school, and things got rough for him there. The lessons were difficult, and he was homesick. He wrote home and said, “Dad, it’s hard here. The assignments are too heavy, and the dormitory rules are too strict. I’m homesick and I want to come home.” The father wrote back a stern and severe letter in which he said, “You stay on there and study hard. Apply yourself to your work.” When the boy got that letter, he thought, I don’t think my dad loves me anymore. My dad couldn’t love me, or he wouldn’t want me to go through this torture that I’m going through here. We have a Heavenly Father who tells us, “You stay down there in the college of life. I’m preparing a place for you, and I am also preparing you for that place.” With this in mind, let us turn to this final passage of Zephaniah.
For then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may all call upon the name of the Lord, to serve him with one consent [Zeph. 3:9].
God has this far-off purpose—it is called the teleological purpose of God. We will find it all through this section because now we are in the light. We are no longer in the darkness of the judgment, no longer in the Day of the Lord which begins at night. The sun has now arisen, and light has broken upon mankind.
“For then will I turn to the people a pure language.” He does not mean that everybody is going to speak Hebrew, although a great many people think that that is the meaning. Nor is He going to turn them to some other, perhaps unknown, language which everybody will speak. Nor is the “pure language” English spoken with a Texas accent! Many people find my Texas accent rather distasteful. I thought for awhile that you were going to have to get accustomed to it because it was what everybody would be speaking in heaven—but this doesn’t mean that at all. “Pure language” means exactly what it says: the language will be pure. There will be no blasphemy heard. There will be no vileness nor vulgarity. There will be nothing repulsive. The language will be pure.
At one time we had a neighbor who was a very big-hearted woman in many ways, but she was unsaved. She not only had a mean tongue, but she also had the vilest tongue that I have ever heard. It was offensive to people whenever she would lose her temper, for you could hear her throughout the entire neighborhood. It was very distasteful, so much so that some wanted to report her. In heaven, my friend, there will be nobody to report because there is going to be a pure language. Heaven will be pure in thought, word, and deed.
“That they may all call upon the name of the Lord, to serve him with one consent.” There will be no rebellion against God in that day. Heaven is going to be a really nice neighborhood to live in. In fact, it is going to be a glorious place, and you are going to have some good neighbors there.
From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia my suppliants, even the daughter of my dispersed, shall bring mine offering [Zeph. 3:10].
This verse of Scripture has been variously translated, and all sorts of interpretations have been presented for it. One interpretation is that the ark of the covenant is down in Ethiopia and that it will be brought up to Jerusalem as an offering at this time. I do not think that that is the thing Zephaniah has in mind here at all. Others call attention to a tribe in Ethiopia or Abyssinia known as the Falashas, which comes from the same root as the word Philistine, meaning migrant. They claim that they can trace their origin back to Israel, that they are Israelites. It is argued that these are the “suppliants” referred to here. Many feel that this verse speaks of those converted from the nations of the world who will bring dispersed Israelites back to their land as an offering to the Lord. My position is that this verse means that Ethiopia will enter the millennial kingdom—that is what is important for us to see. The offering that they will bring is the sacrifice of Christ Himself; in other words, they will come, having accepted His redemption.
In that day shalt thou not be ashamed for all thy doings, wherein thou hast transgressed against me: for then I will take away out of the midst of thee them that rejoice in thy pride, and thou shalt no more be haughty because of my holy mountain [Zeph. 3:11].
God is talking to His own here. We have seen that one of the things for which God was judging them was that there was no shame in their vile acts and gross immorality—they were not ashamed of it. But, my friend, God’s people will never reach the place where they can be satisfied in sin. If you can live in sin and be happy—you can be sure of one thing—you are not a child of God. The prodigal son was never happy in the pigpen, and since he was the son of the father, he had to say, “I’m going home to my father.” That revealed that he wasn’t a pig. Pigs love pigpens, but sons don’t love pigpens. A son wants to go to the father’s house because he has the nature of the father. God makes this very clear here: “In that day shalt thou not be ashamed for all thy doings, wherein thou hast trangressed against me.”
“For then I will take away out of the midst of thee them that rejoice in thy pride, and thou shalt no more be haughty because of my holy mountain.” This speaks of the day when the meek shall inherit the earth. The other crowd has it now, and they are not doing very well with it.
I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord [Zeph. 3:12].
When the Babylonians took Judah into captivity, there were three deportations of slaves taken, but they never took all of the people. The poor, the afflicted, and the crippled were not taken to Babylon. You can imagine how they felt. It was terrible to go into Babylonian captivity to become a slave, but it was actually worse to be left behind. God says here, “I intend to take care of the afflicted and the poor.” You will notice that all the way through Scripture, the Lord often mentions the fact that He intends someday to see that the poor get an honest deal and that they are treated right. The only one in the world today who has a helpful program for the poor is the Lord Jesus Christ. If you are poor and needy, He is the one to go to. He can help you, and He is the only one who can help.
The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid [Zeph. 3:13].
“The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity.” God has always had a remnant, and there will be this very large remnant in the Millennium.
“Nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth.” That the day is coming when they will not do these things would seem to indicate that they once did them. Even God’s people indulged in sin—but not permanently. They cannot continue to live in sin. They may get their feet dirty, they may get down in the pigpen, but they simply will not stay in the pigpen.
“For they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid.” All of this has reference to the day when God will put His people back in their land and give them the land. Therefore, are you prepared to say that what has happened and is happening in that land today is a fulfillment of prophecy? Is it true that “none shall make them afraid”? My friend, Israel has not had a moment, since they’ve been in that land, that they have not been frightened.
We come now to a description of the day when the King is going to set up His kingdom on the earth.
Sing, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel; be glad and rejoice with all the heart, O daughter of Jerusalem.
The Lord hath taken away thy judgments, he hath cast out thine enemy: the king of Israel, even the Lord, is in the midst of thee: thou shalt not see evil any more [Zeph. 3:14–15].
The Lord Jesus will come to the earth, evil will be put down, and “… the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” (Isa. 11:9).
In that day it shall be said to Jerusalem, Fear thou not: and to Zion, Let not thine hands be slack [Zeph. 3:16].
“In that day it shall be said to Jerusalem, Fear thou not.” Jerusalem has reason to be afraid now, but she will have nothing to fear in that day.
“And to Zion, Let not thine hands be slack.” In other words, “Be busy for the Lord.”
Verse 17 is a marvelous verse—
The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing [Zeph. 3:17].
My friend, God has a purpose. He goes through the night of judgment in order to bring us into the light of a new day. He does all of this that the day might come when He can rest in His love. God loves you and me today. I don’t know about you, but I doubt very seriously whether He can rest in His love for Vernon McGee. He could say of me, “He’s not perfected yet. He seems so immature. He is so filled with faults. He is apt to digress, apt to detour, at any moment.” God cannot rest in His love today. But the day is coming when we will be in His likeness—after He has put us on the “operating table”. Then He is going to bring us to Himself. What a wonderful and glorious picture this is!
I will gather them that are sorrowful for the solemn assembly, who are of thee, to whom the reproach of it was a burden.
Behold, at that time I will undo all that afflict thee: and I will save her that halteth, and gather her that was driven out; and I will get them praise and fame in every land where they have been put to shame.
At that time will I bring you again, even in the time that I gather you: for I will make you a name and a praise among all people of the earth, when I turn back your captivity before your eyes, saith the Lord [Zeph. 3:18–20].
Oh, this is the day of light that will come. It will be glorious for the nation Israel, and it will be glorious for the church also. God is putting many of us through the furnace, and He is putting us through trials. The glorious thing about heaven will not be the golden streets, it will not be the gates of pearl, and it will not be the fact that He is going to wipe away all tears. The glorious thing in heaven will be that we are going to thank Him for every trial we had and for every burden that He put on us in this life.
I conclude with this wonderful little poem, “In the Crucible”—
Out from the mine and the darkness,
Out from the damp and the mold,
Out from the fiery furnace,
Cometh each grain of gold.
Crushed into atoms and leveled
Down to the humblest dust
With never a heart to pity,
With never a hand to trust.
Molten and hammered and beaten,
Seemeth it ne’er to be done.
Oh! for such fiery trial,
What hath the poor gold done?
Oh! ’twere a mercy to leave it
Down in the damp and the mold.
If this is the glory of living,
Then better to be dross than gold.
Under the press and the roller,
Into the jaws of the mint,
Stamped with the emblem of freedom
With never a flaw or a dint.
Oh! what a joy the refining
Out of the damp and the mold!
And stamped with the glorious image,
Oh, beautiful coin of gold!
Someday, when you and I are in the presence of our Savior, we will thank Him for every burden, every trial, every heartache. We will thank Him for dealing with us as a wise father deals with his children, and we will thank Him for the dark side of His love.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Minor Prophets of Judah. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1975. (Obadiah, Joel, Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, and Habakkuk.)
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The book of
Haggai
ITRODUCTION
The prophets to the returned remnant were Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Haggai, the writer of this short book, is mentioned in Ezra 5:1–2 and 6:14 as one of the two prophets who encouraged the remnant (that returned after the Babylonian captivity) to rebuild the temple in spite of the difficulties that beset them on every hand. From this and the brief references that he made to himself in his prophecy, four things become apparent:
1. Haggai was self-effacing—he exalted the Lord. He took the same position that John the Baptist took: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).
2. He was God’s messenger. The expression “Thus saith the Lord” characterizes his message.
3. He not only rebuked the people; he also cheered and encouraged them in a marvelous way.
4. He not only preached; he also practiced.
Haggai begins his book by saying, “In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month.” Hystaspes (the Darius mentioned here) began to reign in 521 b.c., making the second year of his reign about 520 b.c. “The second year of Darius” enables the historian to pinpoint the time of this prophet in profane history. It is interesting to note that the post-Captivity prophets begin to date their prophecies according to the reign of gentile rulers. Those prophets who prophesied before the Captivity always tied the dates of their writings into the reign of either a king of Israel or a king of Judah or both. After the Captivity, since there was no king in either the northern or the southern kingdom, Haggai dates his prophecy according to a gentile king. The Lord Jesus said, “…Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled” (Luke 21:24). In Haggai’s day the “times of the Gentiles” had already begun (in fact, it began with the captivity of Judah under Nebuchadnezzar). Since that time Jerusalem has been under gentile domination, and Haggai dates his prophecy accordingly.
The theme of Haggai is the temple. The reconstruction and refurbishing of the temple were the supreme passion of this prophet. He not only rebuked the people for their delay in rebuilding the temple, but he also encouraged them and helped them in this enterprise.
Haggai constantly referred to the “word of the Lord” as the supreme authority. He willingly humbled himself that the Lord might be exalted. His message was practical. It was as simple and factual as 2 + 2 = 4. The prophecy of Haggai and the Epistle of James have much in common. Both put the emphasis upon the daily grind. Action is spiritual. A “do nothing” attitude is wicked. Both place this yardstick down upon life. Work is the measure of life.
Haggai’s contemporary, Zechariah, was visionary and had his head in the clouds, but pragmatic Haggai had both feet on the ground. The man of action and the dreamer need to walk together. First Corinthians 15:58 can appropriately be written over this book: “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.”
There are two key verses in this book: “Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the Lord …. And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and did work in the house of the Lord of hosts, their God” (Hag. 1:8, 14).
OUTLINE
The compass of this book is three months and fourteen days, according to the calendar. There are five messages in the book, and each was given on a specific date. The calendar furnishes the clue for the contents.
I. September 1, 520 b.c., Chapter 1:1–11 A. Challenge to the People
A. A Charge of Conflict of Interest, Chapter 1:1–4
B. A Call to Consider Their Ways, Chapter 1:5–7
C. A Command to Construct the Temple, Chapter 1:8–11
II. September 24, 520 b.c., Chapter 1:12–15 The Response to the Challenge
A. Construction of the Temple; People Obeyed, Chapter 1:12
B. Confirmation from God, Chapter 1:13–15
III. October 21, 520 b.c., Chapter 2:1–9 The Discouragement of the People; The Encouragement of the Lord
IV. December 24, 520 b.c., Chapter 2:10–19 An Appeal to the Law; The Explanation of the Principle
V. December 24, 520 b.c., Chapter 2:20–23 A Revelation of God’s Program; An Expectation for the Future
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Challenge to the people; charge of conflict of interest; call to consider their ways; command to construct the temple; construction of the temple—obedience of the people; confirmation from God
Haggai was a prophet to the restored remnant who returned to Jerusalem after the seventy-year captivity in Babylon. In the study of this prophecy we will note how important it is to consider the historical books along with the prophetic books. There is a little cluster of books that belong together: Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther for the historical record; and Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi for the prophetic section—also, the Book of Daniel probably should be studied first. These books belong together and constitute a unit.
CHALLENGE TO THE PEOPLE
Haggai and Zechariah prophesied during the same period, yet their approach was altogether different. They both challenged and encouraged the returned remnant to rebuild the temple and then to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. “Then the prophets, Haggai the prophet, and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophesied unto the Jews that were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel, even unto them. Then rose up Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and began to build the house of God which is at Jerusalem: and with them were the prophets of God helping them” (Ezra 5:1–2). So, you see, both Haggai and Zechariah are mentioned in this historical Book of Ezra as the two prophets who encouraged the people to rebuild the temple and also aided them in it. Also, in Ezra 6:14 we read: “And the elders of the Jews builded, and they prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. And they builded, and finished it, according to the commandment of the God of Israel, and according to the commandment of Cyrus, and Darius, and Artaxerxes king of Persia.”
CHARGE OF CONFLICT OF INTEREST
In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month, came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet unto Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, saying [Hag. 1:1].
“IIn the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, in the first day of the month” gives us the date of this prophecy, which is September 1, 520 b.c., according to the Jewish calendar. This is a book we can date very easily. As we said in the Introduction, the dating is according to the gentile ruler, Darius. The dating is no longer geared to the king of Israel or Judah because Haggai is writing during the “times of the Gentiles,” which began with the Babylonian captivity and continues to the present day. The Lord Jesus said, “And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled” (Luke 21:24).
“Came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet.” We will find all the way through this little book that Haggai repeatedly refers to the Word of the Lord. He is making it clear that he is not speaking his own thoughts but is giving the Word of God to his people.
“Unto Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah.” The name Zerubbabel means “sown in Babylon”; that is, he was born in captivity down in Babylon. It is actually a heathen name, by the way. He was in the line of David, the grandson of Jehoiachin (see 1 Chron. 3:16–19), and was appointed by Cyrus to be governor of Judah.
“And to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest.” Joshua was the son of Jehozadak who was high priest at the time of the Babylonian invasion (see 1 Chron. 6:15). This man was the religious head. So, you see, God is sending His message first to the leaders, the religious and civil rulers.
When the Israelites returned from Babylonian captivity to their own land, they returned with great anticipation, and their enthusiasm for rebuilding ran high. But they met gigantic obstacles which required herculean effort and hardships. After they had gone through a period like that, they were discouraged when they began to build the temple. The difficulties seemed insurmountable. Therefore they rationalized and decided that it was not the time to build. In other words, this was their pseudoconsolation. They decided to maintain the status quo. They said, “It is so hard, evidently God doesn’t intend us to do it.” They had laid the foundation of the temple, but the opposition of the Samaritans was so intense that they simply stopped building, and their excuse was, “Well, the time has not come.”
Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, This people say, The time is not come, the time that the Lord’s house should be built [Hag. 1:2].
If you will read the Book of Nehemiah, you will see that, when they were rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, the opposition was terrific. Well, they had the same kind of opposition in rebuilding the temple, and the people said, “Well, this is not the Lord’s time to build it.”
Notice that God says, “This people say”—ordinarily He calls them My people, but not here. By this He doesn’t mean that He has disowned them; He is just displeased with them. They are not in His will, and they are covering their disobedience with the pioussounding excuse, “It is just not the right time to build the Lord’s house.”
What Haggai is going to say will hurt a little. He is going to stick the knife in the trouble spot that, by the way, touches the lives of many Christians. Have you ever heard people say that they had given up trying to do something or that they did not go someplace because it was not the Lord’s will? They will sometimes say that the Lord directed them to do something else. Saying that it is the Lord’s will to do this or not to do that is a Christian cliché that covers a multitude of sins. It is so easy, when things get hard and rough, to turn in a report to everyone that says, “The Lord wanted me to do something else.” Many a preacher, when things got tough in his church, has said, “The Lord needs me somewhere else.” My heart goes out to pastors who are really trying to serve God but are having trouble and end up saying, “The Lord is leading me elsewhere.” When the Lord’s people started building the temple and the going got rough, they said, “It’s not the Lord’s time to build.”
I remember when we attempted to remodel the church in downtown Los Angeles, California, where I served as pastor. The church in its long history had never been remodeled, and the seats, which numbered four thousand, were built to take care of people who lived fifty or sixty years ago. We discovered that people today are about 2 1/2 inches wider than they were fifty years ago! We decided to put in new cushioned seats. Some of the very pious folks said, “We don’t feel that money should be spent for cushions. We should give that money to missions.” Now the majority of the people wanted the cushioned seats, and I did too, so I made a proposition to the congregation. I said, “There are so many people enthusiastic about remodeling that they are going to give enough money to cushion their seat and yours too, so those of you who don’t want to pay for cushioned seats can give your twenty-five dollars to missions. I hope that we can take an offering today for several hundred twenty-five dollar checks.” Well, there were very few twenty-five dollar checks. Why? The truth was that the folk who were objecting to the cushioned seats never intended to give at all, and “missions instead of cushions” was their excuse. But what they said was, “It isn’t God’s will to have cushioned seats. The time hasn’t come to remodel the church.”
It was my privilege to remodel every church which I served as pastor. I never built a new church, but I remodeled each of them. And I always encountered the same problem. In each church there was a little group—a very small group, thank God for that—which didn’t do anything, but they were good at criticizing. And the excuse was always the same—“The money shouldn’t be spent on us here; it should go to missions.” Then they should have given it to missions, but they did not.
The crowd that Haggai is addressing rationalized in the same way. He is pulling the Band-Aid off and exposing the sore. And it isn’t an “ouchless” Band-Aid—it hurts, you may be sure of that.
Now here is message number one, given on September 1, 520 b.c. Notice that Haggai is giving the Word of the Lord.
Then came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet, saying,
Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in your ceiled houses, and this house lie waste? [Hag. 1:3–4].
These folk who said it was not time to build the Lord’s house had all built their own houses—it seemed the time to do that! And the Lord pointed out that their houses were “ceiled houses.” This means that they were beautifully paneled; they were luxuriously built. And for fifteen years, while they had been building their elaborate homes, the Lord’s house had been lying waste.
It is amazing, but I have found it true thoughout my many years in the ministry, that a great many people say, “I feel it is God’s will for me to help you in your ministry,” and then when the going gets a little rough, say, “It doesn’t seem to be the Lord’s will for me to help at this time.” You see, the minute that things become difficult, that is the time most people decide their resolve is not the Lord’s will. But when it is something for their own selfish ends, they usually go ahead and do it, don’t they? Most people are that way. We make the effort to accomplish that which will always be to our advantage.
In Haggai’s day, how in the world were the people able to build their lovely paneled homes? Surely they encountered difficulties, but they were not willing to face the same difficulties to build the Lord’s house. Their lame excuse was, “It’s just not the Lord’s will right now for us to do that.”
Oh, I get so weary of hearing people give that excuse for not doing something for God! What do they know about the Lord’s will? Just because something is difficult and hard and is going to cost you something, does that mean it is not the Lord’s will? May I say to you, that is not the way to interpret the Lord’s will. Sometimes the Lord’s will is very rugged. If we could just listen to the stories of some of God’s choice saints of the past, they would tell us that God’s will was not always a smooth path.
I wonder what Abraham would say to the people today who say, “It is not God’s will for me to do this or that.” Abraham lived in Ur of the Chaldees. This man who was to be the father of the Israelites was no doubt a good businessman. He had a nice business in Ur, a highly civilized city in those days and a prosperous one. It was a city of luxury. One day God said to Abraham, “I want you to leave Ur.” It would have been easy for Abraham to rationalize, “I must have misunderstood the Lord. He would not ask me to leave this place. The life here is soft and easy. It couldn’t be the Lord’s will for me to leave this city.”
There are literally thousands of missionaries on the mission field today who are making great sacrifices. Why? They do it because they believe it is God’s will for them to be on the mission field. I wonder how many of us here at home should be on the mission field. I wonder how many church members there are today who are as busy as termites arranging social events that require no sacrifice or hardship, instead of standing up to the opposition and really getting out the Word of God.
Notice again that Haggai is making it clear that these are not his own words; they are the words of God.
I always feel badly when I am in a place like Mexico, and I see all of those ornate cathedrals and the people living in poverty around them. It is easy for us to point a finger and say, “That just isn’t right.” I agree that it isn’t right, but neither is it right for a church to be in a state of disrepair. A church needs to be attractive in order to attract the sinner. One excuse I heard for a church being in such terrible shape was that the congregation gave all of its money to missions. A deacon in that church told me that the reason their church did not have a carpet on the floor or new pews was that all their money had gone to missions. When that deacon took me to his home, he treated me royally. He put me in a guest room that was nicer than any room I had ever been in. His home, I was told, cost over one hundred thousand dollars back in the old days. I have a notion it is worth a great deal more today. It was all I could do to keep quiet. I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying, “You believe in giving to missions, and you don’t put a rug on the floor of your church, but look at your home! You could have been a little less lavish and still could have had money for missions and your church.”
Let me ask you a question, friend, “How much are you spending on yourself, and how much are you doing for God?” That question gets close to us, doesn’t it?
May I use another illustration concerning this subject? I went to dinner with a friend of mine who is a fine Christian layman. The dinner was rather expensive, and he left a generous tip for the waitress. Then we went to a church service that evening in order to hear a certain preacher. We heard a good sermon, and when the offering plate was passed, my friend put in one dollar, which was much less than he had given the waitress. I thought, My, he’s not even tipping God! My friend, this gets right down to where we live.
The Israelites were saying, “It is just not the time for the Lord’s house to be built.” God says, “Then why is it time for your houses to be built?” There is a lot of hypocrisy in the church today. It is sickening to hear people boast about what they do for God when what they do for themselves is a thousand times more than what they are doing for God.
I told you that what Haggai has to say will hurt. He would never win a popularity contest. He is rather like an alarm clock. The alarm clock will never become the most treasured possession of the average American. It is an institution of our contemporary American society but not one that will win a loving cup or a popularity contest. We do not like to be awakened from a sound and restful sleep. The culprit who does it is a criminal, and he should be punished, not rewarded. There are manufacturers today who are making alarm clocks with pleasant sounds, but they are still alarm clocks. Today America is prosperous and powerful and comfortable and satisfied and satiated. We have come to a place where it is woe to anyone who disturbs us, sounds an alarm, blows a whistle, or turns on a siren. In one community a church was restrained from putting up chimes because it would wake up the people in the neighborhood on Sunday morning. If Paul Revere rode again today, he would be arrested for disturbing the peace. John the Baptist would lose his head, not for rebuking a king’s sinful life but for being a rabble-rouser and a calamity-howler.
That is the reason God’s prophets never won a popularity contest. They were stoned, not starred. And Haggai is an alarm clock. He wakes us up, and he disturbs us. We don’t like that. And the people in his day didn’t like it. They had just come out of the Babylonian captivity, and they didn’t want to hear his message. Haggai occupied a very difficult position. He stood between a rock and a hard place. Yet he attempted to wake up his people to do something for God, and his method was very unusual, though not original by any means. Although his method is not being used in our day, I think it would still be effective in God’s work.
CALL TO CONSIDER THEIR WAYS
Now God calls their attention to something which is very practical. This gets right down to the nitty-gritty of life.
Now therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts; Consider your ways [Hag. 1:5].
“Consider your ways” is literally, set your heart upon your ways. Look at what is happening to you. Now He goes into detail—
Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Consider your ways [Hag. 1:6–7].
God was judging them concerning their material things, and they were not recognizing it as His judgment. We see in the Book of Hebrews, “If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?” (Heb. 12:7). When God disciplines us, there is a reason for it. The child of God needs to consider his ways. He needs to examine his own heart to see why God is putting him through the mill or using sandpaper on him. God wants to smooth the rough edges off our lives; so He does use sandpaper.
For the people of Israel there had been crop failure. There had been famine. There had been little money to buy clothes or food, and they had no savings account. But they never once attributed this to their disobedience. They were trying to explain it in other ways. What about God’s children in our day? “Oh,” they say, “that’s just my luck.” It is not luck if you are God’s child. Difficulties come to you for a purpose. God won’t let anything happen to you unless it has a purpose. God is trying to develop something valuable in your heart and life. That is why God said, “Consider your ways.” Man’s ways always seem right to him. The writer of the Book of Proverbs says, “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” (Prov. 14:12). In Isaiah 53:6 we read, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way …” (italics mine). The problem with mankind today is that we all want to go our own way. Again the writer of Psalm 1 says, “For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish” (Ps. 1:6).
Notice how the Word of God enlarges upon the things that reveal man’s way as opposed to God’s way: “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon” (Isa. 55:7). And in Proverbs 13:15 He says that “… the way of transgressors is hard.” It certainly is hard! Again in Isaiah He says, “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isa. 55:9). And then—“O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps” (Jer. 10:23). Also, “Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein” (Jer. 6:16). Man is in rebellion against God. In Jeremiah 10:2 God says, “… Learn not the way of the heathen….” And God says, “… This is the way, walk ye in it …” (Isa. 30:21). And the Lord Jesus said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. But he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep” (John 10:1–2). He goes on to say, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture” (John 10:9). How tremendous this is!
This is what God is saying to His people. He wants them to consider their ways. He wants them to set their hearts upon their ways. He asks, “Don’t you see what is happening to you?”
Now let me ask you, “What way are you on today? What path are you taking? Where is that path leading you? Have you ever considered where drugs are going to lead you? It is a broad way where you start out, and you can do as you please, but that broad way is actually a funnel, and it grows narrower and narrower until there is only one little opening, which leads only to destruction. But God says that the way which leads to life is a narrow way—Christ is that way; He is the only way to the Father. When you enter the narrow way, it becomes broader and broader as you go along until you can go in and out and find pasture. You will have life and have it abundantly. My friend, it is time to consider your ways. Set your heart upon your ways. Where are you headed today? How is your marriage working out? If you are a young person in college, do you have a goal in life? If you are a young lady, how about the young man you are dating? Where is he leading you? What is going to happen to you? Why don’t you consider your ways?
Folk from all walks of life write to me. Many are headed in the right direction; others very frankly say that they are on the wrong path, and they are suffering broken homes, broken hearts, and wrecked lives. God says, “Consider your ways.”
COMMAND TO CONSTRUCT THE TEMPLE
Now God is going to give them the solution to their problems. It is so simple, so clear that you may wonder why it is necessary to emphasize it. God gives them a command to construct the temple, and He tells them three things that they are to do. You see, the children of Israel had a conflict of interests. They had put their own homes before God’s house. They were putting their selfish ends ahead of God’s program. The Lord Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, said that we are to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness (see Matt. 6:33). That “righteousness” is in Christ. When you have Christ, you have everything—you have all those things you are after. Money can be spiritual, depending on what you use it for. Your home can be spiritual if it is a place where God is honored. It can be a place where a testimony for the Lord is given, where friends can come and be refreshed, or where a Bible class can be taught. It can be a place as sacred as your church. The things that people are after today may not be wrong, but it is wrong when they put them first in their lives and use them for their own selfish ends.
Now God tells the people in Haggai’s day what they are to do:
Go up to the mountain, and bring wood, and build the house; and I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified, saith the Lord [Hag. 1:8].
The solution is so simple—there are only three things they are to do: (1) “Go up to the mountain, and” (2) “bring wood, and” (3) “build the house.” I’ll be honest with you, I wonder why some of the children of Israel had not realized this sooner. When people get that big “I” in front of their eyes, it obscures everything else, and they are blind to the things they should see. That which should be very simple becomes a very complex problem. People today say, “Life is so complicated. We need a psychiatrist. We need to get things straightened out.” My friend, if you just put God in His rightful place, He will straighten out a great many things for you. But first, you must get the big “I” out of the way.
“Go up to the mountain, and bring wood.” If you have visited the land of Israel, you may wonder about God’s command to go up to the mountain and bring down trees since that land is almost denuded of trees today. For many years now Israel has been carrying on a project of tree planting. Although they have planted millions of trees, the hills still look bare to me. Very few of them have any sign of green on them. At one time that land was covered with trees, as this verse reveals. God wouldn’t tell them to go up to the mountain and get wood if there were not wood up there. Then what happened to the trees? Well, when the enemy invaded Israel in a.d. 70, the forces of Rome not only destroyed the cities, they also denuded the land of trees. They cut down practically every tree.
Now notice again God’s simple solution to their problems: (1) “Go up to the mountain, and” (2) “bring wood, and” (3) “build the house.” Going up to the mountain, felling the trees, and making them into lumber would take work and a great deal of effort.
My friend, if you are not ready to go to work for the Lord, if you are not willing to do what God wants you to do—whatever that might be—Bible study is really not going to help you very much. God believes in work, and the message of this little Book of Haggai is the gospel of work.
As we have seen in this marvelous little book, first there was God’s challenge to His people. They were kidding themselves that they were doing God’s will. But the reason they had not built the temple was that they were just plain lazy. They tried to conceal that fact with the very pious platitude, “The time isn’t right. It isn’t the will of God to build at this time.” God told them to get off their haunches and go to work. He said, “You have been attributing the fact that you have had bad crops and that things are difficult for you to other causes. You have been blaming your circumstances. Why don’t you blame Me? I am the One who has sent trouble to you. I’m trying to wake you up.” He tells them to consider their ways, to set their hearts on their ways. And now He says to get busy. He charged them with a conflict of interests, then He called them to consider their ways, and now He commands them to start to build the temple. And it is very simple, “Go to the mountain and bring down wood. You can’t expect the logs to roll down to you. It is up to you to go to work.”
There are so many voices today encouraging Christians to expect a miracle in their lives. They say, “God is going to deal with you by a miracle!” Well, I’m here to tell you that He is not. It would have been very easy for someone to have come along and to have told these Israelites to expect a miracle, but God says, “Go up there and bring down wood. Go to work.” My friend, there is no easy shortcut in our service for God.
Very frankly, laziness is the reason Sunday school teachers don’t succeed. Laziness is the reason preachers don’t succeed. Laziness is the reason people fail in their Christian lives. You have to work at it. I do not think that the Holy Spirit will ever bless laziness.
In seminary I remember one of the students complaining to the professor, “Doctor, that book you assigned for us to read is really dry!” The professor looked up and smiled, “Well, dampen it with a little sweat from your brow.” That’s the way to do it, friend. Don’t expect the Christian life to be handed to you on a silver platter. The miracle comes in the work that you do. God told His people in Haggai’s day to go to work.
Dr. Frank Morgan has called it (1) the appeal to the mind. God told them at the very beginning, “You say it is not time to build God’s house? I want you to think about that. How is it that you are living in fine houses?” That was His appeal to the mind. (2) He appealed to the heart. He called them to consider, to set their heart on this. They had not done so, but that was His challenge. (3) God gave them a command, and that command was an appeal to the will. “Go up, bring wood, and build”—so simple yet so important.
My friend, roll up your sleeves, and let’s go to work for God today. So many people are sitting on the sidelines. This is a day of spectator sports; but frankly, it is a day of spectator Christians also. They like to sit on the sidelines and watch somebody else do it. Many a preacher is being worked to death. He is called upon to visit all the sick folk in his congregation. He does all the administrative work—he is expected to supervise everything. What about you deacons? Why don’t you go to work? What about you members of the church? Are you visiting the sick? The pastor is to train you to do the work of the ministry. He is not the one to do it all. The work should be divided and shared. The burden of the ministry should not fall on just a few folk. If you are a member of a local congregation, you should go to work. Work is something which is desperately needed in our churches today.
Let me illustrate what I mean. My first pastorate after I was ordained was my home church, the church in which I had been raised. One morning a deacon made a special trip to the study to talk with me. He said, “Vernon, I can’t pray in public. I don’t know why, but I can’t do it. The fact of the matter is, I can’t speak in public either. Don’t ever call on me to speak or pray in public. If you do, I will embarrass you, and I will embarrass myself. I simply can’t do either one of these things in public, and I can’t seem to overcome the weakness.” Tears were in his eyes as he spoke. Then he said, “But anytime anything needs to be done in this church, whether it is to replace a light bulb that has burned out or to put a new roof on the church, you can call on me. I will be glad to do it.” Do you know what I did after that? If something needed repairing or remodeling around the church, I would call on him. Sometimes in less than an hour, a whole crew of men would be at the church to work, and that deacon would work right along with them. I learned very early that he was one of the most valuable members I ever had in a church. He was a Haggai. He believed in getting down to business and doing the work that needed to be done. Often I heard visiting speakers and others say, “My, this church is certainly kept up; what a lovely place to come and worship!” Do you know why that church looked so nice? A man in my church could not pray in public. Thank God he couldn’t pray in public, because most churches have too many men who love to pray in public. We need people who are working people, too. We need people who are willing to roll up their sleeves and go to work.
Actually, the Book of Haggai is too simple to be in God’s Word. It should be a little bit more complicated. Haggai gave the people a sermon. He said, “Go up to the mountain.” That is the first point. Then he said, “Bring down the wood.” That is point number two. Then he said, “Build a house.” That is the third point. Those were God’s simple instructions. There was nothing more to say, but there was something to do.
Now God explains why the people of Israel had been having such a difficult time—
Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came to little; and when ye brought it home, I did blow upon it. Why? saith the Lord of hosts. Because of mine house that is waste, and ye run every man unto his own house [Hag. 1:9].
“And ye run every man unto his own house” indicates the zeal and enthusiasm with which they had been taking care of their own interests and building their own homes.
They had been wondering why all of these difficulties had come upon them, but they were too pious to blame God. They claimed that their bad luck was due to circumstances. It was a bad year. “We had a drought, you know,” they would say. But God told them, “I want you to know that I caused the drought. I saw to it that you were not successful in your different schemes, and I will tell you why I did it. It is because My house is lying in waste while every man improves his own home.”
Let me repeat that the Lord Jesus stated the great principle in the Book of Haggai, which is applicable for all people of all ages, when He said, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matt. 6:33). When God is put first in our lives, all other things will take care of themselves. What a message this is! Yet it is so simple, I’m afraid we will miss it.
Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew, and the earth is stayed from her fruit [Hag. 1:10].
Naturally, when there was no rain, there were no crops. The wheat and the barley would not grow, and the vines would not produce. God says, “I turned off the spigot; I didn’t give you any water.”
In our contemporary society we don’t interpret life like that. Because we live in a mechanical society, an electronic age, we blame our problems on someone’s failure to push a button or on pushing the wrong button. I wonder if God would like to get through to America and say, “Look, has it ever occurred to you that I may be behind the problems you are having? Did it ever occur to you that I am trying to get your attention off things and onto Me?”
Notice that God takes the blame for all of these trials which have come upon Israel—
And I called for a drought upon the land, and upon the mountains, and upon the corn, and upon the new wine, and upon the oil, and upon that which the ground bringeth forth, and upon men, and upon cattle, and upon all the labour of the hands [Hag. 1:11].
God is saying to them, “Material blessings have been withheld from you because Iwithheld them. I am responsible.”
In our day, the tendency is to blame first the police—they should have been on the job. Then we blame the mayor, we blame the legislature, and we blame Washington. Very possibly all of them are guilty. But, my friend, has it occurred to you that you yourself are to blame? Although we blame men and machines for the conditions of the world, God has brought it all to pass. Do you want to blame Him? Go ahead. He told Israel that He was responsible. But He also told them why. They had neglected Him. You see, the solution to our problems is very simple; yet it is complicated. We think that if we put in a new method or a new machine or a new man, our problems will be solved. My friend, why don’t we recognize what our problem really is, who caused it, and how it can be solved?
Now Haggai tells us the response to the challenge which God has given to the people of Israel.
CONSTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLE—OBEDIENCE OF THE PEOPLE
Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the Lord their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God had sent him, and the people did fear before the Lord [Hag. 1:12].
Zerubbabel is the governor, Joshua is the high priest, and “all the remnant of the people” refers to the people who returned to the land of Israel from Babylonian captivity.
Notice that they did two things: (1) They obeyed God. As Samuel the prophet had said to a disobedient king, “…to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams” (1 Sam. 15:22). And the apostle John put it this way, “…if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:7). You see, we must walk in the light of the Word of God, and the Word will humble us and show us our failures. A great many of us don’t like to have them called to our attention; but if we will recognize them and deal with them, we will find that the blood of Jesus Christ will just keep on cleansing us from all sin, and we will have fellowship with God. So we see that the people of Israel obeyed God.
Also (2) they feared God. The writer of Proverbs says that “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom …” (Prov. 9:10).
It is significant that the leaders of the people, Zerubbabel and Joshua, are mentioned first in their obedience to God. The need today in our country is for obedient Christians in places of leadership. William Gladstone, the famous British statesman, was asked what was the mark of a great statesman. His reply was that a statesman is a man who knows the direction God is moving for the next fifty years. Well, we don’t seem to have men in leadership who know the direction God is moving for the next fifty minutes. Oh, how we need men who really know God and are being led by Him!
CONFIRMATION FROM GOD
When they obey God and fear Him, they receive this wonderful confirmation from Him.
Then spake Haggai the Lord’s messenger in the Lord’s message unto the people, saying, I am with you, saith the Lord [Hag. 1:13].
He says, “I am with you.” How wonderful! You remember that the Lord Jesus said to His own, “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the age.” And notice that the promise of His presence rested upon their obedience: “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world [the age]. Amen” (Matt. 28:19–20). He didn’t say that He will be with you if you sit on your haunches and don’t do anything for God. He didn’t promise to be with you there. He said that He will be with you when you obey Him. That is the place of blessing and of fellowship. And you can’t have anything better than that.
Now notice that the leaders enter enthusiastically into the work.
And the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people; and they came and did work in the house of the Lord of hosts, their God [Hag. 1:14].
It is pretty important to see the leadership of the nation in action. Zerubbabel was the civil leader, the governor. He was in the kingly line and was the son of Shealtiel, whose name means “asking of God in prayer.” And Joshua, the high priest, was the son of Josedech (Jehozadak) who was high priest at the time of the Babylonian invasion. So we see here the civil and religious leaders joining in with the people in doing the work of the Lord.
This second message was given, and Haggai dates it—
In the four and twentieth day of the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the king [Hag. 1:15].
This is September 24, 520 b.c. The first message, as we have seen, was given on September 1, 520 b.c.—that was when God challenged them. They had responded to the challenge, had come together, had organized the project, were cutting down trees, were making them into lumber, and had started to build the temple. Now, twenty-four days later, Haggai gives them this second message from God, the assurance of His presence.
Haggai was an orderly man, as his book indicates. He was also an administrator. He was a man who was right down to earth. He helped the people rebuild the temple, and as they worked together he continually encouraged and challenged them in their work. The results would be great. God would be pleased, and God would be glorified.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Discouragement of the people; encouragement of the Lord; appeal to the Law; explanation of the principle; revelation of God’s program; expectation for the future
In the second chapter we see the discouragement of the people and the encouragement of the Lord. The obvious inferiority of the second temple to the temple of Solomon became a cause of discouragement, but God responded to it.
DISCOURAGEMENT OF THE PEOPLE
In the seventh month, in the one and twentieth day of the month, came the word of the Lord by the prophet Haggai, saying [Hag. 2:1].
Notice that this took place in the seventh month—the previous time they heard God’s message of encouragement was in the sixth month. So now they had been working for a month. They had spent about twenty-four days getting organized, and now the temple is beginning to go up. There is great enthusiasm as they see their progress. And they remember God’s encouraging, “I am with you.”
Now we come to the second item of discouragement.
Speak now to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest, and to the residue of the people, saying [Hag. 2:2].
This message is directed to the same group of people whom God had encouraged in the previous chapter, the same leaders and the same people.
Now here is the second hurdle which Haggai had to clear as he prophesied to these folk—
Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? [Hag. 2:3].
Many of those who had returned from the Babylonian captivity could remember—although they had been very young at the time—the beauty and the richness of Solomon’s temple. This little temple which they were putting up looked like a tenant farmer’s barn in Georgia in comparison to the richness and glory of Solomon’s temple. Although Solomon’s temple had not been a large temple, as temples go, they could remember its ornate richness, the jewels, the gold, and the silver which had been put into it. Before inflation the estimated value of the materials that went into Solomon’s temple varied between five million and twenty million dollars—that is quite a difference, of course, but in that day either five or twenty million dollars was quite a sum of wealth. That temple had been like a beautiful little jewel box.
Now let me draw your attention again to the dating of this third message from God: “the seventh month, in the one and twentieth day of the month.” If you cheek this date in Leviticus 23, you will find that it was the seventh day of the Feast of Tabernacles, the final feast of ingathering for the Jews. I am of the opinion that the builders had really pushed and speeded up their building in order to get the temple as far along as possible in order to use it for the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles. So when some of the old timers came into it and saw the lack of beauty and richness which had characterized Solomon’s temple, they were disappointed. As you know, any kind of structure, whether it is a home or a great office building, doesn’t look very impressive before it is completed. You have to wait until the building is finished to really appreciate it. But this little temple in Haggai’s day, even when it was finished, was no comparison to Solomon’s temple. And there was a mixed reaction to it.
The Book of Ezra, chapter 3:8–13, gives us more background as to what went on at this time: “Now in the second year of their coming unto the house of God at Jerusalem, in the second month, began Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and the remnant of their brethren the priests and the Levites, and all they that were come out of the captivity unto Jerusalem; and appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to set forward the work of the house of the Lord. Then stood Jeshua with his sons and his brethren, Kadmiel and his sons, the sons of Judah, together, to set forward the workmen in the house of God: the sons of Henadad, with their sons and their brethren the Levites. And when the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, they set the priests in their apparel with trumpets, and the Levites the sons of Asaph with cymbals, to praise the Lord, after the ordinance of David king of Israel. And they sang together by course in praising and giving thanks unto the Lord; because he is good, for his mercy endureth for ever toward Israel. And all the people shouted with a great shout, when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid.”
It may have been just the foundation and a few uprights, but they had to celebrate it. Ezrass record continues—“But many of the priests and Levites and chief of the fathers, who were ancient men, that had seen the first thouse, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice; and many shouted aloud for joy: So that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people: for the people shouted with a loud shout, and the noise was heard afar off.”
You see, amid all of the shouts of joy there was another sound—a weeping and howling by those who were making a comparison between the two. They were saying, “Look, this little temple that you are putting up here doesn’t amount to a hill of beans. Incomparison to Solomon’s temple, it doesn’t amount to anything.” This internal criticism was like a wet blanket on the celebration of the construction of the new temple. It dulled the edge of the zeal to rebuild the temple. It poured cold water on the enthusiasm generated by the prodding of Haggai. If you want to dampen a project, all you have to say is, “You think this is great, but you should have seen the original back in the good old days.”
When I was a boy, I remember some of the adults talking about the good old days. Well, I don’t remember any good old days when I was a boy—those days when I was growing up were hard. I remember the first little church I served in Georgia. It was a little white building sitting on a red clay hill. During my first year there as a student pastor I preached a series of evangelistic messages on the Book of Revelation. I haven’t been able to do that again in my ministry, but I did it then, and God blessed. Many young people were saved. On the Sunday night of the final message some of us sat on the steps of the church because it was a warm Georgia evening—most of us were young people—and we were talking about what a wonderful meeting it had been. There was one old man there with whiskers like Methuselah. He said, “You’ve had some good meetings, young man, but I remember ….” When someone starts that, you are headed for the toboggan, and soon you’re on the downhill run. He took us for quite a ride down the hill. He told us, “When I was a young man, we really had a meeting here!” As he told us about the meeting, ours seemed pretty small compared to his, although I learned later that he exaggerated a little. Yet what he said was discouraging.
And in Haggai’s day the folk, who had been so enthusiastic about the temple they were building, became discouraged.
How is God going to meet this situation? Well, I’ll tell you how we in the church would handle it. We would appoint a committee to see what could be done. As someone has said, a committee is a group of people who individually can do nothing and who collectively decide that nothing can be done. Or, as another has said, a committee is a group of incompetents, appointed by the indifferent, to do the unnecessary. Having been a pastor for many years, I am confident that we would use the committee approach to handle this problem. But that is not the way God solved it. He faced the problem squarely and came up with a very simple solution.
Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the Lord; and be strong, O Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest; and be strong, all ye people of the land, saith the Lord, and work: for I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts [Hag. 2:4].
God’s challenge is twofold here. First, He says, “Be strong,” three times. He says be strong to the civil ruler. He says be strong to the religious ruler. Then when He speaks to the people, does He have something new for them? No, it’s the same thing—be strong. Now that is very simple, but it is very important.
My friend, you and I live in a big, bad world today. What is our encouragement? God’s work in many places is small and doesn’t seem to amount to very much. What is the solution? Well, here is God’s answer to us: “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might” (Eph. 6:10). We need to recognize that we can’t do anything but that God can do a great deal. Be strong in the Lord. How wonderful that is.
Also in Hebrews 11:34 it says that believers “Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong …” (italics mine). Doesn’t God say that He chooses the weak things of the world? God does not choose these big, ornate buildings. He doesn’t choose these beautiful mausoleums that have steeples on top of them. Nothing very great is happening in places like that, but things are really jumping in some suburban areas, and many of the smaller churches are packed. I know what I am talking about because I have had the privilege of going across this country several times since I have retired, and this is what I have seen. I have also been abroad several times. I visited one of the great churches in London, England. At one time that church was filled with several thousand people three times a week on a regular basis. When I visited the church on a Sunday night, there were not more than two hundred people in attendance. That great imposing building with its impressive name was not very formidable any more. This same thing is true in my own nation. I have been in some of our great churches, and, my, the amount of lumber I can see in the pews—but nobody is sitting in them. Yet when I go out to some of our small churches, I find that they are packed to the doors and are having two and three morning services.
Today we are to be strong in the Lord. This is repeated many times in the Word of God. Paul, writing to a young preacher, said, “Thou therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 2:1, italics mine). The Epistle of 2 Timothy is Paul’s swan song, and in his final message to this son in the faith, he is saying, “You are a son of God. Be strong now.” What a word of encouragement that should be.
Somebody says, “My ministry is so insignificant and my group is so small that I don’t think it amounts to very much.” My friend, if that is what you are thinking, it is the Devil who is talking to you. Don’t listen to him. It is God who is going to put the measuring rod down on it and determine who is great and who is not. There are a whole lot of straw stacks being built today, and they look impressive. I myself have always been fearful that I was building a straw stack. Oh, I know there is some gold in it, but have you ever tried to find a needle in a straw stack? How will you find a little piece of gold that is the same color as the straw? God makes it clear that size is not the important thing.
God is saying to you and me, “Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong” (1 Cor. 16:13). Paul wrote this to a bunch of baby Christians over in Corinth. He was urging them to get out of the crib, get out of their high chairs, and grow up. Be strong in the Lord. Oh, how we need that sort of thing in God’s work, my friend.
Paul wasn’t through with the Corinthians—he wrote a second letter to them in which he said, “(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)” (2 Cor. 10:4, italics mine).
It was my privilege to pastor a downtown church in Los Angeles and to have succeeded some great men. Although I may not have approved of everything they had done, I certainly had great respect for them. They were great preachers. Dr. R. A. Torrey had been the founder of that church. I never walked into that pulpit without first looking to God and saying, “Lord, I am unable, I am insufficient for this task. I call upon You today.” I say to you that I am thanking God that out of weakness He can make us strong. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds. And I told God many times, “Lord, if anything happens here today, You will have to do it because You and I know that this poor boy can’t do it at all.”
In 2 Corinthians 10:5–6, Paul goes on to say, “Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; And having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled.” In other words, make very sure you are being obedient to God. It doesn’t make any difference how large or how small the work is. We need to remember, “Be strong.” God said to Israel, “Sure, this temple is not as impressive as the other temple was. I know that, but be strong. That is My challenge to you.” He said three times, “Be strong!”
God’s second word of challenge was “and work.” Just keep at the job. Let God be the One to determine who is doing the greatest work. When we get to heaven and stand in the presence of Christ, I suspect that we will find out that there were people who were greater than Luther in Luther’s day, greater than Wesley in Wesley’s day, greater than Billy Sunday in his day, and greater than Billy Graham in his day. I used to tell the pastoral staff at the Church of the Open Door, “Someday when we stand before God, He may call some woman to come forward and say, ‘This woman was a member of the Church of the Open Door while Vernon McGee was pastor, and she is the most honored one. I am going to reward her.’ I’ll nudge you fellows and ask you if you knew her. You all will say, ‘No, we never heard of her.’ She is one of the unknown members. All she had was only one little boy. Her husband deserted her, and she raised that boy alone. Then she sent him to the mission field and, my, what a work he did! She was faithful. She didn’t have the opportunity to speak to thousands, but she had the opportunity of speaking to one, and that is all God asked her to do.” My friend, I think we are going to get our eyes opened in that day when we stand in His presence. He says, “Be strong and work.” We are to be faithful at the task which God has given us to do.
Now here is God’s glorious word of encouragement: “For I am with you, saith the Lord of hosts.”
The fact of the matter is that the shekinah glory had departed from the temple of Solomon long before the temple was destroyed. I have always taken the position that the shekinah glory departed in the days of King Manasseh. He was a ruler who sinned so wickedly that the nation of Israel sank lower than it ever had gone before. If the shekinah glory did not leave during his reign, I can’t figure out any other time afterward that it would have been more inclined to leave. If I am correct in this, the shekinah glory, which was the visible presence of God Himself, had left the temple about one hundred twenty-five years before the temple was destroyed by Babylon. Therefore, in Haggai’s day, the old men, the ancients, who had seen Solomon’s temple, had seen only its outward glory. The shekinah glory had long since gone.
There is no doubt that the outward glory of Solomon’s temple was tremendous. As you know, the Mosque of Omar stands on that temple site now, and its dome is gold. I have been told that it is gold leaf. Whether that is true or not, it is really a thing of beauty. I have looked at that dome from the Mount of Olives, and I could have looked at it from Zion. I have looked at it from the tower of a Lutheran church, and I have looked at it from hotel windows—my, how it shines! As I looked at that pagan mosque, I thought of how Solomon’s temple must have looked in the bright sunlight of that semidesert air. We know that it was a very ornate, rich temple and that the boards were covered with real gold. How beautiful it must have been! Of course there was no comparison between it and the temple which was then under construction, but God considered Zerubbabel’s temple in the different stages of its construction—Solomon’s temple, Zerubbabel’s temple, and later Herod’s temple—as one house, not three houses. Therefore it is in the same line as the house (called Herod’s temple) into which the Lord Jesus Christ would come. Christ was the shekinah glory. He was God manifest in the flesh. The apostle John said, “… we beheld his glory …” (John 1:14)—but it was veiled in human flesh. And the Lord Jesus walked into that temple not one time but many times.
So God says to these discouraged builders in the days of Haggai, “Yes, this little temple you are building is not much, but I am with you.” My friend, that is a great deal better than having a magnificent temple without God being there. This is the same contrast between that contemporary big church with empty pews—cold, indifferent, and dead—and the little church around the corner packed with people and with a faithful pastor teaching the Word of God. We need to get a correct perspective of what is real and what is not real, what God is blessing and what He is not blessing.
According to the word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not [Hag. 2:5].
Though this new building was not impressive, God says, “My spirit remaineth among you.” That was a great deal better than a very ornate temple which was devoid of the presence of God.
This reveals the difference between the ministry of the Holy Spirit in Old Testament and New Testament times. In that day He was among the people. In our day He is in believers. He has certainly changed positions. This is one of the great benefits we have as believers in Christ.
“Fear ye not.” If they had no reason to fear, certainly the child of God today should not fear.
For thus saith the Lord of hosts; Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land;
And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts [Hag. 2:6–7].
First of all, we need to recognize what God is doing here. He is attempting to get their minds and hearts and eyes off that which is local, that which is very limited, and get their eyes fixed upon God’s program for the people of Israel. He wants them to see what is out yonder in the future—extending all the way into the Millennium.
My friend, for us today it is so easy to get the wrong perspective of the Christian life. We get our nose pressed right up to the window of the present, and we don’t see anything else. As you know, you can put a dime so close to your eye that it blots out the sun. Well, a dime is like the present that blots out God’s plan and purpose for our life. Don’t be discouraged because present circumstances are not working out for you. Recognize that for the child of God, “… all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose” (Rom. 8:28). That is, “the good” is out yonder in the distance.
“I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land.” In other words, God intends to move in judgment. We are going to see, before we finish this little Book of Haggai, that God is looking forward and speaking of the Great Tribulation, which is the Day of the Lord, and later of the coming of Christ to the earth and the setting up of the millennial temple, events which are also included in the Day of the Lord.
“I will fill this house with glory.” Although it was a series of houses—Solomon’s temple, Zerubbabel’s temple (which was torn down by Herod), and Herod’s temple—God saw it as one house. And into that temple came the Lord Jesus Christ. The glory was there, although in human flesh. Then Herod’s temple was destroyed (even before it was finished) in a.d. 70 by the forces of Rome under Titus. On that temple site no other temple has been built from that time to this. Actually, the Mosque of Omar stands there today, and the Islamic world would never permit it to be removed because it is either the second or third holiest spot in the world of Islam. However, later there will be built the temple which will be designated as the Great Tribulation temple. And after that, the millennial temple will be built on that site. Therefore, seeing it as one house, God says that the day is coming when “this house” will be filled with glory. I believe that the shekinah glory will come with Christ when He returns to the earth. In Matthew 24:30 we read, “And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.” This verse speaks of the sign of the Son of man in heaven, then immediately speaks of the glory of the Lord. I believe that His glory, the shekinah glory, will be seen in the temple which we designate as the great tribulation temple. But when He comes to occupy it, it won’t be a Great Tribulation temple that is in rebellion against Him. There won’t be in it the image of Antichrist, but Christ Himself will be present there.
“I will shake all nations.” Today it is difficult to believe that there will be more shaking than there has been in the past century. This century was practically ushered in by World War I. That was rather world-shaking. And there have been earthshaking events since then. There was a worldwide depression. There was World War Il. Also, oil crises and energy shortages have shaken all nations, but all of these things are nothing compared to the shaking that will come in the future.
“The desire of all nations shall come.” The commentators from the very beginning, in fact, the early church fathers, interpreted “the desire of all nations” to be Christ. Frankly, that has disturbed me from the time I was a younger preacher, because I never could believe that Christ was the desire of all nations. There are those who interpret the desire of all nations to be the longing of all nations for the Deliverer, whether or not they realize that the Deliverer is Christ. This may be true, but whom are they going to accept when he comes? They will accept Antichrist. Antichrist is the world’s messiah, the world’s savior, and they will accept him. I do not think that the nations have any desire for the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is my feeling that the meaning of this passage becomes clear if we continue reading. Now, let’s put verses 7–8 together:
And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts.
The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts [Hag. 2:7–8].
What is the desire of all nations? It is silver and gold. In our day many nations have had to go off the gold standard. When they did this, the economic foundation of the entire world was rocked. Why? Because there still is a desire for gold and silver. When Solomon’s temple was built, from five to twenty million dollars worth of precious metals and jewels were used in its construction. It was very valuable. As you read the historical record in Kings and Chronicles, it seems as if Solomon had cornered the gold market in his day. When Nebuchadnezzar captured Jerusalem, all that wealth was taken away. You may remember that in 2 Kings 20:12–17 the record tells of ambassadors who came from the king of Babylon to the king of Judah (which was Hezekiah at that time), and the king of Judah showed them all his treasures, all the wealth of Jerusalem. They made note of it, and in due time they captured Jerusalem and moved all that gold to Babylon. Certainly gold was the desire of the nation of Babylon, and it is still the desire of the nations of the world.
“The silver is mine, and the gold is mine.” All the silver and gold in the world belong to God, and there will be plenty of it to adorn God’s house in the future. The future millennial temple will be, I am confident, a thing of beauty.
The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the Lord of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts [Hag. 2:9].
“The glory of this latter house” is, rather, “the latter glory of this house.” Remember that God views the series of temples as one house, and He is saying that the latter glory of this house, which will be that of the millennial temple, will be greater than the former. It will be even greater than Solomon’s and certainly greater than the temple they were then building.
“In this place” designates the temple area as the site of the house in all of its stages.
“In this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.” I never visit Jerusalem without going to the temple area. Although I have seen it at least a dozen times, I still like to go there. Do you know why? It is because at that spot there will be accomplished what the United Nations and the League of Nations failed to do, which is to bring peace to the earth. When Jesus Christ comes to this earth, His feet will touch down on the Mount of Olives, and when He enters that temple area, peace will come to this earth, for He is the Prince of Peace. He will bring world peace at that time. The “peace” to which He refers in the verse before us means finally that.
This peace, however, could also include the peace which He brought at His first coming. At that time He brought peace to men of good will; that is, to men who were rightly related to God. As the apostle Paul put it, “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). He also brought the peace that passes all understanding, which is for the Christian heart today. He came the first time to bring that kind of peace.
In a day which is yet future He will bring world peace, the kind of peace which this world wants and needs.
So the “desire of all nations” is not Christ. I believe that the proper word is treasure—the treasure of all nations. He said, “The silver is mine, and the gold is mine,” speaking of material treasure. The thought seems to be that the lack of adornment in Zerubbabel’s temple would be more than compensated for by the rich treasures which are going to be brought in the day when the millennial temple will be built. Therefore, this passage looks forward to the final days when the millennial kingdom will be established here on earth. God was encouraging the discouraged builders of Haggai’s day to see their temple in the perspective of the ultimate purpose of God.
Oh, that you and I might see our present circumstances in that same way! We need to look at them in the light of eternity and to look at them in the light of God’s purpose for us. If God be for us, who can be against us? Hallelujah! Let’s not be overcome nor overwhelmed by the circumstances of the moment.
I think of that preacher in Scotland who turned in his resignation at the end of the year. When the elders asked him why, he said, “Because we haven’t had any conversions this year except wee Bobbie Moffat.” Well, my friend, that discouraged preacher couldn’t see that “wee Bobbie Moffat” would become Robert Moffat, the great missionary to Africa, who probably did as much if not more than David Livingstone in opening Africa to Christian missions. That year, which the preacher considered a failure, was probably the greatest year of his ministry. All of us need to see things in light of God’s plan and purpose for our lives.
APPEAL TO THE LAW
In the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord by Haggai the prophet, saying [Hag. 2:10].
This, now, is the fourth message that God gives to Haggai. Notice again how the dating is geared into the reign of Darius, a gentile ruler, because there was no king on the throne of either Israel or Judah. The date is December 24, 520 b.c. The previous message was given in the seventh month; this message was given in the ninth month.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Ask now the priests concerning the law, saying,
If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be holy? And the priests answered and said, No.
Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean [Hag. 2:11–13].
You see, on December 24, 520 b.c., Haggai went to the priests and asked them two questions. Putting it very simply, these are the questions: (1) If that which is holy touches that which is unholy, will it make the unholy holy? The answer is no. (2) If that which is unclean touches that which is clean (holy), will the unclean make it unclean (unholy)? The answer is yes, that is what it will do.
Now these questions are important; so let’s get the background before us. There were many facets of everyday life in Israel which were not covered in detail by the Mosaic Law. There were involved situations and there were knotty and thorny problems which arose in their daily lives, and there was nothing specific given in the Law which would adequately cover them. Then how did Israel function under the Law when there was no specific law to govern certain situations? Well, there is a case in point in Numbers 27 regarding the inheritance of Zelophehad’s daughters. The Mosaic Law had made no inheritance provision when a man had daughters but no sons. Zelophehad didn’t have any sons, but he had a house full of girls. When their father died, the girls went to Moses and said, “Look here, what about our father’s property? The Law says that sons are to inherit, but our father had no sons; he had only girls. So we should have the property.” Maybe Moses was not too enthusiastic about this women’s lib movement; so he took the matter to the Lord. Well, it is quite interesting to see that the Lord was on the side of the girls. He said, “The daughters of Zelophehad speak right; thou shalt surely give them a possession of an inheritance among their father’s brethren.” So this took care of that particular question.
God made adequate provision for justice under the Law. This is the way it worked: When a matter arose that was not covered by the Law, they were to appeal to the priests. Deuteronomy 17:8–11 says: “If there arise a matter too hard for thee in judgment, between blood and blood, between plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, being matters of controversy within thy gates: then shalt thou arise, and get thee up into the place which the Lord thy God shall choose; And thou shalt come unto the priests the Levites, and unto the judge that shall be in those days, and inquire; and they shall shew thee the sentence of judgment: And thou shalt do according to the sentence, which they of that place which the Lord shall choose shall shew thee; and thou shalt observe to do according to all that they inform thee: According to the sentence of the law which they shall teach thee, and according to the judgment which they shall tell thee, thou shalt do: thou shalt not decline from the sentence which they shall shew thee, to the right hand, nor to the left.” When a certain situation arose that was not covered by the Law, the people were to appeal to the priest; he would make a decision, and his decision became the law for cases which dealt with the same issue. That was God’s method, and it seems to me that we follow this same method today. I once took a course in commercial law, and although I don’t remember much of what was taught, I do recall the difference between what is known as statute law and what is known as common law. Statute law is that which is passed by the legislature. When a certain bill comes before that body of lawmakers and is passed, it becomes statute law. That law is written down and stands as law. There are so many statute laws that I am sure no one person knows all of them.
There is also that which is known as common law. For example, a matter is brought into court. Let’s say it is the case of John Doe versus Mary Roe. The lawyer for each side of the case looks for a similar case in the books, one that has already been tried, because there is nothing on the statute books that covers that specific issue. So finally they find a similar case that was decided years ago by Judge Know-It-All in Washington. Such decisions which were handed down by courts are known as common law. Therefore, we have two kinds of law: statute law and common law.
And this is the provision God made for Israel. Not every specific case was covered by the Mosaic Law, although great principles were laid down. The priests were to know the Old Testament, and when a case arose which was not covered specifically by the Law, the people were to bring the matter before the priests for a decision. And the priests would interpret the Mosaic Law for the people according to the great principles found in the Word of God.
EXPLANATION OF THE PRINCIPLE
Keep in mind that in the Book of Haggai we have come to the post-Captivity period. God’s people had already spent seventy years in captivity in Babylon. Only a small remnant had returned to the land, and those people were discouraged. God raised up three prophets to encourage them; and, since Haggai was the very practical prophet, God sent him to the priests to ask the two questions which were not specifically covered by the Mosaic Law.
Remember that when the captives first returned to Jerusalem, they had the enthusiasm to build, but after fifteen years in the debris of Jerusalem and with their enemies outside, they had done nothing about building the temple. They consoled themselves because they had lost their esprit de corps; and sinking into complacency, they were saying, “It’s not time to build the Lord’s house,” and so they did nothing about building it. Haggai spoke into this situation. He encouraged the people; they began to build, and then some of the oldtimers, who had seen the first temple, began to weep and say, “This little temple isn’t worth anything.” However, for three months the people worked. Then a mercenary spirit entered in, and the people said, “You told us to go to work and build the temple, and if we did, God would bless us. We have obeyed, but God is not blessing us.” It was at this juncture that God sent Haggai to the priests with a twofold inquiry. It is actually one question with two facets. Here are the questions and the answers he received: Is holiness communicated by contact? “No,” is the answer. The holy cannot make the unholy holy by contact. Holiness is noncommunicable. Is unholiness communicated by contact? “Yes,” is the answer. Uncleanness is communicated to the clean by contact. When holy and unholy come in contact, both are unholy. In therapeutics, measles is communicated by contact. In the physical realm, dirty water will discolor clean water—not the opposite. In the moral realm, the evil heart of man cannot perform good deeds. In the religious realm, a ceremony cannot cleanse a sinner.
For God’s application of this principle to Israel, we’ll have to move ahead to pick up verse 17: “I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the Lord.” God says that when the remnant returned to the land, they didn’t turn to Him. They went through the rituals, and they brought sacrifices, and they expected God to bless them, but He did not. Religion, you see, is not a salve you can rub on the outside. Friend, you can swim in holy water, and it won’t make you holy. You can go through a ritual, you can be baptized in water and be held under until you drown, but that won’t make you a child of God. We sometimes put too much emphasis on a rite. Don’t misunderstand me, I think baptism is very important, but it does not impart holiness. It will not change a man’s heart.
Now let’s look at the second inquiry again: “If one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, shall it be unclean?” And the priests gave this answer: “It shall be unclean.” Perhaps the key passage that deals with this matter is Leviticus 22:4–6. The Word of God is quite specific. Uncleanness is communicable; unholiness is transferable.
An evil heart cannot perform good deeds. A bitter fountain cannot give forth sweet water. Grapes are not gathered from thorns. Figs do not come from thistles.
There is a syllogism in philosophy where you state a major premise, a minor premise, and a conclusion. In the Book of Haggai the major premise is this: holiness is not communicated. The minor premise is this: unholiness is communicated. The conclusion is that when the holy and unholy come into contact, both are unholy. The Lord Jesus Christ asked the question, “…Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?” (Matt. 7:16). As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. An act or a ritual cannot change the heart. A good deed is actually tarnished when an evil heart performs it. This is ceremonial law, friend, but it is applicable to every phase of life—just like the law of gravitation, it is universal.
Let’s go into a chemistry lab. I fill two large beakers with water. One container I fill with good, clear, clean water, and the other one I fill with the dirtiest water possible. I begin to pour the clean water into the unclean water. How long will I have to pour the clean water into the dirty water before it becomes clear? I will never make the dirty water clean by pouring clean water into it. What happens when I put one drop of the dirty, black water into the clean water? The clean water becomes unclean. So it is in the material world.
In the world of medicine, how do you cure the measles, and how do you get the measles? Do you take a well boy and have him rub up against the sick boy to make him well? Will that cure the boy with the measles? Of course it won’t. What happens? The boy who was well will probably have a good case of the measles.
This principle is also true in the moral realm. The liquor industry gives money to charity, and the race track has a day in which they give all their proceeds to charity. Hollywood produces biblical stories, and we are supposed to applaud them—well, you might applaud, but I won’t. The liquor industry can never cover up the awful thing it is doing to human lives by giving a few dollars to charity. Why? Because, when a clean thing and an unclean thing come together, the unclean always makes the clean unclean. May I say to you, young man and young woman, you cannot run with the wrong crowd and stay clean. If you are running with an unclean crowd, one of these days you are going to find out it has rubbed off on you. If you are going to play in the mud, you are going to get dirty.
And this great principle certainly holds true in the religious realm. Most of the religions in the world teach that if you go through their prescribed rituals and ceremonies, you are acceptable to God. However, the Word of God is clear on the fact that going through a ceremony—baptism or any other rite—or doing anything externally will not meet the conditions which God has put down for man.
After all, man’s condition is a sad one. We read in Jeremiah 17:9, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” What a picture this is of the human heart! No one but God can know how bad it is. If we could see ourselves as God sees us, we could not stand ourselves. We don’t realize how bad we really are. The Lord Jesus made this abundantly clear in Matthew 15:18–20, “But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: These are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man.” Just because you wash your hands, have been through a ceremony, or have performed a ritual does not make you right with God, you see.
I often think of a man I played golf with several years ago in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He told me, “I was a church hypocrite for years. I was a member of a big downtown liberal church. I had been through the ceremonies and had served on every committee. To tell the truth, I was not a Christian, and during the week I was practicing things which no Christian should do. I was a typical hypocrite. Then one day I found out that I was a sinner and needed a Savior. That is the thing that transformed my life.” You see, the heart must be changed. Listen to the Lord Jesus as He talks along this line: “Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit [this is the principle at work]. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them” (Matt. 7:16–20). Out of the heart proceed the issues of life. The heart must be changed.
Shakespeare had it right when he portrayed Lady Macbeth walking in her sleep, rubbing her little hand, and exclaiming, “Out, damned spot! out, I say!…. Here’s the smell of the blood still: all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.” How true! Neither can all the perfumes of Arabia make the heart right with God.
Trying to make yourself acceptable with God through ceremonies and all of that sort of thing is like pouring a gallon of Chanel No. 5 on a pile of fertilizer out in the barnyard in an effort to make it clean and fragrant. My friend, it won’t work. The apostle Peter said to Simon the sorcerer, “…thy heart is not right in the sight of God” (Acts 8:21). God demands a clean heart. In Ephesians 6:6 God speaks of “…doing the will of God from the heart.” And in Hebrews 10:22, “Let us draw near with a true heart….” How can a man’s heart be made clean when his heart by nature is unclean? Is there something man can do to make his heart clean? No! This is rather like the sign I saw in a dry cleaner’s shop in a certain city back East which read: “We clean everything but the reputation.” Believe me, that is something you can’t get cleaned on earth. The writer of the Book of Proverbs asks the question, “Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?” (Prov. 20:9).
Well, God has the prescription: “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isa. 1:18). Peter wrote, “Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Pet. 1:18–19). One song asks the question, “What can wash away my sin?” That same song answers the question—“Nothing but the blood of Jesus.” That is one of the greatest principles ever stated.
God says to the people through the prophet Haggai, “The reason you haven’t been blessed is because you have been coming to Me with unclean hands and unclean hearts.”
Then answered Haggai, and said, So is this people, and so is this nation before me, saith the Lord; and so is every work of their hands; and that which they offer there is unclean [Hag. 2:14].
Their unclean hearts made their service for God unclean. This is the reason that an unsaved person can do nothing that is acceptable to God.
Now, you will find a difference of opinion among Bible expositors on verses 15–19. Some hold that the verses review the condition of the returned remnant when they were indifferent to the Lord’s house before they obeyed the Lord and began to build the temple. Other expositors hold that they refer to the people’s discouragement after they had built the temple because it had not turned the tide of their misfortunes. Haggai tells them that there has not been time for the change to work, that evil has an infectious power greater than that of holiness and that its effects are more lasting.
However, it is my understanding that God is applying to Israel the great principle of the unclean defiling the clean to illustrate to them that although they had rebuilt the temple, their hearts were still far from Him, and He was not able to bless them.
And now, I pray you, consider from this day and upward, from before a stone was laid upon a stone in the temple of the Lord [Hag. 2:15].
He is saying that from this day on He is going to bless them because now they have turned to Him.
Since those days were, when one came to an heap of twenty measures, there were but ten: when one came to the pressfat for to draw out fifty vessels out of the press, there were but twenty.
I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the Lord.
Consider now from this day and upward, from the four and twentieth day of the ninth month, even from the day that the foundation of the Lord’s temple was laid, consider it.
Is the seed yet in the barn? yea, as yet the vine, and the fig tree, and the pomegranate, and the olive tree, hath not brought forth: from this day will I bless you [Hag. 2:16–19].
God says, “Now that your hearts are right before Me, I’ll bless you.” You see, they had rebuilt the temple and had been performing the services of the temple, yet that alone was not enough. In fact, when God had sent them into captivity, they had been going through the temple services. The problem was that their hearts were not right.
My friend, one of the ways that you can make your church a good church—that is, if you have a Bible-teaching preacher—is to go there all prayed up and confessed up and repented up and cleaned up. Then you won’t block any blessing that might come to the church that day. Remember that when the unclean touches the clean, what happens is that the clean becomes unclean. Your heart has to be right with God before there is blessing. This is a tremendous principle. I know of nothing more practical.
REVELATION OF GOD’S PROGRAM
And again the word of the Lord came unto Haggai in the four and twentieth day of the month, saying [Hag. 2:20].
“The four and twentieth day of the month” is the same day on which the previous message was given—December 24. On one occasion I was asked why Haggai gave two messages on the same day, and I replied that probably it was because Haggai wanted to go home for Christmas—so he gave both messages before he left. Well, some folk took me seriously, and I received a ten-page letter explaining that in Haggai’s day they weren’t celebrating Christmas yet! Another letter informed me that no one should ever celebrate Christmas! Well, the fact is that when I don’t have the answer to a question, I generally give some facetious answer. And if you won’t let this word get out, I’ll confess to you that I don’t know why Haggai gave two messages on a particular day—but here they are.
Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, saying, I will shake the heavens and the earth [Hag. 2:21].
“Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah.” This message is to the civil ruler, the man in the kingly line of David, and it is God’s promise to him.
And I will overthrow the throne of kingdoms, and I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the heathen; and I will overthrow the chariots, and those that ride in them; and the horses and their riders shall come down, every one by the sword of his brother [Hag. 2:22].
“I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the heathen [the nations].” When God says that He will shake the heavens and the earth and will overthrow the ruling governments, He is speaking of the Great Tribulation Period, as He did in verses 6 and 7 of this chapter. He says that He “will overthrow the chariots,” because it was that in which the people trusted; in our day it is nuclear weapons. God says, “I am going to remove all of that.”
EXPECTATION FOR THE FUTURE
In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, will I take thee, O Zerubbabel, my servant, the son of Shealtiel, saith the Lord, and will make thee as a signet: for I have chosen thee, saith the Lord of hosts [Hag. 2:23].
“In that day”—notice it is not “in this day.” It looks forward to the end times. “I …will make thee as a signet.” The signet was the mark and identification of royalty. A man used it to sign letters and documents. Since it represented him, he guarded it very carefully and usually wore it. It came to represent a most prized possession.
“I have chosen thee, saith the Lord Of hosts.” As we have seen, Zerubbabel is in the line of David. God’s promise is that not only will the Messiah come through David, He will also come through Zerubbabel. Although the name Zerubbabel (Zorobabel) appears in the genealogy of both Matthew and Luke, the one in Matthew is, of course, an entirely different man. God made good His promise to Zerubbabel. The Lord Jesus Christ is just as much the Son of Zerubbabel as He is the Son of David.
The prophecy looks forward to the day when the Lord Jesus will come at the end of the Great Tribulation period. And God intends to put this line of Zerubbabel, this line of David, in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, upon the throne of the universe. He is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. He will come to the earth to rule. This little Book of Haggai puts Christ in His proper position as the moral ruler, the civil ruler, and the King to rule over this earth in that day, which makes this an important book.
Now it is true that the little temple built in Haggai’s day, which became known as Zerubbabel’s temple, was not very impressive. But it is very important because it is in the line of temples into which the Messiah Himself will come some day.
Someone has poetically summarized the message of this little Book of Haggai. I regret that I do not know the author, but I shall quote it as we conclude this study—
’Mid blended shouts of joy and grief were laid
The stones whereon the exile’s hopes were based.
Then foes conspired. The king his course retraced,
His throne against the enterprise arrayed.
And now self-seeking, apathy, invade
All hearts. The pulse grows faint, the will unbraced.
They rear their houses, let God’s house lie waste.
So heaven from dew and earth from fruit are stayed.
There comes swift messenger from higher court,
With rugged message, of divine import:—
“Your ways consider; be ye strong and build;
With greater glory shall this house be filled.”
He touched their conscience, and their spirit stirred
To nerve their hands for work, their loins regird.
—Author unknown
My friend, again let me say this: Who in our day is going to determine who is doing the great work and who is doing the small work? Your Sunday school class or other seemingly insignificant ministry may be far more important than an impressive work that is well known in our day. Only God can know the importance of it. Let’s be found faithful, and then let’s work. This is the message of the little Book of Haggai.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n. d.
Jensen, Irving L. Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n. d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
Wolfe, Herbert. Haggai and Malachi. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
The Book of
Zechariah
INTRODUCTION
Zechariah, whose name means “whom Jehovah remembers,” is identified as the son of Berechiah, which means “Jehovah blesses,” and his father was the son of Iddo, which means “the appointed time.” Certainly this cluster of names with such rich meanings is suggestive of the encouragement given to the remnant that had returned to Jerusalem after the Babylonian captivity—God remembers and blesses at the appointed time.
Although the name Zechariah was common among the Hebrew people (twenty-eight Zechariahs are mentioned in the Old Testament), there are Bible teachers who identify the Zechariah of this book with the “Zacharias” whom our Lord mentioned in Matthew 23:35 as having been martyred. Many expositors discount this possibility, but it is interesting to note that the Jewish Targum states that Zechariah was slain in the sanctuary and that he was both prophet and priest. In Nehemiah 12:4 Iddo is mentioned as one of the heads of a priestly family. And the historian “Josephus (Wars, iv. 5, 34) recounts the murder of a ‘Zecharias, the son of Baruch,’ i.e., Barachiah, as perpetrated in the Temple by the Zealots just before the destruction of Jerusalem” (Ellicott’s Commentary on the Whole Bible).
Another interesting observation is that Zechariah’s prophecy practically closes the Old Testament—it is next to the final book—and the New Testament opens chronologically with Luke’s account of another Zacharias (meaning “Jehovah remembers”) and his wife Elisabeth (meaning “His oath”). Zacharias was a priest who was serving at the altar of incense when an angel appeared to him with a message from God after four hundred years of silence. So again God remembered His oath.
The prophecy was written in 520 b.c. Zechariah was contemporary with Haggai (see Ezra 5:1; 6:14), although he was probably a younger man (see Zech. 2:4).
This book has the characteristics of an apocalypse. The visions resemble those in the Books of Daniel and Ezekiel and Revelation. Daniel and Ezekiel were born in the land of Israel but wrote their books outside of it. Zechariah was born outside of the land down by the canals of Babylon, but he wrote in the land. It is interesting that Daniel, Ezekiel, and John were all outside Israel when they wrote. Only Zechariah was in that land when he wrote his apocalyptic visions. In the dark day of discouragement which blanketed the remnant, he saw the glory in all of the rapture and vision of hope. He has more messianic prophecies than any of the other minor prophets. This is therefore an important and interesting book.
Zechariah was contemporary with Haggai, but his book is in direct contrast to Haggai. They definitely knew each other and prophesied to the same people at the same period of time. Yet their prophecies are just about as different as any two could be. They are literally ages apart even though they were given to the same people at the same time.
Haggai was down there at the foundation of the temple measuring it. He really had his feet on the ground. Zechariah was a man with his head in the air. Anyone who has ten visions in one night is doing pretty well! He is entirely visionary, whereas Haggai is entirely practical. Yet they were both speaking for God to the same people at the same time concerning the same problem. Also they both speak to us today, but each in his own manner.
We need to recognize that these two types of men are still needed today. They fit together. We need the practical, pragmatic man to go along with the man who is visionary, because there is a danger in the dreamer. Too often the dreamers are not practical. On the other hand, the practical man so often lacks vision. So when you put these two together, you have a happy combination.
OUTLINE
I. Apocalyptic Visions (Messianic and Millennial), Chapters 1–6
A. Introduction and Message of Warning, Chapter 1:1–6
B. Ten Visions (All in One Night), Chapters 1:7–6:15
1. Riders under Myrtle Trees, Chapter 1:7–17
2. Four Horns, Chapter 1:18–19
3. Four Smiths, Chapter 1:20–21
4. Man with Measuring Line, Chapter 2
5. Joshua and Satan, Chapter 3:1–7
6. The Branch, Chapter 3:8–10
7. Lampstand and Two Olive Trees, Chapter 4
8. Flying Roll, Chapter 5:1–4
9. Woman in the Ephah, Chapter 5:5–11
10. Four Chariots, Chapter 6
II. Historic Interlude, Chapters 7–8
A. Question Concerning a Religious Ritual (Fasting), Chapter 7:1–3
B. Threefold Answer, Chapters, 7:4–8:23
1. When the Heart Is Right, the Ritual Is Right, Chapter 7:4–7
2. When the Heart Is Wrong, the Ritual Is Wrong, Chapter 7:8–14
3. God’s Purpose Concerning Jerusalem Unchanged by Any Ritual, Chapter 8
III. Prophetic Burdens, Chapters 9–14
A. First Burden: Prophetic Aspects Connected with First Coming of Christ, Chapters 9–11
B. Second Burden: Prophetic Aspects Connected with Second Coming of Christ, Chapters 12–14
CHAPTER 1
Theme: Apocalyptic visions: of riders under myrtle trees; of four horns; of four smiths
APOCALYPTIC VISIONS
The first six chapters are messianic and millennial. In this section is the record of ten visions, and Zechariah was given all of those ten visions in a single night. I would say that this was a good night’s work, by the way!
INTRODUCTION AND MESSAGE OF WARNING
The first verse serves as an introduction to the Book of Zechariah.
In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord unto Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo the prophet, saying [Zech. 1:1].
“In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius” gears this prophetic book into the reign of a gentile king because this is the period of the return of a remnant of Israel back to their land after the seventy-year captivity in Babylon. There is no king in either Israel or Judah now. The line of David is off the throne, and the Times of the Gentiles are in progress. “The second year of Darius” is the same year in which Haggai prophesied. They prophesied to the same people during the same period of time. Haggai began in the sixth month of that year, and Zechariah began two months later. It is the year 520 b.c. Haggai was given a prophecy in September, October, and December, but none in November. So this man Zechariah was given a prophecy in November, the month Haggai missed.
“Came the word of the Lord unto Zechariah.” This is the same expression that Haggai used. In other words, Zechariah is speaking by the same authority that Haggai spoke. This same phrase occurs fourteen times in this book. Since the Book of Zechariah has fourteen chapters, it occurs on the average of once every chapter. As you can see, this is another book which places a great emphasis on the Word of God.
Now the second verse begins the message of warning which God has given Zechariah. Speaking by the same authority that Haggai did, the Word of the Lord, he is warning the returned remnant not to follow in the footsteps of their pre-Captivity fathers.
The Lord hath been sore displeased with your fathers [Zech. 1:2].
Zechariah is telling them that the reason they had been in captivity was that “The Lord hath been sore displeased with your fathers.” They had sinned against God, and he is warning them against making the same blunder, the same mistakes.
Therefore say thou unto them, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Turn ye unto me, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will turn unto you, saith the Lord of hosts [Zech. 1:3].
“Thus saith the Lord of hosts.” That title for God has become almost a cliché for us; in fact many of the titles of God are almost meaningless to us, although we use them a great deal. What does “the Lord of hosts” really mean? It occurs fifty-two times in this book, which indicates its importance. The word hosts is derived from the Hebrew tsaba (plural: tsabaoth), meaning “service” or “strength” or even “warfare.” The way it is used here “implies the boundless resources at His command for His people’s good.” That is Dr. Fausset’s definition, and I can’t improve on it. In the New Testament it says, “He is rich in mercy” (see Eph. 2:4), and “He has all power” (Matt. 28:18). So what do you need today, my friend? Do you need a little mercy? Well, he has an abundance of it. He is rich in it, and He can extend mercy to you. My, how we all need it! He is the Lord of Hosts—that title occurs three times in this verse and again in the fourth and sixth verses.
“Turn ye unto me, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will turn unto you.” You see how He is extending mercy to them.
Be ye not as your fathers, unto whom the former prophets have cried, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Turn ye now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings: but they did not hear, nor hearken unto me, saith the Lord [Zech. 1:4].
This is God’s very practical warning. He is saying, “Your fathers paid no attention to the prophets whom I sent to them. I sent Hosea. I sent Joel. I sent Amos. I sent to them Isaiah and Jeremiah. I sent all of these prophets, but your fathers did not listen to them nor heed their message. That is the reason they went into captivity.”
Now God asks a question—
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever? [Zech. 1:5].
The voices of the former prophets are no longer sounding. Jeremiah and Isaiah and Hosea and Joel and Amos are gone. They are dead, and their voices are silent. And, by the way, “your fathers, where are they?” Well, they are buried down yonder in Babylon. That is the wrong place for an Israelite to be buried, because he wants to be buried in his own land. Even old Jacob down in the land of Egypt made Joseph take an oath that he would not bury him there in Egypt. He said, “I want to be taken back up yonder and be buried with my fathers.” And that is where his body is today—there in Hebron. The hope of the patriarchs and the godly Israelites was to be in their land at the time of the resurrection of the dead. If you have ever been to Jerusalem, you know that before the Eastern Gate, down through the Valley of Kidron and all up the side of the Mount of Olives are graves of Israelites. The Arabs mutilated a great many of them, but they are being restored by Israel. They want to be buried in that location because they expect to see the Messiah come to the earth at that place. And, personally, I believe that they will be raised from the dead when Christ returns to the earth to establish His kingdom. Let me remind you that at the time of the Rapture the Lord Jesus will not come to the earth. Rather, He will call His own out of the earth and will meet them in the air. At that time He will not come to establish His kingdom upon earth. First the world will go through the Great Tribulation Period, and then Christ will come to the earth to reign personally here. So you see that there would be no point in raising the Old Testament saints (both Jews and Gentiles) before the Tribulation, because they would just have to stand around and wait until the Tribulation was over so that they could enter the kingdom.
Therefore, you can see that God’s question through Zechariah is very pertinent: “Your fathers, where are they?” They are buried down by the canals of Babylon, which is a bad place to be when your hope is in the land of Israel.
But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not take hold of your fathers? and they returned and said, Like as the Lord of hosts thought to do unto us, according to our ways, and according to our doings, so hath he dealt with us [Zech. 1:6].
“Did they not take hold of your fathers?” means “did they not overtake your fathers?” The judgment for their sins overtook them.
“And they returned and said, Like as the Lord of hosts thought to do unto us, according to our ways, and according to our doings, so hath he dealt with us.” They were finally willing to admit that the judgment which had come to them was just and righteous on the part of God—because He had warned them but they had not listened to Him.
This concludes the practical section. I don’t mean that the next section is impractical; I simply mean that it deals with the visions which Zechariah had.
TEN VISIONS
While most expositors and commentators say that there are eight visions here, we will make a further division, as you will see.
VISION OF RIDERS UNDER MYRTLE TREES
The first vision is that of the horses and riders under the myrtle trees.
Upon the four and twentieth day of the eleventh month, which is the month Sebat, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord unto Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo the prophet, saying [Zech. 1:7].
Since the Hebrew months do not begin with January, the eleventh month would be equivalent to our February—February 24, 520 b.c. We will see the significance of this in a few minutes.
Now let’s get the background before us. Five months prior to this vision, the Lord had appeared to Haggai and had given him a message of challenge for the remnant to resume the rebuilding of the temple. And the work of building the temple was begun. Then two months before Zechariah’s vision, the prophet Haggai had delivered a very sharp message to the priests because they were impure and yet were expecting God to bless them. Also, his message had been directed to the people because of their delay in building and their hesitation in moving forward with it. At this time Haggai also had told them about the coming destruction of gentile world power before God would establish His kingdom here upon the earth. He had told them that the one who would rule would be the Messiah and that He was coming from the line of Zerubbabel, who was the civil ruler of Jerusalem at this time and was in the royal line of King David.
Now it was during this time, while the temple was being rebuilt, that Zechariah was given ten visions.
I saw by night, and behold a man riding upon a red horse, and he stood among the myrtle trees that were in the bottom; and behind him were there red horses, speckled, and white [Zech. 1:8].
“I saw by night”—he doesn’t say, “I dreamed by night.” You may get the impression that because Zechariah had these visions at night that they were dreams, but he makes it clear that they were visions, not dreams. He was wide awake, and I don’t think that any tranquilizer or sleeping pill could have put him to sleep on that night!
Many people differ with me in my stand that God does not speak through dreams or by visions in our day. I don’t try to correct them when they say to me, “I saw a vision last night,” I simply ask them if they saw the vision in a dream. If they did, I know immediately that God has not given them a message but that the dream was caused by something they ate for dinner the evening before, or it came out of some experience they had. In sleep the mind is unlatched or released, and it generally wanders back over some experience that produces the dream. Therefore, I think we can be sure that God does not speak to us in dreams.
Notice that Zechariah said, “I saw.” It is important to understand how God revealed Himself to this prophet at this time.
“Behold”—Zechariah introduces his vision in a dramatic way. Frankly, I think the translator should have put an exclamation mark after that word. Behold means “to look.” “Look! There’s a man riding upon a red horse!”
“A man riding upon a red horse.” Who is this man? He is the Lord Jesus Christ before His incarnation. You may ask how I know that. Well, He is identified as the “angel of the Lord” in verses 11 and 12. In the Old Testament the angel of the Lord is designated as God. Therefore, the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament is the Lord Jesus Christ of the New Testament. He is the angel of the Presence; He is Jehovah Himself, the Messiah.
Here in Christ’s preincarnation Zechariah sees Him watching over this world. Now, it is true that Satan is called the prince of this world, that is, of this world system—the carnality of this world today is all under Satan’s control—but God has not given up this earth to Satan. Even at this very moment, the Lord Jesus Christ is standing in the shadows, keeping watch over His own. Here in Zechariah’s vision it is the nation of Israel in particular over which He is watching. What a comfort it is to know that, out of all the galaxies about us which cannot be numbered for multitude, the God of the universe is watching, keeping watch over His own. What a message this vision has for us. Zechariah will give many messages of comfort, and certainly this is one of them.
Notice that the man is riding “upon a red horse.” What is the significance of the color red? Well, red speaks of blood and bloodshed; in the Book of Revelation it speaks of bloodshed in war. But for this one who is riding the red horse, it speaks of His own blood that was to be shed. He is watching over this earth because He would die and shed His blood for the human family on this earth. What a picture we have here!
“Behind him were there red horses, speckled, and white.” It does not say that there were riders on the horses, but I feel that we can rightly assume that each horse had a rider. Here is an instance where God has not given us complete information, but we assume that the riders are angelic beings under Christ’s command whose business it is to watch over this earth and report their findings to Him. I believe that the colors of the horses—red, sorrel (called speckled in the King James Version), and white—all have significance.
I haven’t seen the word sorrel since I was a boy in West Texas and Southern Oklahoma when horses were the means of transportation. I can remember when I saw my first automobile in Springer, Oklahoma. We stood and looked at it for two hours. Can you imagine going to a parking lot today and looking at a car for that long? Well, we did. A doctor owned it, and everyone in that little town in which I lived came out to look at the car. It was fearful to behold and an unusual contraption. Nobody thought it could ever supplant the horse in our day of muddy roads. I remember well the sorrel horses; they were spotted, brownish orange—I always thought of them as a dirty yellow. You might not like that description if a sorrel horse is your pet, but as a boy that is the way they looked to me.
As I said, I believe there is a significance in the colors of the horses. Red horses would be symbolic of warfare. White horses would probably represent victory, symbolic of the fact that the one riding the horse is marching to victory. The sorrel is a mixture of the other colors.
“He stood among the myrtle trees.” The myrtle tree is what we here in California call the laurel tree. We find it down in the desert regions. The Southern Pacific Railroad Company has planted them all along their tracks in the Palm Springs area so that the sand won’t cover the tracks. In the land of Israel, which apparently is their native habitat, there were many myrtle-covered valleys. The myrtle is considered sort of a badge of Israel. You see, certain trees and plants represent the nation—the olive tree, the fig tree, the myrtle tree, the grapevine all have their significance. In Isaiah 41:19 (literal translation mine), God says, “I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, and the myrtle, and the olive, and I will set in the desert the cypress, the plane and the pine together.” And in Isaiah 55:13 He says, “Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle: and it shall be to the Lord for a memorial for an everlasting sign which shall not be cut off.” In modern Israel the tremendous planting of trees—and most of them are myrtle—could have real significance. It is interesting that myrtle branches together with palm branches were used in the ritual of constructing booths in the celebration of the Feast of Tabernacles. In fact, the name myrtle is the Hebrew hadhas, from which the name of Esther, hadhassah, is derived—so that a girl named Esther and another girl named Myrtle actually have the same name, referring to the myrtle tree.
“The myrtle trees that were in the bottom”—what does he mean by “the bottom”? It means down in a valley. The grove of myrtle trees would be in a valley where there was a water supply. The myrtle trees in the valley may be representative of Israel, for she was certainly down in a valley at this time.
Before we leave this verse, let me say that the rider on the red horse is a picture, I believe, of the Lord Jesus just waiting for the day to come when He will take over this earth. And in the meantime He is patrolling the earth, watching over it. And I assume that the riders on the other horses are created intelligences, supernatural beings, or angels, who are there with Him.
Then said I, O my lord, what are these? And the angel that talked with me said unto me, I will shew thee what these be [Zech. 1:9].
“Then said I, O my lord, what are these?” That is the same question we have; so let’s listen. He says that he will show us what these things are—
And the man that stood among the myrtle trees answered and said, These are they whom the Lord hath sent to walk to and fro through the earth [Zech. 1:10].
“To walk to and fro” means that they were patrolling the earth.
And they answered the angel of the Lord that stood among the myrtle trees, and said, We have walked to and fro through the earth, and, behold, all the earth sitteth still, and is at rest [Zech. 1:11].
“All the earth sitteth still, and is at rest” means that there was peace on the earth at this time. That sounds good, because during five thousand years of recorded history, there have been only about two hundred years of peace. Man is a fierce, warlike creature—there is war in his heart. So a period of peace sounds wonderful. But what kind of peace was it? Well, it was the kind of peace that does not last very long.
Then the angel of the Lord answered and said, O Lord of hosts, how long wilt thou not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah, against which thou hast had indignation these threescore and ten years? [Zech. 1:12].
“Against which thou hast had indignation these threescore and ten years”—that is, for seventy years now Jerusalem has been lying in ruin, debris, and ashes. But the remnant of Israel which has returned to the land is beginning to rebuild. The cry is, “How long will it be before God is going to bring real blessing to us?”
God will make it clear that He is displeased with the nations which are at peace and ignore Jerusalem’s plight. God is jealous for Jerusalem, and all the nations of the world are indifferent to it. God returned to Jerusalem with mercies, and the nations have a responsibility also. But the nations are at peace, although they won’t be at peace very long.
My friend, this has application to our present world situation. The world can never have permanent peace until the Lord Jesus is reigning in Jerusalem, because He is the Prince of Peace. In the meantime, the peace which He offers is peace with God because of sins forgiven. If we are right with God, we can have peace with our neighbors and even peace among nations. But the so-called civilized—not Christian—nations are the ones that have carried on two world wars in this century. It is interesting that during World War II when some of our United States troops were fighting in the South Pacific, they expected to find on many of the little islands headhunters and cannibals, but instead they found Christian churches and Christians who received them joyfully. The so-called heathen were at peace, and the so-called Christians were at war! The world cannot have peace apart from Christ.
Jerusalem is the key to world peace. In Zechariah’s day the world was trying to have peace and ignore Jerusalem. This was during the world domination by Media-Persia. You remember that Babylon had put down both Egypt and Assyria; then Media-Persia had put down the Babylonian Empire and was reigning all the way from the Indus River to the Mediterranean Sea and all the way from the snow of the mountains around the Black Sea and Caspian Sea to the burning sands of the Sahara Desert. Their dominion brought a brief period of peace to the world. But it wouldn’t be long until Alexander the Great would come out of the West and upset the apple cart again. Peace could not be permanent because the city of Jerusalem was the key to peace.
And the Lord answered the angel that talked with me with good words and comfortable words [Zech. 1:13].
Notice that they were good words and comforting words, words that were helpful to the remnant. During this time Haggai was pronouncing judgment, but not Zechariah—he was giving God’s message of comfort.
So the angel that communed with me said unto me, Cry thou, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy [Zech. 1:14].
“I am jealous for Jerusalem.” God’s jealousy is not a human sort of jealousy that might be just a flare of bad temper. But men’s jealousy, which is a burning passion for that which is their own and is dear to them and may be taken away from them, may be similar to the jealousy of God. “I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy.” Jerusalem is His city, and the Israelites are His people. He is fully aware of the worldwide woe of oppressed Israel even in our day, and He is exceedingly jealous for His people. I believe that in time God is going to move on their behalf. The world then and now is ready to forsake them.
And I am very sore displeased with the heathen that are at ease: for I was but a little displeased, and they helped forward the affliction [Zech. 1:15].
“I was but a little displeased,” that is, God’s chastisement was intended for a brief period, but the nations of the world wanted her annihilation.
Therefore thus saith the Lord; I am returned to Jerusalem with mercies: my house shall be built in it, saith the Lord of hosts, and a line shall be stretched forth upon Jerusalem [Zech. 1:16].
“I am returned to Jerusalem with mercies.” God had come back to deal with His people in mercy. The Scriptures tell us that He is rich in mercy.
“A line shall be stretched forth upon Jerusalem.” There are those who believe that this “line” stretching forth upon Jerusalem means that there would be a great building boom in Jerusalem, that it would expand and become a great city in that day. I think that is probably true. But in the Scriptures, whenever we find a man with a measuring rod or a measuring line, it means that God is getting ready to move directly in that particular case. In this case, Israel had just returned from the seventy-year captivity, and God is turning to His people again, turning to those who have returned to Him.
All the nations of the earth are to understand that there will never be peace on earth until there is peace in Jerusalem. That is the key to peace on this earth. Haven’t we seen this demonstrated again in these last few years? Haven’t the events since Israel became a nation again rather indicated that? That little nation found out how few friends she really had in the world at the beginning of the oil crisis. The nations which they thought were their friends fell away like dead flies because they wanted oil more than they wanted the friendship of Israel. But, of course, modern Israel has not returned to God in spite of the fact that there is a great building boom over there today. They have returned back to the land and have begun rebuilding the cities, and Zionism is very much a reality, yet they are actually still scattered throughout the world in disbelief. And they are still suffering persecution. The peace of Jerusalem is the key to world peace. You can see this by checking back in the history of the past.
It is certainly true that Jerusalem is crucial in the prophecies of the future: “For the Lord hath chosen Zion; he hath desired it for his habitation. This is my rest for ever: here will I dwell; for I have desired it” (Ps. 132:13–14). Also, “Moreover he refused the tabernacle of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of Ephraim: But chose the tribe of Judah, the mount Zion which he loved” (Ps. 78:67–68). God says that Jerusalem is the spot He loves. I must confess that I do not love Jerusalem as it is today. I must be very frank to say that it is not an attractive place to me. But God is going to make it a wonderful place some day. Although the judgment of God is upon Jerusalem even in this day, God still loves it.
Cry yet, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; My cities through prosperity shall yet be spread abroad; and the Lord shall yet comfort Zion, and shall yet choose Jerusalem [Zech. 1:17].
This looks into the future so that these people can recognize that they are working in the plan and program of God which extends into the future.
Allow me to make an application for Christians today. Are you and I working in something that has eternal value? What are you doing today? What value will it be ten years from today? A hundred years from today? A million years from today? Are you and I actually working in the light of eternity? We should keep that in mind.
VISION OF FOUR HORNS
This is the second vision given to Zechariah.
Then lifted I up mine eyes, and saw, and behold four horns.
And I said unto the angel that talked with me, What be these? And he answered me, These are the horns which have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem [Zech. 1:18–19].
I consider the vision of the four horns as one vision, and the vision of the four carpenters as another vision. Most expositors combine them and consider them as a single vision, but I do not interpret them that way.
Zechariah sees four horns, and these four horns are the ones that scattered Jerusalem and Judah and Israel. They have scattered both the northern and the southern kingdoms.
A horn represents a gentile ruler. We find this in Daniel 7:24: “And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise….” Again, in Revelation 17:12: “And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast.” I think you can see from these other references that horns represent gentile world powers. So these four horns which Zechariah saw represent four gentile world powers.
Well, who are they? The four gentile powers that scattered Israel are: Babylon, Media-Persia, Greece, and Rome. The interesting thing is that in the next vision God makes it very clear that these four horns will be dealt with.
THE VISION OF FOUR SMITHS
In our text they are called carpenters, but they are actually skilled workmen or artisans—or they can be called smiths because a smith is a trained workman.
And the Lord shewed me four carpenters.
Then said I, What come these to do? And he spake, saying, These are the horns which have scattered Judah, so that no man did lift up his head: but these are come to fray them, to cast out the horns of the Gentiles, which lifted up their horn over the land of Judah to scatter it [Zech. 1:20–21].
“Then said I, What come these to do?” That is, “What are these skilled workmen doing here?”
“And he spake, saying, These are the horns which have scattered Judah, so that no man did lift up his head: but these are come to fray [terrify] them, to cast out the horns of the Gentiles [nations], which lifted up their horn over the land of Judah to scatter it.” This is, without doubt, one of the most remarkable prophecies we have in the Scriptures.
Who are the four smiths? There have been many suggestions. Jerome and Cyril and Calvin considered them symbolic of the supernatural means which God uses. Well, I don’t quite agree with that. The smiths or artisans are workmen which build up something. I am greatly indebted to Dr. Merrill Unger for his interpretation, which I consider to be the correct one. (By the way, Dr. Unger’s book on Zechariah is the finest I have seen.) Since the four horns are symbolic of four successive world empires spanning “… the times of the Gentiles …” (Luke 21:24), the four smiths must also represent four successive powers used by God to terrify and to cast down the enemies of God’s people Israel. Now let me quote Dr. Unger from Unger’s Bible Commentary: Zechariah (p. 40):
In line with Daniel’s great prophecies concerning “the times of the Gentiles” (Dan. 2:31–45; 7:2–13) three of the horns in turn and under the punitive hand of God become smiths, while the fourth and last horn is cast down by the world-wide kingdom set up by the returning Christ, coming to dash to pieces His enemies who are at the same time His peoples’ enemies (Ps. 2:1–12). Thus the first horn (Babylon) is cast down by Medo-Persia, the second horn. The second horn (Medo-Persia), accordingly, in turn becomes the first smith. The second horn (Medo-Persia) is cast down by the third horn, and thus becomes the second smith. The third horn (Macedonian Greece), is in turn cast down by the fourth horn (Rome), which thus becomes the third smith. The fourth horn (Rome), the most dreadful of all, does not become a smith but in its revived ten-kingdom form of the last days is destroyed by the fourth smith, the millennial kingdom set up by the returning “King of kings and Lord of lords” (Rev. 19:16).
The interesting thing is that if you study the history of Rome, you will see that Rome was not destroyed by an outside power. In fact, according to prophecy, the Roman Empire will come back together again. It never did die—it just fell apart because of the internal corruption of the kingdom. There is one who is coming, the Antichrist, who will restore the Roman Empire. He will be a world dictator. Who is going to put him down? Christ will put him down when He returns to the earth. Therefore, Christ is represented by the fourth carpenter or smith. He is the one who will put down the Roman Empire when He comes at the end of the Great Tribulation Period.
My friend, I hope this enables you to see how important it is to study the entire Word of God, because “… no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation …” (2 Pet. 1:20)—that is, it is not to be interpreted by itself. It must be fitted into God’s tremendous program that reaches on into eternity.
It is interesting that, when the Lord Jesus came to earth the first time, He had the title of the carpenter of Nazareth. And He is coming again someday as a carpenter to put down this world dictator and establish His kingdom here upon this earth with Jerusalem as its center. Someone has expressed it in these words:
Then let the world forbear their rage,
The Church renounce her fear;
Israel must live through every age,
And be the Almighty’s care.
—Author unknown
Before we leave this chapter, I would like to call your attention to the fact that great prominence is given in each of the ten visions to these truths: (1) that God is not through with the nation Israel; and (2) when God says Israel and Judah and Jerusalem, He means exactly those geographic locations. The modern cult which teaches that Great Britain and the United States are the “ten lost tribes” is entirely wrong. I suppose that it helps our national pride to believe that we might be the “chosen people.” However, the only way God chooses people today is in Christ. It makes no difference who you are, what your color is, or what your station in life happens to be, if you are in Christ, you are chosen and accepted in the Beloved. Unless we are in Christ, it makes no difference to what nation we belong—right now it wouldn’t be helpful even to belong to the nation of Israel. We are looking for a “… city … whose builder and maker is God” (Heb. 11:10), and it is coming from God out of heaven someday. That is our hope.
But God is going to make good His promises to Israel. He will be faithful to them. If you could persuade me that He is going to be unfaithful to the nation Israel, then I do not know on what basis I could believe that He is going to be faithful to the church. But God is faithful, both to us and to Israel.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: Vision of the man with the measuring line
The vision of this chapter prophesies the rebuilding of the temple and the city of Jerusalem by the remnant of Israel in the days of Zechariah. However, this in no way concludes the prophecy. Zechariah—and this is true of all the other prophets—looks forward to the very end times and sees the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the temple during the Millennium. During this period the desert will blossom as the rose—and there is a whole lot of desert to blossom over there! And the Lord Himself will dwell in the city of Jerusalem. Although I don’t like Jerusalem as it is today, when the Lord moves into it, I think both you and I will like it then. (However, we won’t be living there, because the New Jerusalem will be the home of the church.) But the earthly Jerusalem will be inhabited and will become the center of this earth. Keep in mind that the Lord will do this—He has already said in chapter 1 verse 17, “My cities through prosperity shall yet be spread abroad; and the Lord shall yet comfort Zion, and shall yet choose Jerusalem.” So you see, everything that was to be done in Zechariah’s day had eternal significance. God has a purpose with Israel—He is not about to cast her off. Although local circumstances in Zechariah’s day were discouraging and it seemed that God has deserted them, He wanted them to know that not only had He not deserted them, but He has an eternal plan and purpose for them. They could say with us, “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6).
VISION OF THE MAN WITH THE MEASURING LINE
I lifted up mine eyes again, and looked, and behold a man with a measuring line in his hand [Zech. 2:1].
“I lifted up mine eyes again, and looked.” Zechariah sees it with his physical eyes; he is not asleep.
“Behold a man with a measuring line.” The appearance of this man reveals that He is the angel of the Lord, the preincarnate Christ, the same one who appeared in the first vision as the rider on the red horse. You may wonder why I say that He is the angel of the Lord when Zechariah simply calls him a man. Well, Zechariah presents Him as a man (ish in Hebrew). In chapter 6 verse 12 Zechariah will say, “Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH.” That is the branch of David, the sprout which is coming from Jesse, the Lord Jesus Christ.
To determine the meaning of the “measuring line,” I want to call your attention to other verses of Scripture: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the city shall be built to the Lord from the tower of Hananeel unto the gate of the corner. And the measuring line shall yet go forth over against it upon the hill Gareb, and shall compass about to Goath” (Jer. 31:38–39). When you find God using a measuring line, it simply means that He is getting ready to move again in behalf of that which He is measuring. In the Jeremiah reference He is measuring the city of Jerusalem. The prophet Ezekiel also speaks of measuring: “In the visions of God brought he me into the land of Israel, and set me upon a very high mountain, by which was as the frame of a city on the south. And he brought me thither, and, behold, there was a man, whose appearance was like the appearance of brass, with a line of flax in his hand, and a measuring reed; and he stood in the gate. And the man said unto me, Son of man, behold with thine eyes, and hear with thine ears, and set thine heart upon all that I shall shew thee; for to the intent that I might shew them unto thee art thou brought hither: declare all that thou seest to the house of Israel” (Ezek. 40:2–4). If we read further we would see that this is the vision of the building of the millennial temple in Jerusalem. There is another reference concerning a measuring line: “And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months” (Rev. 11:1–2). Without going into detail, let me say that this again is the measuring of the millennial temple that is to be built.
Then said I, Whither goest thou? And he said unto me, To measure Jerusalem, to see what is the breadth thereof, and what is the length thereof [Zech. 2:2].
“Whither goest thou?” Zechariah is interested and asks, “Where in the world are you going with that measuring line?”
“To measure Jerusalem, to see what is the breadth … and what is the length.” He is saying that the city is to be expanded. It did that in Zechariah’s day, and it is certainly doing that now. It spilled over the walls long ago. On every hill around the old city of Jerusalem there is construction going on. I don’t consider the current building program to be a fulfillment of Zechariah’s prophecy because I believe the fulfillment is yet future. The Jews could be driven out of the land of Israel again without disturbing God’s promise to eventually and finally bring them back to that land—for that is exactly what He intends to do.
And, behold, the angel that talked with me went forth, and another angel went out to meet him,
And said unto him, Run, speak to this young man, saying, Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls for the multitude of men and cattle therein [Zech. 2:3–4].
“Run, speak to this young man.” The young man is evidently Zechariah.
“Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls.” In our day the walls of Jerusalem surround only the older city, the small Arab city. Most of the city is outside the walls, scattered on the surrounding hills. This will also be true when this prophecy is fulfilled in the future. It won’t be needful to have walls because (1) in modern warfare walls afford no protection, and (2) the city will be at peace, which means that the Prince of Peace will be reigning in Jerusalem.
For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her [Zech. 2:5].
This certainly is not true in our day. Their help comes from other nations. But God says that in the future He will be a wall of fire around them. This means that God will be their protection. And, my friend, when God protects them, that will be miraculous. Not only will He be their protection, but He Himself will be in their midst. In other words, the shekinah glory will then be back in the temple—it did not return to the little temple which the remnant built in the days of Zechariah. But to the harassed little remnant God is promising His protection, He is saying essentially the same thing which he said to Abraham after he had delivered Lot: “… Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward” (Gen. 15:1). This means that God will make good all that He had promised them.
Daniel, Ezekiel, Zechariah, and Revelation are the four apocalyptic books in the Bible. They all look to the future when the kingdom is to be established here upon earth. I would like to quote a rather extensive passage from Ezekiel 43 to show the glory that is coming. It describes the coming of the Lord Jesus, the Messiah, coming into His temple. “Afterward he brought me to the gate, even the gate that looketh toward the east: And, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east: and his voice was like a noise of many waters: and the earth shined with his glory.”
This is the Lord Jesus, the Messiah, coming into the temple. Notice that He is coming from the east, which is the reason the Eastern Gate in the wall of Jerusalem is so prominent even in our day, although it is sealed up. Facing that gate are graves of thousands of Israelites because they believe they will be resurrected when this prophecy is fulfilled—and they want to be present when the Messiah comes. “And it was according to the appearance of the vision which I saw, even according to the vision that I saw when I came to destroy the city: and the visions were like the vision that I saw by the river Chebar; and I fell upon my face. And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east. So the spirit took me up, and brought me into the inner court; and, behold, the glory of the Lord filled the house. And I heard him speaking unto me out of the house; and the man stood by me. And he said unto me, Son of man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever, and my holy name, shall the house of Israel no more defile, neither they, nor their kings, by their whoredom, nor by the carcases of their kings in their high places” (Ezek. 43:1–7).
Notice it says, “I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever.” Forever is a long time, my friend. You see, this is a prophecy that does not find its fulfillment in the days of Ezekiel but looks down through the ages to the Millennium, the time when the Lord Jesus will come and establish His kingdom here on earth.
Now note again what Zechariah has prophesied: “For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.”
Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north, saith the Lord: for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the heaven, saith the Lord [Zech. 2:6].
“Ho, ho” is a call to listen. One “ho” would be enough, but when there is a double “ho,” it means that He is giving them something very important, and in this case it is a warning.
“Come forth, and flee from the land of the north.” In the following verse we shall see that Babylon is referred to as “the land of the north,” although it is actually situated in an easterly direction from Palestine. It is called the land of the north because invading armies and trading caravans from that land to Jerusalem came around the route called the “fertile crescent” and entered Palestine from the north.
“I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the heaven, saith the Lord.” Although historical Babylon did fall two years after this prophecy was given, the final fulfillment will be in the last days, when God will regather them from their worldwide dispersion.
Deliver thyself, O Zion, that dwellest with the daughter of Babylon [Zech. 2:7].
This means to get out of Babylon. Why? Because Babylon was going to fall. God was going to bring it down. Let me revert to the two visions about the horns and the carpenters. The first horn is Babylon, and now the carpenter (representing Medo-Persia) is coming, and he is going to tear Babylon down. But Medo-Persia will become a great power, a horn, and then he will persecute God’s people. So God will move that nation off the scene by bringing in another carpenter, which will be Greece. And Greece will become a proud nation. And under a ruler, Antiochus Epiphanes, who will come out of the divided empire of Alexander the Great, Israel will be severely persecuted. Then God will raise up another carpenter, Rome, and he will cut down the power of Greece. When the Roman Empire becomes a great power, where is the carpenter who will cut it down? History tells us that the great Roman Empire fell apart, but prophecy tells us that it will come back together again in the last days. Then who will put it down? The Lord Jesus is going to come from heaven. He is the carpenter of Nazareth, and He is also the man with the measuring rod. He will put down the Antichrist and his kingdom. Then Christ will establish His own kingdom here upon the earth. This is the picture given to us in these visions, which makes them of utmost significance.
For thus saith the Lord of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye [Zech. 2:8].
“Apple of his eye” is an unusual expression, although it occurs elsewhere in Scripture. In this instance it is the Hebrew babah, meaning “the pupil” or “the gate” (through which light enters). It is an expression which indicates that which is most precious, most easily injured, and most demanding of protection. This is what Israel is to the Lord God.
For, behold, I will shake mine hand upon them, and they shall be a spoil to their servants: and ye shall know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me [Zech. 2:9].
“I will shake mine hand upon them”—that is, all God needs to do is to shake His hand threateningly against the enemies of His people. “And they shall be a spoil to their servants.” Those who served them shall become their masters.
Now here is one of the great prophecies of Scripture.
Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion: for, lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord [Zech. 2:10].
“Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion.” Zion is a hill over in Jerusalem. There are cults that want to appropriate this verse to themselves; so they have moved “Zion” to England or to the United States. Let’s be clear on this: When God speaks of Zion, He is not talking about Illinois or Utah or any place other than Palestine. There is a constant danger of taking these prophecies which were given to Israel and relating them to us by way of interpretation. Certainly we can make application to our own country and to our own lives because great principles are stated here. But when God is talking about geography, He means exactly what He says. “But,” somebody says, “this is a vision.” Granted, but a vision is a vision of reality. A friend of mine disagreed with my interpretation of the Book of Revelation. He said, “It doesn’t mean that.”
I said, “Then you tell me what it means.”
“It is a symbol.”
“All right, now you tell me what it is a symbol of.”
“Oh, it’s just a symbol.”
“Don’t you know that a symbol has to be a symbol of something? And it has to make sense. You can’t just pull an explanation out of a hat and say, ‘This is what it means.’ How do you know what it means? It is a symbol of something, and by careful study and comparison with parallel passages, you are to determine what it is. No prophecy is of ‘private interpretation’; it must be tested by the whole Word of God.”
Therefore, when God uses a geographical term like Zion, He is talking about Zion in Israel. And notice that He is addressing the “daughter of Zion,” which is the nation Israel. This is a very familiar figure for Israel, and it cannot mean any other people.
“Lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord.” God means this literally. He intends to come to that geographical spot on the earth called Zion and to a certain group of people who will be there, Israel the daughter of Zion.
And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people: and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto thee.
And the Lord shall inherit Judah his portion in the holy land, and shall choose Jerusalem again [Zech. 2:11–12].
“And many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day.” Notice that it is not only Israel, but many nations will be converted to Christ in that day. To be “joined to the Lord” is to be united to Him in faith and spiritual experience.
“And the Lord shall inherit Judah.” The conversion of “many nations” does not imply that God will not fulfill His promises to Judah. Zechariah reminds his people again that they are God’s inheritance and His portion.
This ought to answer once and for all the anti-Semite who insists that Judah refers to Jews and that Israel refers to another race. God says that He intends to inherit Judah.
“His portion in the holy land.” This is the only place in the Bible where the phrase “holy land” is used. It is not the holy land today. When I make this statement publicly, it is generally challenged by somebody who says, “But it is the holy land. That is the place where Jesus walked!” Well, His footprints are all gone. He is not walking there now. However, someday He will return, and when He does, it will be the holy land again.
“And shall choose Jerusalem again” implies that He is not choosing Jerusalem right now—and I wouldn’t either! But when He does choose it, it will become the capital of this earth.
Remember that no prophecy is of any “private interpretation.” It must parallel other Scriptures. So let me call your attention to a parallel passage in Isaiah: “And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem” (Isa. 2:2–3). All of this looks forward to the time of the Millennium.
Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord: for he is raised up out of his holy habitation [Zech. 2:13].
In that day the whole earth will keep silence. Today we hear a lot about freedom of speech, but in that future day there is going to be a marvelous freedom of silence. Why? Because God will be in His holy temple. This looks forward to His visible presence on earth during the Millennium.
This prospect for the future should have been an encouragement to those people in the day of Zechariah. I’m sure it was. And it ought to be an encouragement for us today. God has a plan and purpose for each one of us. He is working in your life and in my life. He works in our hearts both to will and to do of His good pleasure. Oh, to be in step with Him and to be going in the same direction as He is going!
CHAPTER 3
Theme: Vision of Joshua and Satan; Vision of the Branch
As we continue in our study of the ten visions which God gave to Zechariah, keep in mind that we are in a highly figurative section of the Word of God. These ten visions should be considered together as focusing on one particular message. An overall viewpoint will give us a perspective of what each vision is trying to tell us. Also, we need to compare them with other prophetic Scripture passages. As the apostle Peter said, “… no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation” (2 Pet. 1:20). That is, we are not to interpret it by itself, but compare it with the whole program of prophecy to get the overall viewpoint which reaches from eternity past to eternity future.
VISION OF JOSHUA AND SATAN
And he shewed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him [Zech. 3:1].
“He shewed me Joshua the high priest.” Keep in mind that this is not the Joshua who led the children of Israel into the Promised Land. This is the Joshua who served as high priest among the remnant of Israel who returned to Jerusalem after the Babylonian captivity. The name Joshua means “Jehovah saves,” and in the Greek language of the New Testament, the name is translated as “Jesus.” You remember that the angel in announcing His approaching birth said, “…thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21). So you can see that the name Joshua is especially appropriate for this high priest and prefigures what the nation Israel ought to have been—that is, a holy, high-priestly nation.
“Standing before the angel of the Lord.” This angel is the Lord Jesus Christ before His incarnation, as we have seen in the previous chapters.
“And Satan standing at his right hand.” It is quite obvious that if Zechariah saw Joshua, he also saw Satan, which means that Satan is a reality and a person.
In our contemporary culture we see a revival in interest regarding Satan. He pretty much had dropped out of the vocabulary of most people in so-called Christian lands for the past fifty years. They had forgotten about him; or perhaps they felt that by not mentioning him he would go away. But he hasn’t gone away. He is very much a reality. The current interest in the supernatural has turned, unfortunately, to Satan and to demons rather than to God and the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible tells us, and modern thinking demands, that evil be incarnate, that it be represented by a person. Therefore, many folk have gone off into demonology. Logically, if evil must be personified, then good must also be personified. Good is God, and God is good. God in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ will be the final answer to men who are seeking a solution to their own problems and to the ills of the world.
“To resist him.” The fact that Satan is standing at Joshua’s right hand could mean that he is there to support him or defend him, but, no, he is there to bring charges against him. This is typical in the workings of Satan. Scripture tells us that you and I have an advocate with the Father. Why do we need an advocate with God the Father? Because of the enemy who is accusing us. In Revelation 12:10 he is called “…the accuser of our brethren … which accused them before our God day and night.” I have a notion that this very day he has made a charge against McGee, and I’m sure it is a valid charge. And I am confident that he has been making charges against me from the time I became a child of God. When I was in my teens, working in a Nashville bank, I had tried every form of sin imaginable at that time and was one of a very fast crowd. I was the last person in that crowd that anybody would have imagined would ever go into the ministry and become a teacher of the Word of God. After God had saved me and when I felt God was calling me into the ministry, I made that announcement at the bank and resigned from my position. I wish you could have heard the guffaws that went out. “Imagine McGee!” And I suppose that Satan had a busy day accusing me before the Lord—“You would be very foolish to let him into the ministry. That fellow is the last person in this entire area who ought to go into the ministry.” And Satan was standing at the right hand of Joshua to resist him, to accuse him. He was probably saying to God, “How can you put up with this man—he is filthy!” Also Satan was the accuser of the nation Israel. He is really an anti-Semite. If you want to know who is the leader of anti-Semitism, it is the Devil himself.
However, as God’s children we have an advocate with the Father. John, writing to believers, says, “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. [I wish we didn’t, but we do. I And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1). And Jesus Christ is the “angel of the Lord” before whom Joshua the high priest is standing in this vision of Zechariah.
And the Lord said unto Satan, The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire? [Zech. 3:2].
“The Lord rebuke thee” is very gentle, according to my standards. I could think of a stronger rebuke than that, but God respects this one whom He created. Remember that God created him “… Lucifer, son of the morning …” (Isa. 14:12), probably the highest creature that He ever created. Then sin was found in him. What kind of sin? Lust or stealing? No. Pride was found in him. He had a free will, and he set that will against the will of God. My friend, that is sin. “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way …” (Isa. 53:6). Specific sins such as murder, stealing, lying, adultery all come under the heading of “his own way.” This is the problem of mankind.
“Even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee.” This reveals that the rebuke comes not on the account of Joshua the person but on the account of Jerusalem, the capital of the nation.
“Is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?” It looked as if Jerusalem could never be rebuilt after Nebuchadnezzar destroyed it, and it lay in dust and ashes for seventy years. Then out of the ruins the city is rebuilt—a brand plucked out of the burning.
John Wesley called himself a brand plucked out of the burning. I’m of the opinion that many of us today think of ourselves in that way. As I look back, it seems like an accident that I got saved. It just didn’t seem that it could possibly have happened to me. But it did happen, and I know now that it was no accident at all. It can be said of any sinner who comes to Christ that he is a brand plucked out of the fire.
Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the angel [Zech. 3:3].
This vision of Joshua the high priest actually goes beyond the man himself. We will learn that this vision gives us the answer to a very difficult question. This is the problem: We have learned so far that God is going to return the nation Israel to the land and that He will dwell in the midst of them. They will be totally restored as His people. That hasn’t happened yet, but He says He is going to do that. He will bless them in that land. How can God do that when the people are far from Him? In the day of Zechariah they were far from God and living in sin. Today the same thing is true. How can it ever be a holy land when sinners are living in it?
Unger states the problem in this way:
In the preceding visions the marvellous purposes of God’s grace toward Israel appear in the judgment of her enemies and the restoration of both the land and of the people. But a crucial question arises: How can an infinitely holy God accomplish such plans with a sinful and besmirched people? How can the wondrous manifestations of divine mercy to them be consistent with God’s righteousness? (Unger’s Bible Commentary: Zechariah, p. 55).
I think the explanation to this problem will become clear as we study the vision. Joshua was to represent the nation. As we read on, we will find him clothed with a filthy garment, very dirty. If you will remember our study of the high priest, you will recall that the high priest had to be dressed spotlessly or else he was not permitted to serve God. Joshua really was the high priest at this time, but in this vision he also represented the entire nation.
Joshua as an individual was not a perfect individual. Even though he was God’s high priest, he was described as dirty and filthy. That might have been true of him personally, I do not know. But I do know that the high priest has always represented the nation Israel. For example, on the great Day of Atonement, the high priest went into the Holy of Holies for the entire nation. In just the same way, Jesus Christ is our high priest. He is the representative for the corporate body of believers, the church. He appears before God for us today. To see Joshua in the context of all the ten visions of Zechariah and as a prophetic picture of the nation Israel will deliver us from a very limited interpretation.
Leupold says of the high priest:
He represents and practically impersonates Israel in his holy office. For the nation he prays; for it he enters the Holy Place, he bears the nation’s guilt. We must, therefore, not refer the issues and implications of this chapter to Joshua as an individual, nor merely to Joshua, the high priest. We must conclude that his condition is Israel’s condition, his acquittal a typical way of expressing theirs; the words of comfort and assurance given him apply with equal validity to them (Exposition of Zechariah, p. 64).
That is a very fine statement. Leupold is not always one we can follow in his interpretations, but in this instance he is especially good.
Joshua was a symbol, a type, a representative. God had chosen him, and God had also chosen the nation Israel.
The high priest was to be clothed in finetwined, white linen undergarments. And over them were to be placed the garments of beauty and glory. Joshua was pictured here as the high priest representing the nation, and his garments, which should have been clean, were unclean. In fact, he “was clothed with filthy garments.” That word filthy means that there was human excrement on them! Not only was he dirty looking, but he smelled bad. My friend, that is the way the sins of the nation Israel looked to Almighty God. How can this be remedied?
A man with a question called me by telephone from Indianapolis. His question was an old one which has been asked over and over by many people down through the years. It was this: “Have I committed the unpardonable sin?” I told him, “Of course you haven’t. Jesus died for all your sins. Regardless of who you are or what you have done, you can come to Him right now, confessing your sins and trusting Christ as your Savior. If you do that and mean it, He will forgive you. ‘For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth’ (Rom. 10:4). So it doesn’t make any difference what you have done, you can come to God through Jesus Christ.”
And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment [Zech. 3:4].
This is, without doubt, one of the most beautiful pictures we have in the Old Testament. Joshua could not stand before a righteous, holy God with these dirty garments on. Also his weakness was revealed. You see, being dirty and filthy as he was gave Satan an advantage because the adversary could point his finger at him. Let me give you Dr. Unger’s translation of verse 4: “And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take the filthy garments from off him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with rich apparel” (Unger’s Bible Commentary: Zechariah, p. 60).
Joshua represented not only the nation of Israel, he represents us today. In him we see the sin of the believer. Joshua was a priest before God—God appointed priests in the Old Testament. In our day every believer is a priest before God, but some of us are standing in dirty garments. “Yes,” you may say, “but I have been clothed in the righteousness of Christ.” If you have been saved, that is true. And that is exactly the picture which is given to us here. You see, the dirty garments, representing sin, must be removed from him, and he must be clothed with clean garments, symbolic of the righteousness of Christ. This pictures your salvation and mine, which makes this such a precious passage of Scripture. Let me refer you to the Epistle to the Romans. In the first three chapters mankind is set before us as a sinner before God. We all stand dirty before Him. And our righteousness—even the best that we can do—is filthy rags in God’s sight. We stand in Joshua’s condition. What are we going to do about our plight?
Here is God’s answer: “But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Being justified freely [without cause] by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:21–24). Why? Because Christ died, shed His blood, that it might be possible for you and me to come in our filthy rags to Him. He will not accept the filthy rags of our own righteousness. He will take them off and clothe us in the righteousness of Christ. When we stand clothed in Christ’s righteousness, nobody, no created thing, can bring any charge against us because we are God’s elect. Notice what Paul writes in Romans 8: “What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely [without a cause] give us all things? Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us” (Rom. 8:31–34). What a Savior we have! When we trust Him as our Savior, He not only takes from us our sins, removes the dirty garment, but He puts on us the robe of His righteousness, and no one can bring any charge against God’s elect.
But wait—can God’s child get into sin? Yes. Then what is the child of God to do? Well, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). When you and I are out of fellowship with God, we have lost a great deal. We have lost all joy from our lives. We have lost all power from our lives. And it is possible to lose our assurance. I am of the opinion that many folk lack the assurance of their salvation because of sin in their lives. Another thing we lose is our privilege of being of service to God.
You see, if Joshua is to stand before God as His high priest, he must be wearing clean garments. And God provides clean garments. How? By mercy. There was a mercy seat in the temple. And we today have a mercy seat—“And he [Christ] is the propitiation [the mercy seat] for our sins …” (1 John 2:2). How wonderful this is, and what a glorious picture it gives of God’s provision!
Now, you may have an objection to God’s choosing the nation Israel. Did He choose them because they were attractive? No. He didn’t choose me for that reason either. I think of Ruth when she asked Boaz, “… Why have I found grace in thine eyes? …? (Ruth 2:10). Well, I could say to her, “All you have to do is go home and look in the mirror and you will find out why he fell in love with you and why he extended grace to you. You are beautiful. You are lovely.” But, my friend, don’t tell me to look in the mirror. I have already done it, and what did I see? A sinner, a sinner who needs to be clothed with the righteousness of Christ.
And I said, Let them set a fair mitre upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon his head, and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the Lord stood by [Zech. 3:5].
The adding of this mitre or turban is a little something which is beautiful in its symbolism. The garments of the high priest included a turban, and on that turban were the words: HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD, as in chapter 14 verse 20. This man Joshua didn’t have a turban, because in those dirty old garments he certainly was not holy to the Lord. But a turban is given to him now on which is inscribed “Holiness unto the Lord.” He will be used of God now just as Israel will be used of the Lord in the future. After the church has been removed in the Rapture, Israel will be the witness for God during the Tribulation, and then during the Millennium the entire nation will be a priesthood down here upon this earth.
And the angel of the Lord protested unto Joshua, saying,
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; If thou wilt walk in my ways, and if thou wilt keep my charge, then thou shalt also judge my house, and shalt also keep my courts, and I will give thee places to walk among these that stand by [Zech. 3:6–7].
The interpretation of this is quite obvious. Joshua had been dirty, but God had a redemption which enabled Him to extend His grace and mercy to him. Now Joshua is saved, but God says, “If you want to be used, you will have to stay clean. You will have to walk in My ways. You will have to be obedient to Me.”
Not only is God saying this to Joshua, He is saying it to the nation, and He is saying it to you and me today. Jesus said, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). Some folk seem to have the idea that if they are saved by grace, they can do as they please. My friend, that is inconsistent. If you do as you please, you are not saved by grace—because certainly you are going to love the One who died to save you. If you have really accepted Him and are really trusting Him, you are resting upon Him. And if you are resting in Him, you will want to be obedient to Him and do as He wants you to do. It can’t be any other way.
VISION OF THE BRANCH
Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, thou, and thy fellows that sit before thee: for they are men wondered at: for, behold, I will bring forth my servant the BRANCH [Zech. 3:8].
“My servant the BRANCH” is a marvelous picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. “The Branch” is a familiar figure of the Messiah. Isaiah used that figure to predict His first coming as Savior: “And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots” (Isa. 11:1). And Jeremiah uses it to speak of Christ’s coming as King to this earth: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth” (Jer. 23:5).
“Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, thou, and thy fellows that sit before thee.” God is here addressing Joshua and his fellow priests. Now what is the message He is giving them? Leupold’s paraphrase of verse 8 provides the answer: “I shall not let you, Joshua, and your fellow priests be removed from office, nor your office be discontinued, for I have a destiny for you—you are a type of the coming Messiah, who will do My work perfectly (‘Servant’), and who will bring the priestly office to undreamed of glory (‘Shoot’) when He springs forth” (op. cit., in loc.).
For behold the stone that I have laid before Joshua; upon one stone shall be seven eyes: behold, I will engrave the graving thereof, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day [Zech. 3:9].
The “Branch” is also the stone, the stone which Daniel saw in the vision of the great image: “Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshingfloors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth” (Dan. 2:34–35).
“Upon one stone shall be seven eyes.” Seven is not the number of perfection but the number of completeness. The “seven eyes” indicate that Christ has complete knowledge and wisdom. In the New Testament it is said of Christ, “In whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3). And the Lord Jesus has been made unto us wisdom because He is all wisdom (see 1 Cor. 1:30).
“I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day.” Has that happened in our day? No, it certainly has not happened yet. But it will happen in the future. When the Lord Jesus’ Christ comes, He will remove the iniquity of Israel in one day.
In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, shall ye call every man his neighbour under the vine and under the fig tree [Zech. 3:10].
“In that day” refers to the Day of the Lord. “Shall ye call every man his neighbour under the vine and under the fig tree” means that they will be dwelling in peace and enjoyment in that day.
CHAPTER 4
Theme: Vision of the lampstand and two olive trees
We have come now to Zechariah’s seventh vision. Thinking back over the visions he has had, we can see a story unfolding. He has seen (1) the riders under the myrtle trees, (2) the four horns, (3) the four smiths or carpenters, (4) the man with the measuring line, (5) Joshua and Satan, and then (6) the Branch and the Stone with seven eyes in it. The first four visions symbolize the outward deliverance from the slavery and oppression of Babylon. The visions also look to the end times when Israel again will be scattered throughout the world, as they are today, then returned to their land when the Lord Jesus brings them back.
The fifth and sixth visions symbolized inner salvation. The high priest Joshua, clothed in dirty garments which God replaced with clean garments, tells the story of a people brought back to the land for a purpose, but they can’t be used in their sin. They will have to be cleansed; but they cannot cleanse themselves, and their religion won’t do it. The cleansing has to come from someone outside themselves. “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isa. 1:18). God Himself provides the redemption “… with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Pet. 1:19). The cleansing is actually salvation—“Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost” (Titus 3:5).
Now that Joshua, the high priest, is cleansed, you may think that he is ready for service. No, he is not quite ready. We come now to the vision of the golden lampstand, which is going to show us how Joshua is to fulfill the office of high priest.
VISION OF THE LAMPSTAND AND TWO OLIVE TREES
And the angel that talked with me came again, and waked me, as a man that is wakened out of his sleep [Zech. 4:1].
Let me call your attention again to the fact that Zechariah was awake when he received these visions. At this point he already has had six tremendous visions. He was working the swing shift and the night shift and it was time to have a little rest. So after he had been given the sixth vision, he dozed off. Now the angel has to wake him up because he is not to be given this vision in a dream; he will see every bit of it.
And said unto me, What seest thou? And I said, I have looked, and behold a candlestick all of gold, with a bowl upon the top of it, and his seven lamps thereon, and seven pipes to the seven lamps, which are upon the top thereof [Zech. 4:2].
The word candlestick in the Authorized Version is properly translated “lampstand” because this is the seven-branched lampstand which stood in the Holy Place of the tabernacle and later in the temple, and in our day it is one of the symbols of the nation Israel. There are other symbols of this nation which are used in Scripture, such as the burning bush, the vine, and the olive tree, but here it is the menorah, the lampstand.
In the tabernacle, and later in the temple, the seven-branched lampstand was the most beautiful of the pieces of furniture. It was handwrought of solid gold. Bezaleel, the skilled artisan, was the one who fashioned it originally. There were three branches going out on each side of the main stem, and on top of each were bowls beautifully made like open almond flowers in which the lamps were placed. The high priest had charge of the lampstand. He would light the lamps and keep them filled with oil. Also it was his business to trim the wicks and to see that they burned continually. In the Book of Revelation we have a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Great High Priest, walking in the midst of the lampstands which represented the seven churches in Asia Minor. He warned them that if they didn’t repent of their sins He would remove their lampstands. And He did just that. In modern Turkey today not one of those churches is in existence. They all lie in ruins. Christ removed their lampstands. And in our own land our Great High Priest has closed the door of many a church which was not giving out the Word of God. Our Lord has a snuffer, and He just snuffs them out.
And here in Zechariah’s vision the picture is of the nation Israel, represented by the menorah, which will in the future become a witness for God in the world.
“With a bowl upon the top of it.” This is something new which is added that you don’t find in the instructions given to Moses for fashioning the original lampstand. Here there is a “bowl” which acts as a reservoir or oil tank over the seven lamps so that the oil flows by gravity into the lamps from the elevated bowl. The oil is the all-important factor in the vision.
The lampstand speaks of Christ; the lamps with the oil in them speak of the Holy Spirit. We have no better picture of the Holy Spirit than the oil of the lampstand. Hengstenberg is correct in saying that “oil is one of the most clearly defined symbols in the Bible,” and the symbolism is that of the Holy Spirit. While the oil represents the Holy Spirit, the light which is given out represents Christ because He is the Light of the World. The lampstand probably presents the most complete picture of Christ that the symbolism of the tabernacle gives to us. The measurement of the lampstand was not given because it is impossible to measure deity. It was fashioned in a very wonderful way with open almond blossoms at the top into which the little lamps were placed after they had been filled with oil and their wicks trimmed.
When the Lord Jesus was preparing to leave this earth, He told His disciples that He would send the Holy Spirit, adding, “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak.… He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you” (John 16:13–14). With that in mind, look at the lampstand. The lampstand supported the lamps with the light shining from them, and the light, in turn, revealed the beauty and glory of the lampstand. In just such a way, the Holy Spirit does not speak of Himself, but He reveals the glories and the beauties of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And two olive trees by it, one upon the right side of the bowl, and the other upon the left side thereof [Zech. 4:3].
The two olive trees were identified in Zechariah’s day. Zerubbabel, who was the king in the line of David, is one of the olive trees. The other olive tree was Joshua, the high priest. They would be the two instruments God would use to bring light back into the nation Israel and to make them a light to the world.
The olive oil, as I have already indicated (the word in the Hebrew is beautiful: golden oil), represents the Holy Spirit. This prophecy is also destined for a future day, the Great Tribulation Period. This is clearly identified for us in the Book of Revelation: “And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth. These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks [lampstands] standing before the God of the earth” (Rev. 11:3–4). Out yonder in the Great Tribulation Period there will be no witness on the earth because the Antichrist, with the power of Satan (since God withdraws His hand for that brief moment), will have stopped the mouth of every witness on the topside of the earth—with the exception of two. God says that always in the mouth of two witnesses a thing is established. Also God says He will never leave Himself without a witness. During that period there will be these two men who will witness for Him. Who they are is speculation. I think Elijah may be one of them, but whether the other is Enoch, whether he is Moses, whether he is John the Baptist, or somebody else, I do not know. But their identity is not the important thing. God will have two witnesses, and they will speak in the power of the Holy Spirit in that day. They will be God’s witnesses. That is His promise for the future just as He used Zerubbabel and Joshua in Zechariah’s day.
Let me say again that the visions of Zechariah are like stepping-stones which tell out a story. They reveal a very beautiful and complete picture when we put them together. God gave these to the returned remnant for their encouragement. The children of Israel had been in Babylonian captivity and now had returned to the land of Israel. God had made it clear to them that all of this had happened according to His plan and purpose. Now back in the land, they had to be cleansed from their sins and brought into a right relationship with God so that they could render an effective testimony for Him.
Although these visions of Zechariah had a local fulfillment for the past, they also looked forward to the future. The complete fulfillment will be during the millennial period when God will return the Jewish people to the land of Israel. And God will cleanse them in that future day. In chapter 13 of Zechariah we will find that a fountain will be opened for the cleansing of David’s offspring and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem. After they have been cleansed, they will become a light to the world—which was God’s original intention for them. In Deuteronomy 32:8 we read this remarkable verse: “When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.” Why did He arrange the nations according to the number of the children of Israel? The reason is that God intended them to be His witnesses.
The land of Israel is a very sensitive piece of real estate. God has chosen it and made it that way. He chose it because it was the very center of the three major continents: Africa, Asia, and Europe. It is right on the crossroads of those three continents. There is no place on earth that is more sensitive or that has caused more international problems than that little spot. I think that God intended that it should be that way. And there will be trouble until Israel becomes the center for the proclamation of the Word of God. In Ezekiel 5:5 we read these words: “Thus saith the Lord God; This is Jerusalem: I have set it in the midst of the nations and countries that are round about her.” Why? So she could be a witness. And in that future day they will be a witness in every corner and crevice of this world.
It is interesting that the popular symbol of Israel today is the menorah. When I have visited in Israel, the fig tree, the vine, and the olive tree symbols have not been in evidence, but I have seen the menorah in many places. I was there during their twenty-fifth anniversary, and I saw the menorah symbol everywhere. Someday the people of Israel will be the witness which God intended them to be.
Israel has failed in the past, but the church is failing in the present. Although Christ has commanded us to go into all the world with the gospel, there are many places in the world that have no witness at all. I am delighted to be penetrating some of those unreached places by means of radio. A letter came to me from South America telling of a young man who had come to know Christ through listening to our Bible teaching by radio, and he immediately became the preacher to his village. Why? Because there wasn’t any preacher there, and he was the only witness in the town. He became a flaming evangel, a light for the Lord in that place.
In that future day the Jewish people will be witnesses in every corner of the world, and the Word of God shall go out from Jerusalem. “And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem” (Isa. 2:2–3).
So I answered and spake to the angel that talked with me, saying, What are these, my lord? [Zech. 4:4].
This young man Zechariah has no inhibitions, so he says, “I see these things, but what is the meaning of them?”
Then the angel that talked with me answered and said unto me, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord [Zech. 4:5].
The answer of the angel implies that Zechariah should know what it means. In effect he is saying, “You ought to be able to understand it. You are looking at the golden lampstand, and you ought to know the meaning of that.” Well, Zechariah didn’t. He said, “No, my lord, I don’t understand it at all.”
Then he answered and spake unto me, saying, This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts [Zech. 4:6].
Notice that this is God’s message to Zerubbabel. Now who is Zerubbabel? He is serving as the civil head of Jerusalem (while Joshua is serving as the religious head). He was the head of the tribe of Judah at the time of their return to Jerusalem after the seventy-year Babylonian captivity. He is the one who led the first group of his people back to their homeland, as described in the Book of Ezra. Zerubbabel’s great work was that of rebuilding the temple, but the work was dogged by danger from the outside and discouragement from within. God is giving this vision to strengthen the faith of Zerubbabel. It has real meaning for him, and also it contains a great principle for you and me.
Here is the message: “Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts.” The words might and power are quite interesting. Might is a general word for human resources such as physical strength, human ability or efficiency, or wealth. Power also denotes mere human strength—physical, material, and mental strength. Therefore, let me give you my translation of this verse: “It is not by brawn nor by brain, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts.” You can see that this would be a great encouragement to Zerubbabel, the civil ruler. He and Joshua, the religious ruler, were represented by the two olive trees who were supplying oil to the lampstand. The message is simply this: It will not be by your cleverness, you ability, or your physical strength that the temple will be rebuilt, but by the Spirit of God.
My friend, if the Spirit of God is not in our enterprises today, they will come to naught because God is not carrying on His work by our brain or brawn. We speak of clever preachers who deliver very well-composed sermons and all of that, but God’s work is not carried on that way. Sometimes a clever preacher is a dangerous man. The fellow who is sharp mentally may be sharp in the wrong direction and cause a great deal of difficulty among God’s people. I have had to stand on the sidelines and see a great deal of religious racketeering going on when I couldn’t lift my voice against it without being misunderstood. It is quite evident that some clever fellows were good backslappers, good public relations men, good administrators, had nice personalities and a great deal of charisma, and they made an appeal. But God does not carry on His work by the human instrument. It is “not by might nor by power”; it is not by brain nor by brawn, but it is “by my spirit, saith the Lord.”
Let me be personal and very frank. Anything that Vernon McGee does in the flesh, that is by his own effort, God hates. He can’t use it. It will come to nothing because it is nothing in the world but Vernon McGee building a haystack which ultimately is going to be consumed by fire. God wants to do His work through us, by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is important for us to see.
Now looking into the future, this will be especially true during the Millennium. Again, it will not be by brain or by brawn, “but by my spirit, saith the Lord.” David Baron has put it like this: “It is in His light, and by means of the golden oil of His Spirit, which shall then be shed upon them abundantly, that Israel’s candlestick shall yet shine with a sevenfold brilliancy for the illumination of all the nations of the earth.” That, my friend, is a great statement.
Back in the days of Zechariah there was a remnant that needed this encouragement because they were overwhelmed by opposition, and they were beset by doubts and by fears. So the vision was given—it is the Word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel—to encourage them.
Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain: and he shall bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace unto it [Zech. 4:7].
“Who art thou, O great mountain?” The mountain represents opposition. This vision encourages them to believe that Zerubbabel will be able to remove the mountain of opposition. The Lord Jesus used “mountain” in that sense. The Lord Jesus said to His disciples, “… If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you” (Matt. 17:20). I don’t think our Lord was speaking of removing physical mountains—we don’t know of any physical mountains being moved in that day—but the faith that removes mountains is the faith that removes obstacles and opposition to the work of God. And that is the picture this vision gives. God’s temple will be rebuilt regardless of the seeming impossibilities.
“And he shall bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace unto it.” The headstone is the finishing or gable stone which marks the completion of a building. He is saying that the temple will be completed with the shoutings and cheers of the people. What an encouragement this was to the disheartened remnant!
Moreover the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,
The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house; his hands shall also finish it; and thou shalt know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto you [Zech. 4:8–9].
This is God’s promise that the work won’t drag on and finally be completed by someone else, but that Zerubbabel himself is going to finish it. It reminds me of the promise in the New Testament: “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6). God is saying to Zerubbabel, “You have laid the foundation, and I was with you. Well, you are going to put the roof on it, too, and I will be with you.”
For who hath despised the day of small things? for they shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel with those seven; they are the eyes of the Lord, which run to and fro through the whole earth [Zech. 4:10].
“For who hath despised the day of small things?” I can tell you who has—we despise the day of small things. We Americans are impressed with the big and brassy. We like our Christian work to be a success story. And we measure success by the size of the building and the crowds that come to it. Well, I am becoming more and more convinced that the Lord is working in quiet ways and in quiet places today. I am talking to myself when I say that we should quit despising small things.
“For they shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel with those seven.” The “plummet” or “plumb” is a weight on the end of a string, and it is used to determine if a building is vertical to the earth. I wish I had thought of using a plummet when I put up a little shed on my place—because it isn’t quite straight.
“They are the eyes of the Lord, which run to and fro through the whole earth” indicates that God knows what is going on, and He is still overruling.
Then answered I, and said unto him, What are these two olive trees upon the right side of the candlestick and upon the left side thereof?
And I answered again, and said unto him, What be these two olive branches which through the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves?
And he answered me and said, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord [Zech. 4:11–13].
Zechariah is asking again for an explanation. And the angel’s answer, “Knowest thou not what these be?” implies that he ought to know. But he doesn’t know.
Then said he, These are the two anointed ones, that stand by the Lord of the whole earth [Zech. 4:14].
These are the two Spirit-filled men, Zerubbabel, the civil ruler, and Joshua, the religious ruler. We have already seen that Joshua, representing the nation, has been cleansed and now stands in clean garments. When the remnant of Israel confessed their sin and accepted God’s redemption, they were cleansed and now stand in the righteousness of Christ. Therefore, they can be Spirit-filled and can be used of God.
This has a message for you and for me. God wants to fill us with the Holy Spirit. But there are certain conditions to be met. Two of them are negative: (1) “…grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption” (Eph. 4:30). We cannot be filled with the Spirit if there is sin in our lives—we have to be clean in God’s sight. (2) “Quench not the Spirit” (1 Thess. 5:19). Quenching the Spirit is being out of the will of God. And when we are out of the will of God, God cannot use us. If God wants you in Africa and you are still in your homeland, I don’t think that God is going to use you here. But, my friend, if you are in Africa and God wants you to be in your own country, He won’t use you there either. The third condition to be met for the filling of the Spirit is positive: (3) “…Walk in the Spirit…” (Gal. 5:16). Walking in the Spirit is a very practical sort of thing. It is to walk by means of the Spirit, to rest on Him, depending upon Him to do what we cannot do ourselves.
The vision of the lampstands was an encouragement to the remnant in Zechariah’s day; it has an application to our day; and it looks forward to the day when God will pour out His Spirit without measure. I see very little of a genuine pouring out of His Spirit in our contemporary society, but during the Millennium He is going to pour out His Spirit upon all flesh. That day is yet future, my friend.
CHAPTER 5
Theme: Vision of the flying roll; vision of a woman in an ephah
We come now to the two visions which are the most highly symbolic and unusual of this series of visions. The first, the flying roll or scroll, marks a sharp division in the meaning of the visions which Zechariah received. In the first two chapters God makes it clear that He intends to put down all the enemies of Israel and that the nation will become the nation of priests which was God’s original intention. God told them that this was His desire for them when He brought them out of Egyptian bondage, but, because of their sin, only one tribe—the tribe of Levi—was chosen for the priesthood. Then in the vision of Joshua and Satan we learned that the nation first had to be cleansed. Then the vision of the branch and the stone with seven eyes looked forward to the kingdom age when God, having cleansed them, would use them, and they would become a light to the world, symbolized by the lampstand being fed oil from the olive trees. The oil, representing the Holy Spirit, signified that they would witness in the power of the Holy Spirit.
That is all well and good, but it does raise a question. Does it mean that every member of this nation, every Israelite, will be chosen—even those who live in continual rebellion and sin? In the visions before us, we will see that the judgment of God will come upon those who do not become obedient unto Him. He will ferret out those who are rebellious, and He will judge them.
By the same token, God will do this in the whole world. Although these visions have in mind the local nation, they also have a world view. There is here a global gospel that looks forward to the establishment of God’s kingdom here upon the earth. This makes very clear the thing that God said regarding Israel: “…For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel” (Rom. 9:6). It is the national unity, the corporate body—not every member—that will be accepted. Each individual will have to be obedient to God, come God’s way for cleansing, as we have seen, and will have to receive the Messiah.
What is said of the nation Israel is also true of the church. Not every church member is a genuine Christian—that is, a member of the body of believers which is called the church. There will come a day when there will be a separation of believers and unbelievers. The great division of the church will be at the Rapture, and the division for Israel and for all the nations on the earth will be at the second coming of Christ when He gathers His elect into His kingdom. Then there will be a judgment, and Satan will be bound for one thousand years. All of this is in the picture that is given to us here. You can see that this was for the encouragement of the godly remnant of Israel in Zechariah’s day as well as for us today.
VISION OF THE FLYING ROLL
Then I turned, and lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and behold a flying roll [Zech. 5:1].
The first thing that we should establish is that this flying roll is a scroll which represents the Word of God. We get this explanation from the prophet Ezekiel. “And when I looked, behold, an hand was sent unto me; and, lo, a roll of a book was therein; And he spread it before me; and it was written within and without: and there was written therein lamentations, and mourning, and woe. Moreover he said unto me, Son of man, eat that thou findest; eat this roll, and go speak unto the house of Israel. So I opened my mouth, and he caused me to eat that roll. And he said unto me, Son of man, cause thy belly to eat, and fill thy bowels with this roll that I give thee. Then did I eat it; and it was in my mouth as honey for sweetness. And he said unto me, Son of man, go, get thee unto the house of Israel, and speak with my words unto them” (Ezek. 2:9–3:4). Ezekiel was to digest the Word of God and then he was to give it out to the people. This is a tremendous picture for us who are preachers. We ought to digest the Word of God. It might be bitter in our tummies, but in our mouths it should be as sweet as honey—that is, something that we delight in giving out.
I should add that there is a great difference of opinion and many interpretations regarding the meaning of the flying scroll. But the solid interpretation which has come down through the centuries is that the scroll represents the Word of God in general and the Ten Commandments in particular.
And he said unto me, What seest thou? And I answered, I see a flying roll; the length thereof is twenty cubits, and the breadth thereof ten cubits [Zech. 5:2].
The size of the scroll was twenty cubits by ten cubits—that’s a very large scroll. The scrolls in the days of Zechariah were made of papyrus or animal skins with a roller at each end so that the ones reading could roll it off one roller and onto the other roller as they read it. Instead of turning pages, as we do when we read a book, they would unroll more of the scroll as they read along. But the scroll of Zechariah’s vision was 20x10 cubits (a cubit was the measurement from the end of the middle finger to the elbow and would vary depending upon the size of the individual but was about eighteen inches), which would make the scroll about 15x30 feet, much larger than a bed sheet, even a king-sized sheet. The only way it could be seen would be spread out, and he sees it as a great flying scroll, that is, traveling rapidly over the whole land. I imagine that it was completely unrolled as it moved over the earth.
The size of the scroll is probably significant, as it is the same size as the Holy Place of the tabernacle and of the Porch of Solomon in the temple. “And the porch before the temple of the house, twenty cubits was the length thereof, according to the breadth of the house; and ten cubits was the breadth thereof before the house” (1 Kings 6:3). That was the place where the priest could come and worship according to the Law. No one could ever go inside the veil unless the blood was put in there. That was done by the high priest only once a year when he went in as a representative of the whole nation. When the high priest went in there, he stood on redeemed ground, having been redeemed by the blood.
You and I today stand on redeemed ground. We have not been redeemed by gold and silver or by any precious stones or precious jewels, but by the precious blood of Christ. You and I are not standing on a flying carpet. We do not rest on a missile sent from heaven. We have been delivered from the penalty and the power of sin. “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:14–15).
Then said he unto me, This is the curse that goeth forth over the face of the whole earth: for every one that stealeth shall be cut off as on this side according to it; and every one that sweareth shall be cut off as on that side according to it [Zech. 5:3].
Apparently the Ten Commandments were written on the scroll, and the Ten Commandments are divided into two parts. The first four commandments deal with man’s relationship to God, and the last six commandments deal with man’s relationship to man. Therefore, the commandment regarding stealing cited here, “for every one that stealeth shall be cut off as on this side according to it,” probably represents the section which deals with man’s relationship to man. This is clearly identified in Psalm 50: “When thou sawest a thief, then thou consentedst with him [Thou shalt not steal], and hast been partaker with adulterers [Thou shalt not commit adultery]. Thou givest thy mouth to evil, and thy tongue frameth deceit. Thou sittest and speakest against thy brother; thou slanderest thine own mother’s son [Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour]. These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself. but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes” (Ps. 50:18–21). Now, because men in that day were able to break the Ten Commandments without suffering God’s punishment, they came to the conclusion that He was just like they were and would not do anything about their transgressions. But God says that He is going to do something about them.
The Mosaic Law was given to the nation of Israel, and it was to be the Law of that nation, and they were to obey the law. Well, they disobeyed it, of course, and so God put them out of their land. And in their dispersion among the nations, they scattered the Mosaic Law. The mark of civilization has been the commandments of God which relate especially to man’s relationship with man.
I want you to notice here the great principle which is put down concerning the Law and especially the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments were given to the nation Israel as they stood in the crossroads of the world, and they took them with them wherever they went. They had a tremendous influence upon Egypt as they became a nation down there. When they went into Assyrian and Babylonian captivity, they had a great influence upon those first great empires. They had an influence upon the Greco-Macedonian Empire and the Roman Empire.
The Ten Commandments produced a civilization. You can say what you please, but the great civilizations of this world have had these laws as a basis: Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Thou shalt not commit adultery. These have been basic to a nation, building the homes, building a way of life, and establishing a civilization. As long as our nation had them as bedrock, we were blessed of God, and our problems were few compared to what they are today. But our contemporary world society has abandoned them, and we have come to the same place to which the nation Israel had come. God has given Israel as an example. God is saying, “Although I have chosen Israel as a nation, I will judge every individual that breaks My Commandments.” And so this flying scroll represents for the whole earth the basis upon which God deals with nations. The interesting thing is that it is very difficult to find anything wrong with the Law.
Now God goes ahead and says this—
I will bring it forth, saith the Lord of hosts, and it shall enter into the house of the thief, and into the house of him that sweareth falsely by my name: and it shall remain in the midst of his house, and shall consume it with the timber thereof and the stones thereof [Zech. 5:4].
“It shall enter into the house of the thief”—that represents the commandments which have to do with man’s relationship to man.
“And into the house of him that sweareth falsely by my name” refers to the first section of the Ten Commandments. Even by the name of God a man would perjure himself!
The Ten Commandments were never given to the Christian as a way of life. We as believers have been called to a much higher plane, and we attain that plane by grace. Actually, man cannot even attain the plane of the Mosaic Law unaided. God gave them the Law, but He gave them no aid to go with it. That is, He did not give them the filling of the Spirit; the Holy Spirit did not indwell the Old Testament saints. Therefore man in his own strength and ability could never measure up to the Ten Commandments. You and I live in the dispensation of grace, and God has given to us the Holy Spirit whereby we can produce the fruit of the Spirit in our lives (love, joy, peace, longsuffering, etc.), which were never in the Mosaic Law.
VISION OF A WOMAN IN AN EPHAH
Suppose I told you that last night a missile from outer space landed in my backyard and two little men in green came out of it and talked with me. Would you believe it? Well, if you won’t, I won’t tell you such a thing. But there are intelligent people today (as well as others) who actually believe in flying saucers. Some have even testified to having seen them. They have even said they saw little people inside. I understand the U.S. Navy has been giving this serious investigation over the years. We hear from two groups. One believes sincerely and vociferously that there are flying saucers. The other group doubts it and denies it equally vociferously.
While I was a pastor in downtown Los Angeles, I had an invitation to go out to Apple Valley to a large rock that is out in that desert area, which was declared to be the landing field where the missiles from outer space came in. I was told they would give me a ride in one of the flying saucers. I didn’t go out there for two reasons. One was that I wasn’t sure there were flying saucers out there—I’m very much of a skeptic. The other reason was that I was afraid if I did go out there and they put me in one of them, they would take me off and not bring me back—no one assured me of a round-trip ticket. So I didn’t go out there. I voiced my skepticism and cynicism about the whole business, but there were some who sincerely believed that missiles from outer space were landing and taking off out in that area. I have driven by that location many times since then, and I don’t know why, but I always pick up speed going by that big rock!
Zechariah didn’t believe in flying saucers either, but he saw two flying objects in his visions. He saw some strange missiles from outer space. Remember that I said at the beginning that the Book of Zechariah is one of the apocalyptic books of the Bible. It is ethereal, seraphic, spiritual, and highly symbolic. In other words, what he writes is out of this world. We need to avoid fanaticism on one hand and materialism on the other hand.
We’re at the launching pad, and we are ready to see another vision. Actually, we are going to see the first astronaut. Believe it or not, we will learn that it is a woman who is in one of those capsules. It is called an ephah or a bushel basket.
Then the angel that talked with me went forth, and said unto me, Lift up now thine eyes, and see what is this that goeth forth [Zech. 5:5].
Again he has his eyes wide open—this is no dream. And the interpreting angel says, “Look up, please.”
And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah that goeth forth. He said moreover, This is their resemblance through all the earth [Zech. 5:6].
“And I said, What is it?” After all, this is the first astronaut Zechariah had ever seen, and he didn’t know what it was. Possibly you can remember the great thrill it was when you heard about Alan Shepard making his trip in space. He didn’t get very far, but he was the, first American in space. Well, here is a woman in space, and Zechariah wants an explanation.
“This is an ephah that goeth forth.” An ephah is a dry measure equal to a little more than a bushel. It was used to measure such commodities as flour and barley; therefore, this symbolized trade or commerce.
And, behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead: and this is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah [Zech. 5:7].
What we have in this vision is a continuation of judgment upon the sin and iniquity of Israel. It looks forward to the Millennium when sin and iniquity will be removed from the land. Also, it looks forward to the judgment of Babylon, which will precede the Millennium. We need to compare it with Revelation 18 where we see the judgment of commercial Babylon. (Revelation 17 pictures the judgment of religious Babylon.) God will judge this matter of covetousness. His command is, “Thou shalt not covet.” And God will judge the love of money and the greed that are connected with commercialism. The “talent” was the largest measure of weight, and it was made of lead, the most common heavy metal which was employed in all commercial transactions for weighing out money.
We find that one of the great sins of the Israelites when they returned from Babylon was an insatiable love for money and desire for material things. You may recall that Nehemiah had to deal with them on this issue because they were lending to their brothers at high rates of interest (usury). They had been forbidden by the Mosaic Law to do this, and Nehemiah really straightened them out. The last book of the Old Testament, Malachi, pictures life in that land after the temple had been built. Malachi asks the question, “Will a man rob God?…” (Mal. 3:8). Believe me, God answered that question. He said that the whole nation had robbed Him. You see, they were guilty of covetousness; they were bent on accumulating riches for themselves, and they were willing to rob God and hurt their brother in order to do it. That is what they were doing in Zechariah’s day, and God is revealing to him that He intends to remove that spirit of covetousness from the land.
“This is a woman that sitteth in the midst of the ephah.” Anytime in the Scriptures that we see a woman out of place, there is an evil connotation. For example, the woman in the parable the Lord Jesus gave (see Matt. 13:33) who put leaven in flour. That leaven represents evil, and the leaven of evil is a principle all the way through the Word of God. And when the Scripture pictures a woman in religion, such as the church at Thyatira which had “…that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess…” (Rev. 2:20), and the “great whore” of Revelation 17, she represents evil. In Zechariah’s vision, the woman represents the nation of Israel that had gone into commercialism. God wants to bless them, but their awful sin of covetousness must be dealt with first.
And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the midst of the ephah; and he cast the weight of lead upon the mouth thereof [Zech. 5:8].
Let me give you Merrill Unger’s translation and amplification of this verse (pp. 96–97):
Having announced concerning the woman, This is wickedness, thereupon he [the interpreting angel] cast her [the woman] into the middle of the ephah and cast the lead stone [weight] upon its mouth [opening]…. She has been all along sitting or dwelling in the ephah, contentedly, but now that the time has come for commercial Babylon to be removed, to be destroyed, the woman tries to escape from it, because she does not want to be removed with it, and so share its inevitable fate. Therefore, she tries to escape.
Then lifted I up mine eyes, and looked, and, behold, there came out two women, and the wind was in their wings; for they had wings like the wings of a stork: and they lifted up the ephah between the earth and the heaven [Zech. 5:9].
Some time ago a movie was produced called “The Flying Nun”; so I call these two women the two flying nuns. But what do they represent? Well, we may be sure that they represent agents of evil because they are associated with and protective of the woman in the ephah—and the angel had said of her, “This is wickedness.”
“They had wings like the wings of a stork”—that is, powerful wings. In Scripture the stork is not a picture of an angel. It is a dirty bird, an unclean bird.
Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah?
And he said unto me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar: and it shall be established, and set there upon her own base [Zech. 5:10–11].
God is moving this matter of godless and heartless commercialism out of the land of Palestine.
Now I want you to see something here. The children of Israel were originally a pastoral and agricultural people, and most of the Mosaic Law has to do with that type of life-style. It gives instructions regarding the land itself, the vineyards, the grain, the livestock, and all that sort of thing. And in our day, the Jews who have returned to Palestine have returned, in a large measure, to the soil. However, when they are out of that land, they get into other businesses. I have never heard of a Jewish farmer in America, have you?
When they were in Babylonian captivity they learned commercialism, and they learned it from the Gentiles. They became good businessmen, and they acquired an insatiable love for riches which they saw among the Gentiles in Babylon.
Let me refer you again to the Book of Revelation where, in chapter 18, we find that God is going to judge commercial Babylon at the setting up of His kingdom; in fact, He is going to get rid of it.
My friend, the Bible is a rather revolutionary book, which may be one reason why some people don’t like it. It is said that John Calvin got capitalism from the Bible; and I think that he did. But I want to remind you that there is a great deal more in the Bible on the side of the poor people than on the side of the rich. In the Epistle of James, we find this harsh condemnation: “Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days” (James 5:1–3). He speaks out against the gathering of money just for the sake of gathering it. Then he goes on, “Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth” (James 5:4).
I wonder what God has to say to some of these great corporations and the great labor unions of our contemporary society. That sort of thing is not going into the kingdom of God upon this earth. God is going to judge it and get rid of it. If there ever was a revolutionary book, it is this Book, the Word of God. It is too hot for a lot of folk to handle!
Now notice that Zechariah asks the interpreting angel, “Whither do these bear the ephah?” And the angel answered, “To build it an house in the land of Shinar.” Where is Shinar? It is the land of Babylon. God will return this evil system to the place it came from, and its final destruction was seen by the apostle John: “And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies. And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities” (Rev. 18:1–5).
My friend, in our contemporary civilization, is God in big business? Is God in the stock market? Is God in the labor unions? Is God in the entertainment business? Anyone with any intelligence recognizes that God is left out of all of them. And God intends to remove them from the earth someday. “And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all. And the voice of harpers, and musicians, and of pipers, and trumpeters, shall be heard no more at all in thee; and no craftsman, of whatsoever craft he be, shall be found any more in thee; and the sound of a millstone shall be heard no more at all in thee; And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived. And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth” (Rev. 18:21–24, italics mine).
When this evil system is removed, Palestine will become truly the holy land; and when wickedness is destroyed from the whole earth, the kingdom of God will come to the earth. What a glorious prospect this is as you and I live in this present evil age!
CHAPTER 6
Theme: Vision of the four chariots; the symbolic crowning of Joshua
We come now to the final vision of the ten which were given to Zechariah in one night. To get them before us as a background, let me enumerate them again: (1) The riders under the myrtle trees; (2) the four horns; (3) the four smiths; (4) the man with the measuring line; (5) Joshua and Satan; (6) the branch and the stone with seven eyes; (7) the lampstand and the two olive trees; (8) the flying scroll; and (9) the woman in the ephah; and now the tenth, the four chariots. Let me say again that some expositors find only eight visions in this series, but I believe that it is highly consistent to see the visions as ten.
VISION OF THE FOUR CHARIOTS
And I turned, and lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and, behold, there came four chariots out from between two mountains; and the mountains were mountains of brass [Zech. 6:1].
“I… lifted up mine eyes, and looked” indicates again that his eyes were wide open; he saw these things—this was not a dream.
“Two mountains; and the mountains were mountains of brass.” The majority of the outstanding commentators agree that these two mountains are Mount Zion and the Mount of Olives, which would locate these four chariots down in the Kidron Valley.
“There came four chariots”—we assume that horses were hitched to the chariots and that there were charioteers or drivers for each of them. As we read on, we will find that this is true. These chariots could be interpreted as representing the four great world empires that Daniel saw in his vision. All of them were gentile empires, and all of them have been judged of God. That part of Daniel’s vision has been literally fulfilled. These four chariots could represent that very easily.
However, I am inclined to identify these four chariots with the vision which John saw in the Apocalypse, speaking of that which is yet future. In fact, Revelation 6 opens with John’s vision of the Great Tribulation Period by presenting to us four horsemen, and there is a striking correspondence between them and Zechariah’s vision of the four chariots. We have seen in chapter 5 the visions of judgment primarily with reference to the people of Israel, but here in chapter 6 God’s judgment is upon the gentile nations which have oppressed God’s people. It reveals not only a past judgment but a future judgment which is to come during the Great Tribulation Period.
“And the mountains were mountains of brass.” These mountains were of brass, or literally of bronze. Bronze was known in the earth at a very early period. We can go back in history to the Old Stone Age and the New Stone Age, back to the Neolithic and the Paleolithic periods. We find that bronze appears almost at the beginning of civilization.
Symbolically, bronze is used in the Old Testament to represent judgment. It was one of the metals that was used in the tabernacle in the two articles of furniture which were used in the judgment of sin. The brazen altar was made of bronze as was the laver of brass. These both stood in the outer court of the tabernacle, and both had to do with the judgment of the sin of the people.
Since the mountains in this vision are mountains of brass, it would indicate that these mountains speak of judgment. Judgment is going to come forth from God from the Kidron Valley. There are four judgments that go forth, and they are pictured here as four chariots.
In the first chariot were red horses; and in the second chariot black horses;
And in the third chariot white horses; and in the fourth chariot grisled and bay horses [Zech. 6:2–3].
The colors of these horses are significant. We have the same colors in the four horsemen of the Apocalypse in Revelation 6. I don’t think it is accidental that Zechariah had a vision of four chariots and John of four horsemen. They are probably referring to the same events. The red horse in John’s vision represents war. The black horse represents famine, and the pale horse is identified as picturing death. All of these picture judgments from almighty God.
Now what does the first horse, the white horse of the Apocalypse, represent? There are white horses here in Zechariah’s vision also, which probably symbolize victory. In John’s vision, the white horse is immediately followed by the red horse of war. Therefore, I think that the first horseman represents Anti-christ and that he will bring a false peace into the world—because after him rides the red horse of war, and war breaks out upon the earth. My friend, I don’t think that we have seen an actual world war yet; but in the end times the whole earth will be inflamed by war because man is a warlike creature as long as there is sin in his heart. And when that red horseman rides through the earth—I say it reverently—all hell will break loose. It seems to me that no one today is emphasizing how frightful the Great Tribulation is going to be when it breaks upon this earth. Well, it is symbolized by the riding of that red horse of war.
The “grisled and bay horses” of Zechariah’s vision are probably more accurately translated as dappled (lit., as if sprinkled with hail) and would correspond to the pale horse of the Apocalypse.
This tenth vision was given to Zechariah for the encouragement of his people, knowing that God would judge the gentile nations as He would judge His own people.
Then I answered and said unto the angel that talked with me, What are these, my lord?
And the angel answered and said unto me, These are the four spirits of the heavens, which go forth from standing before the Lord of all the earth [Zech. 6:4–5].
“These are the four spirits of the heavens.” The “spirits” are obviously angels so that the four chariots are, as David Baron (The Visions and Prophecies of Zechariah, p. 175) puts it,
… angelic beings, or heavenly powers—those invisible “messengers” of His “who excel in strength, and who ever stand in His presence, hearkening unto the voice of His word,” and then go forth in willing obedience, as swift as the “winds,” to carry out His behests (Ps. ciii. 20, 21, civ. 4).
In other words, the angels are in charge of the judgments which will be coming upon the gentile nations, as we see also in the Book of Revelation.
Now we get the interpretation—
The black horses which are therein go forth into the north country; and the white go forth after them; and the grisled go forth toward the south country.
And the bay went forth, and sought to go that they might walk to and fro through the earth: and he said, Get you hence, walk to and fro through the earth. So they walked to and fro through the earth [Zech. 6:6–7].
The black and white horses will go forth into the north country. The “grisled” or dappled and “bay” will go forth into the south country.
Then cried he upon me, and spake unto me, saying, Behold, these that go toward the north country have quieted my spirit in the north country [Zech. 6:8].
Notice that none of the horses go to the west—that would put them into the Mediterranean Sea, and none of these are sea horses! Neither do any of the horses go to the east because the great Arabian desert is out there. They go to the north and to the south, which is the way one would go from Israel to any other part of the world. The directions given simply mean that they go out from Israel throughout the whole earth.
It says that the black and the white horses go up into the north country. I personally believe that the judgment of the Great Tribulation Period begins with Russia coming down into the land of Israel, so that judgment will first go to the king of the north, to Gog and Magog in the north. Judgment will also go south toward Egypt. However, the riding of the horses is not the main issue here. In the Book of Revelation we are given the series of events in the Great Tribulation Period, one event after another, one crisis after another. When the white horse rides forth, he will bring a victory that will set up a false peace upon the earth. The world will think that it is entering the Millennium when actually it will be entering the Great Tribulation Period. Immediately after the white horse there will come the red horse of war—war breaks out worldwide—followed by the black horse of famine. Famine generally follows war as do plagues and death, which are symbolized by the fourth, the pale horse. In contrast to this, in the vision of the four chariots which was given to Zechariah, the order is not the important thing. Rather, the emphasis is upon the fact that God intends to judge all the nations of the earth, and the four chariots represent those judgments. All of them are to take place during the Tribulation Period. This concludes the ten visions given to Zechariah.
THE SYMBOLIC CROWNING OF JOSHUA
Now we come to an event which takes place during the days of Zechariah.
And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,
Take of them of the captivity, even of Heldai, of Tobijah, and of Jedaiah, which are come from Babylon, and come thou the same day, and go into the house of Josiah the son of Zephaniah [Zech. 6:9–10].
Here we are given the names of three men who came from Babylon. They had not come with either of the two groups of the remnant that returned to the land of Israel, but they came on their own. The name Heldai means “robust”; Tobijah means “God’s goodness”; and Jedaiah means “God knows.” Linking these names together indicates that God knows that through His goodness He intends to put His King upon the throne, and He will do it in a robust and powerful manner.
What will take place here is a symbolic crowning, but it pictures the coming of Christ to this earth to reign, which is, of course, yet future.
Then take silver and gold, and make crowns, and set them upon the head of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest [Zech. 6:11].
This seems like a strange thing to do. Why did they place the crown on the head of Joshua the high priest rather than on the head of Zerubbabel who was in the line of David? The reason they were not to crown Zerubbabel is that God was not going to restore the line of David to the throne at that time. The fact of the matter is that the next one who will wear the crown of David will be the Lord Jesus Christ when He comes to this earth to establish His kingdom. But crowning the high priest was very unusual because God kept the offices of king and priest entirely separate.
The explanation is found in the fact that Joshua, the high priest, in this passage is representative of the Lord Jesus Christ who is our Great High Priest today. The Epistle to the Hebrews tells us to consider our Great High Priest. Christ, after His resurrection, ascended into heaven, and as our Great High Priest He has passed within the veil. He is seated now at God’s right hand and is waiting for the time when his enemies will be made His footstool. He will come forth and establish His kingdom here upon this earth. The chapter before us pictures His coronation.
Notice the sequence that is followed in this little Book of Zechariah. After the visions that depicted the judgment of God upon His people and upon all the gentile nations of the world, we have this, the coming of Christ and His crowning as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
It is interesting to see the threefold ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ in time spans. The first time span is His ministry as God’s Prophet when he came to this earth over nineteen hundred years ago. He came down here to speak for God, and He Himself was the Word of God as He revealed God in human form. And He revealed the love of God by dying upon the cross for your sins and my sins. He was God’s Prophet.
In the day in which you and I live He is God’s Priest. When He ascended into heaven, He passed within the veil, and in the Holy of Holies He presented His own blood for our sins. Today He is there to make intercession for us. He intervenes for us when there is sin in our lives and we confess that sin to Him. He serves there as our High Priest.
One day in the future He will be coming out again. The Book of Revelation makes it very clear that He will come as King of kings and Lord of lords. Prophet, Priest, and King is the threefold ministry of Christ.
Now Christ is presented under another figure of speech—
And speak unto him, saying, Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH; and he shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord [Zech. 6:12].
“The BRANCH” is not the name of Joshua. It is a prophetic name which is given to the Lord Jesus Christ. He came to this earth over nineteen hundred years ago as the Branch, a root out of dry ground (see Isa. 53:2). The very fact that He came to humanity and came to a people at a time when they were subject to Rome is the most amazing thing in the world. He was called a root out of Jesse, the peasant, because by the time the Lord Jesus was born, the royal line of David had sunk back into poverty. The Lord Jesus was born into poverty and obscurity. He was indeed the root out of a dry ground.
Suppose you were walking in a desert area—like the extremely desolate desert east of here in California. As you walk along you see no growing thing except a few cacti and a rattlesnake or two. Then suddenly you come upon a plant of iceberg lettuce growing there, luscious and green. You would be amazed. You would be unable to account for it. Well, the Lord Jesus was like that—a root out of a dry ground.
Jesus Christ is coming again as the Branch, and this time the Branch is going to rule the world.
“He shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord.” You see, this is given as an encouragement to the remnant in their struggle to rebuild the temple. As we saw in the Book of Haggai, it looked small and insignificant to many of them, but in God’s eyes His temple was one house. Although there is a series of temples—the wilderness tabernacle, Solomon’s temple, Zerubbabel’s temple, Herod’s temple, the Great Tribulation temple, the millennial temple—God calls it one house. He didn’t view Zerubbabel’s temple as a separate house. Although it was considered unimportant by some of the people, God says that He is the one to judge its importance. And it is in His plan and purpose.
Many letters come to me with the lament, “I can’t be very much for God.” Well, that was also the cry of the discouraged remnant in Zechariah’s day. The temple they were building seemed like nothing compared to the grandeur of Solomon’s temple. But God was assuring them that the temple they were building was in His will and that He was the one to determine the importance of it.
Again let me say that I believe that some of the greatest pulpits we have in Southern California are not in churches; they happen to be sickbeds where some dear saint of God is confined. Recently I heard of a young man who listens to our Bible-teaching radio program. He is paralyzed from his neck down but is a radiant Christian and sends out Christian literature continually. I’m not sure but what his ministry for God is more important than mine or that of anyone which seems to be doing something great for God. We are to let God decide that. The important thing for you and me is to get into the will of God.
That was the point that Haggai and Zechariah were trying to get over to these people. They were encouraging them. They were saying, “You are doing what God wants you to do. Sure it looks small, but it is in the plan and purpose of God. That makes it great and big. It is going to eventuate in the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ to this earth to establish His Kingdom.”
“Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH.” The word of God speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ as “The Branch” in a fourfold way. (1) He is called the Branch of David: “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth” (Jer. 23:5). Here Christ is presented as the King, the Branch of David. (2) He is spoken of as Jehovah’s Servant, the Branch; as we have already seen in chapter 3 verse 8: “Here now, O Joshua the high priest, thou, and thy fellows that sit before thee: for they are men wondered at: for, behold, I will bring forth my servant the BRANCH.” (3) And here in chapter 6 verse 12 He is called “the man whose name is The BRANCH” (italics mine). (4) Finally, He is presented as the Branch of Jehovah: “In that day shall the branch of the Lord [Jehovah] be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel” (Isa. 4:2).
It is interesting that the gospel records in the New Testament present the Lord Jesus in the same fourfold way. In the Gospel of Matthew He is the King, the Branch of David; in the Gospel of Mark He is Jehovah’s Servant, the Branch; in the Gospel of Luke He is presented as the perfect Man whose name is the Branch; and in the Gospel of John He is the Branch of Jehovah, God the Son. This is a marvelous portrait that we have of Jesus as He was when He walked on this earth as a member of the human family.
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.
And the crowns shall be to Helem, and to Tobijah, and to Jedaiah, and to Hen the son of Zephaniah, for a memorial in the temple of the Lord [Zech. 6:13–14].
“Even he shall build the temple of the Lord.” “Even he” is the sprout, the Branch who grew out of poverty and obscurity. “He shall build the temple of the Lord,” refers to the millennial temple.
Christ the Messiah, “shall sit and rule upon his throne; and he shall be a priest upon his throne.” He shall be both King and Priest. The two offices will be combined in one person.
“The crowns shall be … for a memorial in the temple of the Lord.” Joshua did not wear these crowns. They were placed upon his head only for the symbolic crowning. Then, according to Jewish tradition, they were placed as symbols in the top windows of the temple for a memorial, serving as a reminder that the Messiah would come and that He would be not only the King but He also would be the Priest.
And they that are far off shall come and build in the temple of the Lord, and ye shall know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto you. And this shall come to pass, if ye will diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God [Zech. 6:15].
“And they that are far off shall come and build in the temple of the Lord.” Notice Merrill Unger’s comments on this verse (p. 115):
The deputation from far away Babylon bringing an offering of silver and gold for the temple, which was then in the process of construction, was the occasion for Zechariah’s prediction of a future glorious temple to be established in Jerusalem as a House of Prayer for all nations, and to which even the Gentile peoples from afar shall flow, bringing their worship and their gifts.
Isaiah also speaks of the coming of gentile nations to the temple in Jerusalem during the Millennium: “And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it” (Isa. 2:2).
Let me remind you that back in verses 12 and 13 of this chapter it says that Christ (the Branch) shall build the temple of the Lord. And in the verse before us it says that “they that are far off shall come and build in the temple of the Lord.” The nations shall build in the temple of the Lord in that they will bring their wealth into it. We need to make this distinction because only the Lord Jesus Himself will build the temple. Isaiah also says, “Also the sons of the stranger [Gentile], that join themselves to the Lord, to serve him, and to love the name of the Lord.… Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people” (Isa. 56:6–7).
“And ye shall know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto you.” Apparently this means that Christ, the Messiah, will Himself establish the truth of God’s Word.
“And this shall come to pass, if ye will diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God.” I do not understand this to mean that the fulfillment of the prophecy will depend upon their obedience, because the prophecy is in the eternal plan and purpose of God. Rather, their participation in it depends upon their faith and obedience.
As we conclude the first major division of the Book of Zechariah, we need to locate it in the stream of history and prophecy. It is possible to lose our way through this section and, by so doing, miss one of the greatest lessons of Scripture and one of the greatest principles that God puts down in His Word. I urge those who attempt to teach prophecy to study this little book very carefully. It will deliver them from making some wild and weird interpretations.
Because the visions of Zechariah are highly symbolic, we are apt to come to the conclusion that they are just haphazard dream-stuff of a prophet of long ago. Folk who consider them totally unrelated to each other feel free to interpret them in any way they choose. There is a danger of lifting out one of the visions from its context and giving it an absurd interpretation. We must remember that one of the great rules of interpreting prophecy is that no prophecy is of any private interpretation—that is, it must be fitted into its proper place in the whole body of prophecy.
We need to keep in mind that all of the visions given to Zechariah are connected and related. They have meaning which is local and also they give an outline of history. They picture the whole future of the nation Israel, including the destruction of her enemies and her cleansing and restoration to her high priestly witness. The section finalizes with the coming of Christ to the earth as the great Priest-King to reign on the earth.
All of this was given by God through Zechariah as an encouragement to the discouraged remnant in his day who were struggling to build the temple. Not only was the work moving slowly and with difficulty, but it seemed so small and inconsequential compared to Solomon’s temple and to the great heathen temples they had seen in Babylon and later in the Medo-Persian Empire. However, Israel was in a time of peace, and it was time for them to build.
Now I would like to call your attention to the threefold meaning. There is what is known as (1) the contemporary meaning, (2) the continuing meaning, and (3) the consummation of all things.
The contemporary meaning is that Zechariah was speaking into a local situation. He was addressing the people of his day regarding their problems. He was urging his own people not to be discouraged but to know that they are in the eternal plan and purpose of God. The little temple they were building would finally usher in the great millennial temple which the Messiah Himself would build.
The continuing meaning is a message for our day. You see, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable …” (2 Tim. 3:16). All of it has a message for us although not all of it was written to us. For instance, God has not asked us to build a temple. A few years ago many Christians tried to get stone out of Indiana and move it over to Israel to help them build the temple. That was a ridiculous idea. Our business is not to get the marble to Israel to help them build the temple; our business is to get to them the message of the One who is the Rock of Ages, the One who is the Stone cut out without hands (see Dan. 2:45), who said of Himself, “And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder” (Matt. 21:44). If we don’t fall upon Him, come in repentance to Him, in this age of grace, the day will come when we will have to bear His judgment. We have seen that God judges nations—the Babylonian, Medo-Persian, and Graeco-Macedonian Empires have come and gone. My friend, are you blind to the fact that God is moving today in the history of this world? Do you realize that God is judging our own nation? Vietnam was a place of shame and humiliation. What did we actually accomplish over there? The billions of dollars spent on war costs should have been invested years earlier in Bibles and missionaries.
Current events should certainly teach us how quickly God can raise up a nation and how quickly He can bring it down. America rose to be the strongest nation on the earth, but we stumbled along in our sin and in our arrogance. Fifty years ago absolutely no one would have believed that the United States would yield to the demands of a few desert sheiks who ruled over a few people and some mangy camels. No one would have seen the relationship between the camel and a Cadillac. Yet today we see the wealth of the world going into Arabian oil. They will bankrupt our nation; yet we close our eyes to what is going on. God can raise nations and bring down nations in whatever way He chooses.
If you listen to the news media, you will become discouraged. Besides that, you’ll get brainwashed. If you look at Washington, D. C., you will feel like giving up—or throwing up! I don’t know about you, but I am tired of hearing panel discussions by politicians, educators, the military, athletes, and the movie colony. I don’t think that any of them have a message for us right now. Perhaps you can hear the still small voice of God in the visions of Zechariah. His visions are not weird and wild, and no weird and wild interpretation is satisfactory. They teach us that God’s purpose will prevail and that God is moving in history to accomplish His purpose.
The final of the threefold meanings is the consummation of all things. History is flowing in the channel of prophecy. Again let me repeat verse 12: “Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH; and he shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord.” The Branch, as we have seen, is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ, a root out of dry ground, who died on a cross for us. But He is coming again to reign. “In that day shall the branch of the Lord be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel” (Isa. 4:2). He shall be the priest upon His throne.
Knowing this should help us to keep things in perspective. There may be some little group of believers who meet on a back street, but they are meeting in the name of Christ and they are seeking to honor Him. They are studying His Word, and they really want to do His will. They sing with sincerity,
My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine,
For Thee all the follies of sin I resign;
My gracious Redeemer, my Saviour art Thou;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.
—William R. Featherstone
That little group may be unknown to the world, but it is more important in the plan and program of God than the meetings held by heads of state in the capitals of the world. This is hard for many folk to believe because the world does not see things from God’s point of view.
You see, that little group of believers will join in with a mighty chorus in heaven some day, singing to the Lamb: “… Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth” (Rev. 5:9–10). That is the goal toward which we are moving. The world may ignore these believers and multitudes simply pass them by; yet they are important in the plan and purpose of God.
This section of Zechariah should help us see things from God’s perspective. This tremendous passage of Scripture still has a message for you and me today.
CHAPTER 7
Theme: Historic interlude; question concerning a religious ritual (fasting); threefold answer; when the heart is right, the ritual is right; when the heart is wrong, the ritual is wrong
HISTORIC INTERLUDE
In chapters 7 and 8 we have what I have labeled an historic interlude. It is very similar to what we also have in the little prophecy of Haggai. In the middle of that prophecy, Haggai was sent to the priest to ask concerning a law: When anything that is ceremonially clean touches that which is unclean, will it make it clean? And, of course, the answer is that it will not. And when that which is ceremonially unclean touches that which is clean, will it make it unclean? The answer is yes, it will. In this historic interlude here in Zechariah, we have the same problem approached from a little different angle.
QUESTION CONCERNING A RITUAL (FASTING)
And it came to pass in the fourth year of king Darius, that the word of the Lord came unto Zechariah in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chisleu [Zech. 7:1].
The impressive thing here is that again Zechariah is going to have a message for these people, and it is a very important message. He makes it clear that it is not his own message, but it is “the word of the Lord.”
“In the fourth year of king Darius …in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chisleu.” If you want me to put this in terms of our calendar, it was December 4, 518 b.c. This is the same period in which Haggai was speaking to the people in a very practical way.
When they had sent unto the house of God Sherezer and Regemmelech, and their men, to pray before the Lord [Zech. 7:2].
David Baron’s comment (p. 210) will help us better understand this verse: “It will be noticed that, together with the Revised Version, and almost all modern scholars, we discard the rendering given of the first line of the 2nd verse in the Authorized Version, namely, ‘When they sent unto the House of God’ Now, Beth-el does mean literally ‘House of God’; but it is never used of the Temple, but only and always of the well-known town of Ephraim, one of the great centers of the Israelitish idolatrous worship set up by Jeroboam the son of Nebat.” In other words, what we have here is a delegation of men sent from Beth-el, which means “house of God.” It was called the house of God by Jacob at that time in his life when he thought he was running away from God as well as from his father and his brother Esau. He spent the night at this place, and God gave him a vision. Jacob said of Beth-el, “… this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” (Gen. 28:17).
Beth-el was located in the northern kingdom of Israel and is the place where Jeroboam put one of the golden calves to be worshiped. This delegation was not made up of men of the tribe of Judah. They were probably of the tribe of Ephraim. The fact that this delegation came down from Beth-el indicates that people from the ten so-called “lost-tribes” were not lost at all—some of them were living at Beth-el. If you will read the Book of Ezra very carefully, you will find that many people who returned from the Babylonian captivity returned to towns that were actually north of the Sea of Galilee, an area that belonged to the ten tribes which constituted the northern kingdom of Israel. All twelve tribes were represented in those who returned, although very few actually returned, less than 60,000 all told.
My friend, there are no “ten lost tribes of Israel.” Those who returned from the captivity naturally went back to the places from which they had come, and many of them went to the northern part which was the kingdom of Israel. They happened to be folk born in the Babylonian captivity (Sherezer and Regemmelech are Babylonian names) who returned as Jews back to their own tribe. If you feel that Anglo-Saxons or any other gentile race makes up “the lost tribes,” may I say to you, you are very much lost in the maze of Scripture. You may be lost, but the ten tribes are not lost.
And to speak unto the priests which were in the house of the Lord of hosts, and to the prophets, saying, Should I weep in the fifth month, separating myself, as I have done these so many years? [Zech. 7:3].
These men have come down from Beth-el to speak to the priests in the temple at Jerusalem, and they have come with a question. The question has to do with a ritual: Is a ritual right or is a ritual wrong? The people had begun to fast before the Babylonian captivity and had continued to do so during the Captivity. Psalm 137:1–2 says, “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.” They just sobbed out their souls there, and that became a religious function. Actually, God had never given them fast days; He gave seven feast days. It was their own idea to fast. They had set aside days of fasting and days of weeping and mourning during their captivity, and they continued it after the Captivity, but God was not blessing them. A certain amount of prosperity had come; many of them were building their homes and were getting very comfortable, even affluent. Yet they were weeping and mourning, and they said, “We’ve been doing this but God hasn’t blessed us.” The question here is of the right and wrong of a ritual.
This is an important question for us because we are seeing today a recrudescence of ritualistic religion. There is a movement toward formalism, toward adopting a ritual. Formalism is always in evidence when people cease to think. When people get away from the person of Christ, they start either getting up and down or marching around—they have to start doing something. This indicates a time of spiritual decline. There was a time when people fought over the prayer book in Europe, as if that were important—whether you should stand up or sit down or kneel or just how you should pray. There are many people who want a liturgy or an elaborate ritual. There are religions that are called Christian religions that are ritualistic or liturgical. Even we nonconformists who have come out of the Reformation say that a ritual is repugnant, we despise it, we see in it evil continually, but our services have a certain amount of ritual. We open with the doxology, and everyone stands up for that. We close with a benediction, and somewhere in between there is an offering, and a sermon.
God gave to the nation Israel a religion—it is the only religion He ever gave—and it was ritualistic. Is a ritual right or is a ritual wrong?—that is the question of these people. They say, “We’ve been fasting and weeping and wailing, and it looks pretty silly now. It’s gotten very boring. After all, it is a religious rite we are going through, and we’re not getting any results. God doesn’t seem to be blessing us. Should we keep on doing this?”
THREEFOLD ANSWER
Zechariah will give the people God’s answer concerning this question. God doesn’t come out and say that it is wrong to fast, nor does He say it is right. He doesn’t answer the question directly, and yet He answers the question. We will find that there is actually a threefold answer to this question concerning a religious ritual. The first answer is that when the heart is right, the ritual is right (vv. 4–7). The second answer is that when the heart is wrong, the ritual is wrong (vv. 8–14). The third answer is found in chapter 8: God’s purpose concerning Jerusalem is unchanged by any ritual. That will answer a great many folk today who are saying, “Let’s do this or that to hasten the coming of Christ.” My friend, you cannot move it up one second by anything you do. Don’t you know that He is running this universe? Anything that you do is not going to interfere with His plan or program. These people thought that a ritual might have something to do with changing God’s plan. In chapter 8 God will let them know that He intends to accomplish His purpose.
WHEN THE HEART IS RIGHT, THE RITUAL IS RIGHT
Then came the word of the Lord of hosts unto me, saying,
Speak unto all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month, even those seventy years, did ye at all fast unto me, even to me? [Zech. 7:4–5].
“When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month”—that would be the months of August and October. “Even those seventy years”—that is, while Israel was in captivity.
“Did ye at all fast unto me, even to me?” God says to them, “When you went through your ritual, did you do it for Me? Did you do it to honor Me and to praise Me? Or did you do it as a legalistic sort of an exercise that would build up something on the credit side which would make you acceptable to Me and cause Me to bless you?” God does not approve nor does He condemn the ritual. He inquires into their motive.
The people say that they have been fasting “these so many years.” Oh boy, you can read between the lines there! Worshiping God had really become boring to them. And the Lord is saying to them, “If you really want to know the truth, I was bored with you also. I thought you were very boring.” I think there are a lot of so-called Christian services which cause God to yawn. I think that He says, “Ho hum, there they go again, jumping through some little hoop as though they think that it will please Me.”
And when ye did eat, and when ye did drink, did not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves? [Zech. 7:6].
God says, “You didn’t fast unto Me, and when the fasting was over, you couldn’t wait to get to the table. And when you were eating, did you do it unto Me?” Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “But meat commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse” (1 Cor. 8:8). He went on to say later, “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). If you can fast to the glory of God, go ahead and fast, but if you are doing it for some reason other than that high motive, don’t do it. Our Christian faith is not a Sunday affair. The test of the Sunday service is the life that is lived the next day. In the last part of this chapter, God is going to deal with Israel on the very specifics of their business dealings, their social contacts, and their amusements. These were the things that revealed that they did not live their lives unto the Lord at all. There is something more important than the ritual which will determine whether the ritual is right or not.
Should ye not hear the words which the Lord hath cried by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and the cities thereof round about her, when men inhabited the south and the plain? [Zech. 7:7].
“The south [the Negeb] and the plain.” That section all the way up from Beer-sheba, whether you go to Hebron or over to the coast toward Ekron, looks like a big pasture land. It reminds me of the plains of west Texas where I lived as a boy in the days before they irrigated that land. When a wind would come through, it could really blow up a sandstorm the likes of which you had never seen or heard of before. The plains around Beer-sheba are the same kind of land. God says to the people here, “You went through all these rituals before when you were in the land, and what happened? You went into captivity because you did not obey Me, you did not listen to the voice of My prophets.”
WHEN THE HEART IS WRONG, THE RITUAL IS WRONG
Beginning with verse 8, God is going to show that a ritual is wrong if the heart is wrong. This is not another way of saying the same thing as He has just said. God will put down on the people’s lives specific commandments, the commandments that have to do with a man’s relationship to man as well as to God, and it will show that their hearts were not right. My friend, it is wrong to think that we can serve Christ and go through a little ritual of doing something while we are not really right with Him. What the Lord Jesus said to Simon Peter following His resurrection is truly beautiful. Do you know what I would have done if I had been in the Lord’s place and had come to Simon Peter? I would have bawled him out for denying me. I would have told him what kind of fellow I thought he was. But the Lord Jesus said to him, “Do you love Me?” My friend, it is not the ritual you go through, but it is the attitude of your heart that is important to Him.
To some church members, religion is a rite or a ritual or a legalistic and lifeless form, a liturgical system marked by meaningless and wearisome verbiage. There is a lot of religious garbage in our so-called conservative and evangelical churches also. There is a ceaseless quoting of tired adjectives and a jumble of pious platitudes. We so often hear people say, “We want to share our faith.” My friend, most people don’t have enough faith to share. It’s not your faith when you share about how wonderful you are or what wonderful things God did for you. You are to witness to Jesus Christ, who He is and what He did for you. In talking about salvation, people say, “Commit your life to Him.” If you ask them what they mean, they say, “Yield your life to Him.” Do you really think He wants your life? He says that our righteousness and even our so-called good deeds are filthy rags in His sight. God doesn’t want your duty laundry, my friend. I am afraid that we have gotten into the habit of using words that take away the real meaning of the gospel. There is another word that is surely being worn out and whose tread is really becoming thin. Love is a high word of Scripture, but it has been worn out on the freeway of present-day usage. It has been emasculated of its rich, vital, virile, and vigorous Bible meaning. It’s been degraded to the level of a bumper sticker which says, “Honk if you love Jesus!” The other day I noticed that the people ahead of me were honking and going around a little car that was being driven very slowly in the fast lane of the freeway. Car after car had to detour around this man. As I came up to him, I thought that I would honk at him also, but then I saw his bumper sticker which said, “Honk if you love Jesus!” As I went around him, I gave him a hard look. If I could have had an opportunity to speak to him, I would have told him that if you love Jesus, you don’t run around honking your horn. If you love Jesus you’re going to live a life of obedience to Him, and you will be courteous to other people.
My point is that today there is a great deal of “churchianity” that is bland and bloodless, tasteless and colorless. It is devoid of warmth and feeling. There is no personal relationship with Christ that is meaningful and productive. One liberal pastor wrote that it made him sick to hear people talk of a personal relationship with Christ. I would surely make him sick if he would listen to me, because the thing you have to have, my friend, is a personal relationship with Christ. Your ritual and your liturgy are not worth the snap of your fingers unless you have a life that is related to Jesus Christ.
If there is no deep yearning for a life that is well pleasing to Him, if there is no stimulating desire to know Him and His Word, church membership is just like a young man falling in love with a furnished apartment and marrying an electric stove, a refrigerator, a vacuum cleaner, a garbage disposal, and a wet mop! That is just about all it amounts to. A maiden lady was asked why she had never gotten married, and she gave a very interesting answer. “I have a stove that smokes, I have a dog that growls around the house, I have a parrot that cusses, and I have a lazy cat that loafs around all day and then is out half the night—so why do I need a husband?” May I say to you, that is the kind of relationship that a great many folk have to God and to Christ. Let’s stop playing church today and start loving Christ and living for Him!
I want to share with you two of the most remarkable letters that I have received in many a day. The first comes from a little town in Tennessee:
I discovered your program out of Memphis only about six months ago, just when I needed it most. Isn’t that just like our lovely Lord? I am a born again Christian, only two years old. That is truly something for a 55-year-old grandmother to have to admit. My husband is a retired regular army dentist—a heart patient. We moved 33 times in 26 years before retiring on this little farm here in the boondocks. We played church. I even taught a women’s Sunday school class, and my husband was a deacon. I can’t speak for him, but all I had was head knowledge and very little heart knowledge. The young minister in the church where we have gone for 14 years is so liberal he thinks the belief in the virgin birth unnecessary and sees no conflict between transcendental meditation and Christianity. We stuck it out for a year and then left the church. I would be less than honest to say I don’t miss a church home since I’ve had church homes like that.
The other letter comes from Southern California:
I am a wife and mother under 30, and I’ve been a Christian since I was 3 1/2. I have often thought of writing but didn’t think I had anything meaningful to say. Well, I’ve changed my mind. Several years ago I knew a lady quite well who was constantly pushing your program at me. This lady was a terrible housekeeper, had an unhappy husband and marriage and five unruly children. But she listened to her Christian programs from morning till night. Naturally, I associated her fanaticism with you and would not listen. During the past three years, however, I have been listening to you weekdays and sometimes on Sunday before church … I love the study of the Word. I get so much from your theology and your knowledge of the Scriptures. I wish that I could find a pastor locally who preached as well. Our time is so short, and I’m glad you’re filling each minute with vital news of God. I wish I could have seen past that lady’s disorderly life a long time ago. God bless you in your work, thou good and faithful servant.
Here was a woman who listened to all the Christian programs, who was a fanatical Christian, but who had a home and a life that were a disgrace to the cause of Christ. My friend, a ritual is no good to a person like that. Likewise, there’s nothing wrong with a ritual if you are right with God and if you love Jesus Christ.
This reminds me of the little girl and the story of the three bears. The little girl’s mother was having guests for dinner and she sent the little girl upstairs to go to bed early. She gave her instructions, telling her she knew how to undress, put on her pajamas, and kneel down to have her prayer. The next morning at the breakfast table, the mother asked the little girl how she did. “Just fine” was the reply.
“Did you say your prayers?”
“Well, kind of.”
“What do you mean ‘kind of’?” the mother asked.
The little girl explained, “Well, I got down on my knees to say that prayer I always say, and I just thought that maybe God got tired of hearing the same thing all the time, so I just crawled into bed, and I told Him the story of the three little bears.”
I think God enjoyed that evening when that precious little girl already sensed that there is something wrong with a ritual when the heart is not in it. I think God listened to the story of the three bears. I wish that some church services today could be that interesting, and I think it would get God’s attention. Why do we have all these problem churches today? Why do we have all these problem Christians today? It is because we are going through a rite, we are going through a ritual, we are performing a liturgy without a heart for God Himself. Even we in fundamental churches open with the doxology, close with a benediction, with something in between, and we feel like we’ve been to church. Have we really? Have we been drawn to the person of Christ? Do we know Him? Do we love Him? You can go through any ritual you want to, and it will be all right if you are right with the Lord, my friend.
The importance of ritual is still a very moot question for people today. Should I go through this ceremony or should I do this or should I do that? I believe that certain ceremonies, certain rituals are important. I believe there are two sacraments in the church, and I believe they are all-important. One sacrament is baptism, and the other is the Lord’s Supper. The important thing is that baptism is believer’s baptism. The emphasis should be taken off the mode and put on the heart of the one being baptized: Is he born again? I personally believe in immersion, although I was raised in a church that taught otherwise. I have been both sprinkled and immersed—that way I can’t miss, as you can see. My wife was Southern Baptist, she was immersed, and she still thinks that was pretty important. I like to kid her, “It will sure be embarrassing for you if you and I get to heaven and find that immersion was not the right mode. I’ve had the other, and you haven’t.” I say that facetiously, and I say it for this reason: As important as the sacraments are, they are no good unless the heart is right. Baptism is no good, my friend, unless you’ve turned to Jesus Christ and you have a personal relationship with Him and your sins have been forgiven. I am also afraid that the Lord’s Supper is absolutely meaningless for many people—it would be better for them if they didn’t go through with it. But if your heart is right, the Lord’s Supper is absolutely important. It was Lange who made this statement: “God’s eye of grace and our eye of faith meet in the sacraments.”
Before the Captivity, God judged Jerusalem when the hearts of the people were far from Him, although they were going through the rituals. In verse 7 God said to them, “Should ye not hear the words which the Lord hath cried by the former prophets, when jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and the cities thereof round about her, when men inhabited the south and the plain?” In effect He said, “You went through the rituals before the Captivity, and I sent you into captivity. Why? The ritual had nothing to do with it. It was because your hearts were wrong, and the heart is the thing that is important.”
In the last section of this chapter, God very specifically spells out those things the people were doing which alienated them from Himself. He will be dealing with that part of the Ten Commandments which have to do with man’s relationship to man. The previous section of the chapter had to do with a man’s relationship to God—when the heart is not rightly related to God, the ritual is wrong. In this section the ritual is wrong if the heart is wrong. By putting these commandments right down upon their lives, God will specifically reveal the things they were doing wrong.
We are not dealing with sin today as we should. If you knew me like I know myself, you would not continue to read what I have to say. But wait a minute, if I knew you like you know yourself, I don’t think I’d bother to write to you. May I say to you, we are sinners. When I was a pastor in downtown Los Angeles, I knew a dear little lady who had been a Bible teacher. Whenever I would talk about the fact that we are saved sinners, she always wanted to correct me. She would say, “Dr. McGee, after we are saved, we’re not sinners.”
“I don’t know about you, but I’m still a sinner,” I would tell her.
“If your sins have been forgiven, you’re not a sinner.”
“No, I’m a saved sinner, I’m a forgiven sinner, but I’m still a sinner, and I will be a sinner as long as I live on this earth. ‘Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is’ (1 John 3:2). In that day when you see Vernon McGee, I won’t be a sinner, but until that day, I’m a sinner.”
My friend, both you and I are sinners. All of us are sinners before God, and I am delighted to know that this belief is coming back into style. I have a clipping of a prominent doctor of psychology who states that he used to go along with Freudian psychology which teaches that the reason you are such a lousy person is because your mama didn’t give you the proper affection that you should have had or that maybe you weren’t a breast-fed baby and that is the reason you have gone in for promiscuous sex. My friend, what nonsense that is! Now this doctor has changed his position, and he writes, “The realities of personal guilt and sin have been glossed over as only symptoms of emotional illness or environmental conditioning for which the individual isn’t considered responsible. But there is sin which cannot be subsumed under verbal artifacts such as disease, delinquency, deviancy. There is immorality. There is unethical behavior. There is wrongdoing.” In other words, my friend, you and I are sinners. I have been saying that for years. Even when I studied psychology in college, I did not buy behaviorism. I frankly believe that God alone knows about humanity and about our hearts. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jer. 17:9). Only God knows it, and He alone knows it.
If we could see ourselves as God sees us, we couldn’t stand ourselves. Only God could put up with us, and only God does put up with us. Oh, if we would just come to the Word of God and rest in the Word of God! God is going to be specific with them and put these commandments right down upon their lives. This is what we need to do also. I do not mean to step on your toes, but I am trying to tell you what the Word of God says. Let me illustrate my point. If all the church officers in this country would simply read the pastoral epistles (1 and 2 Timothy and Titus) to see what are God’s requirements for being an officer in the church, and if they would simply follow those requirements, over one-half of the church officers in this country would resign before next Sunday. The church would be better off, and I think a revival would break out in many places. When I teach those epistles, I receive less mail from my listeners than during any other period of time. Why? Because they do not like to hear what the Word of God has to say. Even some of us preachers would have to walk out of the pulpit and never enter it again if we really followed what the Word of God says.
There is little wonder that the church has the problem that it has. There is little wonder that it is filled with a bunch of babies, sucking their thumbs, crying loud and long unless they are given some attention, a rattle to play with, or maybe a yo-yo. They take some little course of instruction and think that that makes them a full-grown child of God in a few weeks. These little courses are not even an all-day sucker for the babe. During the Second World War when there was a shortage of officers, they instituted a ninety-day course to produce second lieutenants. They were called “the wonder boys.” We sure have a lot of “wonder Christians” who know nothing about the Word of God.
Again let me illustrate what I am talking about. Although I have taken as long as five years to teach the entire Bible, I feel like I am a babe as far as the Word of God is concerned. I’ve missed so much even teaching at that slow pace. I hesitate to teach the Book of Revelation, although I consider it the most mechanical, the most simple book in the Word of God. I approach it with fear and trembling. Yet there are pastors and teachers who have been in a church or with a group for just a short period of time who are already teaching Revelation. My friend, there are sixty-five books that come before Revelation, but prophecy is popular and made to be sensational. Sir Robert Anderson calls this “the wild utterances of prophecy mongers.” Many of us are willing to settle for the better things of life when God wants us to have the best things. Oh, that we would put our lives under the spotlight of the Word of God.
And the word of the Lord came unto Zechariah, saying [Zech. 7:8].
Zechariah isn’t just giving his opinion. He is saying to the people, “This is what God has to say, and this is God’s answer to you. The ritual is wrong if the heart is wrong.”
Now God is going to put the spotlight down on the people—
Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment, and shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother:
And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart [Zech 7:9–10].
It will be helpful for us to take a close look at the last of the Ten Commandments. The first four commandments have to do with a man’s relationship to God. The next commandment is a bridge and has to do with man’s relationship to his parents. There is a period in his life when that little fellow in the home looks up to his mama and papa; they are actually God to him, and that is the way God intended it to be. The reason children are to obey their parents when they’re growing up is so that later on they will be able to obey the Lord Jesus. Now notice the last five commandments: “Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s” (Exod. 20:13–17). You are not to covet his Cadillac nor the lovely home that he lives in—you are not to covet these things at all.
Notice how we can put these commandments right down upon our lives. “Thus, speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment”—don’t bear false witness. “And shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother”—you are not to steal, not to lie, not to covet. “And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor”—oh boy, this is getting right down where we live. “Let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart.” The Lord Jesus brought all the commandments up to a higher plane, although He only cited two commandments as illustrations. But He said that if you are angry with your brother, you are guilty of murder.
God is saying that although Israel went through the rituals, you ought to have met them on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday! On Friday night they started through the rituals again, and they would weep and mourn and fast and bring sacrifices. In the Book of Malachi God says to them, “You say that those sacrifices made you sick. You ought to have been in My position—they nauseated Me.”
But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear [Zech. 7:11].
The people did not want to hear what God wanted them to hear, and there are people today in the same position.
They “pulled away the shoulder”—how vivid this is! When I was a little fellow in southern Oklahoma, the little country school put on a program. I think I was in about the fifth grade, and my class was sitting down front. I was causing some kind of disturbance (I don’t know why—I was such a good boy!), and my father, who was sitting in the back, walked down and touched me on the shoulder. I turned and pulled that shoulder away. Oh, what a brat I was to do a thing like that! My dad took me by the hand, led me out the side door, and he said, “Son, I’m going to give you a whipping.” That wasn’t anything new, but he went on to say, “I’m not going to give it to you because you were making a disturbance. I’m going to give it to you because you pulled away from me when I put my hand on your shoulder. You were disobedient.” Then for the next few minutes he impressed upon me that I wasn’t to do that sort of thing.
God says of Israel, “I touched them on the shoulder, and they pulled away the shoulder.” There are many people in our churches today whom God is touching on the shoulder and saying, “Wait a minute. Don’t do that. Don’t live that kind of life.” They pull away their shoulder, they stop their ears, and they don’t want to hear what God has to say.
I was baby-sitting my little grandson out in the yard when he did something he shouldn’t have done. He got into my flower bed and was ruining one of my camellias. I told him to get out, but he looked at me and said, “I’m not going to get out.” (He takes after his grandmother quite a bit, as you can see!) He started back in, and I put my hand on his shoulder to stop him. He did that same little thing—he pulled away. It reminded me of another little boy about sixty-five years ago. I knew what my dad had done, and since I’m his grandfather, I took him and turned him across my knee, and I gave him quite a little lesson. My daughter applauded me for it and said, “I thought you had him so spoiled that you’d never correct him.”
“But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.” This is what these spoiled brats who had come down from Beth-el had been doing; in fact, the whole nation had been doing it. The reason Israel had gone into captivity was not because they didn’t have light. God had put His hand on their shoulder, the prophets had spoken to them, but they “stopped their ears, that they should not hear.” In other words, they turned their backs on God. They had broken the commandments which relate to God, and they were guilty before Him.
Going through a religious ritual will not do you a bit of good if your heart is not right, my friend. Until you get your life straightened out, there is no use becoming religious. Actually, that will only make you a member of the crowd the Lord Jesus called hypocrites. Have you ever noticed that He never called a believer a hypocrite? In the Bible, you’ll never find a real believer called a hypocrite. It is those who pretend, those who have religion, those who have, as the Lord Jesus said. washed the outside of the cup while the inside is still putrid, who are called hypocrites (see Matt. 23:25–26). This was the problem with the people of Israel. God simply put down on their lives the Ten Commandments, beginning with the commandments which relate to man. How were they acting in their business and social and home lives? When He did this, it really showed them up, and it showed the reason why God had not heard and answered their prayers.
Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the Lord of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the LORD of hosts [Zec 7:12].
“Therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of hosts.” The destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and the carrying away of these people into Babylon was a sad thing, a tragic thing, an awful thing. They were religious, they were going through a ritual, but their hearts were far from God, and they were a disgrace to Him.
Therefore it is come to pass, that as he cried, and they would not hear; so they cried, and I would not hear, saith the Lord of hosts [Zech. 7:13].
God says to these people, “I cried to you, and I pled with you, but you would not listen to Me.” Then when they got into trouble, they said, “We don’t want to go into captivity. We’ll come back to You.” And God now says, “I didn’t hear you.” There are a lot of prayers today that God doesn’t hear. I get a little weary of this sentimental rot that is shown on our television screens. In these weepy sob stories, some reprobate—either man or woman—lives any kind of life he wants, but when his little child gets sick, he goes in and kneels by the bed to plead with God for the life of the child! I don’t think God hears that prayer, my friend. I’ll be honest with you: you’ve got to get right with God yourself before you are going to get anywhere with Him by praying. God makes it clear that the other is nothing in the world but religious rot, and it will not get you anywhere at all.
But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they knew not. Thus the land was desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate [Zech. 7:14].
I want you to note that God says that He made the pleasant land desolate. He not only judged the people but also the land. Many people go to that land today and are greatly disappointed because they’ve heard that it is the land of milk and honey. It was that at one time; it was like the Garden of Eden. But I think people are trying to kid themselves when they say today, “Oh, isn’t this a beautiful land!” My friend, it is rocky, it is dry, it is a most desolate place. If you can find anything pretty on the way down from Jerusalem to Jericho and the Dead Sea, I wish that you would point it out to me. It is as bad as the desert in eastern California and in Arizona. It is really a desolate place, and there are very few beautiful spots in that land. It was the pleasant land, but it’s the desolate land today.
One of the proofs that prophecy is not being fulfilled today is the fact that the land has not been restored. I know that the Jews have moved back there and have become a nation, but they have been in trouble ever since. At the time I am writing this, I have just heard from a friend who has recently returned from there. He tells me that taxes in Israel are higher than in any place in the world. Are you going to call that “the promised land,” and are you going to hold God responsible for that? I don’t think He has returned the people back to that land at the present time. My friend also reported to me that a great many of the people who are there now want to leave the land. What is that going to do to these Bible teachers who are trying to date everything in prophecy from the beginning of the modern nation of Israel? My friend, Israel is still a desolate land today, but it’s going to become the pleasant land again someday.
CHAPTER 8
Theme: God’s purpose concerning Jerusalem unchanged by any ritual
Chapter 8 is God’s third explanation to the people concerning their question: We have gone through the ritual and the liturgy—why hasn’t God blessed us? His first answer was that, when the heart is right, the ritual is all right. His second answer was that, when the heart is wrong, the ritual is wrong. In other words, the ritual doesn’t have anything to do with it; it is the heart that is important. Some expositors call chapter 8 the positive answer to this question, with chapter 7 being the negative aspect of the answer. I want to say to you, the answer in chapter 8 is positively positive: God’s purpose concerning Jerusalem is unchanged by any ritual. Whether you go through a ritual or you don’t go through it, you are not going to change God’s plan and purpose. Thank God for that. Thank God that He will carry through His plan and His purpose.
Five words occur in this chapter which are very important. In fact, you can hang the meaning of this chapter on these words.
1. First is the expression, “Lord of hosts.” Dr. Merrill Unger gives the interpretation of this expression as “Lord of armies,” and that probably is a more literal translation. “The Lord of hosts” or “the Lord of armies” occurs eighteen times in this chapter. Apparently, He is very important in this chapter—“the Lord of hosts.”
2. Jerusalem occurs six times, and Zion occurs twice. Jerusalem is a geographical city located in Israel, over in the Middle East today. It never has changed; it is still the same place. When God says Jerusalem, He means Jerusalem. He does not mean London or Washington, D.C., or Rome or Los Angeles or any other place. When He says Jerusalem, God means Jerusalem.
3. The word jealous occurs three times.
4. The word remnant occurs twice. Remember that it was only a remnant from all twelve tribes that returned to the land—they did not return from only the two southern tribes. There were very few, even from Judah, who came back. Approximately sixty thousand returned to that land.
5. The final expression, “Thus saith the Lord, ” occurs ten times. When God keeps repeating that, do you know what it means? It means “thus saith the Lord”—not Vernon McGee, not any man, but it is God who is saying this. I do not speak or write in order to be popular today. I would change my tactics quite a bit if I wanted to do that. I’m attempting to teach the Word of God, and if your toes get stepped on, God is the one who is stepping on them. I’m simply reading what the Word of God has to say. The reason that a book like Zechariah is not being taught today is that people do not like to have their toes stepped on. Yet I am thankful for and amazed at the number of people who are hearing the Word of God. It’s a glorious day in which to live, unlike the day in which I began my ministry.
Some commentators feel that chapter 8 puts the Ten Commandments down on the people of Israel even more than chapter 7 did. I do not feel that that is accurate. My feeling is that the last part of chapter 7 put the Ten Commandments down on them, and they were weighed in the balances and were found wanting—they did not measure up to God’s standard at all. Then in chapter 8, especially in the first eight verses, we find that God’s ultimate purpose is not changed concerning His people—the nation Israel, the land, and Jerusalem. At the present moment, God is not fulfilling any prophecy concerning Israel. He is dealing today with the church; He is calling out a body of believers in the church. And the church and Israel are entirely two separate entities. When God will get through calling out the church, I do not know. It’s not geared to any man’s calendar at all. It’s on God’s calendar, but He has never let any of us see it. God’s Word doesn’t tell us when He will take the church out of this earth, but when He does, He will turn to the people of Israel again. These prophecies here in chapter 8 are simply saying that their return to the land in Zechariah’s day was very small but that it is an adumbration, a little miniature picture, of a return to the land that is coming in the future.
Again the word of the Lord of hosts came to me, saying,
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I was jealous for her with great fury [Zech. 8:1–2].
When God says that He is jealous, it is not the same as man’s jealousy, but He does have the same thing in mind. I feel sorry for any woman who makes the statement, “My husband is not jealous of me.” If it is true, it means that her husband does not love her. I don’t know about you, but I’m jealous of my wife. I married her for myself because I love her. I don’t intend to share her with anybody else, and I will not—that’s for sure. I’m jealous of her. God says that concerning Israel, and He says it to the church today. If you think that you can live for the world and the flesh and the Devil and then serve God on Sunday, you are wrong. You won’t make it, my friend. If you are His child and try to do that, He will judge you. If you do that and live in that, it means that you’re not God’s child because He is jealous of those who are His own. He has told us concerning sin in our lives, “For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged” (1 Cor. 11:31). And we are also told, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). Sin has to be confessed. You cannot have fellowship with Him and have sin in your life, Christian friend.
Thus saith the Lord; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth; and the mountain of the Lord of hosts the holy mountain [Zech. 8:3].
This prophecy was not fulfilled then, which was obvious to those people. Rather, this looks to the future. It has not been fulfilled since then, and it’s not being fulfilled today. God makes it clear that He will return to Zion, and He makes it clear that He is going to dwell in the midst of Jerusalem.
“And Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth.” Today it is a city where there are more religions than you can imagine! Every Christian organization has built something there, and there are all kinds of cults and “isms” there. It is not the city of truth today.
“And the mountain of the Lord of hosts the holy mountain.” I have never seen anything there that I thought you could call holy. It’s just not holy today, my friend. It will be holy when He gets back there, but He is not back there yet. This prophecy looks to the future.
“Thus saith the Lord; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth.” Earlier, Isaiah had made it very clear that Jerusalem is to become the capital of the earth. In the second chapter of his prophecy, we read, “The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s, house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it” (Isa. 2:1–2). Zechariah is here looking on toward the last days and is encouraging the people. They have returned to the land, and God has blessed them to a certain degree, but this is a miniature of what is going to come in the future. There is a glorious day in the future which does not depend upon a ritual or a liturgy or a ceremony or jumping through some little hoop and thinking that that will please God. God says that it is the heart which will have to be changed, and He says that He is going to change these people’s hearts. The Word of God will go forth from Jerusalem, and it will be called a city of truth. Isaiah goes on to say in his prophecy, “And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more” (Isa. 2:3–4). But we have not come to that day yet—we had better keep our atom bombs dry and ready for use. You never know in this mean, big, bad world when you will need things like that. Yet there is coming a day when “Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth; and the mountain [or, kingdom] of the Lord of hosts the holy mountain.” In other words, Zechariah is speaking of the establishment of the millennial kingdom which is yet in the future.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; There shall yet old men and old women dwell in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for very age [Zech. 8:4].
Jerusalem will be a place where old people can live. People will not have to go to retirement centers or to senior citizens’ cities. I want to say something here that I know is not very popular today. These senior citizens’ places of retirement are painted to be very delightful places. I have been to several of them, and I may have to move to one before it is all over, but frankly, I do not think they are very healthful. My wife and I stop at a certain one every now and then to eat lunch because they have good food which is reasonably priced. I tell my wife—and she agrees with me—that it makes me feel very, very downcast to go there and see nothing but old gray heads around. It will be nice that in Jerusalem they will not have to have a retirement center. In the Millennium they are going to improve on the method which we have today. It will be a place for old people where they will be safe and welcome and where they will enjoy living.
And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof [Zech. 8:5].
This means they will not have automobiles, and we will get rid of the smog and the pollution. There are not going to be any cars, and the streets of Jerusalem will be playgrounds for the boys and girls. Jerusalem will be a place for old people and for young people, boys and girls. I think it’s nice for grandma and grandpa to see the little grandchildren every now and then. They don’t want them for too long, though. When the little ones get tired, they become ornery like their grandmother, and that makes it a little difficult for grandfather, and so he likes to send them home after awhile! But it is wonderful when they can mingle. It’s good for the little folk to have a grandma and a grandpa to put their arms around them and tell them how much they are loved. Children need all the love they can get in this world. This is a beautiful picture here—a picture of old age and childhood in the Millennium.
At that future time, Jerusalem will be the capital of the earth, Jesus will be reigning there, and the church will be out yonder in space, dwelling in the New Jerusalem. Someone will say, “I thought that the church would be with Christ.” Yes, Scripture assures us that the church will be with Him; therefore, I think He is going to commute every day. In the Millennium, there will not be all the tie-up on the freeways that we have today. I do not think it will take Him more than a couple of seconds—maybe not even that long—to commute between the New Jerusalem in space and the city of Jerusalem, the capital of the earth.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; If it be marvellous in the eyes of the remnant of this people in these days, should it also be marvellous in mine eyes? saith the Lord of hosts [Zech. 8:6].
When the delegation came down to Jerusalem from Beth-el, they were greatly impressed. The temple was being rebuilt, many of the people had built their homes, and there was an air of prosperity in Jerusalem. They said, “My, it does look like God is really moving here.” And God says, “You don’t see what I see in the future. You think that this is something wonderful, but this is nothing compared to what it is going to be like in the future.”
Notice again how often the words, “the Lord of hosts” or “the Lord of armies,” occur—
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Behold, I will save my people from the east country, and from the west country [Zech. 8:7].
This is quite interesting. “The east country” is the place from which the remnant had returned. A great many come out of Yemen even in our day, and I am told that there are still great numbers of Jews in the Orient. God says, “I will bring My people from the east country and from the west country.” Where is “the west country”? My nation is part of it, I think. When I take a plane from Jerusalem, it flies out toward the west and just keeps going west until I finally get back to Los Angeles. The Jews will be leaving this country someday. Just think what New York City will become. It will practically become a ghost town because there are more Jews there than there are in Israel today. God is going to bring His people back to the land of Israel. He is telling the people of Zechariah’s day, “If you of the remnant think that what you see is wonderful, think of what I see out yonder in the future.”
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 [Zech. 8:8].
The Jews are not His people now. Somebody asks me, “Do you believe that the Jews are God’s chosen people?” I probably shock them a little when I say, “No, I don’t think so.” God’s chosen people today are the church. Peter writes, “… ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people…” (1 Pet. 2:9). What is Peter talking about? The church—that is, he is talking about the body of believers in which both Jew and Gentile have been brought together and made one in Christ. The only real brotherhood that there can be in this world today is in the church of Jesus Christ. Someday the church will be removed from the earth, and then God will take His chosen people, the Jews, and return them to their land.
We have already seen in Zechariah’s visions that God will cleanse these people. They need cleansing just as we in the church do. The church is a blood-bought, blood-washed people. Why? Because we are sinners. We are saved sinners right now, but we are still sinners. One of these days, I am going to be a real saint. I am a saint now by name, but my life doesn’t always look saintly. But one of these days, I am going to be like Christ, and that will be a glorious day. The people of Israel are going to be transformed also. God says, “They shall be my people.” When? In that day when they go back to Jerusalem. They are not in the city of Jerusalem today. I have been through the old city of Jerusalem, and it is filled with Arabs. The Arabs are the ones who are living there even at the present time.
“And I will be their God, in truth and in righteousness.” They are not back there in truth today. They still deny the Lord Jesus Christ as their Messiah; they do not accept Him. I am amazed how little reference there is to God in that land today; in fact, there is practically nil. The leaders of Israel say less about God than anybody else. I heard an Arab, leader say, “If Allah wills it.” He didn’t seem to be ashamed of his concept of God, but Israel doesn’t mention her God today. They are not boasting of Him at all. However, in the kingdom age God “will be their God, in truth and in righteousness.” And “righteousness” means that things are going to be made right.
In verses 9–19, we see that God expects the delegation newly come from Babylon to hear the prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, in view of the perspective of the glorious future. Also, these people are to keep the commandments. Just because they didn’t come back with the remnant does not mean that they are excused from the commandments. They are to listen to Haggai and Zechariah.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Let your hands be strong, ye that hear in these days these words by the mouth of the prophets, which were in the day that the foundation of the house of the Lord of hosts was laid, that the temple might be built [Zech. 8:9].
“The prophets” are Haggai and Zechariah. They are the ones encouraging the people to build the temple. They are encouraging these newcomers to help with the building of the temple, and they did help, by the way.
For before these days there was no hire for man, nor any hire for beast; neither was there any peace to him that went out or came in because of the affliction: for I set all men every one against his neighbour [Zech. 8:10].
“For before these days there was no hire for man, nor any hire for beast.” In other words, unemployment was a real factor in the economics of the country at that time.
“Neither was there any peace to him that went out or came in because of the affliction: for I set all men every one against his neighbour.” In my nation today, we have practically forgotten God. There are very few in public life today who make any reference to Him except to ridicule Him. God is pretty well left out; yet we are wondering why we are having all this trouble with the different groups which we call “minority groups.” Not only are there the racial divisions, but also there are social divisions, economic divisions, and geographic divisions. There has never been a time when there has been so much talk like: “Let’s get together. Let’s stand together as a nation. Let’s do this as one people.” We get a great deal of that kind of talk from our leaders. They encourage us to do this and to do that in order to accommodate this minority group and that minority group. And yet we get farther and farther apart. Do you know why? Because we have left God out. God told Israel, “You’re not having peace, and there are divisions among you.” Certainly there are all kinds of divisions among us—it is almost warfare that is taking place. There is turmoil and violence on every hand. Every politician who runs for office thinks that he’s got the solution to it. The problem is that he doesn’t have the solution. And I want to say to you, I don’t have the solution, but the Word of God says, “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked” (Isa. 57:21). The answer is that we need to get God back in the picture today. We need to turn to Him.
But now I will not be unto the residue of this people as in the former days, saith the Lord of hosts [Zech. 8:11].
God says to them, “I don’t intend to bless you as you are now or as you were before I sent you into captivity, but I am going to bless you.”
For the seed shall be prosperous; the vine shall give her fruit, and the ground shall give her increase, and the heavens shall give their dew; and I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these things [Zech. 8:12].
God brought prosperity to that nation for a period of time. The great judgment came upon them, of course, when they rejected the Messiah—Titus the Roman destroyed Jerusalem and scattered the people throughout the Roman Empire. They have never returned from that dispersion, according to the Word of God.
And it shall come to pass, that as ye were a curse among the heathen, O house of Judah, and house of Israel; so will I save you, and ye shall be a blessing: fear not, but let your hands be strong [Zech. 8:13].
At the time that I am writing this, there are still fingers being pointed at Israel. Practically all of Europe has deserted them because of the oil situation, and they are finding out that they are not worth more than a gallon of gasoline. It is a tragic situation. They have become a curse among the nations. Anti-Semitism is growing again throughout the world. God says, “When I save them and bring them back to that land, they are going to be a blessing to the world.” I believe that the nation of Israel will be the priests for the gentile nations of the earth. They will stand between God and the gentile nations during the Millennium.
For thus saith the Lord of hosts; As I thought to punish you, when your fathers provoked me to wrath, saith the Lord of hosts, and I repented not [Zech. 8:14].
“For thus saith the Lord of hosts.” Notice how often this phrase occurs. “As I thought to punish you, when your fathers provoked me to wrath, saith the Lord of hosts, and I repented not.” In other words, God says, “I didn’t change my mind about that.”
In this section we are looking forward to the time when God is going to make Jerusalem the capital of this earth. God says that nothing can detour or detract Him from His purpose. He intends to do this by His marvelous infinite grace. In writing to the Romans Paul says, “For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy” (Rom. 9:15–16). Moses went to God and prayed about whether or not God would destroy the children of Israel. God said in effect, “I’m going to hear you, Moses, but I’m not going to hear you because you are Moses. I will show mercy and grace to those whom I will show mercy and grace. Therefore, it is not him that runneth—to him that trots through a ritual or goes to a lot of church services—it is the Lord Jesus Christ who shows mercy.” My friend, we can say with the apostle Paul we are what we are by the grace of God.
So again have I thought in these days to do well unto Jerusalem and to the house of Judah: fear ye not [Zech. 8:15].
God says to these people, “It is not because you have been through the ritual or because you have omitted the ritual. Whether you do or whether you don’t, I am showing mercy to you.” But this is not the end in itself, this time of blessing is a very small thing. God looks down through the centuries and says, “The day is coming when I intend to deal again with you, and in that day I will do a glorious thing upon the earth.” He is looking down to the time of the Millennium.
Now since they are going to represent God in the end times, it does not mean that they can do as they please. The grace and mercy of God extended to us does not mean that we can live any kind of life, although some people think that. Listen to what God says now—
These are the things that ye shall do; Speak ye every man the truth to his neighbour; execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates [Zech. 8:16].
“These are the things that ye shall do.” Have you trusted Christ as your Savior? Then you have been saved by grace and mercy. But wait a minute, He says, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). If you love Him, you are going to keep His commandments. You do not keep His commandments in order to get saved, because you have been saved by His grace and mercy. The obedience of your life will never add anything to your salvation.
“Speak ye every man the truth to his neighbour.” Ours is the day when lying is acceptable in every walk of life. Business cannot be depended upon today to tell the truth. Advertising is very inaccurate. The news media cannot be depended upon to tell the truth. The government cannot be depended upon to tell the truth, and it does not make any difference what party you are talking about. It would seem that you cannot trust men in any walk of life—not the military nor educators nor scientists. In all of these areas today, we are finding that truth has suddenly gone out of style. It is about time that boys and girls were taught in school certain moral standards, and one of them is that if you don’t tell the truth, you’re a liar—there is no other way around that.
“Execute the judgment of truth and peace in your gates.” “The gates” were where the courts of law convened in that day. Many today have confessed that they have lied even to a grand jury, that they have lied when they were under oath!
“Execute the judgment of truth.” What He is talking about here is not the act of judging. You and I are going to judge. Whether we judge honestly or dishonestly, whether we judge truthfully or untruthfully, we are going to judge. What He has in mind here is the motive. The thing that should motivate judging is truth.
And let none of you imagine evil in your hearts against his neighbour; and love no false oath: for all these are things that I hate, saith the Lord [Zech. 8:17].
“And let none of you imagine evil in your hearts against his neighbour.” That means that you’re not to covet anything that is your neighbor’s.
“And love no false oath: for all these are things that I hate, saith the Lord.” Actually, Zechariah is again referring to the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments show us some of the things which God hates. They are not given to save us but to show us the things in our lives that God hates. They are given to show us that we need to turn to Him. We have all these bumper stickers that say that God is love. That is great—God is love—but God also hates. You cannot love something without hating something else. If you love the truth, you’re going to hate the lie. If you love your child, you’ll hate a mad dog that comes into the yard to bite the child. You would kill that mad dog if you love your child. God hates certain things—I’d like to see that put up on billboards today. God hates lying. God hates covetousness. He hates a whole lot of things that the world is doing today.
And the word of the Lord of hosts came unto me, saying [Zech. 8:18].
Zechariah says it again—what repetition we have! God wants you to know that He said these things.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; The fast of the fourth month, and the fast of the fifth, and the fast of the seventh, and the fast of the tenth, shall be to the house of Judah joy and gladness, and cheerful feasts; therefore love the truth and peace [Zech. 8:19].
God says to them, “I never gave you any fast days. These days that you have set up to fast and to go through a nice little religious ritual, I’m going to turn them into feast days, days of rejoicing, days of love and truth and peace.” These are the things that are absent in our contemporary culture and society. I wonder if it has ever occurred to anyone that if we would go back and teach the great biblical and moral values that are stated in the Word of God, it might have a tremendous effect upon our society today. Some of us believe that it would.
In effect God is saying, “I don’t want you to come before Me with a long face and that pious look that you have. I want you to come before Me with joy.” My friend, a lot of us are not enjoying being Christians as we should. God wants us to have a whole lot of fun. I think that the big fun center for Christians ought to be the local church. Someone says, “Oh, do you mean we ought to have a volleyball court?” No, I mean to come together and study the Word of God—that ought to be fun. And there’s something wrong with you, Christian, if studying the Word of God is not fun.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; It shall yet come to pass, that there shall come people, and the inhabitants of many cities:
And the inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts: I will go also [Zech. 8:20–21].
This looks to the fact that Jerusalem will become the capital of the earth—not only the political capital but also the religious capital. It looks forward to that time which we call the Millennium. “It shall yet come to pass”—this is something that is for the future.
Yea, many people and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem, and to pray before the Lord [Zech. 8:22].
“Yea, many people and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem.” I take it that that does not mean Los Angeles—it means Jerusalem.
“And to pray before the Lord.” Very frankly, Jerusalem is not an ideal place to go to pray; it just isn’t geared for that today. Actually, you see more religion manifested there and less Christianity than any place that I know of. But it will become the center of God’s government during the Millennium.
We referred earlier to the second chapter of Isaiah, and there are many other Scriptures along this line. This illustrates why it is so important to study the Book of Zechariah. A great many teachers in our day have zeroed in on the Book of Daniel. If you go to the average seminary library or to any good library, you will notice that there is volume after volume written on Daniel. Go down the shelves a little farther and see how many books you find that are written on Zechariah—there is a dearth of them. I have a friend who does not believe that there is going to be a Millennium on this earth. He doesn’t believe that God will turn to Israel ever again or that He will ever turn again to Jerusalem. He believes that God is through with the people of Israel. He has written a book on Daniel, and he told me, “I have proved my point in Daniel.”
I said to him, “Has it ever occurred to you that no prophecy is of any private interpretation? You do not study the Book of Daniel by itself. Why didn’t you bring in a little of Zechariah?”
He looked at me rather funny and said, “I didn’t need to.” So I frankly said to him, “Well, if you hold the theory that God is through with Israel, you can’t handle the Book of Zechariah.” My friend, Zechariah makes it clear that God is not through with Jerusalem and He’s not through with the nation Israel.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts; In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you [Zech. 8:23].
“In those days”—what days? This is that expression that we find again and again in Scripture. “In that day,” or “in those days”—this is the Millennium that is coming. The Great Tribulation is actually the beginning of it, and it ushers in the coming of Christ and the thousand-year reign of Christ that is called the Millennium. The Millennium, in turn, ushers in Christ’s eternal kingdom on this earth.
“In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you.” Is God through with the Jew? In the Millennium, the church will have been removed from the earth. You see, the church could not be here in a period like this. I believe that the number ten here rather suggests a whole number, that it represents the fact that all the gentile nations in that day will find Jerusalem very attractive and they will go there. Why? Because the Lord Jesus will be there, the millennial temple will be there, and it will be the place to worship God.
CHAPTER 9
Theme: First prophetic burden; The coming of Christ
We have come to the end of the historic interlude, and we now enter the third and last major division, which I call “Prophetic Burdens.” And I have divided this final section into two divisions: The first “burden” deals with the prophetic aspects which are connected with the first coming of Christ (chs. 9–11). The second “burden” deals with the prophetic aspects which are connected with the second coming of Christ (chs. 12–14).
We will see that this new division goes over the same ground that was covered in the ten visions, but it is approached from a different viewpoint. It begins with the people of Israel as they were in the days of Zechariah when they were a small, discouraged remnant attempting to rebuild the temple. God had raised up Haggai and Zechariah to encourage them to rebuild the temple. Zechariah begins with that local, contemporary scene, then moves on down into the immediate future when they would experience for a time the blessing of God. Then he moves on down through the centuries—God had a plan and purpose—to the coming of the Messiah. We shall see the two comings of the Messiah, coming first as the Savior and coming the second time as the Sovereign. His coming the first time had the cross in view; His second coming will have the crown in view.
FIRST BURDEN—JUDGMENT UPON GENTILE NATIONS
In the first eight verses we read of the judgment upon the gentile nations which was accomplished by Alexander the Great—an amazing section.
In the days of Zechariah some folk could have become a little too optimistic. They could have said, “Well, this is going to be the Millennium now that we are back in the land and the temple is rebuilt.” So Zechariah is telling them, “No, out in the future there is coming another world ruler.” And we will see the contrast between that world ruler and the One whom God will send to the earth for His first coming. The world ruler is Alexander the Great, an arrogant, insolent, highly conceited young man but probably the most brilliant general the world has ever seen. Not only was he a tremendous military leader, but he was a great political leader as well. He had a certain charisma, and multitudes followed him.
The burden of the word of the Lord in the land of Hadrach, and Damascus shall be the rest thereof: when the eyes of man, as of all the tribes of Israel, shall be toward the Lord [Zech. 9:1].
“The burden of the word of the Lord.” This word burden means judgment, a judgment of God. Alexander the Great was unwittingly God’s instrument of judgment. His forces subjugated “the land of Hadrach,” taking the key towns, Damascus and Hamath. Damascus was the capital of Syria and still is today. Also, it continues to cause Israel a great deal of difficulty.
The cities mentioned in verses 1–7 trace the march of Alexander’s great army down into the Promised Land. It is history now; but, when it was written, it was prophecy. Its literal fulfillment makes it one of the most remarkable accounts we find in the Word of God. This is so disturbing to the liberal theologian that he attempts to move the time of the writing of Zechariah up to the time of Alexander the Great!
Alexander left Europe and crossed over into Asia Minor (modern Turkey), and he took city after city. He was a cruel and brutal man. However, we must understand that he had an army of only fifty thousand men, which in that day was rather small. Therefore, he could not leave any of his men behind to control the cities that he conquered. He had to either destroy the cities or so weaken them that they could not attack him from the rear. He obliterated many of these cities mentioned here. It is interesting to note that Alexander, brilliant though he was, died of alcoholism at the age of thirty-two, almost the same age as the Lord Jesus when He died. In the Book of Daniel the Graeco-Macedonian Empire is represented as the third great world power of Daniel 2, the panther of Daniel 7, and the rough goat of Daniel 8 (the goat is the Graeco-Macedonian Empire, and the horn is Alexander the Great himself).
Here Zechariah presents to us the march of Alexander. I am looking at the works of Flavius Josephus in which are recorded the Jewish wars, including details of the march of Alexander as he came with his army into the land of Palestine.
And Hamath also shall border thereby; Tyrus, and Zidon, though it be very wise [Zech. 9:2].
“Tyrus, and Zidon” were wealthy commercial cities of that day.
And Tyrus did build herself a strong hold, and heaped up silver as the dust, and fine gold as the mire of the streets.
Behold, the Lord will cast her out, and he will smite her power in the sea; and she shall be devoured with fire [Zech. 9:3–4].
Everyone felt that Tyre was impregnable as it was situated out on its island fortress. The inhabitants were Phoenicians, a seagoing people who had developed a great commercial nation and had accumulated a great deal of wealth. Alexander besieged it for seven months and finally conquered it by scraping the ruins of the old city into the sea to build a causeway out to the island city. Today we can see all of this, and I have pictures which I have taken that reveal how that prophecy was literally fulfilled.
After taking Tyre, Alexander moved down into the Philistine country.
Ashkelon shall see it, and fear; Gaza also shall see it, and be very sorrowful, and Ekron; for her expectation shall be ashamed; and the king shall perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon shall not be inhabited [Zech. 9:5].
I have been in this area and have pictures of ruins of the old temple of Dagon. That area has been returned to the nation Israel today. At Ashdod they have built an artificial harbor, and they have built apartment after apartment there. Literally thousands have moved into Ashdod. Farther inland as you go down the coast you will find Ashkelon. It is a thriving city today, but it is not in the same location as the old Ashkelon. The original Ashkelon was right on the seacoast, and the ruins are still there today. It is more or less a park now, a beautiful area, but it is not inhabited. It is not a city anymore. It is interesting to see how God’s Word was literally fulfilled. Alexander the Great destroyed these cities and broke the power of the Philistines.
And a bastard shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of the Philistines [Zech. 9:6].
“A bastard shall dwell in Ashdod.” It does not say that Ashdod will not be inhabited; it just says that there won’t be a very high class of people living there. And Ashdod is inhabited today.
“I will cut off the pride of the Philistines.” Alexander the Great brought the Philistine nation to an end. They never again emerged as a nation.
And I will take away his blood out of his mouth, and his abominations from between his teeth: but he that remaineth, even he, shall be for our God, and he shall be as a governor in Judah, and Ekron as a Jebusite [Zech. 9:7].
“And I will take away his blood out of his mouth, and his abominations from between his teeth” refers to the polluted food and idolatrous sacrifices they engaged in. God would take away the idolatry of Philistia. However, when Christ returns they will be converted to the God of Israel—“he shall be for our God,” says Zechariah. Philistia will become a part of the people of God and will inherit the blessings of Israel.
This man Alexander the Great destroyed everything that was ahead of him. If he had to wait around a few months to capture a city, like he did at Tyre, he didn’t mind doing it, because he would not leave any strong fortress behind him anywhere.
Now he is approaching Jerusalem. What will he do to Jerusalem? Well, we have a very strange statement here—
And I will encamp about mine house because of the army, because of him that passeth by, and because of him that returneth: and no oppressor shall pass through them any more: for now have I seen with mine eyes [Zech. 9:8].
“I will encamp about mine house,” refers, I believe, to that little temple they were building. God said that He was going to protect it from Alexander the Great. God said it, and Zechariah had the nerve to record it because he could depend upon the accuracy of God’s Word and believed that it would be fulfilled.
Well, was it fulfilled? Let me give you the record of the historian Flavius Josephus. According to him, the high priest in Jerusalem had a vision in which he was instructed to go out and meet the conqueror who was coming, and so he waited for the coming of Alexander the Great.
And when he understood that he was not far from the city, he went out in procession with the priests and the multitude of the citizens. The procession was venerable, and the manner of it different from that of other nations … and when the Phoenicians and the Chaldeans that followed him, thought they should have liberty to plunder the city, and torment the high priest to death, which the king’s displeasure fairly promised them, the very reverse of it happened; for Alexander, when he saw the multitude at a distance, in white garments, while the priests stood clothed in fine linen, and the high priest in purple and scarlet clothing, with his mitre on his head, having the golden plate whereon the name of God was engraved, he approached by himself, and adored that name, and first saluted the high priest. The Jews also did altogether, with one voice, salute Alexander, and encompass him about; whereupon the kings of Syria and the rest were surprised at what Alexander had done, and supposed him disordered in his mind. However, Parmenio alone went up to him, and asked him how it came to pass that, when all others adored him, he should adore the high priest of the Jews? To whom he replied, “I did not adore him, but that God who hath honoured him with his high-priesthood; for I saw this very person in a dream, in this very habit, when I was at Dios in Macedonia, who, when I was considering with myself, how I might obtain the dominion of Asia, exhorted me to make no delay, but boldly to pass over the sea thither, for that he would conduct my army, and would give me the dominion over the Persians; whence it is, that having seen no other in that habit, and now seeing this person in it, and remembering that vision, and the exhortation which I had in my dream, I believe that I bring this army under the divine conduct, and shall therewith conquer Darius, and destroy the power of the Persians, and that all things will succeed according to what is in my own mind. (Flavius Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews Book XI, chap. VIII, p. 350).
Then he entered into the city of Jerusalem and worshiped God in the temple. Another tradition says that not only did the high priest approach him arrayed in his priestly garments, but that he also brought along the Book of Daniel and showed Alexander the prophecy concerning him. This so moved him that he went into the city and offered sacrifices and worshiped in the temple. The fact that he did not destroy Jerusalem makes Zechariah’s prophecy very remarkable, and it doesn’t contradict the fact that Alexander, though the most brilliant general of the day, was still highly cruel, brutal, and arrogant.
THE COMING KING
The next verse is one of the most remarkable in the Scriptures. Generally we hear a message from it on Palm Sunday because it has to do with the so-called triumphal entry of Christ into Jerusalem.
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem: behold, thy King cometh unto thee: he is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass [Zech. 9:9].
I am going to spend quite a bit of time on this verse because it is a key verse. It is the hinge on which the prophecy turns. I hope you will carefully follow this through with me. May I point out first that salvation would be better translated as “victory” or “deliverance.” He is the King who is bringing victory or who is coming to deliver.
Although all the Gospel writers record the so-called triumphal entry of the Lord Jesus, only Matthew quotes from Zechariah. The Gospel of John gives almost a running commentary on the prophecy of Zechariah. For example, instead of saying “Rejoice,” he says, “Fear,” which is actually a good, sound interpretation. Now notice Matthew’s record: “And when they drew nigh unto Jerusalem, and were come to Bethphage, unto the mount of Olives, then sent Jesus two disciples, Saying unto them, Go into the village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied, and a colt with her: loose them, and bring them unto me. And if any man say aught unto you, ye shall say, The Lord hath need of them, and straightway he will send them. All this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, Tell ye the daughter of Sion, Behold, thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass” (Matt. 21:1–5).
Notice that Matthew says, “Tell ye the daughter of Sion” instead of “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion” as Zechariah has it. Also note that Matthew leaves out “he is just, and having salvation” (a better translation would be “he is just and having deliverance or victory”). Matthew quoted only a definite portion of verse 9. Why did he leave out certain things and include others? Well, that which Matthew quoted—and also which John interpreted—has to do with the first coming of Christ. The remainder of the verse has to do with the second coming of Christ.
The Lord Jesus came riding on the little animal of peace and came bringing peace at His first coming. He will come riding upon the white horse, the animal of warfare, at His second coming. But He is going to bring peace. How? By putting down all unrighteousness. You see, the world has had over nineteen hundred years to decide what it is going to do with Jesus Christ, and He is pretty much rejected in our day. So God is going to make it very clear that the Son is coming back to reign. He came the first time to die for our redemption, but the next time He will come to reign.
This was something that I’m sure puzzled Zechariah (it is still puzzling some folk today), but Simon Peter made it clear that not only Zechariah but the other prophets were puzzled. Peter wrote, “Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow” (1 Pet. 1:10–11). When the first and second comings of Christ were tied together in one passage, the prophets “inquired and searched diligently,” but they were unable to make the distinction. They just had to write it down as the Spirit gave it to them although they themselves didn’t understand it. Simon Peter by the Spirit of God makes the distinction. Christ came one time to suffer, to bring redemption; He will come the next time in glory to reign upon this earth. And Matthew by the Spirit was able to make that separation so that in his quotation of verse 9 he used only that portion of the verse which speaks of the first coming of Christ.
Frankly, I think that the church has misnamed it the triumphal entry. I was in San Francisco the night Gen. Douglas MacArthur arrived from Japan a great while after World War II had ended. He was whisked from the airport to the hotel in what they thought would be a private or at least semi-private procession. Well, instead there was a public demonstration that snarled traffic. I was leaving on the train that night to return to Los Angeles. A friend had warned me, “You’d better get down to the train if you intend to catch it, and you ought to leave now.” So I took my suitcase down to the train station and checked it. Then I went back into San Francisco to eat dinner. When I came out of the restaurant, I had never seen such a crowd in all my life! No traffic could move. I tried to get back to the railroad station by taxi, but the taxi couldn’t move. I finally got out and walked from the civic center to the railroad station. It was the only way I could have gotten there on time. The next day the same thing was repeated when MacArthur arrived in New York. That was a triumphal entry.
By comparison, the so-called triumphal entry of Christ into Jerusalem would seem very poor indeed. It was actually a parade of poverty. It was no ticker tape parade but was the coming in of a very poor man with a few very poor followers. If there had been a Roman in Jerusalem that day who had stepped out of a building at that moment, he would have asked someone what was going on. If they had said, “This is the triumphal entry of Jesus,” he would have laughed. He would have said, “You think this is a triumphal entry? You should have been in Rome when Caesar came back from Gaul. There was a parade that lasted over three days as he brought back the booty and the captives.” To a Roman, this entry of Jesus would have looked mighty poor and beggarly.
Well, Christ did not intend that it be triumphal. When He rode into Jerusalem, it actually marked a crisis in His life, a life that was filled with crises. It marked a change of tactics. Heretofore He had slipped into the city silently. He had entered unobtrusively. He had sought the shadows. There was no publicity. He was always withdrawing from the crowd, not courting attention. It was foretold that He would not cry or strive or cause His voice to be heard in the street (see Isa. 42:2). He entered by the Sheep Gate and would attempt to come in eluding the mob, evading the crowd. Even after He had performed a miracle, He put a hush-hush on it. Now there is an about-face in His approach. It would seem to us that there is an inconsistency here if we did not recognize this as a crisis point. Now He comes out into the open. He enters publicly. He demands attention. He requires a decision. He forces the issue. For one brief moment the nation must consider Him as their King and their Messiah. The Pharisees were accurate when they said, “… the world is gone after him” (John 12:19). Jerusalem was stirred when He came in. In spite of His pushing Himself to the front, He was meek. Matthew lifts that out of Zechariah’s text which says that He was just and lowly. I disagree with several good Bible commentators who assume that His riding on the little animal, the donkey, denotes His meekness. Far from it. That little donkey was an animal that kings rode upon. You see, the horse was the animal of warfare and is so used in Scripture. The little donkey was the animal that kings rode upon when they were at peace. It was a royal animal. In Judges 10:3–4 we see a judge who had thirty sons, and he got all of them donkeys to ride upon. In this day it would be like buying them each a Jaguar sports car. Riding a donkey did not denote meekness. The thought in Zechariah’s prophecy was that in spite of the fact that the coming Messiah would be riding in as the King, He would still be meek and lowly.
In this incident there is another false impression that needs to be corrected. There is the assumption that there was one so-called triumphal entry. Bible teachers in Great Britain and Europe have largely recognized that Christ entered Jerusalem on three consecutive days. He came the first time on the Sabbath day, which was Saturday. Also He came in on Sunday and again on Monday. He came in the first time on the Sabbath day as the King. Notice Mark’s record: “And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and into the temple: and when he had looked round about upon all things, and now the eventide was come, he went out unto Bethany with the twelve” (Mark 11:11). He just looked around. The money changers were not there—it was the Sabbath; He just looked around and left. His very action was one of rejection. He came in as King on Palm Saturday, if you please. Then, when He came in on Sunday, the first day of the week, the money changers were in the temple, and He cleansed the temple at that time. “And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves” (Matt. 21:12). This is quite remarkable. It is the only action that He ever performed as Priest when He was here upon this earth. The writer to the Hebrews makes it clear that He was not a priest here on earth: “For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law” (Heb. 8:4). No priest dared to cleanse the temple, but He did when He came back to the temple on Palm Sunday.
Then He came back in on Monday, and on the way He cursed the fig tree, then—“… when he was come into the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came unto him as he was teaching, and said, By what authority doest thou these things? and who gave thee this authority?” (Matt. 21:23). Notice that on this day He was teaching; He was speaking for God. He was God’s Prophet. At that time He met every objection; He silenced the enemy. His was the voice of God. He said, “… he that hath seen me hath seen the Father …” (John 14:9), and certainly it was equally as true that he that heard Him had heard the Father.
So you see that Christ’s entry into Jerusalem was not one but three times. His final appearance before the nation was in His threefold office of Prophet, Priest, and King.
We have seen that His entry was not meant to be a triumphal entry, but was it an entry at all? No, actually He was making an exit not an entrance. He was not arranging to take up residence in Jerusalem and reign as King. He sent His disciples ahead to arrange for a room to eat the Passover, but He didn’t send them in to rent an apartment. He was not preparing for His reign; He was preparing for His passion, His suffering, His death, and His passing through the portals of death.
His entrance into Jerusalem was not a one-way ticket but a round-trip ticket, and it was part of the program which led to His death, His resurrection, His ascension, His intercession, His coming at the Rapture, and finally His coming as King. The fact of the matter is that the trail of triumph cannot be confined to a ride on a little donkey from Bethany to Jerusalem. That is only a minor segment of a trip which began in eternity past—when He was the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world—and extends into eternity future. My friend, when you see it in those terms, it becomes meaningful. Without that perspective it is meaningless. The One who came out of eternity is the One who came into Jerusalem—“ … the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy …” (Isa. 57:15). As Moses wrote, “… even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God” (Ps. 90:2). That is, from the vanishing point to the vanishing point, He is God.
The church calls it a triumphal entry, but I think it is a triumphal exit. That crowd who followed Him crying “Hosanna” did not think of Him as the Son of God, the Savior of the world. That same crowd that said “Hosanna” on one day said “Crucify Him” on the next day. One of the most expressive pictures I have ever seen, painted by an artist whose name I do not know, depicts a little donkey in the foreground chewing on a palm frond while in the background there stand three crosses. That tells the story. It wasn’t a triumphal entry; it was a triumphal exit. Six months earlier He had steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem to die. He moved by a prearranged program, an avowed arrangement, a definite decision. Nothing was accidental. When He rode into Jerusalem, He had come out of eternity, and He was going into eternity. It was an exit rather than an entry. The cross and the empty tomb were not His final destination. Neither was the ascension the end of His story. He could say to the dying thief, “… To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43).
When He returns He will come as King. As we look into the future, we can sing,
Crown Him with many crowns,
The Lamb upon His throne;
Hark! how the heavenly anthem drowns
All music but its own!
Awake, my soul, and sing
Of Him who died for thee;
And hail Him as thy matchless King
Through all eternity.
—Matthew Bridges
As we leave verse 9, I hope you see the importance of it. It is the hinge of the door on which the interpretation of this section of the book swings.
Now we have seen something of the march of Alexander the Great as he crossed what is now modern Turkey and destroyed those great Greek cities. (It was almost a shame to destroy some of those lovely things, but he did it, of course, because he was moving swiftly to world rulership.) Then he made the turn to go down across the land bridge which is the land of Israel. He destroyed the great cities which were in Assyria in the north, then we saw him as he entered into the Promised Land, first the land of the Philistines, then he came to Jerusalem. Everyone expected him to destroy Jerusalem because the high priest there had refused to pay the tribute money to Alexander which he had been paying to Media-Persia. The high priest felt obligated to keep the treaty with Media-Persia. Naturally this infuriated Alexander, and he was intending to destroy Jerusalem. But he did not destroy it because of the vision he had had of the high priest.
Zechariah presents a contrast here. The triumphal entry of Alexander into Jerusalem was something to behold. Then here comes Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a little donkey. And Jesus is not coming to destroy the world; He is coming to save the world. He is not coming to form a great kingdom and attract a great following that would minister to Him. “For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).
As we have said, when Jesus came into Jerusalem as Israel’s King, it was not a triumphal entry; it was an exit. He was getting ready to leave. But He will be coming back. The world will have had a long time to decide what they are going to do with Jesus. They have to make a decision concerning Him.
He is coming someday to bring peace to the world. So He says—
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 unto the heathen: and his dominion shall be from sea even to sea, and from the river even to the ends of the earth [Zech. 9:10].
“Ephraim” represents the northern kingdom, “Jerusalem” the southern kingdom—one went into Assyrian captivity, the other into Babylonian captivity. However, they are one people and will be reunited under Christ’s rule.
“I will cut off the chariot … the horse … the battle bow.” These stand for the whole class of offensive weapons. The Jews won’t need their armaments anymore.
“He shall speak peace unto the heathen [nations].” This earth, my friend, will never have peace until Jesus Christ comes and establishes peace. I always shiver when I hear each succeeding president of my nation talk about bringing peace to the world. None of them has been willing to recognize that he is not able to bring peace to the world. Only Jesus Christ can bring world peace—it is just as simple as that. For this reason we have armed soldiers throughout the world today, and we have fought two terrible wars since World War II—in Korea and Vietnam. I agree that we should stay prepared, but we are not going to bring peace to the earth by war. Only Jesus Christ can bring peace by putting down unrighteousness, and that will not take place until He comes again to this earth. Instead of trying to make peace throughout the world, we just need to keep prepared to protect ourselves because this is a big, bad world that we live in today. We talk “brotherhood” among nations, which is not scriptural at all. The only brotherhood that can be formed today is in the body of Christ among those who have been redeemed by the blood of Christ.
I know it is not popular to talk like this, but I have discovered that the doctor gives me medication and puts me on the operating table and keeps cutting and cutting on me to get rid of the cancer. It is not fun, but the only way in the world that I can have health is by that route. And the only way the world is going to have peace is through Jesus Christ, whether the world likes it or not. There is no alternative.
As for thee also, by the blood of thy covenant I have sent forth thy prisoners out of the pit wherein is not water [Zech. 9:11].
“As for thee” refers to the godly remnant in Israel which was suffering. The best I can do is to make a spiritual interpretation of this verse. The only deliverance for mankind is through the blood of the covenant, and that blood of the covenant is the blood of the New Testament, the blood of Christ. Man talks about his freedom and his liberty. Man in this world today does not recognize that he is actually a prisoner. He is “sold under sin” (Rom. 7:14) He is a slave to sin. In a day in which we hear so much about liberty, I receive hundreds of letters from former drug addicts who have been delivered. How? Only by the blood of Christ, my friend, only by turning to Him for deliverance. He alone can deliver prisoners from “the pit wherein is no water.”
Turn you to the strong hold, ye prisoners of hope: even to day do I declare that I will render double unto thee;
When I have bent Judah for me, filled the bow with Ephraim, and raised up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece, and made thee as the sword of a mighty man [Zech. 9:12–13].
“When I have bent Judah for me.” We are looking now toward the Millennium, to the time when Christ will reign. All the nations of the world are going to bow to Him. My friend, when Christ comes again, that is going to be a triumphal entry.
And the Lord shall be seen over them, and his arrow shall go forth as the lightning: and the Lord God shall blow the trumpet, and shall go with whirlwinds of the south.
The Lord of hosts shall defend them; and they shall devour, and subdue with sling stones; and they shall drink, and make a noise as through wine; and they shall be filled like bowls, and as the corners of the altar [Zech. 9:14–15].
I would say that this is a picture of how it is going to be until Christ comes. Man is not going to bring the Millennium to this earth!
And the Lord their God shall save them in that day as the flock of his people: for they shall be as the stones of a crown, lifted up as an ensign upon his land [Zech. 9:16].
“In that day” is an expression which Zechariah will use a great deal in chapter 12. “That day” is the Day of the Lord, which will begin after the church makes its exit from the earth by way of the Rapture. It ushers in the Great Tribulation Period, and it ends, we believe, after the seven years of tribulation when the Lord Jesus Christ will return to establish His kingdom here upon this earth. Then upon this earth will be the thousand-year reign of Christ.
“They shall be as the stones of a crown” or like the glittering jewels of a crown. The prophet Malachi tells us that the Lord is going to make up His jewels in that day: “Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another: and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name” (Mal. 3:16). This refers to the godly of Israel and of the gentile nations. The church, the “… pearl of great price …” (Matt. 13:46), is not included, by the way. Christ paid a tremendous price for that pearl.
For how great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty! corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids [Zech. 9:17].
“How great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty!” This is the goodness of the One who is coming in contrast to Alexander who was not known for his goodness—he was cruel, brutal, and filled with pride. The Lord Jesus was meek and lowly, and He is great in His goodness and in His beauty. There was “… no beauty that we should desire Him” (Isa. 53:2) when He came the first time. The cross was a horrible thing. But when He comes again—oh, how beautiful He will be! We speak of beautiful people in our day, but He is the beautiful one, and He puts His beauty on those who are His own.
“Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids.” New wine is not intoxicating—it hasn’t had a chance to ferment. So what we have here is a reference to abundance of food. There will be no famine or energy shortage during Jesus’ reign upon this earth. It will be a joyous time of plenty; that will be one of the characteristics of His kingdom.
CHAPTER 10
Theme: Judah and Israel to be scattered and regathered
We have seen in chapter 9 the future deliverance of both the northern and southern kingdoms of Israel and how God is going to use them in the future when they will serve, actually, as priests to the gentile nations of the world. There are those who interpret chapter 10 as a continuation of chapter 9. Some very fine Bible expositors feel, however, that only the first verse belongs to chapter 9, and I accept that view.
The remainder of the chapter is separate, which we will see as we go along.
Ask ye of the Lord rain in the time of the latter rain; so the Lord shall make bright clouds, and give them showers of rain, to every one grass in the field [Zech. 10:1].
This first verse, as we have seen, belongs to chapter 9. It continues the description of the prosperous conditions which will prevail during the millennial reign of Christ on the earth.
The rain mentioned in this verse means exactly what it says—literal rain. You see, God has promised Israel, who are an earthly people, earthly blessings. (To the church He has not promised earthly blessings but spiritual blessings.) The fall and spring rainfall is a very important part of Israel’s temporal blessings and would make that land like the Garden of Eden. In our day it looks almost the opposite because judgment has come upon the land as well as upon the people of Israel. The thing that denotes God’s judgment is the withholding of rain. I would say that Israel’s greatest problem next to the Arab problem is the water problem—how to get more water. Well, the best and the easiest thing for them would be to turn to God and experience the physical blessings which would come through rain. But they have not returned to God, and the rain has not returned.
I have been told that the latter rains have returned to the land. They are getting more rainfall, that is true; but if you are there in late summer, you will see that the groves they have set out need rain and need it badly. There is not nearly enough water to irrigate the amount of land that needs to be irrigated. The latter rains, the spring rains, come during March and April. Although they do get some rain at that time, it is not nearly the amount of rain indicated in the verse before us. During the Millennium God will send them rain so that there will be plenty of grass for the stock and other animals. There will be plenty of rain for the crops and the trees which they would like to set out. The interpretation of this verse pertains to physical rainfall.
However, rain is also a symbol of spiritual refreshment, and it is used that way in other passages of Scripture. For instance, Joel 2:28 has that connotation. That which physical rain does for the land, the spiritual rain, or the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, does for the spiritual lives of these people. Both the prophecy in Joel and the prophecy here in Zechariah have definite reference to the Millennium of the future. There will be a pouring out of the Spirit of God in that day. Therefore, the rain has a twofold meaning.
JUDGMENT FOR ISRAEL’S DECEPTION
Now beginning with verse 2 we have a turning back again to the subject of judgment. Although God intends to strengthen them for the last days and intends to bring them into the Millennium, there are certain things which are radically wrong in their midst. He immediately puts his finger down on what was wrong in Israel. The thing which was really causing the trouble in the nation was idolatry.
For the idols have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie, and have told false dreams; they comfort in vain: therefore they went their way as a flock, they were troubled, because there was no shepherd [Zech. 10:2].
“The idols have spoken vanity.” The word for “idols” is actually teraphim. They were small household oracular divinities, which are spoken of elsewhere in Scripture. Merrill F. Unger, who is quite a Hebrew scholar, has written several books in the area of demonism in our day and also in the past. I am indebted to him for this bit of information which modern archaeology has uncovered regarding the nature of the teraphim. At an ancient site which is right near Nineveh, called Nuzu, excavations were made between 1925 and 1941. They found tablets which illustrate customs which went as far back as the patriarchs. You will recall that Jacob had trouble with his uncle Laban, and he left with his two wives, Leah and Rachel. He was glad to leave, and Rachel actually took the teraphim from the home of Laban and concealed them. Now, with the Nuzu evidence, we know that the possession of those household gods implied leadership of the family. When she stole those gods, she was getting for her husband the right to her father’s property, and the theft was a very serious matter. This explains why Laban was so wrought up over it. He certainly didn’t want Jacob to get his estate. He felt that Jacob had gotten more than he should have already.
The second medium of deception was used by the diviners, and the verse before us says that “the diviners have seen a lie” or envisioned a falsehood. Divination is an occult, heathen imitation of biblical prophecy. The Devil has always imitated that which was biblical; he never gets far from the Bible. And every one of the cults and “isms” here in Southern California, including Satan worship, uses the Bible. That is the Devil’s method of deception.
It is quite interesting that just this morning there have come in the mail box six different communications from cults and “isms”, and each of them has some weird interpretation of the Word of God. You see, every one of them uses the Bible.
The Hebrew word for divination means “to cut or divide.” It had to do with the taking of a sacrificial animal, cutting it open, and looking at its liver—the form of the liver and the way that it was shaped. This ancient form of divination was called hepatoscopy. (It sounds like a medical term, and it seems to me that the doctors used a word like that in reference to my gall bladder surgery, but I don’t think they were looking at my liver for purposes of divination!) The liver was considered to be the seat of the victim’s life, and the shape of the liver supposedly told them the shape of things to come. We have reference to this procedure in Ezekiel 21:21: “For the king of Babylon stood at the parting of the way, at the head of the two ways, to use divination: he made his arrows bright, he consulted with images, he looked in the liver.” The Babylonians had diviners (Balaam was a diviner), the Philistines had them, and the false prophets of Israel used their methods. Now God, through Zechariah, is saying that “the diviners have seen a lie.” It was demonic inspiration; they were not getting their information from God. God had put down a law forbidding His people to use divination; it was entirely satanic. All the prophets warned against this sort of thing.
Many years ago in downtown Los Angeles, I spoke on the subject of demonology in a Sunday evening series, and we averaged about three thousand people in attendance at each service. Some of my preacher friends kidded me about it. One friend with whom I played golf said, “McGee, you will do anything to get a crowd! Now you are speaking on demonology.” Well, I spoke on that subject because I felt it was needed in that day. However, the pendulum of the clock has swung over to the other side, and now there is too much discussion in the church regarding demons and Satan. It is true that there is a manifestation of demonism in our contemporary society, but we need to keep our attention centered upon the Lord Jesus Christ rather than upon Satan.
I am convinced that Satan is out working on the front where the Word of God goes out. And I suspect that the many physical problems that I have had in recent years may be because God has let Satan get through to me. I am sure that Satan would like to stop the teaching of the Word of God today—that would naturally be his priority. No wonder so many of our so-called Bible churches have gone off on an ego trip, playing up some novel program that brings the crowds. My friend, the only thing that God is going to honor permanently is His Word. And during these days I have attempted to keep my eyes centered on the person of Christ. What is the reason for all the froth and even false teaching which is invading our conservative churches today? I think the explanation is that the Devil is out to deceive Christians. And he can destroy the reputation of almost anyone. That is the reason we need the protection of God in this hour as we have never needed His protection before. And we need to keep our eyes upon Jesus Christ. If we stay very close to Him, we will be very far away from the Devil and demons.
Instead of centering our attention on the casting out of demons, we need to think instead of casting in Christ. That’s the important thing. You will remember that the Lord told a parable about a man who had a demon. The demon went out of the man, and the man got all swept and garnished. Although he was rid of the demon, he had nothing to fill up the empty apartment. Well, when this demon got tired of walking around, he remembered this fellow, and he went back into him because he was an easy mark. Also, he brought some of his demon friends with him so that the last state of the man was worse than the first. So, you see, it is not enough to cast out a demon, the life must then be filled with Christ.
You see, when Israel rejected God’s messengers and God’s message, they failed in their obedience to God. As a result, they turned to all sorts of satanic deception. God says to them through Zechariah, “The idols have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie, and have told false dreams; they comfort in vain: therefore they went their way as a flock, they were troubled, because there was no shepherd.” Israel no longer had a true shepherd to lead them.
My friend, you and I are living in a day when there is a manifestation again of demonic power. A great many folk are judging individuals and judging organizations by the apparent success they are having. It never occurs to them that we are to test the spirits. The apostle John warned: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). The need of the hour is not for more youth programs or more new methods in our churches. What we need today are true shepherds who will feed the sheep the Word of God.
Mine anger was kindled against the shepherds, and I punished the goats: for the Lord of hosts hath visited his flock the house of Judah, and hath made them as his goodly horse in the battle [Zech. 10:3].
“Mine anger was kindled against the shepherds.” These shepherds were false prophets in Israel who had turned to the occult, had turned to the supernatural which was satanic.
“And I punished the goats.” God is calling the leaders of Israel “the goats.” When I was a young fellow I worked in an abattoir, a place where they killed cattle, sheep, and pigs for the butcher shop. It was a very bloody business, and during the first two days I worked there, I had to go outside occasionally to recover from it. But the thing that seemed to me more cruel than anything was the use of an old goat with a bell around his neck. He was called a Judas goat because he would lead sheep to the slaughter. Instead of the workmen driving the sheep, they would start this old goat up the ramp, and all the sheep would follow him. Then the goat would step aside while the sheep went to the slaughter. Now when the Lord said, “I punish the goats,” He is talking about the leaders in Israel. They should have been leading their people into the Word of God, to the place where they could have peace with God, peace in their own hearts. Instead, they were false prophets, giving them false comfort, and actually leading them away from God. God said that He was angry with them.
“For the Lord of hosts hath visited his flock the house of Judah, and hath made them as his goodly horse in the battle.” God, you see, intends to strengthen them against their enemies.
PROPHECY OF THE MESSIAH
Then He looks on to the future when there will come the Messiah, and I believe He is clearly identified in this next verse.
Out of him came forth the corner, out of him the nail, out of him the battle bow, out of him every oppressor together [Zech. 10:4].
“Out of him”—out of whom? Out of the One who is coming—the tense is future. It means that from Him shall come forth the corner, the cornerstone. As you know, a cornerstone is placed in a building structure where two walls meet at a ninety-degree angle. The square cornerstone is fitted in there. This is marvelous picture of Christ as the cornerstone because, you see, there was the wall of Judah and the wall of the ten tribes. The message is that Christ will be the cornerstone to unite them and permanently bring them back together.
However, the cornerstone has a wider meaning than this. It gives us another very wonderful picture. Notice what the prophet Isaiah has written about it: “Therefore thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste” (Isa. 28:16). Peter quotes this in his epistle and makes it clear that the cornerstone is Christ. “Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded” (1 Pet. 2:6). Notice that Peter used the word confounded, while Isaiah had used the expression “not make haste,” meaning “did not get in a hurry, did not get confused.” They both are expressing the same thought. My friend, in these days in which we live, what is the answer to the occult, to the satanic? Well, in the first place, we should have nothing to do with it. We are not to meddle with it. Secondly, we should stay close to the Word of God and close to the person of Christ. Here in Zechariah note that immediately after He has warned against the occult, He introduces the cornerstone.
We need not imagine that we are too intelligent to be deceived by the occult. The Greeks in their day were a very intelligent people; yet they made constant trips to Delphi. The way that the priests interpreted the blowing of the leaves in that cave at Delphi would put the Greek army out to sea or would take a man off his throne. It would change the course of history. If you think they were just following a superstition, I think you are wrong. It is my conviction that the Devil was using it to direct the Greek Empire. He was having a heyday. Frankly, it concerns me to hear of our leaders in Washington consulting fortune-tellers and others who deal in the occult. I am afraid that we are getting our guidance from the wrong source.
What should we do? Turn to the person of Christ. He is the cornerstone. He is the foundation on which we can rest. “Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed” (1 Pet. 2:7–8). It is my observation that the people who go into the cults have heard the Word of God and have heard the gospel, but they have turned their backs on it. When an individual rejects the truth, God sends them “… strong delusion, that they should believe a lie” (2 Thess. 2:11). That principle is still in operation today.
The Lord Jesus made a very startling statement when He called Himself a stone: “… whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder” (Matt. 21:44). What happens to you is determined by your relationship to the stone. You can fall on it, or it will fall on you. You can accept and receive Jesus Christ. You can come to Him as a sinner and fall upon Him. You can trust Him, rest upon Him. This means that you are broken in that you no longer trust yourself; you trust Him. But if you reject Him, He will become the stone that will fall on you and grind you to powder. In other words, He is going to be your judge.
Daniel mentioned this in chapter 2 of his prophecy. He was given a vision of the times at the end of the gentile world rule when a stone cut out without hands (representing the Lord Jesus Christ) will smite the earth—every government and everyone in rebellion against God. He is that kind of a stone.
Now not only does Zechariah call Him the cornerstone, but also “out of him the nail.” This is an interesting word. A nail is, of course, a stake or a tent peg used to fasten a tent securely to the ground. In the case of the wilderness tabernacle, the Israelites had tent pins which they used to keep the tabernacle from taking off with the wind. They had to nail it down with pins driven deeply into the desert sand. And here Christ is pictured as the nail or the tent pin. He is the one who holds things down, and we need to allow Him to hold us to the faith. What a picture this is of Him!
Also, that nail or peg was used in another way. A tent pin was used inside a tent to hang things on. Women could hang their jewelry on it and men could hang their valuables on it. This also pictures Christ as the one on whom the Father will hang all His glory—“And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open. And I will fasten him as a nail in a sure place; and he shall be for a glorious throne to his father’s house” (Isa. 22:22–23). Although this prophecy was directed to Eliakim, Revelation 3:7 makes it clear that the final fulfillment will be in Christ Himself. He is the one who will become a throne of honor to His Father’s house, and only on Him will rest all the glory of His Father’s house. To gain Him is to gain that which is more precious than anything in the world.
Notice that Zechariah presents Him not only as the cornerstone and the nail, but he also presents Him as the “battle bow,” meaning the warrior and conqueror. He is the one who is going to come to this earth to put down all unrighteousness, and the armies of heaven are going to follow Him. He is going to put down “every oppressor”—the false leaders, both religious and political, whom He has called “goats.”
And they shall be as mighty men, which tread down their enemies in the mire of the streets in the battle: and they shall fight, because the Lord is with them, and the riders on horses shall be confounded [Zech. 10:5].
This refers to the very dark period of the Great Tribulation. God is going to undertake for His people and enable them to go through it, because at the close of that period Christ will come.
Down through the years when they have rejected Christ, of course there has been no hope for them. When Titus the Roman was outside the gates of Jerusalem in a.d. 70, the walls came down, the city was destroyed, and the people of Israel were scattered throughout the world. It is the current belief of several outstanding expositors that the nation Israel is not now in that land permanently. I’m not sure but what the accurate interpretation of the Word of God is that they will again be put out of the land of Israel and that subsequently God Himself will return them to the land. When God brings them back to the land, they won’t have any trouble with the Arabs. Their neighbors will not try to exterminate them. Rather, when the Lord regathers them, they will be there permanently and will be a blessing to the world.
And I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph, and I will bring them again to place them; for I have mercy upon them: and they shall be as though I had not cast them off: for I am the Lord their God, and will hear them [Zech. 10:6].
“I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph.” The “house of Judah” is, of course, the southern kingdom and “the house of Joseph”, the northern kingdom. That is, the whole nation will share in the joyful victory and blessing of the coming kingdom.
Even in the time of Zechariah, the small remnant that had returned was made up of all the tribes. We know this because a delegation had come down from Beth-el, and that was one of the capitals of the northern kingdom.
Now why does God protect them during this interval which we call the intertestamental period? Well, His answer is, “For I have mercy upon them.” We can ask ourselves the same question: How did you and I get saved? It was “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy …” (Titus 3:5). God is rich in mercy. He had to have a lot of it to save—maybe He didn’t need that much to save you. But He is rich in mercy; He has an abundance of it. And it is on the basis of His mercy that He preserved them during that period. After the last book of the Old Testament, Malachi, had been written, God went off the air, and He did not broadcast for about four hundred years. During that silent interval the people of Israel probably suffered more than at any other time (except perhaps during the time of Hitler and the Nazi regime in Germany). Although God was silent during that four-hundred-year period between Malachi in the Old Testament and Matthew in the New Testament, we have a very good record of what transpired because of the prophecies given to Daniel and Zechariah, as we are seeing here.
And they of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man, and their heart shall rejoice as through wine: yea, their children shall see it, and be glad; their heart shall rejoice in the Lord [Zech. 10:7].
Now just in case you think that the ten tribes got lost, “Ephraim” is one of the names which God gave to the ten northern tribes of Israel. If you want to cheek on that, turn to Hosea. Notice how tenderly God said, “How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? …” (Hos. 11:8). Well God didn’t give them up. They are not lost. It is by His grace that they have been preserved as a nation.
“They of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man.” The records we have of the intertestamental period give the most thrilling accounts of how the Israelites stood against the Syrian conqueror, Antiochus Epiphanes. His persecution of these people was frightful; yet they were enabled to stand. “They of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man.”
“And their heart shall rejoice as through wine.” It was a very difficult period, and they were far from God many times, but also there were periods when they rejoiced in the Lord.
I will hiss for them, and gather them; for I have redeemed them: and they shall increase as they have increased [Zech. 10:8].
It is estimated that there must have been around twelve million people in the land of Israel by the time Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans under Titus in a.d. 70, which is a far greater Jewish population than is there in our day.
God says, “I will hiss for them.” The word hiss doesn’t quite express what He is saying. Have you ever been sitting in an auditorium when you hear somewhere behind you a “Pssst!”? You turn around to see who is trying to get your attention. That is what “hiss” means. Merrill Unger gives a translation with a new twist, and it is a good one. He says that it means, “I will whistle for them.” I like that. God says, “I’ll whistle for them and gather them.”
We know that this has not yet been fulfilled, because in the very next verse it speaks of their being scattered again among the nations. Although there was a great population in Israel at the time of Christ, the Lord Jesus made it very clear that Jerusalem would be destroyed after He had gone. He was crucified somewhere around a.d. 30, and in a.d. 70 Jerusalem was destroyed, and the Jews were scattered throughout the Roman Empire.
And I will sow them among the people: and they shall remember me in far countries; and they shall live with their children, and turn again [Zech. 10:9].
“And turn again.” Turn to what? To the land? No, to God. The Jews who have returned to the land in our day have not returned to God. I am in agreement with the Bible expositors who believe that the Jews will be put out of the land of Israel again and will be scattered among the nations. We do know that there is some disillusionment in the land and that many of the Jews want to leave and go back to the countries they came from. I believe the day will come when the Jews will again leave Israel.
I will bring them again also out of the land of Egypt, and gather them out of Assyria; and I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon; and place shall not be found for them [Zech. 10:10].
“I will bring them again also out of the land of Egypt.” There are very few Jews in the land of Egypt in our day. I believe this refers to future dispersion.
“I will bring them into the land of Gilead and Lebanon.” If you read the Book of Joshua very carefully and notice where the borders were placed, you will see that Lebanon was part of the Promised Land. Some expositors believe that when the Bible speaks of the land of milk and honey, it has reference to the southern part of the Lebanese coast, which even today is a very rich and fertile area. Well, I don’t agree with that because we know that at the time the spies searched out the land, the rainfall was adequate, the hills were wooded, and there was fruit in abundance. Actually, a few years of withholding rainfall can make a desert. But Lebanon was part of the Promised Land. God certainly has not given Lebanon to the Jews in our day, but someday it will be theirs. If you are Lebanese, you won’t like that, but don’t worry, because it will not happen until the Millennium—and everything will be so wonderful at that time that you won’t mind at all.
And he shall pass through the sea with affliction, and shall smite the waves in the sea, and all the deeps of the river shall dry up: and the pride of Assyria shall be brought down, and the sceptre of Egypt shall depart away.
And I will strengthen them in the Lord; and they shall walk up and down in his name, saith the Lord [Zech. 10:11–12].
Notice that the language reflects God’s miraculous deliverance of Israel from Egypt the first time He returned them to the Promised Land. But when He regathers them in the future, it will be by even greater miracles—so much so that Jeremiah wrote: “Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that they shall no more say, The Lord liveth, which brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt; But, The Lord liveth, which brought up and which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country, and from all countries whither I had driven them; and they shall dwell in their own land” (Jer. 23:7–8). In other words, when God regathers them in the future, it will be by a so much greater miracle that they will forget the miraculous deliverance from Egypt.
My friend, I do not think that the wildest interpretation of prophecy in our day would dare say that the present return of Israel to Palestine is a fulfillment of this Scripture. It could not possibly be. It clearly refers to a future regathering.
CHAPTER 11
Theme: Jesus rejected as King at His first coming; the Good Shepherd—Christ; the foolish shepherd—Antichrist
This chapter concludes the division of “burdens” which hinge on the first coming of Christ. It brings us to the Roman period. This, as the Maccabean period before it, was a very dark period.
We have seen that Zechariah is the prophet of hope—many expositors call attention to this. And his name actually means “the Lord remembers.” It is quite interesting that his is one of the last voices to speak for God in the Old Testament. And then the New Testament opens with an angel appearing to another man by the name of Zechariah, the husband of Elisabeth who gave birth to John the Baptist, the forerunner of Christ. Again, God remembers His people.
Not only is Zechariah the prophet of hope, he is also the prophet of truth. Being a prophet of hope is not enough, because it could be a false hope such as the false prophets were giving the people. Temporarily, there is to be great blessing materially and otherwise, but out of the west are coming other conquerors—first Alexander the Great, then the Roman armies. It will mean great suffering for the people of Israel.
This chapter also presents the Good Shepherd of His people, the Good Shepherd who will give His life for the sheep. Then another shepherd is presented, the foolish shepherd, who will come much later. He pictures the Antichrist, the one who will shear the sheep and kill them for food.
JUDGMENT RESULTING FROM MESSIAH’S REJECTION
Open thy doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars [Zech. 11:1].
This doesn’t sound very promising. This reveals that there is to be a scattering of the people of Israel even after the time of Zechariah. This was, I think, performed by the Romans.
The Romans used the same method that Alexander the Great used—they came down from the north. If you go to Lebanon today, you will see above Beirut a river which is known as the Dog River. There, right at the entrance by the sea, on the face of the mountain are inscriptions which have been labeled “The Calling Cards of the Nations of the World.” Every great general of every great nation who went through there carved his name in the rock. I have looked at it, and the translation was given to me. The only one I could read for myself was the one in Greek—I finally figured out that one. All the great generals came that route because it is the beginning of what is known as the Great Rift, which moves inland and extends into North Africa. The Sea of Galilee, the Jordan River, and the Dead Sea are all part of the Great Rift. So Zechariah is describing here the advance of the conqueror who is coming into Palestine.
“That the fire may devour thy cedars.” The cedars of Lebanon were famous. Much of Solomon’s temple was built of the cedars of Lebanon, as was his own palace. The cedar trees have largely disappeared today. There are very few of them left. The nicest one I saw was actually in a park right outside Jerusalem. It was a beautiful tree, well cared for. The one I saw in Beirut was a scrawny sort of tree, but it had grown up very large. The place where they would grow the best is up in the snow country. In fact, Lebanon means “white or snowy,” taking its name from the snow covered mountains of the area. The Great Rift comes down right beside them. That was a tremendous passageway for the great world conquerors of the past—Egypt, Babylon, Media-Persia, Syria, Greece—and here Zechariah is giving, I think, the description of Rome coming down into Palestine.
Howl, fir tree; for the cedar is fallen; because the mighty are spoiled: howl, O ye oaks of Bashan; for the forest of the vintage is come down [Zech. 11:2].
“Howl, O ye oaks of Bashan.” Bashan was an area in the northern part of Israel. There were a lot of oaks in that country—I think we call them live oaks.
There is a voice of the howling of the shepherds; for their glory is spoiled: a voice of the roaring of young lions; for the pride of Jordan is spoiled [Zech. 11:3].
“There is a voice of the howling of the shepherds.” These are the false shepherds who had been giving the people wrong directions and a false security.
“A voice of the roaring of young lions” probably refers to the young princes.
Thus saith the Lord my God; Feed the flock of the slaughter [Zech. 11:4].
“Feed the flock of the slaughter.” This is almost terrifying! The “flock” refers to those of the remnant who had returned to the land of Israel. But for what had they returned? Although there would be a time of blessing, the conqueror was coming, and untold suffering lay ahead.
Whose possessors slay them, and hold themselves not guilty: and they that sell them say, Blessed be the Lord; for I am rich: and their own shepherds pity them not [Zech. 11:5].
How accurate this prophetic picture is of that which did happen to these people when the Romans came down.
For I will no more pity the inhabitants of the land, saith the Lord: but, lo, I will deliver the men every one into his neighbour’s hand, and into the hand of his king: and they shall smite the land, and out of their hand I will not deliver them [Zech. 11:6].
God says that He will permit this to take place because they had not only turned from Him, but they also rejected the Messiah when He came.
And I will feed the flock of slaughter, even you, O poor of the flock. And I took unto me two staves; the one I called Beauty, and the other I called Bands; and I fed the flock [Zech. 11:7].
“And I will feed the flock of slaughter, even you, O poor of the flock.” Expositors differ in their interpretations of this. Did Zechariah actually become a shepherd during this time? Was this a parable he was giving, or did he act it out? I personally think that this is a parable in action. Several of the prophets used that method—Ezekiel certainly did. You may recall that Ezekiel locked himself in his house, dug himself out, and came up in the street outside. Here in Pasadena where I live, digging up streets is nothing new. I think that every street in this city has been dug up sometime during the past year—they may have missed one or two, but I doubt it. But in Ezekiel’s day it was unusual. In fact, it would be unusual today if someone locked himself in his house and dug himself out! Well, Ezekiel did that, and he had a message when he came up out there in the street. Also he had a crowd. It was a good crowd-getter, and I am of the opinion that Zechariah used the same method.
“And I took unto me two staves.” One he called Beauty which means “grace or graciousness” That was the shepherd’s crook, the one that he used to keep the little sheep in line. If one started to wander into a place of danger, he reached out with that crook and pulled him right back in line. The other stave he called Bands. The English word bands is probably a good translation because it has to do with the making of a covenant. That speaks of another staff which the shepherd carried. It was a heavy stick, not like the shepherd’s crook but a heavy club. He used it to fight off wild animals and even human beings who would try to steal the sheep. So Zechariah speaks of taking two staves: Beauty and Bands, or Grace and Covenants.
“And I fed the flock.” I think that Zechariah, did this literally.
Three shepherds also I cut off in one month; and my soul loathed them, and their soul also abhorred me [Zech. 11:8].
“Three shepherds also I cut off in one month” were probably the false prophets.
Then said I, I will not feed you: that that dieth, let it die; and that that is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another [Zech. 11:9].
I believe here he is speaking against the false prophets, and he is speaking against the kinds of sacrifices the people were bringing to the Lord. We learn from Malachi that some of the people in that day were stingy; they were skinflints who didn’t even like to give a tenth. They didn’t like to bring their animals to sacrifice to the Lord. So if a man had an old sick cow, he would tell his boys to rush the animal up to the temple, to the altar, and get the cow killed for a sacrifice before it died a natural death. Then they would pretend they had given the Lord one of their prize cattle. Malachi’s prophecy really zeroes in on the people for doing that which was phony and false. God, of course, would not accept such an offering. “That that dieth, let it die.” That is, don’t slaughter it hurriedly and use it. He is calling them back to honesty and to be clear-cut in their dealings.
And I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it asunder, that I might break my covenant which I had made with all the people [Zech. 11:10].
“I took my staff, even Beauty, and cut it asunder.” Remember that Beauty means “graciousness,” and Zechariah is saying that he is chopping that staff to pieces, signifying that God’s grace would be withdrawn. You see, when God put His people in the Promised Land, He promised to bless them and protect them from their enemies. God was dealing with the returned remnant in grace. Back in 10:6 God had said, “I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph, and I will bring them again to place them; for I have mercy upon them….” God was going to do this for them—not because they were worthy or because they were obedient. They were disobedient, but God was dealing with them in mercy. However, there would come a time when His mercy would be exhausted, and then He would withdraw His covenant. He would no longer deal with them in mercy; He would no longer be gracious to them.
“That I might break my covenant which I had made with all the people.” What does God mean when He says that He will break His covenant? Hasn’t He repeatedly told us that He will never break His covenant? Well, we need to understand the difference between a conditional and an unconditional covenant. God never breaks an unconditional covenant. But a conditional covenant depends upon a response from the human side. The covenant of the verse before us is conditional. God’s promised protection of Israel against their enemies depended upon Israel’s obedience to Him. When they disobeyed Him, He followed through by removing His protection. It is in this sense that He broke His covenant.
We have examples of this in the New Testament. For instance, God’s promise, “If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it” (John 14:14) is a conditional promise. Dr. Harry Ironside was sitting on a platform with a young pastor during a meeting one night. A young lady entered the meeting, and the pastor told him that she formerly had been an active leader among his members, then began to run with the world, and that this was the first time he had seen her in church in months. Dr. Ironside preached on this passage of Scripture that night. She was greatly incensed and came to see him after the meeting. “How dare you tell these people that if you ask anything in the name of Jesus, He will do it?” she asked him. Dr. Ironside answered, “Why don’t you sit down and tell me about it.” She told him that her father had been desperately ill some months before, and while the doctor was up in his room, she had knelt in the living room, claimed that promise, and prayed in Jesus’ name for his recovery. When the doctor came down from the room, he told her that her father was dead. “Now,” she said, “don’t tell me that God keeps His promises!” Dr. Ironside said, “Did you read the next verse, ‘If ye love me, keep my commandments’?” Then Dr. Ironside asked her what would happen if she found a cheek made out to someone else and tried to cash it by signing that name. She said “I would be a forger.” So he referred her to this verse, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.” Then he asked her, “Have you been doing that?” Instead of replying she turned red. Then he explained that what she was trying to do was the same thing as trying to cash a cheek made out to somebody else. We all need to recognize, friend, that obedience to Him is the evidence of our love for Him, and this promise is given to those who love Him.
And it was broken in that day: and so the poor of the flock that waited upon me knew that it was the word of the Lord [Zech. 11:11].
“So the poor of the flock that waited upon me” refers to those of the remnant who actually obeyed God and believed the Word of God.
My friend, the fundamental, primary thing for us as believers is to believe the Word of God. If you don’t believe that the Bible is the Word of God, you are not ready for any growth in the Christian life. Belief in the Word of God has to be settled. And God will establish you in that belief as you study His Word. You may start out a little skeptical and find certain things in the Bible difficult to believe. That is the way I started, but I have now reached the place where I don’t just believe the Bible is the Word of God; I know it is the Word of God. This is the reason I don’t waste my time preaching apologetic sermons. I recognize that most such sermons are needed, and I thank the Lord for young preachers because they generally get into the apologetic field. I spent the first two or three years of my ministry proving that the Bible was true. Now I consider it a waste of time. I like the illustration used by the late Dr. Bob Shuler, who was the great Methodist preacher in downtown Los Angeles years ago. One day he said to me, “If you had a lion in a cage in your backyard, you wouldn’t employ a guard to stay at the door of the cage to protect the lion from pussycats in the neighborhood. All you would need to do would be to open the door of the cage, and the lion would take care of himself.” That is a great illustration, and I have attempted to follow it in my ministry. I just attempt to open the door of the Word of God and let it prove itself. It can take care of itself. I don’t have to try to protect it from the pussycats in the neighborhood. I just give out the Word of God as it is.
Zechariah is saying that “the poor of the flock,” the remnant of the remnant, believed it was the Word of the Lord.
THE GOOD SHEPHERD—CHRIST
There would be coming in their line one who would be their Messiah, and the majority of the nation would reject Him. Only a very small remnant would receive Him at that time. For their rejection, the nation would be judged and scattered throughout the world. Now notice this next verse—
And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver [Zech. 11:12].
This is a very remarkable prophecy that has been literally fulfilled in a most remarkable way. Notice Matthew’s record: “Then one of the twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went unto the chief priests, And said unto them, What will ye give me, and I will deliver him unto you? And they covenanted with him for thirty pieces of silver” (Matt. 26:14–15). This is exactly the price that Zechariah mentions. It is quite interesting that the chief priests didn’t want to pay very much. I wonder if Judas had a little difficulty agreeing on the price—“So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver.”
Over in Matthew 27:9–10, we find something else that is quite interesting: “Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet, saying, And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him that was valued, whom they of the children of Israel did value; And gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord appointed me.” You will find this prophecy alluded to in Jeremiah 18:1–4 and evidently quoted from Zechariah 11:12–13. It is credited to Jeremiah simply because in Jesus’ day Jeremiah was the first of the books of the prophets, and that section was identified by the name of the first book.
And the Lord said unto me, Cast it unto the potter: a goodly price that I was prised at of them. And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the Lord [Zech. 11:13].
“A goodly price” is sometimes translated a “lordly” price. I think an even better word would be a fancy price. You have heard the expression, “Well, that’s a fancy price for such and such an article.”
“That I was prised at of them.” Thirty pieces of silver—imagine that! They paid very little for Jesus. They weren’t willing to pay a high ransom price of several million dollars to have Him delivered to them. No, they would give only thirty pieces of silver. How cheap that was.
What did Judas do with the thirty pieces of silver? “And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the Lord.” There has been some disagreement on what was meant by this. Some expositors even think that “cast … to the potter” should be translated “cast … to the treasury.” Well, Judas came into the temple and threw the money down there, but the record says, “And the chief priests took the silver pieces, and said, It is not lawful for to put them into the treasury, because it is the price of blood. And they took counsel, and bought with them the potter’s field, to bury strangers in” (Matt. 27:6–7). Zechariah had already said, “And I took the thirty pieces of silver, and cast them to the potter in the house of the Lord.” That was no accident. This is one of the most remarkable passages of Scripture that we have.
What is the potter’s field? The potter’s field was property belonging to the potter. When he had clay on his wheel, attempting to make a pot, a vessel, a vase, but it didn’t yield to his fingers or it wouldn’t bend where he wanted or a piece came off, he would take it off the wheel and throw it into the field. The clay wasn’t the right texture to be molded. It was discarded as useless.
In Jeremiah’s prophecy, God likens Himself to the potter. God puts the clay, mankind, on the potter’s wheel and attempts to fashion it into the vessel He has in mind. But the clay has to yield to Him. The clay that won’t yield to Him is thrown out into the potter’s field. He can’t use it.
It is interesting that the price of Christ was thirty pieces of silver, and the priests took the coins—they were very pious about not using the price of blood for religious purposes—and bought the potter’s field as a burial place for the poor.
My friend, the Lord Jesus has been working in the potter’s field for a long, long time. He purchased it. But He didn’t purchase it for thirty pieces of silver. He paid the full price—far more than any amount of silver or gold—His own precious blood. He paid the price so that He might buy this old world in which you and I live, a world filled with the broken lives of mankind—broken physically, broken mentally, broken morally, broken spiritually. The great Potter, the Lord Jesus, takes the clay that was thrown away, puts it on the wheel of circumstance, and shapes it into a vessel of honor. We are the clay. He is the Potter. And even in these days of His rejection, He is working in the potter’s field.
Then I cut asunder mine other staff, even Bands, that I might break the brotherhood between Judah and Israel [Zech. 11:14].
The chopping up of this second staff indicates the complete severance of all relationships between the Shepherd and Israel, His flock. It is as if God is saying, “When you sold Me, when you turned Me over into the hands of the Gentiles to be crucified, I broke my covenant. Titus the Roman will soon be here, and you will be scattered throughout the world.” Their Messiah came, the nation rejected Him, and the Jewish people are still scattered throughout the world.
THE FOOLISH SHEPHERD—ANTICHRIST
And the Lordsaid unto me, Take unto thee yet the instruments of a foolish shepherd [Zech. 11:15].
This, I think, is another parable that Zechariah is to act out. He is to take again the instruments of a shepherd.
For, lo, I will raise up a shepherd in the land, which shall not visit those that be cut off, neither shall seek the young one, nor heal that that is broken, nor feed that that standeth still: but he shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces [Zech. 11:16].
Zechariah has presented the Good Shepherd, sold for thirty pieces of silver, delivered to His enemies, then crucified on a Roman cross. But that cross became a brazen altar where the Lamb of God was offered to take away the sin of the world. He was the Good Shepherd who gave His life for the sheep.
Now Zechariah presents the foolish shepherd, who will appear much later in history. There is an interval of time between the coming of Christ and the coming of Antichrist that does not concern Zechariah at all. He is prophesying to the remnant of Israel who had returned to Palestine after the Babylonian captivity. If you think he has in mind the church age, you are entirely wrong. The “foolish shepherd” will be coming after God completes His purpose with the church and turns again to Israel as a nation.
Notice how Antichrist will deal with the people of Israel: he “shall not visit those that be cut off, neither shall seek the young one, nor heal that that is broken, nor feed that that standeth still: but he shall eat the flesh of the fat, and tear their claws in pieces.” He will shear the sheep and kill them for food. What a contrast to the Good Shepherd who gave His life for the sheep!
The Lord Jesus said, “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive” (John 5:43). Frankly, when I began my ministry, I thought we must be very far away from the appearance of the Antichrist because there was not the world climate nor psychological background for the appearance of a man like he will be. However, we have come a long way since I was a young minister. Today, as I look about me, I think that the world is ripe for Antichrist. I don’t mean that I think he is coming shortly, because I do not know that; only God has that information. But I am confident that if a man appeared on the scene who had the right credentials (and Antichrist will have them), a man who could bring peace in the world and bring order out of the chaos we are in and bring prosperity, the world would receive him with open arms. Do you think that the world would ask if he came from heaven or hell? I don’t think that people would care where he came from. In our day every country seems to be accepting almost any kind of leadership. The world is not blessed with great leaders—certainly our country is not. We are ready for the Antichrist when he comes. His coming may be a long way off, but we have the right climate for it today which we did not have when I first began in the ministry.
Woe to the idol shepherd that leaveth the flock! the sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened [Zech. 11:17].
He is called here “the idol shepherd,” meaning the worthless shepherd. He is no good, he is of no value, he is the great deceiver. Dr. Merrill Unger is quite a Hebrew scholar, and I like his translation of this verse: “Woe! Worthless shepherd, forsaker of the flock! Let the sword be against his arm and against his right eye! His arm shall be completely dried up and his: right eye shall be completely blind.”
This “foolish” shepherd is of no benefit, but the world will go after him. When Israel rejected the Good Shepherd who was promised, they were scattered worldwide. And the gospel, which the Lord Jesus said would begin at Jerusalem and go to the ends of the earth, is being preached today. It is my personal conviction that through the medium of radio we will be enabled to get the gospel to the ends of the earth. The interval in which the gospel has been going out has already been a long one—over nineteen hundred years. Then this false shepherd will appear. He is worthless, but he is going to promise everything. He will be the supreme politician, promising everything in the book and out of the book.
“Woe to the idol [worthless] shepherd that leaveth the flock!” The word woe is the Hebrew hoy, and the very sound of it denotes trouble that is coming—“Hoy, hoy, hoy!”
“The sword shall be upon his arm, and upon his right eye: his arm shall be clean dried up, and his right eye shall be utterly darkened.” What does this mean? Well, he used his eye, not to protect the sheep, but he kept his eye on them to see which was the fattest that he could use. His arm should have been wielding the crook and the club to protect the sheep from harm. But he didn’t do that. He exposed them instead of watching over them. God says that judgment will come upon him. His right eye shall be blinded and his arm shriveled or atrophied. In the Book of Revelation we find that God is going to judge the false shepherd, Antichrist—in fact, he will make it to the lake of fire even before the Devil gets there!
The false shepherd, the Antichrist, will actually be the one who brings in the Great Tribulation in all its fury. In the first part of the Tribulation Israel will be deceived into thinking that Antichrist is their Good Shepherd, but by the time they discover his real character, he will be the world dictator, and the armies of the world will come against Jerusalem.
CHAPTER 12
Theme: Second prophetic burden connected with Christ’s second coming
In chapters 12–14 we come to the prophetic aspects connected with the second coming of Christ. This is the second and final division of this last major section of Zechariah’s prophecy. The primary reason that this is such an important section is that it is quite obvious that Zechariah is presenting God’s program here. In chapter 11, the prophet first showed us that the true Shepherd, the One who gave His life for the sheep, is rejected. In fact, He was sold for thirty pieces of silver—how cheap! Our redemption was not purchased with silver and gold but with the precious blood of Christ, but what a cheap price He was sold for in that day. The Lord Jesus said when He was on earth, “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive” (John 5:43). That one who is coming some day is the one Zechariah calls the idol or worthless shepherd. That shepherd is identified as being the Antichrist. After the church is removed from the earth, after the interval in which the true Shepherd is presented to the world as the One who gave His life for the sheep, we come to the time when the worthless shepherd will present himself. He will be accepted, and he will bring in the Great Tribulation, not the Millennium. As a result, we see here that Jerusalem—which will become the capital of the earth where Jesus will reign some day in the Millennium—is under attack by Antichrist, and we see how it will be delivered.
The second reason that this section of Scripture is so important is that this area of prophecy is rejected today by many Bible expositors, even by so-called conservative expositors. They will not face up to the fact that God presents here a panoramic program of His purposes with this world and with Israel in the future. That is a sad thing to say, but it is true. We also have some men who are called fundamentalists but who border on the sensational and lift out certain statements from this section. I don’t think that it is honest to lift certain things out of a passage and try to fit them into the events of today when they have to do with the future. Any interpretation must fit into the entire program that Zechariah is presenting.
Chapter 12 deals with the final siege of Jerusalem and the lifting of that siege. “Jerusalem” is mentioned ten times in this chapter, and “in that day” is mentioned seven times. These two expressions occur again and again. “In that day” is a reference to the Day of the Lord which begins with the Great Tribulation Period and eventuates and goes into the millennial kingdom which the Lord Jesus will usher in when He comes again. The Antichrist brings in the Great Tribulation; the Lord Jesus brings in the Millennium. I want us to note these expressions—“in that day” and “Jerusalem”—for they are the subject of this chapter.
There is so much confusion today as to the meaning of the Day of the Lord. Even as far back as 1951 when I was participating in several summer conferences, I heard two other Bible teachers present a very hazy, indefinite, and uncertain view of the Day of the Lord. It occurred to me that if the man in the pulpit is so fuzzy and foggy on this subject, what about those in the pew? Is there a clearcut understanding of what the Day of the Lord is? What do you think of when you hear the expression, the Day of the Lord? Do you have a definite conception of what it means? Or is it just a nebulous and incoherent expression that is like some sort of umbrella that you can put down over a great many things and it can mean almost anything to you? We hear people use the word glory. What does it mean? When people say amen to something, what do they mean by that?
I am reminded of the Englishman who went into a restaurant here in the United States after he had been here for just a short time. He asked the waitress, “What kind of soup do you have?” She started out by saying, “Well, we have bean …” He stopped her immediately and said, “I don’t care where you have been. I want to know what kind of soup you have.” Then there was the preacher in the South years ago who said in the church business meeting, “Now we’re going to call on the president to share his report and let us know the status quo of the church.” One of the deacons got up and said. “Mr. Preacher, I think you ought to explain to us what the status quo is.” The preacher replied. “Well, that’s Latin for the mess we’re in.” My friend, these expressions can mean different things to different people.
The Day of the Lord is an important expression. It occurs eighteen times in the Book of Zechariah alone. We find it in both the Major and the Minor Prophets. The Day of the Lord is actually the theme of Joel’s book. Malachi speaks of “… the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord” (Mal. 4:5). In one sense it is a theme of the Old Testament and one of the most important themes. It would be helpful for us to break down this expression and take a closer look at it.
“The day of the Lord.” Let’s understand clearly that this does not refer to the Lord’s Day. The Day of the Lord and the Lord’s Day are two different things. Like a chestnut horse and a horse chestnut or like antifat and fat Auntie—they are simply two different things.
The Day of the Lord is not a twenty-four-hour day. Peter says, “But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Pet. 3:8). The events that the prophets include in the Day of the Lord preclude the possibility of their happening in a 24-hour day. In fact the tremendous things which are going to take place during the Great Tribulation have made some men actually reject it and ridicule that viewpoint. They argue that you just cannot have that many crisis events take place in that brief seven-year period. But things are different since we have gotten into the twentieth century. In one issue of their magazine, U. S. News and World Report took the ten-year period from 1960–70 and listed the many crisis events that took place in that brief period of time. There has been a tremendous speeding up of crises in the world today. I do not think that God will have any trouble fulfulling all the prophecies concerning the Great Tribulation Period. The Day of the Lord, therefore, is a period of time. It includes the Great Tribulation Period and the millennial kingdom, which means that it is over a thousand years in length.
Has the Day of the Lord come? Are we living in it? The Old Testament closes with that day still in the future. The Old Testament pointed ahead to it, and the New Testament still anticipated it. The apostle Paul made it very clear that it was still in the future as far as he was concerned: “For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night” (1 Thess. 5:2). The Day of the Lord had not come up to Paul’s time, and nothing has happened since then that would indicate that it has come.
Concerning the character of the Day of the Lord, it is a good day and it is a bad day. Good news and bad news can come in one message. It is like the pilot on the Italian airplane who came on the air and introduced himself. Then he said, “We welcome you aboard this flight. I have some good news for you, and I have some bad news for you. First of all, I’ll give you the bad news. We’ve lost contact with the ground. Our entire radar system has gone out, and we have no radio contact. In fact, we don’t know where we are. That’s the bad news. Now for the good news: We’re making good time.”
May I say to you, the Day of the Lord is good news and bad news. The bad news first: the Great Tribulation. The good news next: the millennial kingdom. Both features will be emphasized beginning here in chapter 12. Zechariah will give you the bad news in verses 2 and 3: “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem. And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.” That’s the bad news. But there is also some good news coming in chapter 14, beginning at verse 8: “And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem.” There is bad news and good news, and in chapter 12 we will be dealing with the bad news.
We have, therefore, presented to us the Great Tribulation and Jerusalem under siege. This is the time that Jeremiah called “the time of Jacob’s trouble.” In Jeremiah 30:5–7 we read: “For thus saith the Lord; We have heard a voice of trembling, of fear, and not of peace. Ask ye now, and see whether a man doth travail with child? wherefore do I see every man with his hands on his loins, as a woman in travail, and all faces are turned into paleness? Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob’s trouble; but he shall be saved out of it.”
Daniel also wrote concerning this time: “And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people: and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book” (Dan. 12:1).
The Lord Jesus spoke of this time, He identified it, and He Himself labeled it the “great tribulations”: “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be And except those days should be shortened there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened” (Matt. 24:21–22).
THE GREAT TRIBULATION
We have in chapter 12 a description of this Great Tribulation Period, and it is presented to us like this—
The burden of the word of the Lord for Israel, saith the Lord, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him [Zech. 12:1].
“The burden of the word of the Lord for Israel.” The word burden here means “a prophecy, a judgment.” A judgment is coming to them—it is a burden in that sense. This prophecy had to do with the siege of Jerusalem which precedes the Battle of Armageddon.
“The burden of the word of the Lord for Israel, saith the Lord.” In this section of Scripture which is rejected by so many men today, there is a particular emphasis upon the statement of Zechariah again and again that he is not giving you his idea but “thus saith the Lord.” This prophecy comes directly from God. If you reject this, you are not just a higher critic with a little superficial knowledge who is able to make very intellectual statements about what you do and don’t believe—but, my friend, you are making Zechariah a liar. Zechariah says here that this is the,Word of the Lord. He is either accurate and means what he says or he is a liar—there is no “in-between.” When you reject this—no matter who you are—you’re making this man liar. Well, I don’t think he is a liar, but I think you are the liar if you reject him.
There are three great statements in this verse which give to us a sublime description of God as the Creator of this universe and of everything that is in it. This is a tremendous and overwhelming statement that we have here:
1. He is the One “which stretcheth forty. the heavens.” The psalmist says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork” (Ps. 19:1). All of that above us declares His glory, and it show His handiwork. And it is being stretched out. Quite a few years ago now. Sir James Jeans, an English astronomer, advanced a theory which has been pretty well accepted today among astronomers. I understand that Jeans was a Christian. His proposal suggests that this universe has grown—even since you have started reading this chapter—and is now several million miles bigger. That is really stretching things! You and I are living in a universe in which these tremendous creations of God are moving away from each other, streaking across the universe. He “stretcheth forth the heavens.” How great God is!
2. “And layeth the foundation of the earth.” God has given particular attention to this little earth that we live on. Man just isn’t satisfied that he lives in a universe in which he is the only human being around. So we have been sending missiles out to the other worlds. We aren’t electronically bugging them in order to tape anything they might say, but we are sure looking in their front window to see if they might be there. There’s been nobody there. God made this earth the habitation for human beings.
3. This is the most remarkable thing: He “formeth the spirit of man within him.” Man is a little different creation from anything else that is on this earth. He is above anything that is on this earth, but he is not equal to the created intelligences which we call angels. I think that the universe today is filled with God’s created intelligences. I do not mean that there are men from Mars. (They have now found Mars to be the kind of place that if you lived there, you would want to move right away!) Although we live in a universe that looks as if it’s not inhabited, I do not think that God has a “Vacancy” sign hanging out anywhere. I believe that if you moved out of our solar system, you would find that God’s created intelligences are in this universe. They are spiritual creatures, and our cameras are not apt to pick up any of them, I can assure you. What a glorious picture this verse gives of God as the Creator!
Men years ago who were called deists—none of them were evolutionists—believed that there was a Creator, and they believed that God created the universe but that He went off and left it. He just forgot about it. He wound it up, started it off, and then He walked away. However, this verse reveals that God did not walk off and leave the universe. It reveals that God is immanent in His universe as well as outside of it. This passage portrays the tremendous activity of God out yonder in the heavens as He moves in our great universe. We live in a universe that is filled with energy. It is man who has depleted the energy on this little world on which we live. I think that God put just enough energy down here to last us until He is ready to move in and take it over again. It looks as if the filling station which we live on down here is running out of gas. This is another reason I believe that we are moving on to the end of this age.
We see here that God is working with very definite and positive action as far as this universe is concerned. He is that One who has formed the spirit of man. He is our omnipotent (all-powerful), omniscient (all-knowing) God. He is wisdom and knowledge. As Dr. Unger expresses it, this “comprises one of the most magnificent eschatological vistas to be found in the Word of God”; yet it is disbelieved by even a great many who call themselves conservative or evangelical.
Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem [Zech. 12:2].
Jerusalem is mentioned twice here in this one verse. As we have already indicated, it is mentioned ten times in this chapter alone. Here we have Jerusalem becoming the very center of the activity which will take place when Antichrist takes over. Jerusalem becomes the center of attack and of judgment.
“Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about.” Better words for “cup” are bowl or goblet or mug.
Let’s identify when this will take place: “When they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem.” When is that? In the last days, in the time that the Lord Jesus called the Great Tribulation Period. Therefore, the interpretation of this entire section is for a future day. But it is going to have a message and a tremendous lesson for us.
In Dr. Unger’s words, God will make Jerusalem “a goblet of intoxication,” “a goblet of staggering” for those who are concerning themselves with it. In other words, they will be staggering because of it.
And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it [Zech. 12:3].
In effect God says, “You’re going to get hurt fooling with Jerusalem.” Again, this hasn’t anything in the world to do with Rome or Paris or London or Washington, D. C., or Los Angeles or your town. When He says Jerusalem, He means Jerusalem. Although He says it ten times, somehow or another it doesn’t get through to us. Some of the commentators don’t quite get the message. Jerusalem means Jerusalem, and when He puts Judah with Jerusalem, He is talking about Jerusalem which is in Judah.
“And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people.” Now that seems strange, doesn’t it? Jerusalem is a rather isolated place, an old city, and actually not very attractive today. Despite the fact that it has so many spots which are sacred and meaningful to us, I know a lot of places I like better than I like Jerusalem. I always enjoy staying there because there are so many things to see that are identified with the Bible. But why should this place be so prominent and significant in the last days? How do you explain that? Well, that city even today has become a burdensome stone, but we have not seen the fulfillment of prophecy—it is nonsense to talk like that. This prophecy fits into a program that is yet future, but God just wants you to know that He was not making an exaggerated statement when He said that Jerusalem can become a burdensome stone. I believe that what we have seen is nothing compared with what it will be in that day. It almost broke up the Common Market, it almost wrecked NATO—Jerusalem became a burdensome stone. Consider the list of the nations of the world which have captured that city and have tried to rule it. For example, at the time when General Allenby took Jerusalem and delivered it from the Turks, Great Britain was the number one power, and the sun never set on the British Empire. But, my friend, today the British Empire’s sun has set. It went down because they got involved with that city. Frankly, I hope that the United States doesn’t get too involved. God says, “Keep your hands off. I am the One running that place.”
In that day, saith the Lord, I Will Smite every horse with astonishment, and his rider with madness: and I will open mine eyes upon the house of Judah, and will smite every horse of the people with blindness [Zech. 12:4].
Again God says, “In that day”—this is going to get monotonous before we finish this book.
The horse represents warfare, and when a horse goes blind and the rider is mad, you are certainly going to have confusion. God says here that when the enemy comes against Israel, He is going to make them ineffective.
And the governors of Judah shall say in their heart, The inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be my strength in the Lord of hosts their God [Zech. 12:5].
In that day Jerusalem will become a refuge for God’s people on the earth.
This siege of Jerusalem in which the enemy comes in from every direction is the result of the activity of Antichrist, but God will intervene on their behalf. When they have rejected Him, why in the world does He intervene on their behalf? We will find the answer in this section of Scripture.
In that day will I make the governors of Judah like an hearth of fire among the wood, and like a torch of fire in a sheaf; and they shall devour all the people round about, on the right hand and on the left: and Jerusalem shall be inhabited again in her own place, even in Jerusalem [Zech. 12:6].
Again I remind you that we are talking about Jerusalem—not about Rome or Washington, D. C., or Geneva, Switzerland. We are talking about Jerusalem, the geographical spot located in Judah. He has already identified both Judah and Jerusalem, and He will do that again here—
The Lord also shall save the tents of Judah first, that the glory of the house of David and the glory of the inhabitants of Jerusalem do not magnify themselves against Judah [Zech. 12:7].
In other words, Jerusalem would be looking down, as it were, on the rest of the country. People today in one section of our country have a tendency to look down upon people from other sections of the country. I have been very much amused at the reactions which people have to my accent. Many of them very frankly write letters and say, “When I started listening to you, I thought you were just some wild-eyed ignoramus.” Well, there are some people who still think that, but the letters go on to say, “But we kept listening and saw beyond that accent.” They realized that I had been to school or at least had finished the sixth grade! My point is that this is a tendency we all have. We folk who have been born in Texas have been given the impression that there is nothing beyond the borders of Texas, that the chosen people are in Texas. There are some of my fellow Texans who still believe that, and such is human nature.
Zechariah is saying that if the Lord manifested Himself first to Jerusalem and to the house of David, then they would look down upon the rest of Judah. They would say,“These are country rubes and hillbillies. After all, the Lord didn’t manifest Himself to them first.” But God says, “I shall save the tents of Judah first.” Remember that the Lord Jesus said, “But many that are first shall be last; and the last shall be first” (Matt. 19:30).
We are going to get many shocks when we get to heaven. I think that one of the greatest surprises is that we will find people up there whom we didn’t think were going to be there. And there are going to be some missing whom we thought were going to be there. That’s the number one shock we will get. Then we are also going to find out who really are the people that God recognizes as those who were His servants and who were doing faithfully that which He wanted done. And they are not going to be the ones we would have chosen. God makes it clear here in Zechariah, “I am going to manifest Myself to Judah first,” and that will give Jerusalem and the house of David something to think about.
In that day shall the Lord defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and he that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David; and the house of David shall be as God, as the angel of the Lord before them [Zech. 12:8].
“In that day shall the Lord defend the inhabitants of Jerusalem; and he that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David.” David was quite a soldier. If you don’t believe that, read the account concerning his son Absalom, or read how he took that nation which was scattered and divided and brought it together and how he dealt with the Philistines. David was a great administrator, a great soldier, a general of great strategy, a man of tremendous ability. In that day, even the weakest man will be like David.
“And the house of David shall be as God.” To me this is one of the most thrilling statements in Scripture: David will be like God. I want you to know that there came One in David’s line who is God. David is going to be like God. That One is the Lord Jesus Christ who was born to Mary of the household of David. He was born in the city of Bethlehem. Mary went down there to be enrolled because she belonged to the house of David. And Joseph also had to be enrolled for he was of the house of David, but he had nothing to do with the birth of the Lord Jesus. They went down to Bethlehem, and Jesus was born into the family of David. Matthew writes: “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham” (Matt. 1:1)—that is the way the New Testament opens. That He is the Son of David is the first thing that is mentioned. He is also “the son of Abraham,” but David is mentioned first.
And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem [Zech. 12:9].
There will be a converging of all the nations against Jerusalem, which we see in a great deal of detail in the Book of Revelation. All of these great prophecies are like trains or planes coming into a train station or airport. All of these great themes of prophecy which originate elsewhere in the Bible converge into the Book of Revelation like a great airport or Union Station.
ISRAEL’S DELIVERANCE
There is coming against Jerusalem in that day the enemy from the outside. Why is God going to protect them, and why is God going to deliver them? The reason is given here in verse 10—
And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn [Zech. 12:10].
“And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications.” This is another reason why I do not believe the present return to the land is a fulfillment of any prophecy of Scripture. The Scriptures make it clear, not only here but also in Joel, that God is going to pour out upon them the Spirit of Grace, that is, the Holy Spirit. He will pour out the Holy Spirit upon these people during this period. Because of this effusion of the Holy Spirit that is to come upon them, they will be His witnesses, and He will protect them during the Great Tribulation Period. Revelation speaks of the angel who seals these people: “And I heard the number of them which were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel” (Rev. 7:4). This 144,000 means the people that we know as Israel who live in that land. It does not refer to any people who arbitrarily claim it for themselves without any basis at all. This has to rest upon facts, and the Book of Revelation makes it very clear that it is 12,000 out of each of the twelve tribes (see Rev. 7:5–8). If you are going to claim to be one of the 144,000, that means that you are unsaved today and that if the Rapture took place, you would not leave the earth but would go into the Great Tribulation Period when they are to be sealed. Therefore, the 144,000 does not mean any group that we have today, but it does mean a certain group among the people of Israel.
There is another large group of people who are to be sealed, but we are not given the number of them. They are Gentiles who are to be sealed during that period. They will go through the Great Tribulation Period, and they will stand for God in that time.
When the church is removed from the earth, the Holy Spirit, as I understand Scripture, does not leave the earth, but He will be on a different mission. He then will return to what He was doing before the Day of Pentecost—that is, He will come upon certain people. Zechariah tells us that there is to be a pouring out of the Spirit upon the remnant that will be back in the land. I do not think that, in what has happened over there since they became a nation in 1948, there has been any time that you could say there has been the pouring out of the Spirit of God.
When that pouring out of the Spirit takes place, they are going to recognize Christ as their Savior. “And they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.” This will be the fulfillment of the great Day of Atonement when they are going to look upon Him. Chapter 13 will develop this a great deal for us. It opens with this: “In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness” (Zech. 13:1). Then verse 6 in chapter 13 reads, “And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.” In that day they are going to look upon Him whom they pierced, and the question will be asked of Him, “What do these wounds mean? We didn’t expect our Messiah, our King, to come with these wounds that You have in Your hands and feet and in Your side.” He will say to them, “I got these wounds in the house of My friends. I came before, but you didn’t accept Me or receive Me, and now I’ve come back.” They will then mourn because of that.
The explanation is given here as to why God is going to defend Jerusalem. He will pour out the Spirit of grace upon them. My friend, that is the only way today that you and I are indwelt by the Spirit of God. You don’t have to seek and groan and grunt and think that you become a super-duper saint in order to have the Holy Spirit. All you must do is to come as a sinner to Jesus Christ and accept and receive Him as your Savior. Then you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit of God. Paul called the Corinthian believers babies, he called them carnal, he called them fleshly; yet he could say to them, “What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” (1 Cor. 6:19). He is the Spirit of grace. He does not indwell me or fill me because I’m super-duper or because I’m a little ahead of somebody else—I’m not, I’m way behind most. It is because of His grace that He does these things. And that is the way that He is going to do this for Israel. Since He’s been so gracious to me, I’m not going to object to His being gracious to these people.
Israel will know Him when the veil is lifted from their eyes, as Paul put it in 2 Corinthians 3:13–16. That veil doesn’t mean that they are not responsible. Any time any one of them will turn his heart to Christ, Paul makes it very clear that the veil will be removed, and he will see Christ as his Savior. My friend, this is true of any sinner today. You are not lost because you haven’t heard the gospel; you are not lost because of this, that, or another thing. You’re lost today because you have made a definite decision to reject Jesus Christ. This is a false idea today that somehow or another we are not responsible. Although it is by grace, you and I are responsible to respond to the marvelous, infinite, wonderful grace of God. Therefore, God saves us not because of our ability, not even by our faith, but He saves us by the precious blood of Christ. This is a wonderful passage of Scripture.
In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon [Zech. 12:11].
“In that day”-aren’t you getting just a little bit tired of hearing Zechariah talk about “in that day”? Well, you haven’t heard anything yet. All the way through the very last chapter and the last verse, he is going to talk about “in that day.” By now we ought to know what “in that day” means. It is that period of time known as the Day of the Lord. The Day of the Lord begins when the church leaves at the Rapture and the Great Tribulation Period begins, and then it will continue right on through the millennial kingdom, to the time when all rebellion is put down and the eternal kingdom begins. The eternal kingdom simply continues the thousand-year kingdom, except that it is no longer a time of testing but everything is then fixed for eternity.
“In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem.” This is the real Day of Atonement. The Day of Atonement in the Mosaic system was the only day Israel was to weep. It was the day that atonement was made for their sins. “In that day shall there be a great mourning.” May I just pause and say that there is today a great deal of so-called gospel preaching that says, “Come to Jesus. He will make you over. You are going to be a new personality, and you are going to attain your goal.” All kinds of attractions are offered to you. But may I say, what do you really think about your sins? Have you ever mourned about them? Has it ever broken your heart that you have been a sinner? This is the one thing that this poor preacher right now can say to you: When I look back on my life and see some of the things that I did in the past, I tell you, it breaks my heart. It is for that that my Savior died. There ought to be that mourning, that repentance in the Christian life. The one thing that is missing today is that which used to take place at the Methodist altars in the old days. In those meetings men and women would come weeping down to the altar to accept Christ—but I see very little of that today. They come down smiling, thinking they’re going to get a new personality. My friend, the truth is that you’re an old, rotten, dirty, filthy sinner in His sight, and even your good things are bad to Him. He says that our righteousness is as filthy rags in His sight. And if my righteousness is filthy rags, think what my filthy rags are! If you and I could see ourselves as God sees us, we couldn’t stand ourselves. We would get rid of our conceit and our self-sufficiency. Oh, how the church needs a real baptism of repentance! This is the thing that is needed today—repentance on the part of believers, a repenting of their sins.
“As the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon.” This refers to the valley at Megiddon and to the time of Josiah. Josiah was a king greatly loved of the people, and when he died there was great mourning for him. Jeremiah wept over Josiah as he wept over no one else.
And the land shall mourn, every family apart; the family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart [Zech. 12:12].
They shall mourn “apart.” That is, it will be done in a private manner. Such repentance is something that many of us even today need to do privately.
The family of the house of Levi apart, and their wives apart; the family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart;
All the families that remain, every family apart, and their wives apart [Zech. 12:13–14].
This will be a real mourning. What great sin have they committed? They had rejected their Messiah when He came the first time. Think what it will be like when He comes the second time and there are those who have heard the gospel message but have turned it down. May I say to you, that day is coming on this earth when He will come again. Today if you will hear His voice, harden not your heart. Open up your heart and receive Christ as your Savior.
CHAPTER 13
Theme: The cleansing of Israel
You are seeing, I trust, that this Book of Zechariah is a very important book. I have always appreciated it and felt that it is a neglected book. Each time I go through it I learn something new. In fact, this final section is so tremendous that I do not feel competent to interpret it on the high plane that it belongs. I would love to make it mean as much to you as it means to me. Perhaps my feeling is best expressed in the lovable language of the Pennsylvania Dutch: “We grow too soon old and too late smart.” That fits my case.
In the previous chapters we have seen a very definite progress through a program which began with the first coming of Christ to the earth. At that time He had entered Jerusalem, and He had been sold for just a few pieces of silver. Only part of the prophecy of Zechariah was fulfilled at His first coming, which indicates that the other part will be fulfilled at His second coming.
He was rejected as the Good Shepherd who gave His life for the sheep. Another is to come in the future. He hasn’t come yet and won’t appear until the church is removed from the earth. He will be the false shepherd who will lead the nation of Israel, as well as the world, into the Great Tribulation Period. The only deliverance at that time will be the second coming of Christ to the earth when He comes to establish His kingdom. He alone can bring peace to this earth.
It was back in December, 1959, on a Thursday evening, that a Boeing 707 took off from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland and headed toward the sunrise. That jet plane bore the insignia of the president of the United States. The president was beginning the longest trip that any president had made previously. He was to visit three continents, confer with a dozen rulers, and be seen by thousands of people. The supreme objective of that trip was peace. President Eisenhower at that time expressed it by stating that it was an effort to attain peace with justice. Certainly that was a laudable and worthy objective, and he traveled 22,370 miles in 19 days in his attempt to achieve it.
Since that time, every other president has traveled farther in his efforts to bring peace to this earth. But at the time President Eisenhower made the trip, the longing and the prayers of over a billion people were with him because the world wants peace. The human heart desires peace above all else. It was very interesting that he went in the season of the year when we celebrate the birth of a Baby, when it was said, “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:14). Well, I must confess that back there in 1959 I very sincerely prayed for peace. My good wishes and my prayers went with the president for success and a bon voyage. You know, I am sure, that I did not entertain the delusion that the president or any mere man could bring permanent peace to the earth. Actually I got the impression, as I listened to him on television, that he didn’t believe he could achieve peace in the world. I do not think he entertained any grandiose ideas. As a military man, he faced reality. But I think he hoped to relieve the tensions so as to postpone the evil day and to make plain the purpose and intents of this nation by clearing up misunderstanding and misrepresentations.
Well, after all the years which have gone by since then, it is still true that the Baby born over nineteen hundred years ago is the only hope for permanent peace. He alone can and will bring peace to this earth. He holds in perpetuity the title “… The Prince of Peace” (Isa. 9:6). He has a program and a plan to bring in permanent peace. He will establish the kingdom of heaven on earth.
The prophets, especially Zechariah, sketch this program in some detail. In this book, as elsewhere, we find out something of the character of that kingdom, which we will note as we go along. We have already seen that the kingdom has a great many physical aspects that appeal to men: the desert will blossom as a rose, the lame will leap, the blind will see, and there are those who like to think of the golden streets in the New Jerusalem. But when we get off on that tangent we forget the spiritual aspects. We have already seen in this little book that the kingdom will be characterized by truth: “Thus saith the Lord; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth …” (Zech. 8:3). It certainly is not that today, but it will be the city of truth when Christ reigns there. I should add that there is no capital in the world today which is noted for truth.
Not only will Christ’s kingdom be characterized by truth, it will be characterized by holiness and righteousness, as we will see in verses 1 and 2 of the chapter before us. And in chapter 14 we shall see that even the bells on the horses and the pots and pans in the temple will be holiness to the Lord.
Also, the kingdom will be characterized by freedom from fear—we will find that aspect in chapter 14.
Added to this, the kingdom will be characterized by joy, as we have seen in chapter 10: “And I will strengthen the house of Judah, and I will save the house of Joseph, and I will bring them again to place them; for I have mercy upon them: and they shall be as though I had not cast them off: for I am the Lord their God, and will hear them. And they of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man, and their heart shall rejoice as through wine: yea, their children shall see it, and be glad; their heart shall rejoice in the Lord” (Zech. 10:6–7). It will be a time of great joy, you see.
All of these are spiritual—not physical—aspects of the kingdom, and the chief one is peace. When Christ comes to reign, He “will speak peace unto the nations.”
We have been following in Zechariah’s prophecy God’s program which will ultimately bring permanent peace to the world. When Christ came the first time, He was rejected and sold and turned over to the Gentiles who crucified Him. Then a period of time lapses which Zechariah does not deal with. It is the church period in which we are living today. When it ends, there will appear the worthless shepherd, the Antichrist. He won’t usher in the kingdom; he will bring in the Great Tribulation Period. His world dictatorship can only be ended by the coming of Christ to establish His kingdom upon the earth. This is what we have before us in chapter 13.
All of this should be taken in a literal way. The reason that many folk in our day think that God has no future purpose with Israel is that they don’t believe that God means what He says. You couldn’t read the section before us and dismiss it unless you spiritualize it away. If you do that, you do not have a very high view of the inspiration of Scripture. The very center of God’s plan, as we saw back in chapter 12, is Jerusalem. In the last three chapters of this book, chapters 12–14, the name Jerusalem occurs twenty-one times. My friend, God wouldn’t have used it that many times unless He had meant literal Jerusalem. He was not talking about London or Paris or Berlin or Moscow or Peking. He was speaking about the actual city of Jerusalem. It is quite interesting that even President Eisenhower, back in his day, bypassed Jerusalem, and heads of state have been bypassing it ever since. You will find that the better conservative expositors take the position that this section should be interpreted literally. Let me share with you a quotation from Dr. Merrill F. Unger, whom I value very highly as an interpreter of the Book of Zechariah. I feel that his book, Unger’s Bible Commentary: Zechariah, is the finest I have found. It is scholarly, and you need a little smattering of Hebrew to get through it, but it is a wonderful book. Here on page 221 is his comment:
Only a literal application of these prophecies to the restoration and conversion of the Jewish nation at the second advent of Christ can satisfy the scope of these prophetic disclosures. Other interpretations ignore the true scope of Zechariah’s prophecies as a whole, violate the immediate context, resort to pointless mysticalizing, and end up in a morass of uncertainty and confusion.
I say amen to that. I believe that spiritualizing it is practically a denial of the inspiration of the Word of God.
THE NATIONAL CLEANSING OF ISRAEL
In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness [Zech. 13:1].
“In that day.” We have already determined that “that day” refers to the Great Tribulation and moves on into the millennial kingdom. Christ will come to this earth at the end of the Great Tribulation, and then He will establish His kingdom.
This verse does not refer to the first coming of Christ. At that time He did not open up a fountain to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem “for sin and for uncleanness.” Instead, they rejected Him and crucified their Savior. Even Paul writes in Romans 10:3: “For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.”
“A fountain” is God’s cleansing power which was opened by Christ’s death upon the cross. At His first coming Israel rejected their Messiah-Savior, and this fountain will be opened to them at His second coming to the earth. The chapter before us continues the presentation of God’s program, and we saw in chapter 12 that in “that day” God would pour out His Spirit upon the people of Israel. The prophet Joel spoke of that also. It is at this time that the “fountain” will be opened to them, which will be when they realize the fact that Christ was crucified for them. We have seen that they are going to look upon Him. Remember that this is God’s Word, and He puts it very definitely, “They shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him.” It is going to be a real Day of Atonement for these people when Christ comes the second time. They are going to be greatly moved, and the Spirit of God will remove the veil from their eyes. Paul makes it clear that the veil can be taken away even today if they really want to give up their sin.
You see, the problem with man is heart trouble, not head trouble. No man really has an intellectual problem. He hasn’t got enough mentality to deal with the Creator of this universe, with an infinite God. His problem is that he does not want to give up his sin. That is true of the people of Israel, and it is true of the Gentiles. It is true of all of us—it’s face up to it.
And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord of hosts, that I will cut off the names of the idols out of the land, and they shall no more be remembered: and also I will cause the prophets and the unclean spirit to pass out of the land [Zech. 13:2].
“And it shall come to pass in that day”—again he dates it as being “in that day.”
“I will cut off the names of the idols out of the land.” When they were in Babylonian captivity, they took the “gold cure,” that is, they gave up idolatry as they had observed it before. The golden calves were never put back at Dan and Beth-el. But they were still using the little household teraphim and other little fetishes. Even today a great many so-called civilized folk think that if they wear a certain object or if they put up a certain little gadget somewhere, it will ward off harm. That was the kind of idolatry that the people of Israel were engaged in. Also they dealt with the zodiac.
“And also I will cause the prophets and the unclean spirit to pass out of the land.” The “prophets” are, of course, the false prophets. The “unclean spirit” refers to demons. We live in a world where demons are very active, and attention is being called to them at the present time. It may be that we are seeing an outbreak of demonic activity as we draw near the end of the age, but, candidly, I think there has been a subtle manifestation of them all along. The reason this passage is so important is that it is the only place that speaks of the demons being put out of this earth during the Millennium. The Book of Revelation tells about the false prophet and the Antichrist being put out of the earth: “And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone” (Rev. 19:20). And Satan will be bound during the millennial period (see Rev. 20:1–3). So we know that the false prophet and the Antichrist will be in the lake of fire and the Devil will be bound in the bottomless pit. Nothing is said in the Book Revelation about the final casting out of demons, but it is logical to believe that it will be done at this time also and that they will be put in one place or the other. At least we know that they will be removed from the earth.
You would think that once a people had been delivered from paganism and heathenism, they would not go back to it. But in our day the world is going back to it because the human family is gradually moving into the darkness again due to a lack of knowledge of the Word of God. And this is the explanation for the demonic dynamic being manifested in our day. Ignorance of God’s Word gives energy to the occult—there is no energy shortage in that particular connection.
What a different world this will be when there is a complete extermination of idolatry and demons are removed from the entire earth.
And it shall come to pass, that when any shall yet prophesy, then his father and his mother that begat him shall say unto him, Thou shalt not live; for thou speakest lies in the name of the Lord: and his father and his mother that begat him shall thrust him through when he prophesieth [Zech. 13:3].
That seems like strong language, but the day is coming, my friend, when God’s children are going to put Him first. They betrayed Him the first time He came, and He is being betrayed in our day, but in that future day they are going to be faithful to Him even if the one who prophesies falsely is their own son.
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the prophets shall be ashamed every one of his vision, when he hath prophesied; neither shall they wear a rough garment to deceive [Zech. 13:4].
There are two things that interest me here. First, when the Lord comes the false prophets will be ashamed, deeply convicted, of their deceptive “vision.” They will be disgraced because the Lord Jesus has come and made liars out of every one of them. The second thing that we note is that “neither shall they wear a rough garment to deceive.” The garment worn by prophets was a mantle of rough, untanned sheepskin or goatskin or a cloak of camel’s hair. (When Esau was born it is said that he looked like this kind of hairy garment!) The prophet Elijah wore this type of mantle, and it was this mantle that fell upon his successor, Elisha. It was a garment which distinguished a man as a prophet of God, and the false prophets will feel guilty about trying to impersonate a true prophet. You see, Zechariah was not introducing something new but something that was very familiar to the folk of his day.
But he shall say, I am no prophet, I am an husbandman; for man taught me to keep cattle from my youth [Zech. 13:5].
The men who were false prophets will go back to the farm.
The next two verses are startling. In fact, the critics have tried to eliminate them from the text because they say that it is shocking to find this prophecy given at this time. And it is! That is the wonder of it. Certainly it is no excuse to reject it; it is there to alert us. I should mention that there is a difference of opinion as to who is addressed in this verse. I believe that it is Christ.
And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends [Zech. 13:6].
“Wounded in the house of my friends” has been translated by some of the higher critics as “wounded in the house of those who loved me.” Well, they didn’t love Him the first time He came—they hated Him. Scripture says that they hated Him without cause. “He came unto his own, and his own received him not” (John 1:11). But to as many as received Him at that time He gave the authority to become sons of God. Well, when the Spirit is poured out, they (that is, the remnant) are going to receive Him. And they will wonder, saying, “Where did you get those wounds in your hands?” He will answer, “I was wounded here when I came the first time.” He came to His own people, the Jewish race (remember that the woman of Samaria recognized Him as Jew). These were His people, and only a remnant received Him at that time. And, actually, it will be only a remnant who will receive him at His second coming, although I think it will be a much larger remnant. “And one shall say unto him” probably refers to the spokesman for the remnant, just as Peter spoke for the other apostles when he said to Jesus, “… Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:16).
There is a song in which Jesus is called “the Stranger of Galilee.” I don’t know about you, but I don’t like that song. He is not the stranger of Galilee to those who know Him. When He came the first time He was the stranger of Galilee to His own people, but when He comes the second time He will not be the stranger of Galilee to them. Certainly He is not the stranger of Galilee to Christians in this age in which we live, and I don’t think we should sing that song. To know Him is life eternal. The apostle Paul at the end of his life wrote, “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death” (Phil. 3:10). But it is true that they did not know Jesus when He came the first time.
This matter of mistaken identity has been the source of plots for writers of both comedy and tragedy down through the years. Shakespeare used it in The Comedy of Errors. Dickens used it in The Tale of Two Cities. Many dramatic productions are based upon this idea—Alexandre Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo, for example. It becomes even more tragic when it is a real life story. I read of a mother who had not seen her daughter for seventeen years, and when she went to meet her in New York, she walked right past her. It took some time to meet again because the mother didn’t recognize her own daughter. In Reedley, California, I met a mother who had come from Russia and had not seen her daughter since she was a baby—of course she wouldn’t be able to recognize her.
However, I think that the greatest tragedy of the ages is expressed in just eleven words: “He came unto His own, and His own received him not.” What a picture! John the Baptist elaborated upon it when he said, “ … I baptize with water: but there standeth one among you, whom ye know not” (John 1:26, italics mine). And the Lord Jesus Himself said that they knew not the time of their visitation—what a tremendous statement! And Paul wrote: “But their minds were blinded: for until this day remaineth [notice that!] the same veil untaken away in the reading of the old testament; which veil is done away in Christ. But even unto this day, when Moses is read, the veil is upon their heart” (2 Cor. 3:14–15). Notice that the veil is upon their heart—but when the heart is right, they can turn to Him. He is a stranger only to those who do not know Him as Savior. Zechariah speaks of this. In His first coming they didn’t know Him.
There is a striking contrast between the first and second comings of Christ. Redemption is the high word of His first coming; revelation is the high word of His second coming. It was reconciliation at His first coming and recognition at His second coming. It was the Incarnation at His first coming and identification at His second coming. It was the mystery at His first coming, and it will be manifestation at His second coming. At His first coming it was propitiation; at His second coming it will be proclamation. What a picture this gives of Christ!
THE SMITTEN SHEPHERD AND THE SCATTERED SHEEP
Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts: smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered: and I will turn mine hand upon the little ones [Zech. 13:7].
This refers to the time that He was smitten. In fact, when Christ was here the first time, He said that this verse applied to Himself, as we shall see. We immediately identify this remarkable passage of Scripture with “… they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him …” of Zechariah 12:10.
“Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts.” The Lord God is the speaker, and Christ, the Messiah, is the person spoken of. The phrase, “the man that is my fellow” would be better translated, “the man my equal” or “the man of my union.” This is an unmistakable Old Testament reference to the deity of Christ.
“Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered.” Who would have thought that this would refer to the Lord Jesus Christ? We know it does because Jesus Himself quotes it. “Then saith Jesus unto them, All ye shall be offended because of me this night: for it is written, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad” (Matt. 26:31). You see that He makes it applicable to Himself. If you doubt that God has a future purpose for Israel, you need to note this carefully. In the prophecies that we have here which relate to the first and second comings of Christ, did the Lord Jesus lie? He says that Zechariah was referring to Him when he said, “Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered.” And when He comes the second time, they will ask “What are these wounds, these nail prints, in Your hands?” And His answer will be, “I received these in the house of My friends.” And, as we saw in chapter 12, “They shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son.” This will be the great Day of Atonement for the Jewish people, and obviously it is for a future time.
The final two verses of this chapter refer to the Great Tribulation Period.
And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith the Lord, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the third shall be left therein [Zech. 13:8].
“The third shall be left therein” refers to the same remnant that shall ask, “What are these wounds in thine hands?” They will have come through the horrors of the Great Tribulation Period in which two-thirds of their people have perished.
And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The Lord is my God [Zech. 13:9].
Isn’t that a wonderful statement? These are the ones who will take a stand for Christ and will be faithful to Him. They will make it through the Great Tribulation because He has sealed them (see Rev. 7:1–8). Then we see them again in Revelation 14: “And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father’s name written in their foreheads …. And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth” (Rev. 14:1, 3).
CHAPTER 14
Theme: The second coming of Christ, the Messiah
Chapter 14 concludes the second division of the last section of the Book of Zechariah. This last section, chapters 9–14, deals with prophetic burdens. There was the first burden, dealing with the prophetic aspects connected with the first coming of Christ (chs. 9–11). In the second and last division (chs. 12–14), we have the second burden in which we have the prophetic aspects connected with the second coming of Christ. This final chapter just gathers together everything and ties up any loose strings there might be.
The very interesting thing is that we have had a very definite program given to us in the Book of Zechariah, and that has been true in all three of its major divisions. We had the ten visions, then the historic interlude, and now this last major division of prophetic burdens. We always start where Israel was at that particular time (and they were in a certain amount of difficulty), and then we move through the national conversion of Israel when the nation will turn to God and there will be a pouring out of the Spirit of God. All of this prepares the scene for the return of Messiah, because at that time they have entered the Great Tribulation Period.
This last chapter is a great climactic chapter, but it also follows the entire program that has been given to us in Zechariah. This is a section that leads up to and into the establishment of the kingdom at the second coming of Christ. In each of these major divisions, Zechariah, encouraging the people of that day, looks on to the future and outlines a prophetic program.
There are certain things which we need to make clear about this chapter. The first is that it is wholly prophetic—it is entirely that. The other is that it has no prophecy which is being fulfilled in this present age. In other words, it is speaking of the end of the age that ushers in the kingdom. You will find that many commentators, especially of the higher, critical school (and I believe that largely all amillennialists follow this same plan and purpose), teach that this does not actually speak of prophecy, that it is not literal, and that it can be fitted into the present age. Believe me, that leads to some strange interpretations! Lowe and DeWette, who belonged to that camp, both said: “This chapter defies all historical explanation.” We can certainly say amen to that, as nothing like this has ever happened in the past. Therefore, this chapter is entirely prophetic; that is, it is prophetic from where we are today, and it looks to the future.
The only interpretation of this chapter which will satisfy is a literal interpretation; that is the only one that will give the meaning. And any interpretation must be in harmony with the context. In interpreting prophecy or interpreting Scripture anywhere, you cannot disregard the context before and after. Also, you must interpret this in keeping with the spirit and the feel of the entire Word of God. You absolutely cannot reach in here and come out with some wild interpretation that has no basis in fact. I believe that this is a very, very important passage of Scripture, because it demonstrates the difference between literal interpretation of Scripture and that which spiritualizes or mysticalizes it, making it mean practically nothing at all. Such interpretation merely makes this passage something that is allegorical or something that is mythical or something that actually can be dissipated into thin air. It is an attempt to explain it away rather than to explain it.
Let me make a suggestion that is really a mean one. If you are wanting to know the position of a pastor whom you’re not sure about, if you really want to know what he believes, take the fourteenth chapter of Zechariah to him and ask him to explain it to you. You will find out what a man really believes when he deals with this chapter.
Certain of the liberal commentators, actually great scholars of the past, and Hengstenberg specifically, refer chapter 14 “to the whole of the Messianic era.” What he really means is that it refers to this church period today. You cannot, by the wildest kind of interpretation, fit that in. That is the reason he does not go into detail. Leupold, another outstanding liberal scholar, says:
Our verses do not, therefore, apply to any one situation. They do not describe a siege, capture, and captivity which actually occurred. By means of a figure they describe a situation which obtains continually through New Testament times. God’s people shall continually be antagonized and suffer bitter adversity at the hands of their foes and shall in consequence be brought low; but there shall always be an imperishable remnant, and that not so extremely small.
Would you tell me what he really means by that? He means that he doesn’t know what to do with this chapter at all. So the thing he does is spiritualize it—he spreads it out like butter on toast, and it melts just about the same way!
May I say that these verses are not just figurative, they do not apply to New Testament times, and the remnant that is spoken of here—it’s been made clear to us in this book—is a Jewish remnant. We need to recognize that this chapter is entirely eschatological.
There have been other scholars who identify this chapter with “the error of so-called ‘Jewish Chiliasm.’” The fact of the matter is, as Dr. Unger goes on to say, “‘Jewish Chiliasm’ was wrong only in the fact that it overlooked the prophesied rejection and death of the Messiah as the indispensable prelude to His manifestation in kingdom glory.”
With that as a background, let us come to the text itself—
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee [Zech. 14:1].
“Behold, the day of the Lord cometh”—this would make a good headline for the newspaper. Many times, when you get down into an article, it moves behind the headline and gives you the preliminaries that led up to the headline. That is what happens here.
“Behold, the day of the Lord.” Here we are again with this very impressive statement. We will find that the thing which is before us in these first three verses is the last siege of Jerusalem. Then in verses 4–7, we have the personal advent of the Messiah. We have seen all of this in other chapters of Zechariah, but now we have it brought in from a little different angle. For instance, regarding the Great Tribulation Period and the siege of Jerusalem, the thing that was important in the other passages was an emphasis on the latter part of the Tribulation and the deliverance that came, and Zechariah was prophesying to the people for their encouragement. But here we see how tragic it is actually going to be during that period of the Day of the Lord. The thing that Joel had said was that the Day of the Lord is not light; it is darkness. It begins in darkness. The hopelessness and the helplessness of these people in that period is difficult for us to understand.
“Behold, the day of the Lord cometh.” The Hebrew idiom that is employed here is yombaÕ leyahweh (I pass that on to you just to let you know that I did study Hebrew, although I’ve forgotten most of it by now.) This is the expression that is headline material here, and it refers to this coming day which is yet in the future (after the church is removed) when Antichrist brings on the Great Tribulation, although the world will believe that he is bringing in the Millennium. We certainly have had quite a few presidents in my day who were going to bring in the Millennium. Not one of them has gotten within four miles of the Millennium, but that does not prevent Americans from believing that the next candidate is going to do it. Well, none of them is going to do it—only Jesus Christ can do that.
Dr. Unger’s rendering of this verse is: “Lo, a day is coming—the Lord’s—when thy spoil shall be distributed in the midst of thee.” The enemy is going to take Jerusalem again, and this will be the last siege.
For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city [Zech. 14:2].
This is the last siege of Jerusalem, and it is not a pretty picture that is given to us here. The enemy takes the city, and when Zechariah says “all nations,” I am of the opinion that he means that each nation will have representatives there. You might ask how that could be. Well, we have that same thing today with the United Nations. At the time that I am writing this, there are United Nations troops in Israel again. The soldiers come from different nations, and they more or less serve as a buffer between Israel and the enemy. It will be different in that day, but it will be an army that is made up of those who represent all the nations. They will come against Jerusalem, and they’re going to take that city.
Again, let me give you Dr. Unger’s translation. It is a sad state: “And the city shall be captured and the houses plundered, and the women raped, and half of the city shall go into captivity, but the rest of the people shall not be cut off from the city.” Apparently, some will be able to escape. There are those, including myself, who believe that it will probably be the rock-hewn city of Petra to which they will go. Masada would also be a good place. That is where the Jews escaped to at the time of the invasion by Titus in a.d. 70. The only thing is that Masada would sure be a good target for bombers if they went there. I believe that the rock-hewn city of Petra could be the place.
This is a sad thing that is revealed to these people through Zechariah. The city is taken, the houses are plundered, and the women are raped. These are the three things that Zechariah mentions here.
Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle [Zech. 14:3].
This is a picture of the Deliverer who is coming. It is at this time that their help will not come from the north or south or east or west, but their help will come from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. This will be none other than the Lord Jesus Himself coming to the earth to deliver these people.
And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south [Zech. 14:4].
“And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives.” This is a tremendous statement that is made here, and it is quite literal. The Mount of Olives is literal, Jerusalem is literal, these people are literal. When the Lord Jesus comes, His feet will stand upon the Mount of Olives. When Zechariah says His feet, he’s talking about His feet, not His hands. Zechariah says that they will touch the Mount of Olives, and apparently he means that that’s where the touchdown is going to be. I’m of the opinion that if men can send a missile that goes out to the moon and spends a few days there and comes back, and if they can put a battleship out in the Pacific and have that little capsule come down within two or three miles of the battleship, then God is not going to have any trouble with the Lord Jesus Christ touching down at the Mount of Olives. He is the glorified Christ today. He has nail prints in those feet, but those feet left the Mount of Olives when He left this earth, and He’s coming back to the Mount of Olives when He comes again. This is exactly what was told His disciples. When He ascended, two witnesses came and said, “… Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11). This is the fulfillment of it that will take place in the future. When? In the Day of the Lord, in the time when they are in great trouble, when Jerusalem has been besieged and taken for the last time.
“Upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east.” This mention of the east is not a casual statement. You will notice throughout Scripture that help for Israel is coming from the east. This is the reason they pay great attention to that eastern gate which some call the golden gate. I personally believe that the reference to the golden gate is the gate in the temple that shall be built. If you want to call it the golden gate, that’s fine—it is the eastern gate. He will probably come in from the east.
Ezekiel also tells us that help is coming to them from the east. I think that it is interesting that we have been on the side of Israel from the very time that it became a nation—but we happen to be a western nation, you see. The real help for them is coming from the Lord, and there is no fulfillment of prophecy taking place there today. We can see that clearly when we put this prophecy down on what is going to happen.
“And the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.” Great physical changes that are going to take place are mentioned to us here. There will be a great earthquake, and the Mount of Olives will be split right down the middle. Half of it will go to the north and half to the south.
“And there shall be a very great valley.” Jerusalem today is surrounded by the roughest terrain that I know of anywhere. I frankly have been no place that can compare to it. It is rugged if you go north or if you go east or if you go south or if you go west—any direction that you might go. If you go south to Bethlehem, you would think you were riding one of the toboggan rides at Disneyland. Up and down you go—mountain after mountain—and it is rugged. If you go north, it is rugged. If you go west, it is rugged—big boulders and rocks. You’ve never seen such great big rocks. Going east down to Jericho—again, it is a rugged trip. The only thing is that the United States put in a wonderful macadam highway there. It is not a freeway, but it is a good highway, and it makes such an easy trip that the tourist doesn’t realize what rough terrain it actually is.
And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the Lord my god shall come, and all the saints with thee [Zech. 14:5].
“And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains.” This is the reason that many commentators believe that they will flee over yonder to the rock-hewn city of Petra in the old country of Edom. However, we cannot be dogmatic because Scripture has not told that.
“And the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.” This is a very interesting passage of Scripture. It is a picture of the Lord Jesus coming back to the earth. We find this also in Revelation 19 where we are told that the armies of heaven will follow Him. Here it says that all the saints will come with Him. Let us look for a moment at Romans 11:25 which says, “For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.” This is the time of the fullness of the Gentiles when all the nations come up against Jerusalem. Romans 11:26 reads: “And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob.” That time has definitely not come. The Lord Jesus’ first coming doesn’t satisfy this, and the Jews’ present return to the land does not satisfy any of these Scriptures.
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be clear, nor dark:
But it shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord, not day, nor night: but it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall be light [Zech. 14:6–7].
There will be changes in the lighting of the earth. We are moving through that period of dawn to the coming of Christ to establish His kingdom. This is, of course, a definite reference to the Day of the Lord, which is actually not a twenty-four-hour day.
We come now to a new section in which we find the establishment of Israel’s kingdom here upon the earth.
And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea: in summer and in winter shall it be [Zech. 14:8].
“The former sea” is the Dead Sea, and “the hinder sea” is the Mediterranean Sea. In other words, this will be a spring that will gush up water, and I think it means literal water. Apparently, Jerusalem, which has been an inland city, will suddenly become a seagoing city, that is, a port town. If you want to find in this verse a suggestion of the spiritual Water of Life, I think that will be true also because Zechariah also tells us that the Law, the Word of God, will go out from Jerusalem in that day. But this is literal water that Zechariah is talking about here.
And the Lord shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one [Zech. 14:9].
This is another very marvelous passage of Scripture. It refers to the Day of the Lord and to the fact that the Lord will be King—this is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ, of course. In that day there will be one Lord and one language. I’d like to turn to Zephaniah 3:9 which reads: “For then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may all call upon the name of the Lord, to serve him with one consent.” I do not think that we can be definite about which language this will be. God put up language as a barrier to mankind. No wall could be built any higher than the wall of a language barrier. That was the way in which He was enabled to scatter mankind and then, down through the years, to prepare for the coming of a Savior. Today the gospel is going back into those languages throughout the world. This is another of the great signs which indicate that we are moving toward the end of the age. There will be one language in that day, and I am going to be glad of that. I don’t care what language it is, but everybody will speak that same language.
All the land shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem: and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place, from Benjamin’s gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananeel unto the king’s winepresses [Zech. 14:10].
This is very important as we are now looking at what is really the finale—this brings us to the end.
“All the land shall be turned as a plain [the Arabah].” The Arabah is the geographical name of that deep rift that comes down from above the Sea of Galilee, through the Jordan Valley, through the Dead Sea, down into the Gulf of Aqaba, and on into North Africa. It has been called the Great Rift. It begins at the Dog River at the coast north of Beirut in Lebanon. Zechariah is saying that there will be another great valley that resembles the Arabah.
Zechariah says that this great valley will go all the way “from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem.” This indicates the hill country of the ancient tribe of Judah to the border of Simeon on the south. It goes all the way from up north where Geba is located in the tribe of Benjamin to Rimmon, which is thirty-three miles southwest of Jerusalem. That will be a tremendous valley. All of that rugged terrain that is around Jerusalem is going to be smoothed out, and, apparently, Jerusalem will be elevated—“and it shall be lifted up.”
“And it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place, from Benjamin’s gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananeel unto the king’s winepresses” One commentator years ago said that this could not be literal because nobody could find the tower of Hananeel. The interesting thing is that archaeologists have since located it, and this brother is going to have to come up with another interpretation!
And men shall dwell in it, and there shall be no more utter destruction; but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited [Zech. 14:11].
This will be the first time in the history of Jerusalem that it will be a safe place to live. It is not so today, and it never has been. It is a very tender spot. The most sensitive spot in this universe is there. But when the Millennium has come, the Lord Jesus has come, His feet have touched the Mount of Olives, and these tremendous physical changes have taken place, then the people can dwell in Jerusalem safely. In other words, peace will have come to the earth for the first time.
And this shall be the plague wherewith the Lord will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth [Zech. 14:12].
“Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet.” This is a living death against the enemies of God that will take place. The Book of Revelation tells us that this will take place in the Great Tribulation Period.
“And their eyes shall consume away in their holes [sockets], and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.” May I say, this is a terrible thing.
And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great tumult from the Lord shall be among them; and they shall lay hold every one on the hand of his neighbour, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbour [Zech. 14:13].
That the enemy will be able to take the city will largely be due to this tremendous revolution that apparently will be taking place in the city.
And Judah also shall fight at Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the heathen round about shall be gathered together, gold, and silver, and apparel, in great abundance.
and so shall be the plague of the horse, of the mule, of the camel, and of the ass, and of all the beasts that shall be in these tents, as this plague [Zech. 14:14–15].
Jerusalem will become the commercial center of the world. We are told elsewhere in prophecy that, just as they brought great wealth out of Egypt in the days of Moses, they will bring great wealth into the land of Israel when they return—that is, when God returns them.
We come now to a description of the kingdom itself in contrast to the setting up of it. In the coming of Christ to the earth, He will put down all unrighteousness, all rebellion.
And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles [Zech. 14:16].
This verse means that there will not only be a remnant of Israel saved, but also a remnant out of each nation of the Gentiles. And they will be the ones who enter the kingdom.
“Every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up [that is, face in] from year to year to worship the King.” They are going to face in to Jerusalem. There are great changes taking place at this time—not only physically, not only spiritually, not only economically, and in fact, in every area of life, but also the manner of witnessing for God will be different during the Millennium. Today we have been told, beginning at Jerusalem, to go to the ends of the earth (see Acts 1:8). Here we find that people from all nations are to go up to Jerusalem—that is what they did before the Lord Jesus came and died on the cross. But after His death and resurrection He said, “Go to the ends of the earth with this message.”
They shall “go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles.” The Feast of Tabernacles is the feast that the Israelites celebrated when they came out of Egypt. In that day, they will celebrate it because they have been brought from the ends of the earth back to Jerusalem.
And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain [Zech. 14:17].
Someone will say, “I thought this was the Millennium!” It is, but the Millennium will be a time of testing those in this great multitude—a remnant, but a large remnant, I believe—who have turned to God. It is like being a church member—not all church members are Christians, by any means. Therefore, this period of the Millennium will be a time of testing.
And if the family of Egypt go not up, and come not, that have no rain; there shall be the plague, wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.
This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles [Zech. 14:18–19].
Egypt is used as an example.
In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses, HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD; and the pots in the Lord’s house shall be like the bowls before the altar [Zech. 14:20].
“In that day”—Zechariah will not let loose of this expression!
“In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses, HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD.” Even a harness on a horse will be holiness unto the Lord. What does that mean? Everything will be for the service of God. The vessels in the tabernacle were called holy vessels. Why? They weren’t unusual. I have a notion that after forty years in the wilderness they were beaten and battered, and I think they looked like they had really had it. But they were holy because they were for the service of God. And everything in that day will be for the service of God.
“And the pots in the Lord’s house shall be like the bowls before the altar.” Everything will be for the service of God then, but today we are living in a world where practically nothing is used for the service of God.
Yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holiness unto the Lord Of hosts: and all they that sacrifice shall come and take of them, and seethe therein: and in that day there shall be no more the Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts [Zech. 14:21].
“Yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holiness unto the Lord of hosts.” Just think of that! That skillet that you have, the pot for cooking beans or cabbage—in that day, all will be for the service of God. Everything will be dedicated to Him.
“And all they that sacrifice shall come and take of them.” Are they going to offer sacrifices in that day? We read also in Ezekiel that they will. Certainly these sacrifices will look back to the death of Christ just as the sacrifices before Christ looked forward to His coming.
“And in that day there shall be no more the Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts.” This means that all the hypocrites are going to be removed. This means that every unbeliever will be removed, and there will be none in the service of God unless they belong to Him. This will be the Millennium, my friend. What a glorious picture this is! This is a great finale and climax for the prophecy of Zechariah.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Baron, David. The Visions and Prophecies of Zechariah. London, England: Hebrew Christian Testimony to Israel, 1918.
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Bible Commentary: Zechariah. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1963.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
The Book of
Malachi
INTRODUCTION
Malachi brings down the curtain on the Old Testament. He is the last in a long succession of prophets who foretold the coming of the Messiah. In fact, if we were to go back one thousand years before Malachi and then come down through the centuries, we would find that God was increasing the tempo of telling the people about the coming of the Messiah. And the last voice is that of this man Malachi. I like to think of him as a sort of radio announcer for the Lord. It is as if he were saying, “The next voice you hear will be John the Baptist four hundred years from now.” Well, four hundred years is a long time to wait for station identification!
Malachi is a very interesting person although we know nearly nothing about him. We will find that he has a wonderful sense of humor. I do not think you can be a prophet or a preacher without a sense of humor, and if you haven’t found humor in the Bible, my friend, you are not reading it aright.
We will also see that this man Malachi in a very definite way was a messenger. The name Malachi means “my messenger.” The Septuagint gives its meaning as “angel,” since angelos is the Greek word for “messenger.” An angel was a messenger and could be either human or supernatural. In fact, there were a few church fathers who actually thought that Malachi was a spiritual angel, that an angel wrote this book—but there are no grounds for this. At the opposite extreme we have the liberal school of higher criticism which claims that the book is actually anonymous. They argue that Malachi means just messenger that it is only a title and not a name at all. Surely our information of Malachi is as limited as it is regarding angels. If the book were anonymous, it would be the only book of prophecy to be so, and I do not think that Malachi would want to be the exception to the rule, especially since he was the last one to write.
There is a reason that we do not know very much about Malachi. He is a messenger, God’s messenger with a message, and frankly, we don’t need to know about the messenger. When the Western Union boy rings your doorbell at one o’clock in the morning with a very important message for you, you do not question him about his ancestors! He doesn’t tell you all about himself and his family. You’re not interested in the Western Union boy’s ancestors, and you don’t care whether or not they came over on The Mayflower—especially at one in the morning! The fact of the matter is that you don’t even get his name. The important thing is the message that he brings. Malachi was just a messenger, and the important thing is the content of his message.
We have this same method used by the Spirit of God in the Gospel of Mark where the Lord Jesus’ genealogy is not given at all. The reason is that each of the four Gospels presents Christ in a different way. Matthew Presents Him as the King. If He’s the King, He will have to be in the line of David, and that is the way the Gospel of Matthew opens: “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David …” (Matt. 1:1). The important thing is that He is the Son of David because Matthew is presenting Him as the King. But when you come to the Gospel of Mark, which presents Him as the Servant of God, Mark is not concerned about giving His genealogy, and there’s none given. The important thing about a servant is whether or not he can get the job done. That is the thing you want to know about anyone who comes into the place of service for you. And Mark shows that the Lord Jesus could get the job done, and He did get it done. In the same way, it is the message, not the messenger, which is important in the prophecy of Malachi.
There is some difference of opinion about the time at which Malachi wrote. The date that I suggest is 397 b.c., which is probably a late date. It is the belief of conservative scholars today that Malachi prophesied in the last part of the fifth century. That would be near 397 b.c. but somewhat earlier than that. The important thing is that Malachi was the prophet at the time of Nehemiah as Haggai and Zechariah were the prophets at the time of Zerubbabel and Joshua. This man Malachi concluded the prophetic books as Nehemiah concluded the historical books of the Old Testament. He probably prophesied during the time of Nehemiah’s governorship or immediately afterwards.
As we have said, Malachi was a messenger, but the thing that is important is his message. He himself uses the term messenger three times, and he makes three tremendous and significant references to other messengers.
1. In Malachi 2:7 he refers to Levi as the messenger of the Lord: “For the priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth: for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts.” This suggests that every messenger, every witness, every teacher of the Word is an angel of the Lord, a messenger of the Lord. In the Book of Revelation where we have the messages addressed to the seven churches, it is expressed in this way: “Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write …” (Rev. 2:1, italics mine). I believe that this means the messenger of the church—not a supernatural being, but just the human messenger—in other words, the pastor of the church. I was a pastor for a long time, and I rather like this idea of calling the pastor an angel. I’ve heard him called everything else, so I don’t know why we shouldn’t include “angel.”
2. Malachi also announced the coming of John the Baptist as “my messenger”—“Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me …” (Mal. 3:1). John the Baptist was the Malachi of the New Testament and began where Malachi of the Old Testament left off.
3. The third reference to a messenger is to Christ as “the messenger of the covenant.” Again in Malachi 3:1 we read, “… and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts.” The angel of the Lord in the Old Testament is definitely the preincarnate Christ.
I want you to see something that makes Malachi one of my favorite books of the Bible (of course, I have sixty-five other favorite books in the Bible), and that is that Malachi has such a wonderful sense of humor. He had to have one in order to deal with the group he had to deal with in that day. He adopted a question-and-answer method. First, he would quote a declaration or an interrogation which God had made to Israel. Then he would give Israel’s answer which in every case was supercilious and sophisticated sarcasm. It was arrogant and haughty and presumptuous and even insulting. But, believe me, Malachi has some good answers from the Lord! And since they are the Lord’s answers, it is the Lord who has a sense of humor. I hope you enjoy this book because it is a great little book, by the way.
OUTLINE
I. The Love of God for Israel, Chapter 1:1–5
II. The Priests Reproved for Profanity, Chapters 1:6–2:9
III. The People Rebuked for Social Sins, Chapter 2:10–17
IV. The Prediction of the Two Messengers, Chapter 3:1–6
V. The People Rebuked for Religious Sins, Chapter 3:7–18
VI. The Prediction of the Day of the Lord and of the Sun of Righteousness Who Ushers It In, Chapter 4
CHAPTER 1
Theme: The love of God for Israel; the priests reproved for profanity
Malachi is going to deal with those same problems with which Nehemiah dealt, and this reveals that Malachi was speaking into that same day. The first problem is the defilement of the priesthood. The second is their foreign marriages and the divorce of their Israelite wives—believe me, God is going to come down hard on this. Many folk ask me to deal with the subject of divorce. Well, I take whatever comes up in the Word of God, and God will talk about divorce in Malachi. Then the third problem is that the people of Israel were neglecting their giving the tithe and the offering to God. You can be sure that you won’t like what God has to say about those who are kidding everybody about their giving to the Lord.
The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi [Mal. 1:1].
Malachi means “my messenger.” He is the Western Union boy who brings the last message from God to the people of Israel.
“The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel.” A “burden” is a judgment, a judgment from God, and it will be a very strong and rigorous rebuke that God will give to them.
Something else that we should note is that Malachi is addressing Israel, that is, all of the twelve tribes. It is obvious that the tribes of Israel didn’t really get lost. Although they seem to be “lost” to some people today, they never were lost. This message is “to Israel,” to all twelve of the tribes. There had returned to the land just a remnant from each tribe, very few from each one. But God addressed them and, very frankly, I think that Malachi’s message went out from here to the others who had not returned. The Book of Nehemiah reveals that there was communication back and forth. There were messengers, travelers, going back and forth between Israel and the place of captivity where they had been in slavery. We are going to see that, apparently, the message went out to all twelve of the tribes.
I have loved you, saith the Lord. Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord: yet I loved Jacob,
And I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness [Mal. 1:2–3].
Malachi’s message starts out in this very marvelous, wonderful way: “I have loved you, saith the Lord.” Isn’t that a wonderful way to begin!
Now how do you think that these people are going to respond to that? Remember that they have returned to the land, and by the time of Nehemiah, although they are discouraged about the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem, there is a show of prosperity, and they are going through the form of worship in the rebuilt temple. They are going through the ritual of it, and on the surface everything looks good. But, oh, are they a sarcastic, supercilious, sophisticated, blasé group! God says to them, “I have loved you, saith the Lord.” And listen to them!—“Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us?” Can you believe, that these people would have the audacity to speak to God like that? They say, “In what way have You loved us?” I’m not sure but what there are a great many today in the church who would raise that same question and say, “Look at the things that are happening to us today. How can you say that God loves us?” Well, God made it very clear to Israel from the very beginning that He loved them.
It is interesting that you go a long way into the Bible before you find God telling anybody that He loved them. But when you get to Deuteronomy (by that time you’ve come to Moses), you’re out in the wilderness and you’ve been out there for forty years, and it is going to be pretty hard to make anybody believe that God loves him. But listen to what Moses says in Deuteronomy 10:15: “Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them …” God simply had not been saying that to anyone. You go through the time of the Flood and afterwards, and God never told anybody that. God didn’t tell Abraham that He loved him, but He did, of course. The point is that God was in no hurry to let mankind know that He loved them. But He says here, “Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.”
Now God is prepared to prove what He has said, and His answer is this: “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord: yet I loved Jacob, And I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness.” This is a tremendous statement that God makes to them. The people were questioning, they were doubting the love of God, and God reminds them of the origin of their nation. Jacob and Esau were twins. God made a difference between them at the very beginning (see Gen. 25:22–23), but it was about fifteen hundred years before He stated as He does here that He loved Jacob.
This presents a problem: Why should God say that He loved Jacob and hated Esau? A student came to the late Dr. Griffith Thomas with that question. “I have a problem,” he said. “Why does God say that He hated Esau?”
“Well, I have a problem with that verse, too,” Dr. Thomas replied. “But my problem is why God said that He loved Jacob. That’s the real problem.”
My friend, the real problem here is why God would say that He loved this people. But let’s understand one thing: God never said this until Jacob and Esau had become two great nations which had long histories. Therefore, God said that He loved Jacob because of the fact that He knew what was in Jacob’s heart. He knew that here was a man who had a desire for Him and that Esau did not have a desire for Him at all. But it had to be worked out in fifteen hundred years of history before God was prepared to make the kind of statement He makes here in Malachi. We need to understand that the difference here between loving and hating is simply that the life of the nation that came from Esau, which is Edom, and the life of the nation which came from Jacob, which is Israel, demonstrate that God was right when He said that He loved one and hated the other.
All this reveals something that we need to face up to today. We have majored so much on the love of God. Do you know that if God loves, God also hates—because you cannot love without hating? As someone has said, love and hate are very close together. If God loves the good, He has to hate the evil—it couldn’t be otherwise—and that is exactly what we find here. The histories of the nation of Israel and the nation of Edom are altogether different. God says that because of Esau’s life, because of the evil which was inherent in this man and which worked itself out into the nation of Edom, He is justified in making this statement.
Whereas Edom saith, We are impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places; thus saith the Lord of hosts, They shall build, but I will throw down; and they shall call them, The border of wickedness, and, The people against whom the Lord hath indignation for ever.
And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say, The Lord will be magnified from the border of Israel [Mal. 1:4–5].
What God is saying to them is this: “My action and conduct with these nations which came from Esau and Jacob reveal that I loved Jacob and that I hated Esau.” After God judged Edom, they never made a comeback. When was the last time you saw an Edomite? They are just not doing business today. They went out of style years ago. God judged Edom, and this action of His looks like loving and hating. And God says to Israel, “I demonstrated that I loved you.” At the beginning, He never made that statement because He had to wait until it worked itself out. This reveals, therefore, that God’s choice is neither capricious nor is it an arbitrary choice. God does not make choices like that. There has to be something to back it up. God had a real relationship with His people. He was the Father of the nation; He was their Lord, their God, and also their Judge. And He judged them most severely. In fact, it would seem that later on He judged Israel more severely than He judged Edom—but that was when they rejected the Messiah.
There is a great deal said today about “God is love.” It is an abstract statement to say that God is love. God doesn’t say to Israel that He is love. He says, “I have loved you and I have demonstrated it.” God was a long time telling the human family that He loved them, but He demonstrated it long before He said it. He demonstrated it from the very beginning, in the lives of Adam and Eve, from the time of the call of Abraham, and right down to the present.
A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I be a father, where is mine honour? and if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the Lord of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name? [Mal. 1:6].
“A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I be a father, where is mine honour?” Now God was never Father to an individual Israelite. Even of both Moses and David, the best that was said was that they were servants of Jehovah—each was a servant of Jehovah. But God called the whole nation His son. Here He reminds them that He has this relationship with the nation.
“And if I be a master [that is, your Lord], where is my fear? saith the Lord of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name?” They are greatly offended that God would say this about them. They say, “My, we’re such nice, wonderful little Sunday school boys and girls. We go to the temple, we go through the rituals, we are very faithful, and we are really the pillars of the whole nation of Israel. And then You dare ask us about despising Your name? How in the world are we despising Your name?”
Of course, you’ve got to go way back into “uncivilized” times to find children honoring their parents. The modern way and the civilized way is not to honor your parents. But back in that day they did, and so God uses that as the illustration: “A son will honor his father, and a servant his master, but you don’t honor Me.” This is something that should have gotten to them, but it didn’t get to them because they had a hard shell about them. They were a very arrogant and haughty and self-sufficient people. You couldn’t tell them anything. I am of the opinion that that is a picture not only of youth today but of all people. We accuse young people of not listening, but the older folk are not listening either—they, certainly are not listening to God at all. God said to Israel, “You despise My name.” And they act hurt; they act as if they really don’t know what He is talking about. Very frankly, had you been in Jerusalem in that day, you would have seen the crowds flocking into the temple. They were bringing their sacrifices. They were going through the ritual. They gave an outward show of being very religious. Their pious performance was very impressive. I am sure that most of us would have said, “This certainly is an alive group, and they’re certainly worshiping God.” To tell the truth, they were very far from God. Down underneath they actually despised His name.
Ye offer polluted bread upon mine altar; and ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The table of the Lord is contemptible [Mal. 1:7].
How could they despise His name when they were going to the temple so regularly? God begins to lay it out for them: “Ye offer polluted bread upon mine altar.” I think we should make it very clear that the bread refers to the offering that was made on the altar. It would be what we would call a meat offering, that is, it would be an animal sacrifice. God will make it clear in verse 8 that that is really what He is talking about.
God says that their sacrifice was polluted, but they wouldn’t acknowledge that. They ask the question, “Wherein have we polluted thee?” My, are they offended that God would dare say this to them because they are such lovely people! To pollute God, by the way, was a serious charge if it were true, but the people dismiss the charge with an indifferent nod of the head and a pretended ignorance. They act as if God doesn’t know what He is talking about.
Then God says to them, “In that ye say, The table of the Lord is contemptible.” They said that it was contemptible, and they despised it by the way they treated it and by the way they acted.
God is speaking to these people, the Jewish remnant which has returned to the land and has settled upon their lees. They are very happily situated now. They have been back for over one hundred years. The Captivity is now in the background, and things are prosperous in the land. They’ve become just a little self-sufficient. They have a temple now, and they are going through the ritual of it, but they actually are far from God. They have become insolent as they talk back to God as He says things to them. Maybe you will want to tune me out because what the Lord says now is really going to hurt.
And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 1:8].
“And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil?” It is clear now that He is talking about animal sacrifices. God made it clear to Israel at the very beginning that nothing which was in any way maimed or defiled or any of that sort of thing was to be offered to Him. In other words, when you give secondhand clothing to the rescue mission, don’t put that down on your books, thinking you will get credit from God. Don’t misunderstand me—the mission can use the secondhand clothes, but you’re not giving sacrificially to God when you give that sort of thing. Listen to the instructions God had given to them: “But whatsoever hath a blemish, that shall ye not offer: for it shall not be acceptable for you. And whosoever offereth a sacrifice of peace offerings unto the Lord to accomplish his vow, or a freewill offering in beeves or sheep, it shall be perfect to be accepted; there shall be no blemish therein. Blind, or broken, or maimed, or having a wen, or scurvy, or scabbed, ye shall not offer these unto the Lord, nor make an offering by fire of them upon the altar unto the Lord. Either a bullock or a lamb that hath any thing superfluous or lacking in his parts, that mayest thou offer for a freewill offering; but for a vow it shall not be accepted” (Lev. 22:20–23).
God was telling them that the offering they offered was really a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ who is the perfect Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Any imperfect offering was an insult to the Lord Jesus Christ. In case they missed it in Leviticus, God interprets the law for them in Deuteronomy 15:21: “And if there be any blemish therein, as if it be lame, or blind, or have any ill blemish, thou shalt not sacrifice it unto the Lord thy God.”
Now what was happening in Malachi’s day was something like this: Imagine there is a man living up in the hill country of Ephraim who has prize cattle. He always gets the blue ribbon at the cattle show. But one day his prize bull becomes sick, and when he calls the veterinarian, the veterinarian says, “I don’t think he’s going to make it. I think he’ll die.” So the man says, “Well, let’s load him in the truck in a hurry and rush him down to the temple where I’ll offer him for a sacrifice.” When the man brings the bull to the temple, the priests can see that the old bull is sick, but they go through with it because this is a very prominent fellow who lives up in Ephraim, you see. But when the people see this prize, blue-ribbon bull being offered, they say, “Mr. So-and-so sure is a generous fellow. Look at what he is offering to the Lord!”
What do we do today that corresponds to that which was taking place in Israel in Malachi’s day? Remember that the apostle Paul described the men in the last days as “having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof …” (2 Tim. 3:5). Men will be very pious. There is a great deal of pompous piousness that is demonstrated by many so-called Christians today. Paul describes them as “having a form of godliness!” You can pour oleomargarine into a butter mold, and it may look like butter, it may even smell like butter, but it is not butter. You probably have heard the story of the very stingy man who gave his wife a mink coat—at least, it was supposed to be a mink coat. No one could understand why this man would be so generous until one day when he and his wife went walking down the street. As they passed a rabbit hound, the coat jumped off his wife and started running! It just happened to be rabbit, you see—not mink.
We should recognize God’s rebuke here as a danger signal and as a red light for us. This is a message for folk who go to church—they listen, they are very orthodox, very fundamental, and they say amen. They know the language. They can quote any number of pious platitudes. They are satisfied with a tasteless morality. They go through a form of truth and all the shibboleths, and they are satisfied. But may I say to you, they actually despise God when they approach worship like that. It was Dr. G. Campbell Morgan who years ago made the statement, “I am more afraid of the profanity of the sanctuary than I am of the profanity of the street.” The profanity of the streets is bad enough, my friend.
You may protest, “But I’ve never brought a sick cow to God and offered Him that!” Will you notice what God says here in our verse: “Offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the Lord of hosts.” In other words, try paying your taxes with that old sick cow! This is a good question: Do you pay more in taxes than you give to the Lord? I want to say very candidly, shame on you if you are paying more taxes than you are giving to the Lord. I believe that when the offering is taken in the average church, there is actually lots more profanity taking place there than down in the slums of the city where the drunkards are. Why? Because there is a great deal of put-on, of hypocrisy, taking place in the sanctuary today.
I know a very prominent businessman who lives in the East. He’s a man that I greatly respect, but I have suspected his generosity for many years. He likes to give, and he’ll give generously if you’ll put up a building with his name on it. When we obtained our new headquarters facilities some years ago, I had a suggestion or two from folk who would be glad to give if the building were named in their honor. We simply don’t do business that way at the “Thru the Bible” radio ministry. When you give to this ministry, you’re giving to get out the Word of God. You’re not giving to get your name engraved on anything. I realize that our policy causes many prominent, wealthy people to turn from us, but that is perfectly all right. The Lord is speaking to a whole lot of other folk, and I rejoice in that. I happen to know that this particular businessman has buildings named for him on two college campuses. He’s a big shot. When he gives, you can be sure it will be with the blowing of the horn, the blare of the trumpet, and the beating of the drum. The Lord Jesus told about the Pharisee who went down to the street corner to give to the poor, and he had somebody down there blowing a horn. Everybody said, “Oh, look at Pharisee So-and-so! Isn’t he generous? He’s down there on the corner, just giving money away to the poor!” One time this prominent businessman invited me out for an evening meal, and we had good fellowship. He’s a likable fellow. He has real charisma. Afterwards, he came with me to the church where I was preaching that night. The pastor of the church invited him up to the platform to lead in prayer. He’s a wealthy man, let me tell you, and so he was invited up there to lead in prayer. I saw with my own eyes that this man who had given the waitress a two-dollar tip for our dinner put only a one-dollar bill in the offering plate. I thought, My, he didn’t even tip God generously tonight!
When the One who was here nineteen hundred years ago sat by the treasury and watched how the people gave, I am sure that some of them thought, “What business has He to see how I give?” He happened to be the Lord Jesus Christ, and I’m not sure but that on Sunday morning He looks over your shoulder as you give. Are you giving what you give for a good meal when you eat out? Are you giving as generously to the Lord’s work as you do to other things where it makes a show? My friend, the old sick cow is still being taken to church today. That is the method that Israel used; and, believe me, the Lord didn’t let it pass.
This is burning sarcasm—listen to Him: “And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the Lord of hosts.” I will say it again, and it is none of my business, but I’m just telling you what the Lord says. He is saying here in a very definite way that you cannot bring Him a sick cow. You don’t pay your taxes with a sick cow. Are you giving to the Lord as much or more than you are giving in taxes today? You may argue, “I have to pay my taxes.” Yes, you sure do, but what about your giving to the Lord? That is supposed to be on the basis of love. The Lord Jesus said. “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15). I do not think we are under the tithe today at all. It is interesting to note, however, that in the Mosaic Law there was more than one tithe; we know that there were two tithes, and many think that there were three tithes. That would mean that the people actually gave thirty percent of what they made to the Lord.
When the Lord Jesus looked over the treasury, He saw how the rich gave—and they gave large sums—but He didn’t commend them for it because they kept so much more for themselves. But He saw the poor widow—and those few little coppers which she dropped in there, compared to the wealth of the temple, very candidly, were nothing—she gave nothing! But the Lord Jesus took those copper coins, He kissed them into the gold of heaven, and He said that she gave more than anybody else.
I am amazed at how our Bible-teaching radio ministry is carried on. It is carried on by many widows who send in a dollar bill, and they always say, “It isn’t anything.” Maybe in comparison to our costs, it isn’t much, but when a whole lot of widows get together it sure makes an impression. It is the people who regularly send in the five-dollar and ten-dollar gifts that sustain this radio ministry.
The Israelites in Malachi’s day were being very clever. When an old cow got sick or a lamb broke his leg, they would patch it up and rush it off to the temple to offer it as a sacrifice to God. God says that He will not accept such a sacrifice. I wonder how many offerings are really made acceptable to God today? We are told that any offering we make to God is like the priest making an offering back in Old Testament times. Believers today are priests before God, and we are to give by grace, but grace does not mean that we give as little as we possibly can. I am afraid that we are actually seeing a sacrilege committed in the church every Sunday. Someone will say, “But a sacrilege means that somebody steals something in the church.” Yes, that is the meaning. The Israelites were guilty of sacrilege because their offerings really cost them nothing. They were valueless, though they may have been large. And, my friend, it is sacrilege to enter the church and put something into the offering plate when there is no blood or sacrifice on the gift.
Frankly, I think that it is sometimes wrong to give. Many people pay ten dollars to see a football or baseball game, and God says to them, “If you pay that kind of money for that and then come into My house and drop a one-dollar bill into the offering and think you have done something for Me, you are wrong. Why, you didn’t even give Me the kind of tip that you give to a waitress!” This is pretty strong language here, is it not?
And now, I pray you, beseech God that he will be gracious unto us: this hath been by your means: will he regard your persons? saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 1:9].
Is it possible that these people could continue giving an outward show but not realize that in their hearts they are not right with God? Their hearts are polluted, and their offering, therefore, is polluted.
Who is there even among you that would shut the doors for nought? neither do ye kindle fire on mine altar for nought. I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord of hosts, neither will I accept an offering at your hand [Mal. 1:10].
God says, “All this ritual that you are going through is absolutely meaningless. It is for nothing. It doesn’t profit.” But they continue on in it.
For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering: for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 1:11].
Israel was bringing the name of God into disrepute by the way they were serving Him. They were not serving Him as they did in the days of Solomon, for instance, when the Queen of Sheba was greatly impressed with what she saw. At this time, the unsaved were not impressed because it was just a form and a ceremony.
God says that there is a day coming when His name will be great among the Gentiles. If you think that this has been fulfilled today, you’re entirely wrong. It will be fulfilled in the Millennium but not today. God’s name is not great among the nations today.
“And in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering.” “Incense” speaks of prayer. That “pure offering” is Christ.
“For my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts.” God’s purpose in choosing Israel was that they might witness to the nations of the world.
But ye have profaned it, in that ye say, The table of the Lord is polluted; and the fruit thereof, even his meat, is contemptible [Mal. 1:12].
The Gentiles profaned the name of God because of the lives and actions of God’s people whose hearts were polluted and whose ritual was contemptible.
Ye said also, Behold, what a weariness is it! and ye have snuffed at it, saith the Lord of hosts; and ye brought that which was torn, and the lame, and the sick; thus ye brought an offering: should I accept this of your hand? saith the Lord [Mal. 1:13].
“Ye said also, Behold, what a weariness is it! and ye have snuffed at it, saith the Lord of hosts.” In effect they were saying, “It makes us tired to go to church, to go through all of these things. Oh, what a weariness!” My friend, when the heart is not in the thing, it becomes weariness.
One morning my daughter and I were driving in the morning rush-hour traffic. At the time I was a pastor in downtown Los Angeles. I couldn’t wait to get to the church that morning. I had broadcast tapes to make, and I was looking forward to it. I said to her, “Look at the faces of all these people in this big traffic jam. They are bored to tears, dreading to go to work. The worst thing in the world that I can think of is to be doing a job you hate to do. It makes the hours long, and there is no joy in it whatsoever. Going to church is just as boring to a great many people.” This is the reason we so often hear it asked, “What can we do to interest our people in the church?” Have you ever heard that discussed? Or, “What can we do to get people to come on Sunday nights?” Somebody will suggest, “Let’s serve a dinner. Let’s have a banquet. Or let’s have a little different service. Instead of all this boring Bible study, let’s have some special music, and let’s put on an entertaining program. We could have some sort of pageant.”
What is wrong, my friend, when people are saying that God is becoming boring to them? Why do you think that men ever adopted a ritual to begin with? Why do they wear robes and chant and burn incense and march around? They are tired of spiritual worship that’s it—and they need something to tickle the flesh. Somebody says, “But I love an orderly service.” I do too, but there is danger in loving order, and there is danger in loving a ritual.
I recognize that ritual has its place and that there are many fine folk who were brought up that way. When I was a pastor in downtown Los Angeles, I knew a lovely couple who really loved the Word of God but who were members of a very formal, a very high church. He was actually enraged by the informality of the way in which I began the service. He and his wife would not come until we had completed the brief preliminaries of the service. He very frankly told me, “I just can’t stand that informality”—but he loved the Word of God, and so I forgave him for the other.
Way back in the stern days of our fathers, the Puritans, they would sit on log benches and listen to a sermon for two hours. Today there are people who will sit on bleachers for three hours out in the hot sun to watch a baseball game. There are folk who will sit out in the cold to watch a football game. And there are those who will sit for three hours listening to an opera, or for two hours watching a movie, or for four hours to see Hamlet. I find it thrilling to sit and listen to a Shakespearean play. When my wife and I were at Stratford-on-Avon and saw Richard III, I didn’t sit on the edge of my seat, but I sat back, relaxed, and thoroughly enjoyed it for three hours. My friend, why are you weary when your preacher speaks for one hour? I’m a long-winded preacher and always have been. I would speak for an hour, and do you know who complained about it? It wasn’t the average person; many people said they didn’t think it was too long. It was some of the leaders, the so-called spiritual leaders of the church, who complained. We love the ritual, and we love the form. We go to church, we stand up and sit down, and we sing the doxology loudly, but really where are our hearts? Do we do it because of a love for Him? Do we desire to worship Him? We sing, “Were the whole realm of nature mine, that were a present far too small.” Is that a gift far too small? It sure is. Then why did you put just a dollar in the offering plate? If the whole realm of nature isn’t big enough for a gift to God, then what about that dollar bill which isn’t worth very much today?
It is so easy to get tired and weary in church work. Dwight L. Moody came home one time, and although he was very weary, he was going to another meeting without taking time out to rest. His family begged him to cancel it because he was so weary, but he said this, “I get tired in the work, but I never get tired of the work.”
But cursed be the deceiver, which hath in his flock a male, and voweth, and sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing: for I am a great King, saith the Lord of hosts, and my name is dreadful among the heathen [Mal. 1:14].
“For I am a great King, saith the Lord of hosts, and my name is dreadful [to be reverenced] among the heathen.” His name is going to be reverenced someday, but it’s not reverenced even today.
One of the things that has brought God’s name into disrepute has been the ministry and those who represent Him here, the believers. I don’t question their salvation—and yet I’m afraid I do question the salvation of some. Have you ever noticed that God never called a real believer a hypocrite? But the Lord Jesus really laid it on the line when He was talking about the religious Pharisees of His day. Very frankly, He said terrible things about them. He called them “whited sepulchres.” Can you imagine that? That is an awful thing to call these people, but that is what He called them. And He likened them to a dish that on the outside is beautiful, but on the inside it hasn’t even been washed. It didn’t get into the dishwasher, and it is filled with all kinds of garbage. The Lord Jesus said, “That’s the hypocrite” (see Matt. 23:25–29). And that’s what these people were in Malachi’s day—they were merely going through a form of religion.
Let’s put it on the line today: Do you have religion, or do you have Christ? Are you real, or are you just going through the form of it? Do you wear your Christianity like a garment that you can take off and put aside at any time, and do you generally put it aside when you are not in church? Perhaps you assume a certain pious attitude and can quote pious platitudes, but how real is Christ to you?
The first thing that Israel did was to bring those old sick cows as sacrifices. Now they are saying, “Oh, this is boring! All these long services. Bible study certainly is boring.” I thank God that over a period of twenty-one years, we averaged fifteen hundred people for Bible study in our midweek service in downtown Los Angeles. I have always thanked God for that. But when someone would come and pat me on the back and tell me how wonderful it was, I would remind them of those great office buildings there in downtown Los Angeles. Each afternoon well over two hundred thousand people would empty out of those buildings to go home. Out of that number only about fifteen hundred would return on Thursday nights for Bible study. Our batting average was not really very good, was it? Most of the people who worked in those building, were church members, and probably they were all out to church on Easter Sunday. They could always make it to the ball game at Dodger Stadium on Sunday afternoon, but they would find it impossible to get to the Sunday evening service. Today there is a great deal of religion, but very little real Christianity. A great many folk are just playing church. When I was a kid, we played store. I used to fill tin cans with dirt and sell them to the other kids in the neighborhood. My, I ran a store! Playing store never got anywhere, but it was a lot of fun. And there are a lot of adults having fun playing church today.
At the time that I was ordained into the ministry, the man who gave me the charge of entering the ministry said that there are three great sins of the ministry that I should avoid. Maybe I haven’t followed through as I should, but I have always remembered those three sins.
The number one sin of the ministry is laziness. Yes, that’s right. The reason we don’t have more expositors of the Word of God today is because it requires study to be an expositor. It is so easy for a pastor to get busy during the week. Shame on you, if you’re taking your preacher’s time during the week and not letting him study if he wants to study. Any church that has a man who is an expositor and wants to spend time in study should let him study. He needs that time, and he’ll have to have it if he’s going to be an expositor. He cannot be lazy and expect to be a real teacher of the Word of God.
One young fellow who was a student of mine at Biola became a pastor in California’s San Joaquin Valley. After he had been up there about three years, he came down and said he wanted to talk to me. We went to lunch, and I asked him, “What’s your problem?”
“I’m getting ready to get out of the ministry. I’ve run out of things to preach. I’m beginning simply to repeat myself, and people notice it.”
So I said, “How long do you take to prepare a sermon?”
“Well, I’ve preached all of yours that I have. And I’ve preached others. Generally, I prepare one in three hours.”
I told him, “Although my sermons may not look like it, I spent over twenty-four hours just preparing each sermon. I have never preached a sermon until I was ready to preach.”
Laziness is a great sin, and I don’t think that God excuses it. I dealt with a young fellow recently who wanted to go into the ministry, and at one time he had high hopes of going to seminary. Now he has the vain notion that he can become a preacher by just going out and letting the Holy Spirit teach him. My friend, the Holy Spirit has never yet taught a lazy preacher. He will only teach the one who is willing to go all the way in study.
Spiritual worship became wearisome to the people of Israel because they didn’t love the Word of God. You have to love the Word of God. This is one way in which the Bible is different from any other book. Any other book you must read before you love it, and you must understand it before you can love it. But, my friend, you must love the Word of God before you can understand it. The Spirit of God is not teaching lazy folk.
Then the second great sin of the ministry is an overweening ambition. This can manifest itself in several different ways. It’s a form of covetousness, of desiring fame, of wanting to be a big preacher, of wanting to preach to the crowd. This is a great sin in the ministry today: wanting to speak to crowds. I am convinced that the great preachers today are not in the big churches, and they are not always the ones getting the big crowds. I listened to a man some time ago preach a sermon, and I do not think there were a hundred people present. But it was a great sermon, an expository sermon. It just thrilled my heart to hear that young man preach. I asked him, “How long did you spend preparing that sermon?” He told me that he had been working on it all week. I suppose that boy put in over twenty hours getting up that message, and he’s willing to be a pastor to a small group of people. However, too many are eager to become great and to minister to a large church.
I heard the story of a preacher somewhere in Texas who came home and told his wife one day, “The next town over has a church which has asked me if I would consider a call to their church. It’s a larger town, a larger church, they pay a larger salary, and they are really lots better people over there. I’m going upstairs to pray about it and to see what the Lord wants me to do.”
She said, “I’ll go up and pray with you.”
“Oh, no,” he said, “you stay down here and start packing!” I am afraid that there are a great many in the ministry who are just like that.
The third great sin of the ministry is to be dull and boring, to be tedious and wearisome. The reason this happens, of course, is that a man does not stay enough in the Book. A man doesn’t have to have charisma—many do not—but there is no excuse for being apathetic, very prosaic, colorless, and lackluster.
I mentioned earlier that my wife and I went to see Richard III. Shakespeare was a great writer. I don’t think he just dashed it off, all of a sudden. We are told that he spent hours writing his plays. I listened to the two young men, one of them playing the part of Richard III and the other playing the one who was supposed to have been his friend but who finally dethroned him and put him in the Tower of London. Of course Shakespeare was a genius, but the thing that impressed me about the play above everything else was the way these young men enunciated, how clearly they spoke, and how they had worked on their lines. I watched purposefully because I had been in Shakespearean plays when I was very young. They didn’t miss a cue. There wasn’t one slip of the tongue. They went right through it. Do you know why? They had worked and worked and rehearsed and rehearsed and rehearsed. If the actor in the world can spend all that time preparing for a performance, why can’t we spend time preparing to give out the Word of God? Any preacher who goes into the pulpit unprepared despises the name of the Lord, and he is causing people to say, “Boy, the Bible is boring! And going to church is tiresome. Next Sunday I’ll do something interesting.” Being a dull preacher is another great sin of the ministry.
Verse 14 says, “But cursed be the deceiver, which hath in his flock a male, and voweth, and sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing.” Here is something else people do: making vows to God and then not following through on them. We find it taught both in Leviticus and Proverbs that God does not want us telling Him something unless we mean it. If you promise to do something for God, you had better go through with it because God means business. He doesn’t ask you to make the vow—it is voluntary—but if you make that vow, be sure that you go through with it.
There were people in Israel who were making great protestations, saying, “It looks like we’re going to have a bumper crop this year. I am going to give the Lord not only a tenth, but I’m going to give some freewill offerings to Him.” But then when the harvest came in in abundance, they decided they would keep it for themselves. They decided they would not turn it over to the Lord after all. Instead, they offered to God the corrupt, the lame, and the sick.
CHAPTER 2
Theme: The priests reproved for profanity and the people rebuked for social sins
In this chapter we come to another section, but it is still dealing with the priests. God is reproving the priests for their profanity. They were profane (fanus means “temple”); they were against the temple. Instead of serving God, they were opposed to God, disgracing God in the very service they were performing in the temple.
In the first chapter we saw that the priests were despising God’s name, and I mentioned the old sick cows which they presented as an offering to God. The real condemnation of that practice was not because they were giving a valueless thing to God and He was rebuking them because they were not giving as they should. A little later He will come to that and will ask the very pointed question, “Will a man rob God?” But here the emphasis is not upon the value of the offering but upon the character of the offering that was placed on the altar. In the Book of Leviticus we find that there are five great offerings mentioned, and each of them points to Jesus Christ. Each offering had to represent the One who was coming, and this One was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners. He was perfect, and the offering which represented and pointed to Him must be without blemish. The sweet savor and even the nonsweet savor offerings pointed to the Son of God. Now in the days of Malachi the priests were despising God’s name in that they were bringing to God an imperfect offering—an old sick cow! It was blasphemy to bring a diseased or crippled animal to the altar as a representation of the perfect One who was coming.
The same thing is being done in our day. A few years ago the very popular rock opera Jesus Christ, Superstar presented the Lord Jesus as an immoral, confused man. Well, the world cannot forget Him that’s for sure, but the world is not thinking rightly of Him. Those who represent Him in books and plays and even in the liberal pulpit are despising the name of God. We hear flippant expressions like “the devil made me do it.” Well, the devil didn’t make you do it; you did it because you have that old sinful nature. Another expression is “God will get you!” No, He won’t! Do you think God is running around paddling little boys and girls? Oh, my friend, let’s guard against misrepresenting God.
Our God is gracious, and He is to be held in reverence. He does judge sin and will judge sin in the future. He is called the awful God, that is, the awe-inspiring God. He is the reverend God. He is to be respected. He is to be worshiped. He is to be adored.
The other night I was listening to snatches of Bach’s music and was struck by the fact that it was nothing in the world but praise to God. We don’t have much of pure praise to God even today in our so-called fundamental churches. Our failure to praise God and our praise of men instead is another way in which we despise God’s name. This is a condemnation of our contemporary church.
Since all true believers are priests in the age in which we live, this prophecy of Malachi’s which is directed to priests has real meaning for us.
In chapter 1, verse 6, God addresses the priests and rebukes them for despising His name. Now in chapter 2, verse 1, He addresses them again—
And now, O ye priests, this commandment is for you [Mal. 2:1].
You see, He is still dealing with the priests.
If ye will not hear, and if ye will not lay it to heart, to give glory unto my name, saith the Lord of hosts, I will even send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings: yea, I have cursed them already, because ye do not lay it to heart [Mal. 2:2].
They were not taking their office seriously. And God was going to judge them more severely than He would judge the people. Why? Because of their position of responsibility. They were permitting this sordid condition to exist. They were shutting their eyes to the fact that people were bringing lame and sick animals for sacrifice. God had given them the law of truth, and they were to teach it to their people.
Now I am going to make a very strong statement. I would rather be the worst sinner on this earth—even a gangster or a murderer—than to be a minister who goes into the pulpit with an unbelieving heart and gives only a few little pious platitudes to the congregation. God is certainly going to hold that man responsible.
Behold, I will corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your faces, even the dung of your solemn feasts; and one shall take you away with it [Mal. 2:3].
“Behold, I will corrupt your seed.” Apparently God had been blessing the people, and they had been getting abundant harvests at this time. You will remember that the priests were to be given the tithe of the crops—wheat, barley, figs, grapes—a tenth was given to the Lord to support the priests. Now God says that He will corrupt the seed out there so that they wouldn’t be getting the tithe that they had been getting. Their affluent society was about done with.
“And [I will] spread dung upon your faces.” The interesting thing was that all the maw of the sacrificial animal was given to the priests, but the dung in the maw was rejected and taken away. It could never be left in the sacrificial animal. Therefore, when God says that He will spread dung upon the faces of the priests, it is as if He is saying that He is going to rub their noses in it. And when that happens, they will not be able to serve at His altar. Why? Because no unclean thing can come there, and they will certainly be unclean! This is strong language that God is using here.
And ye shall know that I have sent this commandment unto you, that my covenant might be with Levi, saith the Lord of hosts.
My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him for the fear wherewith he feared me, and was afraid before my name.
The law of truth was in his mouth, and iniquity was not found in his lips: he walked with me in peace and equity, and did turn many away from iniquity [Mal. 2:4–6].
This tells us the reason that God chose the tribe of Levi. If we look at Levi, the son of Jacob, we would never choose him because he had nothing to commend himself to God. And when old Jacob was dying, he called his twelve sons to stand around his bedside, and he gave a prophecy concerning each of them, which we find in Genesis 49. He combined Simeon and Levi into one prophecy: “Simeon and Levi are brethren; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united: for in their anger they slew a man, and in their self will they digged down a wall.” They felt justified in doing it because their sister had been raped, but they were murderers. Jacob’s prophecy continues: “Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel: I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel” (Gen. 49:5–7).
How was God going to scatter Levi in Israel? They would become the priestly tribe. They didn’t get any territory of the land but were scattered among the tribes. But how could they become the priestly tribe when Levi himself was such a rascal and a murderer? We need to follow along in history to see why God chose the tribe of Levi.
Centuries later, when the children of Israel went into idolatry and made the golden calf to worship, Moses called for the idolaters to be slain. It was the tribe of Levi who did according to the word of Moses. When Moses was about to die, he gathered the tribes around him. The twelve sons of Jacob had become more than a million people who were gathered around Moses. Now Moses gives a prophecy to each of the tribes, and this is his blessing on Levi: “… Let thy Thummim and thy Urim be with thy holy one, whom thou didst prove at Massah, and with whom thou didst strive at the waters of Meribah; Who said unto his father and to his mother, I have not seen him; neither did he acknowledge his brethren, nor knew his own children: for they have observed thy word, and kept thy covenant. They shall teach Jacob thy judgments, and Israel thy law: they shall put incense before thee, and whole burnt sacrifice upon thine altar” (Deut. 33:8–10).
Notice that although Levi himself was a brutal murderer, the tribe that came from him observed the Word of God; they kept His covenant. And God made them the priestly tribe to teach the people of Israel the law of God and to offer prayers and sacrifices before Him—those sacrifices pointed to Christ. Therefore, “Bless, Lord, his substance, and accept the work of his hands: smite through the loins of them that rise against him, and of them that hate him, that they rise not again” (Deut. 33:11).
That is the covenant which God made with the tribe of Levi. He was to teach Israel, he was to serve at the place of prayer, the altar of incense, and he was to offer the burnt sacrifices which point to Christ. When we move forward in history to the time of Malachi and the remnant which had returned to the land of Israel after the Babylonian captivity, what is the tribe of Levi like now? Well, we have seen that he is willing to shut his eyes when a sick cow is brought as a sacrifice to God. He is despising the name of God, and he is disobeying God. Therefore, how can he teach God’s Word to the people? What a change has taken place! Even after the seventy-year captivity, Levi hasn’t learned the lesson. “My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him for the fear wherewith he feared me, and was afraid before my name.” God is saying through Malachi that Levi previously feared Him, but now the tribe doesn’t. “The law of truth was in his mouth.” He had taught the truth of God. But these priests are not only failing to teach the truth of God, they also are breaking the commandments of God. He continues, “The law of truth was in his mouth, and iniquity was not found in his lips: he walked with me in peace and equity, and did turn many away from iniquity.” He had been a good example, you see, to the people. What a change has taken place.
There is a real application in this for us today. No one can serve God without a reverence for His name. That means that Christ must be lifted up before the people. If Christ is lifted up, He will draw men to Himself. He is lifted up by our witness, and that must be by our lives as well as by our words. Our example is just as important as what we say.
For the priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth: for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts [Mal. 2:7].
The priests are to be messengers of the Lord of hosts. The word messenger, as I have pointed out before, is also translated “angel,” and in the Book of Revelation we find the Lord addressing the “angel” of the church of Ephesus, etc. To whom is He speaking? He is addressing the one who is the leader of the church, the one who is teaching the Word of God in the church.
Now let me sum this up by giving my interpretation of this—and you may not agree with it. I believe that the sole duty of the pastor of a church is to teach the Word of God. God have mercy on the church that expects its pastor to be the public relations man, running all over the countryside visiting sick babies and burping them, and expects him to spend his time in the administration of church affairs when he should be studying the Word of God and then teaching it to his people.
Once I had a telephone call from a man back East who was an officer in his church and was dissatisfied with his pastor. He said that his pastor spent his time studying instead of administering the affairs of the church. So I asked him, “Did you tell me that you are a deacon?”
“Yes.”
“Have you yourself been visiting the sick?”
“No, sir, I keep pretty busy.”
“Do you know that that is your business? You are to visit the sick. You are to take charge of the administration of the church. His business is to teach the Word of God. If he is not teaching the Word of God when he gets into the pulpit, that is another story. But if he is spending his time in studying and giving out God’s Word, then he is doing what God has called him to do.”
Remember that a situation like this confronted the apostles in the early church. The Hellenistic Jews were complaining that their widows were being neglected and preference was being given to the native-born widows. The matter was brought before the apostles, and they did a marvelous job of handling it. They told the church to appoint deacons to handle it. They said, “… It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables” (Acts 6:2).
Having completed my ministry in the church, I stand at a great vantage point today. I thank God that I have reached the place where I no longer have to burp babies and, although I have a little to do with administration, that is not how I spend my time. I am currently spending more time in the study of the Word than ever before, and I thank God for it. If I could relive my days as a pastor, I would spend more time studying the Word—some folk thought I spent too much time as it was. But I believe that studying the Word and teaching it is the pastor’s business.
God says that it was Levi’s business, but in Malachi’s day the priests were not doing it. Therefore, God says to the priests,
But ye are departed out of the way; ye have caused many to stumble at the law; ye have corrupted the covenant of Levi, saith the Lord of hosts.
Therefore have I also made you contemptible and base before all the people, according as ye have not kept my ways, but have been partial in the law [Mal. 2:8–9].
There was a time in our own land when ministers were listened to, but that day is past. God said this would happen when the ministry is not giving out His Word.
Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us? why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers? [Mal. 2:10].
“Have we not all one father?” There are some expositors who say that the “father” refers to Abraham since both Israel and Judah are mentioned in the verse that follows. However, I think that the next question makes it clear that Malachi is speaking about God as the Father: “Hath not one God created us?”
He also makes it clear in what way God is the Father. He is the Father by creation. But man lost that relationship. Adam was called the son of God, but after the Fall, he beg at a son in his own likeness—not in the likeness of God, but in the likeness of his own fallen nature. Therefore, when the nation Israel comes into view, we do not find God speaking specifically of any individual Israelite as His son. Rather, He speaks of the corporate body of the nation as a son. Never in the Old Testament does God refer to an individual as His son. Even of two men who were outstanding, Moses and David, it was “Moses my servant” and “David my servant.” Never does God say, “Moses my son” or “David my son.” Individuals become sons of God through faith in Jesus Christ. God is the Father of mankind in the sense that He is the Creator.
This is something that has been greatly emphasized in our contemporary society, and I think properly so. On a telecast I heard a man, who was definitely an unsaved man, play up the fact that we are all human beings and that we ought to show respect and consideration for one another. Well, that is true. As far as he went, he was entirely accurate. You are a human being and I am a human being, and I should accord to you the same rights and privileges and respect that I would like to have for my self “Have we not all one father? hath not one God created us?” We all are the creation of God.
“Why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers?” Now here they were, a chosen people, yet breaking God’s covenant and dealing treacherously one with the other. They were not right with God, and so they were not right with each other.
This is certainly true of man in our day. I personally have to say that there are a great many unsaved people that I wouldn’t trust. And, unfortunately, having been in the church most of my life, I have to say that there are a lot in the church whom I would not trust either. I have no confidence in them at all. Why? They deal treacherously. There is nothing that hurts the cause of Christ more than a church fight, conflicts in the church, and leaders who are at each other’s throats. Regardless of how evangelistic a church may be, its witness is nil when those conditions exist.
THE SINS OF DIVORCE AND REMARRIAGE
Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the Lord which he loved, and hath married the daughter of a strange god [Mal. 2:11].
He is very specific now: “Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem.” Now we know whom Malachi is talking about: “Judah” is the tribe of Judah, “Israel” includes all the twelve tribes, and “Jerusalem” is the capital.
“An abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem.” God is talking about how they profane the covenant of the fathers by dealing treacherously with one another. They are profaning the holiness of the Lord. God is holy, and God loves holiness. God doesn’t love sin; He hates sin. Now God will spell it out to them. He specifically tells them what He is talking about (see Gen. 6:1–7).
“And hath married the daughter of a strange [foreign] god.” The men saw the beautiful foreign girls who lived around them when they returned from the Captivity. So they were leaving their wives and marrying these foreign girls who served heathen, pagan deities, and brought idolatry into the nation.
We see this same thing all the way through the Word of God. I believe this is the situation in Genesis 6:1–7 where we are told that the sons of God were marrying the daughters of men. I certainly do not hold the view of some expositors that the “sons of God” were angels who were cohabiting with human women and producing some sort of monstrous offspring. Our Lord expressly said that angels do not marry (Matt. 22:30). Rather, this marks the beginning of the breaking down of the godly line of Seth as they intermarried with the ungodly line of Cain.
We see this happening again when the children of Israel were nearing the Promised Land. The king of Moab hired Balaam to curse Israel because the Moabites feared them. When God would not permit Balaam to curse them, he gave the king of Moab some very bad advice—bad for Israel. He said to let the daughters of Moab marry the sons of Israel. They did intermarry, and this brought the idolatry of Moab into Israel.
Again after the kingdom of Israel was divided, the idolatry of Phoenicia was introduced into the northern kingdom by the marriage of Ahab with Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, who was first an idolatrous priest, then king of Tyre and Sidon.
Now this was happening again in Malachi’s day. We learn from Nehemiah that there were all kinds of pagan people living around the returned remnant. A young Israelite would see some good-looking foreign girl and decide that he would like to have her for a wife. So he would get rid of his own Israelite wife and marry this pagan girl.
It is the same old story that is being reenacted in our day. I have been sounding a Warning here in Southern California since 1940, but the divorce rate keeps climbing. Nobody is paying any attention to me, but I’ll keep on saying that a believer and an unbeliever ought not to get married. Any girl or any boy who flies in the face of God’s very definite and specific instructions in this connection is just flirting with trouble. Believe me, problems will be coming their way. It cannot be otherwise.
The Lord will cut off the man that doeth this, the master and the scholar, out of the tabernacles of Jacob, and him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts [Mal. 2:12].
“The Lord will cut off the man that doeth this, the master and the scholar.” It doesn’t make any difference who he is, he will suffer the same judgment. “And him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts.” Neither will he escape if he goes through the temple ritual but continues to live in sin.
My friend, a true child of God will not continue to live in sin. That is the reason the prodigal son down there in the pigpen finally came to himself and said, “I will arise and go to my father …” (Luke 15:18). He was a son and not a pig. He had the nature of his father and could not continue to live as a pig.
I received a startling letter from a church, officer here in Southern California who asked for help because he “couldn’t give up the awful sin of adultery.” If he is a child of God, he will get out of the pigpen. Nothing but pigs love the pigpen and are satisfied to stay down there. A son will get out of it.
And this have ye done again, covering the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping, and with crying out, insomuch that he regardeth not the offering any more, or receiveth it with good will at your hand [Mal. 2:13].
The wives of these men who were divorcing them and marrying foreign girls came to the altar weeping. They shed their tears upon the altar, and God said, “I heard them. Then later you came along very piously and placed your offering upon the same altar on which were the tears of your wives! I want you to know that I paid no attention to your offering.”
The church officer who wrote me the letter (to which I referred earlier) may be the treasurer of the church or the head deacon. I can assure him that God is paying no attention to his “good works.” In fact, it would be better if he stayed at home and kept out of sight. God makes it very clear that He “regardeth not the offering any more, or receiveth it with good will at your hand.” He knows your hypocrisy and will not accept your service.
Now the men in Malachi’s day, with feigned innocence and pretended ignorance, ask why—
Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the Lord hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant [Mal. 2:14].
“Yet ye say, Wherefore?” God is offensive even to suggest that He wouldn’t accept their offering. The thought is that they were saying, “Why wouldn’t He accept it? I brought a very nice fat lamb to offer.” When they ask the question, Malachi spells out the answer for them in neon lights so they cannot misunderstand Him—
“Because the Lord hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously.” You see, the Israelite married a Hebrew girl when he was a young man. But when he grew older and moved among the pagan and heathen about him he decided that he wanted to marry a pagan girl with whom he had gotten acquainted.
“Yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.” His Hebrew wife was the one with whom he stood before the priest and covenanted to be faithful and true to her.
The next verse has always been a difficult passage to interpret, but it is my feeling that Dr. Charles Feinberg is accurate when in his book, The Minor Prophets, he says that the natural interpretation is that the prophet is speaking of divorce. And the reference is to the original institution of marriage by God Himself.
And did not he make one? Yet had he the residue of the spirit. And wherefore one? That he might seek a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth [Mal. 2:15].
“And did not he make one?” goes back to the original creation of man and woman. Adam was a half and Eve was a half, and together they made one. This is evident when a child is born—he is part of both parents. The two are certainly one in the child.
“Yet had he the residue of the spirit. And wherefore [why] one? That he might seek a godly seed.” You see, she is to be like he is—spiritually as well as physically for the sake of the family. A home where there is divorce or where there is polygamy is not a fit place in which to raise children.
My friend, if you are a young lady, you ought not marry that young man unless he believes as you do because, actually, you are supposed to go his way. And you are going to find the going rough if you are a child of God and he is not.
If you are a young man or a young woman, let me say this to you. If you think that you can win your sweetheart to Christ, make sure that you do it before your marriage because that is when you have the greatest influence. I tell you, a young fellow in love will do almost anything to please the girl he wants to marry. But after marriage he will not be so anxious to please her. And, of course, that holds true for a young woman in love also. If you don’t win your sweetheart to Christ before marriage, you are in trouble, and I mean deep trouble.
“Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.” Malachi is warning them to watch what they are doing. God had specifically forbidden His people to intermarry with the heathen.
You may remember that Nehemiah, after he had built the walls of Jerusalem, had returned to his job as the king’s cupbearer down in the capital of Media-Persia. But after he had been there for awhile, he got a vacation and came back to Jerusalem. He found that old Tobiah, an Ammonite, an enemy of God, had been moved into an apartment in the temple! The high priest had made this arrangement for him because his son had married the daughter of Tobiah. Do you know what Nehemiah did about it? He went over there and pitched out all of Tobiah’s belongings, even the furniture, and told him to take off. You may think that is pretty rough and certainly not very polite. No, it wasn’t polite, but it sure did cleanse the temple! As a matter of fact, Nehemiah was pretty rough with his own people whom he found had intermarried with the pagans of Ashdod, of Ammon, and of Moab. Nehemiah himself records his treatment of them: “And I contended with them, and cursed them, and smote certain of them, and plucked off their hair, and made them swear by God, saying, Ye shall not give your daughters unto their sons, nor take their daughters unto your sons, nor for yourselves” (Neh. 13:25). And he reminded them of the disaster which had come to their nation through intermarriage with the heathen. Oh, how we need laymen like Nehemiah in our day to stand for the Word of God!
For the Lord, the God of Israel, saith that he hateth putting away: for one covereth violence with his garment, saith the Lord of hosts: therefore take heed to your spirit, that ye deal not treacherously [Mal. 2:16].
In the Old Testament, when a man married a girl, he took his garment, his outer garment, and put it over her. This lovely custom was to signify that he was going to protect her.
This was the lovely thing which Boaz did to Ruth. Ruth was a widow and, according to the Mosaic Law, she had to claim Boaz as her kinsman-redeemer before he could act. He could not ask her to marry him; she had to claim him. So Naomi, acting like a regular matchmaker, sent Ruth down to the threshing floor. It was harvest time, and all the families were camped around the threshing floor. At night, to protect the grain, the men slept around it with their heads toward the heap of grain and their feet stuck out like spokes of a wheel. Ruth followed Naomi’s instructions and laid at the feet of Boaz. When he realized that someone was there and asked who it was, she replied, “… I am Ruth thine handmaid: spread therefore thy skirt over thine handmaid; for thou art a near kinsman” (Ruth 3:9). She was asking him to put his cloak over her, asking for his protection as her kinsmanredeemer—in other words, asking him to marry her. In marriage a man offers a woman his protection and his love. And she offers her devotion and her life to him. This is a beautiful picture of Christ’s relationship with believers.
In Malachi’s day the men of Israel were, dealing treacherously with their wives. They had covered them with their garments in marriage, but now they were covering their garment with violence. In other words, they had divorced their wives.
Notice that God says that He hates divorce—“the Lord, the God of Israel, saith that he hateth putting away”
God’s ideal for man from the very beginning was that there should be no divorce. We know that, because Jesus said that Moses allowed divorce because of the hardness of men’s hearts but that from the beginning it was not so. Then how was it at the beginning? “And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him” (Gen. 2:20). To begin with, we learn that among all the creation of God that was beneath man, none could take the place of what God would create for Adam, that is, a wife. God had created all other creatures by twos. Neither could man find a mate from the angels which were created above man. So man was pretty much alone. God let Adam give names to all the animals so that Adam would discover for himself that he was alone and that he needed somebody there with him. Only half of him had really been created at the beginning. He needed somebody like he was and yet different from him. He needed one who was a help “meet” of fit for him. He needed someone to be fitted to him. He was just a half, and he needed the other half to be put there so that together they could be one. That was the thing God had in mind. God created Adam first and allowed him time to realize that he needed someone else.
I really get provoked when I hear people talk as if sex is something that is bad. of course, the sex act outside of marriage is wrong. But after all, who was it that thought of sex? God is the One who thought of it and made it. He is the One who designed man and woman. He had in mind a marvelous arrangement when He created the sexes.
“And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof” (Gen. 2:21). Why did God do that? Why didn’t he take her from the ground as He had done with Adam? Because she was to be like Adam and yet different from him. She must come from man because man is not really a whole person. She was made from his side. This is not some foolish story. God wants to impress upon man that woman is part of man, that he is only half a man without a woman.
It has been said that God did not take Eve from Adam’s head so that she should be his superior. Neither did He take Eve from his foot to be his servant. He took Eve from Adam’s side to be his equal and to be his companion. She came from near his heart so that he would love her. She is to be his helper. Together they become one. One plus one equals one. That is God’s arithmetic, and that is accurate.
The Scripture knows nothing about this idea of either women’s lib or the other extreme, the inferiority of women. God put woman on a high plane. It is obvious to us already that the people in the days of Malachi had lost that vision. That is why God was reminding them, “When you sin against the wife of your youth, you are sinning against Me.” God protects the status of women.
“And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man” (Gen. 2:22). She must have been a beautiful creation. God brought her and gave her unto the man. Certainly God made that marriage. The institution of marriage was made in heaven. God’s intention was for marriage to be a blessing. God blessed it, and He intended for it to work for man’s benefit.
“And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man” (Gen. 2:23). What is woman? Adam was ish, and woman is ishshah. She is the other side or other half of the male. We call them male and female. She is “bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” She is called woman because she was taken out of man.
“Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Gen. 2:24). This excommunicates mothers-in-law and fathers-in-law. This removes them from the new family. I’m afraid a great many folk today do not get the light instruction about marriage. A marriage establishes a new creation. Papa and Mama are not a part of the new creation. The young couple has left them. And they, the man and wife, shall be one flesh.
“And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed” (Gen. 2:25). This was before sin had entered into the world. Neither one looked with lust upon the other because at that time they were innocent. They looked upon each other with tenderness and with love. There was a mutual respect. Each of them could truly say, “You are the one for me.” The creation of Eve made Adam a man, all man. The presence of Adam made Eve a woman, all woman.
Then sin entered into the world. It marred everything, including the relationship in marriage. When we get to the time of Moses and the Law, we find that divorce was permitted. This does not mean that it was God’s intention when He instituted marriage, but He permitted it, as Jesus said, because of the hardness of man’s heart. The Mosaic Law said this: “When a man hath taken a wife, and married her, and it come to pass that she find no favour in his eyes, because he hath found some uncleanness in her: then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house” (Deut. 24:1). “Uncleanness” in the bride infers that her husband found that she was not a virgin; then he could write her a bill of divorcement. She had deceived her husband by not being what she claimed to be. He had been “taken in” by her. Naturally, this would lead to trouble in the home, and lead to fighting later on.
By the time of the New Testament, the interpretation of “uncleanness” had become so broad that if a wife even burned the biscuits, that would be grounds for divorce. When Jesus was asked the question, “Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?” the rabbis were teaching that a wife could be divorced upon the slightest whim, which was certainly contrary to the intent of the Mosaic Law.
There were other specifies in this Mosaic Law: “And when she is departed out of his house, she may go and be another man’s wife. And if the latter husband hate her, and write her a bill of divorcement, and giveth it in her hand, and sendeth her out of his house; or if the latter husband die, which took her to be his wife; Her former husband, which sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife, after that she is defiled; for that is abomination before the Lord: and thou shalt not cause the land to sin, which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance” (Deut. 24:2–4). That would be progressive prostitution, and it would lead to the sort of thing we are seeing in our contemporary society, to people being married and divorced seven or eight times! To do that is absolutely to ridicule the marriage vow.
The problem that was prevalent in Israel at the time of Malachi is prevalent in our contemporary culture today. We have certainly changed our viewpoint on divorce in recent years in this country. I suppose that divorce is one of the most controversial subjects that any Bible teacher has to answer today because there is confusion as to what the Bible really says on that problem, and there is a great difference and wide diversion of interpretation. If I may use the colloquialism of the street—it is a hot potato. You cannot say that there are no grounds for divorce, although that was the unanimous decision of the church one hundred years ago—in spite of what the Word of God had to say.
The Lord Jesus made two things very clear on this subject of divorce: (1) Moses had permitted divorce because of the hardness of heart of the people; and (2) there is one clearcut basis for divorce—that is fornication, unfaithfulness on the part of either the man or the woman. Notice this record in Matthew’s Gospel: “The Pharisee also came unto him, tempting him, and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause? And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?” (Matt. 19:3–5).
As I mentioned before, Jesus goes back to the beginning, to the time of creation, when God instituted marriage. “Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. They say unto him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away? He saith unto them, Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so” (Matt. 19:6–8).
Then He sets down the one reason for which divorce is allowed: “And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery” (Matt. 19:9).
It is quite interesting how the disciples followed up that statement with a question: “His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry” (Matt. 19:10). In other words, “If it is really that strict, if there is one and only one reason for divorce, then it would be better not to get married at all.”
Then our Lord explained the liberty that we have: “But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given. For there are some eunuchs, which, were so born from their mother’s womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it” (Matt. 19:11–12). It is not necessary for everyone to get married. There are some men and some women who do not need to marry. By no means is it a sin to be single. Some folk simply do not need to get married—they are eunuchs from birth. Others are made eunuchs by man, such as Daniel in the court of Nebuchadnezzar. It was forced upon them and served the purpose of making captives more docile toward the king, and it also enabled them to devote more time to their studies. Then there are eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. There are men who have kept themselves eunuchs in order to serve the cause of Christ and the cause of the church. It is wonderful if a man or a woman feels able to do that. I have known several preachers who have never married. I thought I would do the same in my ministry and decided that I would be an old bachelor all my life. But I soon learned that bachelorhood wasn’t for me. This is an area in which God has given us great liberty. But the important thing is this: Christ said that if you do choose to get married, it is a lifelong commitment. The only ground for divorce is fornication by your mate.
In the days of the early church this matter of fornication arose in the Corinthian church. People of different religious backgrounds were in the church, and there were couples who had married when they were pagans, then one of the spouses became a Christian. What should be their relationship after one of them became converted? Paul addresses himself to this new situation: “And unto the married I comsmand, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband: But and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband: and let not the husband put away his wife” (1 Cor. 7:10–11). If a couple had been married when they were pagans and now one is converted to Christianity, the Christian is not to walk out on the marriage. If the believer departs, he is to remain unmarried or else be reconciled again.
“But to the rest speak I, not the Lord: If any brother hath a wife that believeth not, and she be pleased to dwell with him, let him not put her away. And the woman which hath an husband that believeth not, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him. For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy. But if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases: but God hath called us to peace” (1 Cor. 7:12–15). Although Jesus said that fornication was the only cause for divorce, the pagan member of a marriage may want to walk out on the marriage. After the partner becomes a believer, the pagan party may say, “I don’t like this arrangement. Things are different now from when I married you. I’m going to leave.” In such a case Paul says to let the unbeliever go. Whether the unbeliever goes out and gets married again or not, in this situation I assume it would mean that the believing husband or wife would be free to marry again.
When Paul said, “A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases,” what is the bondage? It is the marriage vows.
When he says, “God hath called us to peace,” I believe he is saying that God does not ask any man or woman to live in a hell at home. Never. If they find that they cannot get along together, that they fight like cats and dogs, I think that they ought to separate. On several occasions I have advised couples to separate—but neither of them is to remarry. Their problem is not divorce, it is marriage. They should not have married in the first place. God has called us to peace; therefore the home is not to be a boxing ring. It is not a place for karate; it is a place for love.
A home of love is God’s ideal for man. From the beginning God did not intend to have divorce, but, because of man’s sin, He permitted it. You may say, “Well, divorce is sinful.” Sure it is, and so is murder. But a murderer can be saved. In fact, one was dying on a cross next to Jesus, and he got saved. When Jesus Christ died on the cross, He died for all sins. The thief on the cross was both a thief and a murderer, and his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His shed blood saved him. A thief can be saved, and a divorced person can be saved, too. So let’s not put divorce in a special category all by itself. If an unsaved person has been a thief and then repents and gets saved by coming to Jesus Christ, he is forgiven for his thievery. We would permit such a man to get married. We would do the same for a murderer. Then let us be fair about divorce. There are people who get divorced before they are saved. When they come to the Lord Jesus Christ, they are forgiven for that sin. I think such a person is free to marry again, and I feel that this is implied in the Scriptures.
Now as an addendum to this important section on marriage and divorce, I would like to look at it from a little different viewpoint by including a message which I have entitled The Best Love (which is also available in booklet form).
THE BEST LOVE
There is an obsession with sex today that is positively frightening and absolutely alarming! You need only consult contemporary literature to recognize this. In a leading British paper some time ago, this statement was made: “Popular morality is now a wasteland, littered with the debris of broken convictions.” And it was Judge Barron of the Superior Court of Massachusetts who said, “At too many colleges today, sexual promiscuity among students is a dangerous and growing evil.” The Billy Graham paper, Decision, had an editorial (I suppose it was way back in 1964) on the church and the moral crisis in which there is this quotation: “So our young people go riding down the highroad to hell in an atmosphere that would make any self-respecting animal sick to its stomach, and no one thinks that matters are as bad as they seem.” That is a tremendous statement. An outstanding Christian writer in America says, “But where are the compelling external cries to match the inner voices of the soul which at times murmur darkly and other times shout clamorously that all is not well, that wayward feet are treading the way of wrath, the path of judgment?” Then he goes on to say, “The answer is not simply in passing more laws. It is to be found in regeneration by His Spirit, who alone can set men’s souls on fire with a divinely sent thirst for greater purity, both for the individual and for the body politic. Apart from such spiritual burning and purging, men sink beneath the weight and corruption of their own sin.” These quotations go back to about 1965. But there are other voices being lifted in alarm.
Yet all about us are the advocates of this erotic cult that falsely claim that all of this emphasis on sex is a signal of a new, broadminded and enlightened era. The facts are that there is nothing new about it. Furthermore, it does not mark the entrance upon abundant living. On the contrary, it has characterized the demise of all decadent and decaying civilizations—Egypt, Babylon, Greece, and Rome to name but a few. The sex symbol marks the decline and fall of many a great and noble people. It is part of the death rattle of a fading nation. The French Revolution marked the departure of the glory of France, and it was during that time that a prostitute was placed on an altar and worshiped.
The excuse for paying this abnormal attention to the subject, given by these purveyors of filth and licentiousness, is that a blue-nosed generation of the past put the lid down on it. The false charge is made that the Bible and the church have frowned upon the subject of sex until it is taboo today and can only be whispered of in secret. They go on to place the blame for present-day marriage failures and the increase in divorce on the gross ignorance of young people. “If only they knew more about this fascinating subject,” they counsel, “there would be success in marriage.” It is true that the Puritans were blue-nosed, and they probably were a little extreme. I would certainly agree with that, and I would not want to go back to that period. But the tragedy of it is that this present generation hasn’t found the solution either. After all, the Bible doesn’t go with either crowd. I do not think that the Puritans had a Bible basis for their beliefs in this area. Who was it that thought of sex? This crowd in Hollywood thinks they originated it. God is the One who started all of this, my friend, and He wanted it put on a holy basis.
This modern crowd also plays upon the fact that we Americans do not like censorship, and therefore they should be free to say and publish what they choose. Well, these modern Pied Pipers of Hamelin are leading the younger generation into a moral morass of debauchery with dirty sex books and pornographic literature. They give the impression that you must be knowledgeable of this lascivious and salacious propaganda in order to be sophisticated and suave and sharp. The bible of this group is Playboy magazine. These filthy dreamers have flooded the marketplace and the schoolroom today with this smut and depravity—so much so that a modern father said, “It is not how much shall I tell my son, but how much does he know that I don’t know!” In spite of all this new emphasis on sex, the divorce courts continue to grind out their monotonous story of the tragedy of modern marriage in ever increasing numbers.
Now a knowledge of the physical may have its place in preparation for a happy marriage, but it is inadequate per se to make a happy home, and it gives a perverted and abnormal emphasis which does not belong there. As Dan Bennett said, “One of the troubles with the world is that people mistake sex for love, money for brains, and transistor radios for civilization.” That is the problem of the hour.
The Word of God treats the subject of sex with boldness, frankness, and directness. It is not handled as a dirty subject, and it is not taboo nor theoretical, but it is plain and theological. The Bible is straightforward, and it deals with it in high and lofty language. This is the reason we are spending time on this subject here in Malachi. God lays it on the line to these people that this is part of the reason they went into captivity, and it is part of the reason they have been scattered. I think it is time that God is heard. I feel that the pulpit is long overdue in presenting what God has to say on this subject, but it should be kept on the right plane.
In the very beginning it was God who created them male and female. It was God who brought the woman to the man. And I would like to add this: He did not need to give Adam a lecture on the birds and bees. God blessed them, and marriage became sacred and holy and pure. And, my friend, it is the only relationship among men and women that God does bless down here—He promises to bless no other. He says that if marriage is made according to His plan, He will bless it, and there will be happiness.
God wants His children to be happily married. He has a plan and purpose for every one of us if we would only listen to Him. The Lord Jesus says to the church at Ephesus, “Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love” (Rev. 2:4). Yet the church in Ephesus is the church at its best. The church has never been on a higher spiritual level since then. It is difficult for us in this cold day of apostasy to conceive of the lofty plane to which the Holy Spirit had brought the early church in its personal relationship to Christ. The believers in the early church were in love with Christ. They loved Him! And five million of them sealed that love with their own blood by dying as martyrs for Him.
I would like to make a couple of changes in the translation of Revelation 2:4. The word for “first love” is protan in the Greek. It means actually the “best.” It is the same word our Lord used in the parable of the prodigal son where the father put on the son the protan robe—that is, the “best” robe. And to the Ephesian believers Christ is talking about the best love. To this church on its high plane, into which a coolness was creeping, Christ says, “Nevertheless I have against thee that thou art leaving [not had left] the best love.”
Salvation is a love affair. The question that the Lord asks all of us is, “Do you love Me?” He is not asking, “Are you going to be faithful?” or, “Are you going to the mission field?” He is not asking “How much are you going to give?” or, “How much are you going to do?” He is asking “Do you love Me?” Then He will tell you that you are to obey Him and that there will be something for you to do. The apostle John put it like this: “We love him, because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). The second book I ever wrote was on the little Book of Ruth. My reason for writing it was to show that redemption is a romance. God took the lives of two ordinary people, a very strong and virile man and a very beautiful and noble woman, and He told their love story. In that story God revealed to man His great love for him. It was a way to get this amazing fact through to us: Salvation is a love affair.
In Christ’s last letter to the Ephesian church in the Book of the Revelation, He sounds a warning. We do not quite understand this. But I go back thirty or forty years to His first letter to these believers, written through Paul. We call it the Epistle of Paul to the Ephesians. In this epistle He discussed this matter of marital love and compared it to the love of Christ for the church. This has been one of the most misunderstood passages in the Word of God. Listen: “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord” (Eph. 5:22). There has been natural resentment against this on the part of some, especially very dominant women, for many years. And the women’s liberation movement would oppose it. But to resent this is to miss the meaning that is here. Submission is actually for the purpose of headship in the home. It is not a question of one lording it over the other; it is headship for the purpose of bringing order into the home.
But in addition to this it reveals something else that is quite wonderful. He says, “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body” (Eph. 5:23). The analogy, you see, is to Christ and the church. Christian marriage down here, if it is made under the Lord, is a miniature of the relationship of Christ and the church. Christian marriage is an adumbration of that wonderful relationship between Christ and the believer. Christian marriage and the relationship of Christ and the church are sacred.
Now will you listen to me very carefully. The physical act of marriage is sacred. It is a religious ritual. It is a sacrament. I do not mean a sacrament made by a church, nor is it made by a man-made ceremony. But it is a sacrament that is made by God Himself, one which He sanctifies, and He says that this relationship is to reveal to you the love of Christ for your soul. Therefore, the woman is to see in a man one to whom she can yield herself in glorious abandonment. She can give herself wholly and completely and find perfect fulfillment and satisfaction in this man, because this is the man for her.
She delights in her husband, in his person, his character, his affection; to her he is not only the chief and foremost of mankind, but in her eyes he is all in all. Her heart’s love belongs to him, and to him only. He is her little world, her Paradise, her choice treasure. She is glad to sink her individuality in his. She seeks no renown for herself; his honor is reflected upon her, and she rejoices in it. She will defend his name with her dying breath; safe enough is he where she can speak of him. His smiling gratitude is all the reward she seeks. Even in her dress she thinks of him and considers nothing beautiful which is distasteful to him. He has many objects in life, some of which she does not quite understand; but she believes in them all, and anything she can do to promote them she delights to perform …. Such a wife, as a true spouse, realizes the model marriage relation and sets forth what our oneness with the Lord ought to be (Richard Ellsworth Day, The Shadow of the Broad Brim, p. 104).
My beloved, that is a marvelous picture of the wife in a real Christian marriage. The man is to see in the woman one he can worship. Someone says, “Do you mean worship?” I mean exactly that. What does worship mean? You will find that worship is respect that is paid to worth. If you go back and read the old marriage ceremonies, you will find that the bridegroom always said, “I with my body worship you.” That is, he sees in her everything that is worthwhile. He must love her so much that he is willing to die for her.
Now the Bible is very expressive, and I do not know why we should be so reluctant to speak as plainly. If you turn back to the Song of Solomon, you will see the picture of the bridegroom and what he thinks of his bride: “Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee …. As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters” (Song 4:7, 2:2). That is rather expressive, is it not? That is what the bridegroom says. Now hear the words of the bride: “My beloved is mine, and I am his: he feedeth among the lilies” (Song 2:16). You do not go any higher than that! In that moment of supreme and sweet ecstasy, either the wife will carry him to the skies or plunge him down to the depths of hell. Either the husband will place her on a pedestal and say, “I worship you because I find no spot in you,” or else he will treat her with brutality. When the latter happens, he will kill her love, and she will hate him and become cold and frigid. In counseling we find that this is one reason that a great many marriages are breaking up.
Bacteriologist Rene Dubos of the Rockefeller Institute has made this statement, “Aimlessness and lack of fulfillment constitute the most common cause of organic and mental disease in the Western world.” This is breaking up many a marriage. A wife becomes dissatisfied and frustrated. She becomes nervous, neurotic, and nagging. And the husband settles down to a life of mediocrity. He becomes lonely and either develops into a henpecked Mr. Milquetoast or a domineering brute. You will find both in our society.
Now let me ask a question, and this is rather personal: Are you the kind of woman that a man would die for? I am going to be very frank. If you are just one of these little beetle-brains who is merely a sex kitten making eyes at every boy that comes along, although you may have a hairdo like a Navy balloon that is ready to make an ascension on the poop deck of a destroyer, you will never be the kind of woman that a man would die for. If you do not have beauty of character, if you do not have nobility of soul, you will be but a flame without heat, a rainbow without color, and a flower without perfume. The Word of God deals with that outward adorning—and do not misunderstand, the Bible does not militate against it. All of us ought to look the best we can—some of us have our problems, but we should do the best we can with what we have. God intends us to enhance the beauty He has given us. There is no reason for any woman not to dress in style. But God puts the emphasis, not on the outward adorning, but on the meek and quiet spirit, the inward adorning, which is with God of great price. “Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price” (1 Pet. 3:3–4).
Now, young man, are you the kind of man that a woman would follow to the ends of the earth? You may look like a model for Hart, Schaffner and Marx but have no purpose, no ambition, no heart for serving God as a Christian, no capacity for great and deep things, no vision at all. If you are that kind, a woman will not follow you very far. She may go with you down to get the marriage license, but she also will be going down to get the divorce later on.
All across our West there are monuments erected to the pioneer wife and mother. I noticed one as I was traveling through Colorado. She is a fine-looking woman, crowned with a sunbonnet, the children about her holding on to her long, flowing dress. You know she did not go to the psychiatrist or the marriage counselor. Do you know why she never had to go to the preacher to talk about her marriage breaking up? Because one day a man came to her and said, “I am going West to build a career and home. Will you follow me?” She said, “I will.” And she learned that this man would stand between her and danger; she had many experiences when he protected her from the menacing Indians of that day. She had no problems about whether he loved her or not. And he did not doubt her loyalty. They loved each other. These are the kind of people who built our country. It is the other element that is tearing it to pieces—my lovely country—how I hate to see it happening.
I know that someone is saying right now, “Preacher, I am not that kind of person. I’m no hero.” Young man, God never said that every girl would fall in love with you. Ninety-nine women may pass you by and see in you only the boy next door who uses that greasy kid stuff. That’s all. But let me say to you very seriously, one of these days there will come by a woman who will see in you the knight in shining armor. It is God who gives that highly charged chemistry between a certain man and a certain woman.
A young woman may be saying, “But I’m not beautiful of face or figure.” May I say this to you, God never said that you would attract every male—only animals do that. Ninety-nine men will pass you by and see in you no more than what Kipling described as “a rag, a bone and a hank of hair.” But one of these days there will come by a man who will love you if you are the right kind of person. You will become his inspiration. You may inspire him to greatness—to write a book, to compose a masterpiece of poetry or music, to paint a picture, or even to preach a sermon. If you are his inspiration, do not ignore him, do not run from him. God may have sent you together for that very purpose. There will come that one.
Perhaps you are thinking, “Preacher, you are in the realm of theory. What you are talking about is idealistic. It sounds good in a storybook, but it does not happen in life.” You are wrong. It does happen.
I think of the story of Matthew Henry. I’m sitting right now in my office looking at a set of books called Matthew Henry’s Commentary. If anyone ever wrote a musty commentary, Matthew Henry did. Although a great work, it is to me the most boring thing I have ever read. I never knew that fellow was romantic at any time in his life. But when he came to London as a young man, he met a very wealthy girl of the nobility. He fell in love with her, and she loved him. Finally she went to her father to tell him about it. The father, trying to discourage her, said, “Why, that young man has no background. You do not even know where he came from!” She answered, “You are right. I do not know where he came from, but I know where he is going, and I want to go with him.” She went.
Nathaniel Hawthorne was merely a clerk that anybody would have passed by, working at the customs in New York City—until he was fired for inefficiency. He came home and sank into a chair, discouraged and defeated. His wife came behind him, placed before him pen and paper, and putting her arm about him, said, “Now, Nathaniel, you can do what you always wanted to do—you can write.” He wrote The House of Seven Gables, The Scarlet Letter, and other enduring literature—because a wife was his inspiration. Theirs was an eternal love. “In one of her last letters the widow of Nathaniel Hawthorne penned this ineradicable hope, which became an anchor of comfort in her soul’s sorrow: ‘I have an eternity, thank God, in which to know him more and more, or I should die in despair’” (Walter A. Maier, For Better Not For Worse, p. 556).
You say I am talking about theory? I am talking about fact. Let us go back to the very beginning. Consider Adam and Eve. That was a romance! Listen to this: “So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. [She is the other part of you. She’s you.] For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church: For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh” (Eph. 5:28–31).
Eve was created to be a helpmeet—a help that fit—for Adam. The language is tremendous. She was taken from his side, not molded from the ground as were the animals, but taken from a part of him so that he actually was incomplete until they were together. God fashioned her the loveliest thing in His creation, and He brought her to Adam. She was a helpmeet; she compensated for what he lacked, for he was not complete in himself. She was made for him, and they became one.
“And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Gen. 2:23–24).
Let me move down in history. I want to take a story that always has thrilled me. It is the story of Abelard and Heloise. When John Lord wrote his Great Women, he used Heloise as the example of love, marital love. The story concerns a young ecclesiastic by the name of Abelard. He was a brilliant young teacher and preacher in what became the University of Paris. The canon there had a niece by the name of Heloise whom he sent to be under Abelard’s instruction. She was a remarkable woman; he was a remarkable man. You know the story—they fell madly in love. But according to the awful practice of that day—and this day as well—the marriage of a priest was deemed a lasting disgrace. When John Lord wrote their story, he gave this introduction, which I would like to share with you. It is almost too beautiful to read in this day. It is like a dew-drenched breeze blowing from a flower-strewn mountain meadow over the slop bucket and pigsty of our contemporary literature. Here is what he wrote:
When Adam and Eve were expelled from Paradise, they yet found one flower, wherever they wandered, blooming in perpetual beauty. This flower represents a great certitude, without which few would be happy,—subtle, mysterious, inexplicable,—a great boon recognized alike by poets and moralists, Pagan and Christian; yea, identified not only with happiness, but human existence, and pertaining to the soul in its highest aspirations. Allied with the transient and the mortal, even with the weak and corrupt, it is yet immortal in its nature and lofty in its aims,—at once a passion, a sentiment, and an inspiration.
To attempt to describe woman without this element of our complex nature, which constitutes her peculiar fascination, is like trying to act the tragedy of Hamlet without Hamlet himself,—an absurdity; a picture without a central figure, a novel without a heroine, a religion without a sacrifice. My subject is not without its difficulties. The passion or sentiment is degrading when perverted, it is exalting when pure. Yet it is not vice I would paint, but virtue; not weakness, but strength; not the transient, but the permanent; not the mortal, but the immortal,—all that is ennobling in the aspiring soul [John Lord, Beacon Lights of History, pp. 23–24].
Abelard and Heloise, having fallen in love, were not permitted by the church to marry. Therefore, they were married secretly by a friend of Abelard. He continued to teach. But the secret came out when a servant betrayed them, and she was forced into a nunnery. She was never permitted to visit him, and he was never permitted to visit her. Abelard was probably the boldest thinker whom the Middle Ages produced. At the beginning of the twelfth century, he began to preach and teach that the Word of God was man’s authority, not the church. This man, a great man, became bitter and sarcastic in his teaching because of what had been denied him. When he was on his deathbed, for he died a great while before Heloise, being twenty years her senior, he asked that she be permitted to come to see him. The church did the cruelest thing of all—they would not allow her to come. Therefore he penned her a letter. To me it is the most pathetic thing I have ever read. He concludes it with this prayer:
When it pleased Thee O Lord, and as it pleased Thee, Thou didst join us, and Thou didst separate us. Now what Thou hast so mercifully begun, mercifully complete; and after separating us in this world, join us together eternally in heaven.
It is my personal belief that in God’s heaven they are together.
This brings us to a tremendous verse. Malachi has concluded the section on social sins which relate to the family and divorce. They were sins which were like a cancer gnawing at the vitals of the nation. And they will destroy any nation—ours will not be an exception, I am sure.
Ye have wearied the Lord with your words. Yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied him? When ye say, Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delighteth in them; or, Where is the God of judgment? [Mal. 2:17].
“Ye have wearied the Lord with your words.” I can’t help but laugh at that. God says, “I’m so tired of those long, pious prayers that you say. And I am so tired of your testimonies. You really make Me weary.” You remember that back in the first chapter they had said of their perfunctory service to God, “Behold, what a weariness is it.” God says, “You don’t know the half of it. You bore Me to tears by your hypocritical service.”
“Yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied him?” We see again the feigned injured innocence of these people. They are offended that God would dare say this of them—they are entirely ignorant of their sins. They ask, “In what way have we wearied Him?”
Note that this is the fifth sarcastic question of the people to God’s charge of their phony and pseudo worship. Contemptuously and impudently, they contradict God—“In what way have we wearied Him?”
Well, God has an answer for them. He lays it on the line and tells it to them like it is: “When ye say, Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delighteth in them; or, Where is the God of judgment [justice]?” They are maligning the character of God.
This is a philosophy that arises rather frequently in the history of mankind. Man says, “Look, I see men who are big sinners and yet they are prosperous. They don’t seem to have problems or trouble like I have—yet I am trying to serve the Lord. Why does God permit that sort of thing?”
The psalmist expresses this same complaint. He saw folk about him who were getting by with evil and not serving God at all. Yet they were the ones who seemed to prosper the most. He wrote: “But as for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had well nigh slipped. For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity of the wicked” (Ps. 73:2–3). As he looked around, he saw the rascals getting richer and richer while the poor got poorer and poorer. And the poor saints of God were the ones who were not prospering at all.
This was exactly the complaint of the people in Malachi’s day. And that attitude produces very quickly a “new morality.” When they feel that “every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord,” they begin to call evil good and good evil. It pays to do evil.
We have much the same attitude in our day. Most people would say that crime does pay. People get by with as much as they possibly can. This applies to the big corporations as well as to the average man. The government spends our money without any kind of responsibility to the people. The lackadaisical attitude in Washington is one of the real problems in the world today. The politicians try to curry favor with the rich and please the powerful. The little man is stepped on, and nobody cares. Why doesn’t God do something about it?
The psalmist got his answer to this problem because he went to God. “Until I went into the sanctuary of God; then understood I their end” (Ps. 73:17). You see, he had been looking at the immediate present. But how about the far-off future? What about their eternal state? From where you and I stand, their little day is ancient history, but way back then they made their decision for eternity. And for our generation time is slipping through the shuttle fast, let me tell you. So what about the godless today? Well, they can build a “new morality,” they can accumulate as much money as they can, but those who do evil today will face the Judge tomorrow. They are going to have to answer to Him. We need to be very careful about sitting in judgment upon the apparent inaction of God in our contemporary society.
This reminds me of an incident when two of us seminary students were traveling together and picked up a hitchhiker who reeked of alcohol. He smelled like a still that had just come out of the Kentucky hills. He apologized for it and said that he knew he shouldn’t drink. We witnessed to him of Christ, and my friend said something that was startling to me at that time, but I certainly concur with it now. He said to him, “We’re not condemning you for getting drunk. You are a lost man on the way to hell; so you had better squeeze this life like an orange and get all you can of its juice while you’re here. You won’t have this liquor when you get over there. Go ahead and live it up. But you are moving into eternity. Did you ever stop to think about that?”
Any unsaved person who is familiar with the Word of God knows that he is a sinner and that there is a God of justice. But don’t expect God to move in judgment immediately.
When I was a kid in southern Oklahoma, we used to swipe watermelons. I am honest with you when I say that every time I went into the watermelon patch to swipe a watermelon, I thought that there would be lightning out of heaven that would strike me dead. But I was going to steal those watermelons regardless! That is the willfulness of the human heart—even of a little boy.
However, the Lord doesn’t operate quite like that, although He may do so. Because God does not always judge immediately, man interprets this to mean that God will not judge him at all. “Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil” (Eccl. 8:11). If a man gets by with it once, he will figure that he can just keep on getting by with it.
The people in Malachi’s day asked, “Where is the God of justice?” Well, God will give them His answer in the following chapter.
CHAPTER 3
Theme: The prediction of the two messengers; the people rebuked for religious sins
Chapter 3 opens with God’s answer to the question raised by the people of Israel at the end of the previous chapter.
Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 3:1].
Here in one verse we have two messengers. The first messenger who is to go before and to prepare the way is John the Baptist. The second is “the messenger of the covenant,” the Lord Jesus Christ.
The prophecy concerning the first messenger is quoted in all four of the Gospels as applying to John the Baptist; there is no guesswork here. However, the messenger of the covenant is never quoted anywhere in the Gospels, and the reason is obvious. This messenger of the covenant is the Lord Jesus, but this passage hasn’t anything to do with His first coming. This is His coming not in grace, not as a Redeemer, but as a Judge, as the One who will establish His kingdom and put down the rebellion that is on this earth. You remember that on one occasion He even said to a man, “… who made me a judge or a divider over you?” (Luke 12:14). He hasn’t come yet to judge. He came the first time to save. He came to bring grace, not government. He came as the One who is the Savior, not the Sovereign.
I would like to turn now to the Gospel passages which quote this verse in reference to John the Baptist. The first one is in Matthew 11:9–10: “But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet. For this is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.” Over in Mark’s Gospel we find: “As it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee” (Mark 1:2). Then in the Gospel of Luke we read, “This is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee” (Luke 7:27). Finally, John 1:23 records, “He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias.” This is a direct quote from Isaiah, but we can see that Malachi also had this to say about John the Baptist.
Therefore, this is God’s answer to the people of Israel: God will send Him first as a Savior because He is gracious and He wants to save. But that doesn’t end it all: He is coming again as the messenger of the covenant, that is, to execute justice and judgment on this earth.
If you could convince me that God does not intend to judge sin and that He intends to let sinners get by with their injustice today, then I say very frankly that I would turn my back on Him. But He’s made it very clear that He does intend to judge mankind. My friend, if you will not have Him as your Savior, you’re, going to have Him as your Judge whether you like it or not. He said, “For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John 5:22). And in the Book of Revelation, we see a Great White Throne upon which He is seated. And those who are the lost—both rich and poor, high and low, great and small—are going to stand before it. It does not matter who you are, you are not going to get by with sin, my friend.
When it says “the messenger of the covenant,” we need to understand which covenant is meant. A great many have thought that it is the New Covenant in the New Testament. Actually, this has no reference to the first coming of Christ but rather to the covenant which God has made with the people of Israel. This covenant is expressed in several places in the Scriptures. For instance, in Leviticus 26:9–13 we read: “For I will have respect unto you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, and establish my covenant with you. And ye shall eat old store, and bring forth the old because of the new. And I will set my tabernacle among you: and my soul shall not abhor you. And I will walk among you, and will be your God, and ye shall be my people. I am the Lord your God, which brought you forth out of the land of Egypt, that ye should not be their bondmen; and I have broken the bands of your yoke, and made you go upright.”
This is the covenant which God made with the children of Israel. You will find that He confirmed it in Deuteronomy, as the Book of Deuteronomy is a confirmation of the Mosaic Law and the Israelites’ experience with it after forty years. Deuteronomy 4:23 says, “Take heed unto yourselves, lest ye forget the covenant of the Lord your God, which he made with you, and make you a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, which the Lord thy God hath forbidden thee.” Of course, Israel had done the very thing which He had forbidden, turning even to the occult.
Therefore, Malachi tells us that the messenger of the covenant is coming someday to make good this covenant. God will dwell in their midst, and this is the reason we will also find in these first verses of Malachi 3 the cleansing and the purifying that will take place. God will not walk among them unless they are obedient unto Him, unless He has cleansed them and purified them. This is true, of course, of any Christian work today as well.
“The Lord, whom ye seek.” This will be the Lord Jesus Christ, who is God manifest in the flesh.
“Shall suddenly come to his temple.” This does not mean that He will soon come to His temple, but that when He comes it will be suddenly. A man once said to me, “You talk about the Rapture in which the Lord will take the church out of the world. Well, when that takes place and He removes the church and I see them leaving, then I’m going to accept Christ.” But I said, “It will be too late then because the reason that He’s taking the church out is that it is completed. So you would not be able then to be a part of the church. You could accept Christ and go through the Great Tribulation, but I think you’re a fool to wait until then.”
He is called the Lord, this is His temple, and He’s the messenger of the covenant—so we know this is the Lord Jesus Christ. The One whom we know in the New Testament as the Lord Jesus Christ is the angel of the covenant in the Old Testament.
But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner’s fire, and like fullers’ soap [Mal. 3:2].
We know that Malachi refers to the second coming of Christ because it is judgment that is in view here. Note the expression: “But who may abide the day of his coming?” This is the second coming of Christ.
“And who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner’s fire.” In the refining process, the metal is put over red-hot fire, and as it begins to melt, the dross can be drawn off, and the metal is finally made pure.
“And like fullers’ soap.” He intends to purify, and He intends to clean. Purify and clean—there’s not going to be any pollution when He establishes the Millennium on this earth.
And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness [Mal. 3:3].
“And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi.” He is going to cleanse those who enter the Millennium.
“And purge them as gold and silver.” There are two processes: cleansing and purifying. Cleansing is the use of soap as it is expressed here. And the fire is used for testing—this is another way which God has of purifying us and testing us.
Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord, as in the days of old, and as in former years [Mal. 3:4].
“Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord.” The Lord will take a great delight in their sacrifice because the ones who are offering it are now cleansed and purified. God is not interested in your going through rituals until your heart is right, until you have forsaken your sin and turned from it. You can get into sin, but if you stay in it, God is not accepting your religion at all.
“As in the days of old, and as in former years.” In the time of Solomon, there was a period in which Israel served God in such a way that they witnessed to the entire world.
And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 3:5].
“And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers.” Again, through these mixed marriages, through marrying heathen and pagan women who worshiped idols, their sorcery, the occult, and demon worship were brought in.
And in order to fill the great spiritual vacuum that is in our country, multitudes are turning to the occult today. This is the reason the movie The Exorcist was so popular. What a reflection this is on the church which certainly has failed to fill that void.
“And against the adulterers.” This is a reference to those who had made the mixed marriages by divorcing their wives and marrying these foreign heathen women.
“And against false swearers”—that is, liars.
“And against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts.” In other words, the people were not witnessing for God. The stranger in that day, to whom they should have witnessed, actually turned from God because of the way he was treated by God’s people.
For I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed. [Mal. 3:6].
God is a God of judgment, but He is also gracious. The reason that they had not been absolutely obliterated like the Edomites was because of His grace; it was because God is gracious. And He is still gracious because He never changes. Thank God for that. God today is still a God of judgment—that is a terror to the wicked. But He’s also a God who never changes in reference to His grace—and that is a comfort to anyone who will accept the grace of God.
We come now to the sixth of these very smart-alecky retorts which these people give to God. There are eight of them in the book; we’ve seen five of them, and now we’ve come to the sixth. These people are, as it were, putting God on a quiz program. God makes a statement, and they ask Him to prove it. God brings eight incriminating accusations against the nation, and they counter by asking eight very impertinent and presumptuous questions. God answers them politely but emphatically. He is attempting to detour them from the destruction to which they are headed.
To interpret these questions it might be well to pause here again to consider the generation who asked them. After the people of Israel had been in captivity for seventy years, a remnant returned to the land. Reluctantly and halfheartedly, they set about restoring the city and rebuilding the temple. They had known the rigors and suffering of slavery. Like their fathers in the brickyards of Egypt, they had certainly been groaning. And even upon returning, they endured hardships, severe persecutions, and discouragements. Believe me, they thought that when they returned everything would be happy and nice and easy for them—but that was not the case. These were God’s methods of discipline; it was a form of correction, but it did not have the desired effect. Discipline will either soften or harden you, and these people became hardened and embittered under the yoke which galled them. They became as hard as nails. They were like a prison inmate who has been released but not reformed. They had come out of slavery but apparently had not learned the lesson.
Actually, there is not much more that God could have done for them. Even God exhausted His infinite arsenal of correction. It was out of the soil of this generation that there grew up the poisonous plant of the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the scribes who were in existence at the time when the Lord Jesus came four hundred years later. What was a pimple of rebellion against God in the time of Malachi, just a scratch on the surface of the nation, became at the time of the Lord Jesus an internal cancer.
God tried to stem the spread of the virus, to cauterize it, and He brought these eight charges against them. Their response reveals their attitude. They pled not guilty to every one of them, and they expressed surprise that God would even suspect them. They affected an injured innocence. They feigned hurt feelings. They assumed ignorance. They played the part of being highly offended, and with a wave of the hand, they dismissed the charges as unworthy of them.
This now is the sixth sarcastic question that the people give to God’s penetrating charge. God is now going to call on the people to do something—
Even from the days of your fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them. Return unto me, and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. But ye said, Wherein shall we return? [Mal. 3:7].
Oh, what smart alecks they were! They say to God, “You say that we should return to You. We didn’t know that we had gone away. We’ve been going up to the temple to all the services. We tithe to a certain extent. We’re doing this, that, and the other thing, but how can we return when we haven’t even left You?” They were actually so far gone that they did not realize their true condition.
I would say that this is pretty much the picture of a great many folk in the church today. Ritualism has been substituted for reality. Pageantry has been substituted for power. The aesthetic has been substituted for the spiritual, and form for feeling. Even in the orthodox, conservative, and evangelical circles, they know the vocabulary, but the power of God is gone. They are satisfied with a tasteless morality, they follow a few little shibboleths, and they feel that everything is all right.
But God says, “Return! You’ve departed from Me.” What does He mean by returning to Him? He means to repent. To repent is to return to Him. God has said only to those who are His people, “Repent. Return to Me.” You see, the unbeliever can’t quite fulfill the song which says, “Lord, I’m coming home.” The unbeliever hasn’t even been home; he doesn’t even have a home. The prodigal son had to leave a home before he could come back to his home. He was a son all the time. But he left home, and he had to repent and to change his mind. This is what repentance actually means.
We do not get the full meaning of repentance until we come to the New Testament. Metanoia, the Greek word, means “to change your mind.” It means to be walking in one direction, you find out you’re going the wrong way, and then you turn right around and go the opposite way. The other day Mrs. McGee and I drove over to Glendale, which is a city right next to Pasadena here in Southern California. We asked for directions for getting to a certain place, and a girl gave us the wrong directions. She said, “Turn left,” but when we turned left, we ran right up to the side of a mountain. I said to Mrs. McGee, “I think the girl told us wrong.” So what did we do? We turned around. We had to return back to where we had turned off, and then we went the other direction and found that the other direction was the right direction. When I turned around, it was because I had found out I was wrong and I wanted to go the right way—that’s repentance.
Now God speaks to His own about repentance. The interesting thing is that in the New Testament it is always believers to whom God says, “Repent.” It is to those who are supposed to have been His children that He says, “Repent.” In the Book of Revelation God had a message for each of the seven churches. To five of those churches God said, “Repent,” but to the martyr church of Smyrna He didn’t say that. They were dying for Him, and therefore He wouldn’t say that. And to the church of Philadelphia, which was holding to the Word of God, He did not say, “Repent.” But to all the rest of them, including the church at Laodicea, His message to the churches is to repent.
We have the notion today of telling the unsaved that they are to repent. Well, what are they to repent of? Do they need to change their direction? Yes, but repentance is not the message to be given to the unsaved. It is my feeling that the message of repentance is being given over the heads of believers to unbelievers, and it is falling on deaf ears, naturally. The people to whom it should be given are sitting right down in front. Believers are the ones to whom you should say, “Repent.”
Somebody says, “Do you mean that the unsaved person who comes to Christ should not repent?” My friend, all the repentance that he is asked to do is in the word believe. Consider Paul’s message to the Thessalonians. Paul had a very marvelous ministry there, and he said, “For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God” (1 Thess. 1:9). When Paul went into the city of Thessalonica, he did not preach to them against idolatry. It was running riot, but he didn’t preach against it. He didn’t preach against alcoholism or any of that type of thing. This is the reason that I don’t follow the pattern of preaching against certain sins; only when the Word of God touches on these things do I touch on them. Our message to the lost world is what Paul gave to the Philippian jailer: “… Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved …” (Acts 16:31). In the word believe is all the repentance you need. When Paul went to Thessalonica and preached, did he preach repentance? No. He preached Christ. He said, “How ye turned to God from idols.” The Thessalonians were going in one direction, and Paul said, “I want to tell you about Jesus Christ who died for your sins.” And the Thessalonians turned to Christ. But when they turned to Him, they turned away from idols, and turning away is repentance—they turned around, you see—but it is in the word believe.
You must have something to turn to, my friend. You cannot just say to a man, “Repent.” When I went down to an altar as a little boy, nobody counseled with me. I just wept—that was all. I wept because the boy next to me wept. His mother was a shoutin’ Methodist, and she wept. She started all the weeping. The fellow across from me jumped up and said, “He’s prayed through!” I don’t know what he meant by that, but whatever it was I didn’t do it. Nobody presented Christ to me. I was ready to repent because I wasn’t the best boy in the world, although my mother thought so. I could weep for my sins, but I needed Christ. And when you turn to Christ, you’ll turn from these things.
However, many of God’s children, like the prodigal son, get into a far country, and He says, “Repent. Come home.” That’s the fellow who should come home. There are a lot of believers who need to come home. God is not talking about the unsaved fellow down the street. He’s talking to you, and He says, “Come home.” What are you doing in that liberal church? What are you doing committing adultery? God says, “Come on home. Turn around, and come on home.” This is a message to believers. To these in Israel who were His children He said, “Return to me, and I will return unto you.”
The prodigal son didn’t get a whipping when he got home; he had gotten a whipping in the far country. If you think that pigpen was delightful, you are wrong. Any Christian who gets into sin will testify that it is not nearly as much fun as he thought it was going to be—many of us could say that. The important thing is to get out of the pigpen. My friend, there’s not but one class of living creatures that like pigpens, and that is pigs. Sons just don’t like pigpens, and they are going to get out.
The people of Malachi’s day deny that they need to return to God and need to repent. They act as if they haven’t been anywhere. They say, “The temple is crowded. We’re going through the ritual. What do You mean, ’Repent’? What do You mean, ’Return to You’? We’re already here. We haven’t gone anywhere!” But God says, “Yes, you have. You may be going through the ritual, but your heart is far from Me.”
This is also true even in many conservative churches today. People go through the little ritual that we conservative folk have. We have a certain vocabulary. Folk know when to say, “Praise the Lord” and “Hallelujah,” but their hearts are far from Him. He’s asking us to repent, but it seems to be the most difficult thing to do, especially for Christians. I don’t know why, because it should be easier for us than for any other people in the world.
I heard of a church where one of the officers got up and suggested to the board who was finding fault with everything, including the pastor, that he felt the officers needed to repent. Do you know that they rebuffed that man and insulted him so that it apparently brought on his death? That was the way he was treated for even suggesting to a group of church officers that they needed to repent! Israel said, “Wherein shall we return? How can we repent? We’re beautiful people. We don’t need to repent. That crowd outside needs to repent.” There are a lot of folk in our churches today who think that everybody else needs to repent and that they don’t. But we do need it, my friend. We need to return to God today.
When the people respond like this, believe me, God really opens up the wound here—and this will hurt. At this juncture some readers will want to tune me out because this is not going to be pleasant. I don’t think that Malachi has been a very pleasant book, but I enjoy it because I think Malachi is talking right to me as well as to you or anybody else, and we need to be talked to like this.
My cancer doctor was a very wonderful doctor, but he treated me rougher than any doctor I have had. I tried to get him to give me an, encouraging word every now and then. He wouldn’t do it. I tried to get him to give me a prescription for easing pain, you know, but he wouldn’t do it. He just laid it right on the line. I love the man, and I love him because of the fact that he told it like it was. When you’ve had cancer and you may still have it in your system, you really want to be told the truth. And in spiritual matters that have to do with my eternal soul, I want somebody to tell me the truth even if it hurts. God doesn’t mind telling you the truth at all.
We come now to the seventh sarcastic remark that these people make. Eight times in this book these people will return to God a flippant answer. Eight times they will dismiss His charges like petulant children. Eight times they will evade the fact by affecting ignorance. Eight times they will avoid answering by pretending they are pious.
Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In tithes and offerings [Mal. 3:8].
Instead of pronouncing the benediction in many of our churches, the thing that probably should be said is this: “Stop thieves! You’ve been robbing God!” The congregation would be apt to say, “You don’t mean us! We put a generous offering in the plate.” Did you, my friend? Listen to this: “ Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee?” And God’s answer is, “In tithes and offerings, you have robbed Me.”
If you think that God is a Shylock of the sky who was trying to take something away from these people, you are wrong. What God was doing was actually blessing them and saying, “I’m going to let you have nine-tenths, and you return to Me one-tenth.”
There are several rather important things that we do need to correct in our understanding at this point. To begin with, the people of Israel did not give just one tithe, as you would discover if you would examine the Scriptures carefully. I am indebted to Dr. Feinberg’s excellent book on Malachi (pp. 125–126) in which he lists the tithes given by Israel:
The offerings in Israel were the firstfruits, not less than one-sixtieth of the corn, wine, and oil. (Deuteronomy 18:4). There were several kinds of tithes: (1) the tenth of the remainder after the firstfruits were taken, this amount going to Levites for their livelihood (Leviticus 27:30–33); (2) the tenth paid by Levites to the priests (Numbers 18:26–28); (3) the second tenth paid by the congregation for the needs of the Levites and their own families at the tabernacle (Deuteronomy 12:18); and (4) another tithe every third year for the poor (Deuteronomy 14:28–29).
I would like to look more closely at this last Scripture because this is something that I feel should be observed today. I realize that our government has done much in an effort to help the poor—or maybe it’s to help the bureaucrats. There is a real question as to who gets the money which is allocated for the poor. But my feeling is that the church ought to have more of an emphasis on helping the poor. Let’s look at God’s instructions to Israel: “At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and shalt lay it up within thy gates: And the Levite, (because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee,) and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest” (Deut. 14:28–29).
Therefore, every third year there was this extra tithe that was given for the poor. When you say that God required a tithe of Israel, what do you mean by it? We need to understand that there were several tithes which were given.
The second thing that we need to straighten out in our thinking is that we are living in the day of grace. The giving of believers today is on an altogether different basis than Israel’s. We are to give but on a different basis. The church is not under the tithe system as a legal system. That does not mean that some people couldn’t give a tenth to the Lord—that may be the way the Lord would lead them to give. But let’s notice the way the early church gave. When Paul wrote to the Corinthians, he used the Macedonians as an example: “How that in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their liberality” (2 Cor. 8:2).
Though very poor, the Macedonians gave generously. “For to their power, I bear record, yea, and beyond their power they were willing of themselves” (2 Cor. 8:3).
They gave way beyond any tenth—the tithe didn’t even enter into their thinking. They simply gave because of their love of the Lord. And Paul tells us another reason they gave—“Praying us with much entreaty that we would receive the gift, and take upon us the fellowship of the ministering to the saints” (2 Cor. 8:4).
You see, giving is fellowship. It is part of the fellowship and part of the worship of the church. “And this they did, not as we hoped, but first gave their own selves to the Lord, and unto us by the will of God” (2 Cor. 8:5).
This is the reason that from time to time I make it very clear that if you are an unsaved person, if you are not a Christian, we don’t want you to give to our Bible-teaching radio ministry. To begin with, giving couldn’t be a blessing to you, and I don’t think that in the long run it would ever be a blessing to us. God asks His children to give. Have you ever noticed that the ark of the covenant was carried on the shoulders of the priests of Israel? The Lord could have called in somebody from the outside to carry it, or He could have had a cart to carry it because a cart carried some of the other things. But the ark of the covenant, which speaks of Christ, was carried on the shoulders of the priests. If we are going to carry forth His message about what He has done for us, it has to be carried upon the shoulders of those who are priests, those who are His. He’s not asking you to give if you are not a Christian. “I speak not by commandment, but by occasion of the forwardness of others, and to prove the sincerity of your love” (2 Cor. 8:8).
Your giving proves your love for Christ. He doesn’t ask you to give. The song which says, “I gave, I gave My life for thee, What hast thou given for Me?” is as unscriptural as anything can be. He never asks you that question. He says, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15, italics mine). “For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich” (2 Cor. 8:9).
Paul says that you should give hilariously, joyfully. When I was in Israel, I was shown several new government buildings, and one of them was their internal revenue service for the collection of taxes. My Jewish guide very wryly said, “We call that ‘the new Wailing Wall.’” Let me tell you, when the offering is taken in our churches, it also is a wailing wall for some. People think, Oh my, they are going to take an offering! My friend, the offering ought to be a joyful part of the service. If you can’t give joyfully, you ought not to be giving. It won’t do you a bit of good, I can assure you of that.
In chapter 8 and on into chapter 9 of 2 Corinthians, Paul continues to discuss the basis upon which Christians are to give. I think that most Christians in this affluent society ought to be giving more than a tenth. Israel gave more than a tenth—there were four tithes.
When I was a pastor in Texas during the Depression, an elder in my church was the only one who was in a business that was really making money. I used to hunt on his ranch and also fish in the river which went right through his property. He and I were in his boat one day fishing, when he said to me, “Preacher, why don’t you preach more on the tithe?” I said, “Well, I don’t believe in it.” He did believe in the tithe and that was the way he gave. Every time he and I would get together he wanted to know why I didn’t speak on the tithe. Finally, I went through 2 Corinthians 8 with him. Then I said, “There are a lot of Christians who ought to be giving more than a tenth. For example, I would say that you are probably making more money than any other individual in the church except the doctors.” We had five doctors in the church, and they did well financially. But the point was that this man was really making money during the Depression. I told him, “I think that you ought to give more than a tenth.” I looked him right straight in the eye when I said that, and he winced a little. He never again asked me to preach on the tithe because he was glad to give only his tenth. It eased his conscience to feel that that was all he ought to give.
A lot of folk ought to be giving more than a tenth, but when I say “ought to,” that’s me speaking. Jesus says, “Don’t do it unless you are giving it because of love for Me and because you really want to get the Word out.”
God says, “Will a man rob God?” What do you think? Again I say, instead of having the benediction at the end of the church service, they ought to let the people start to leave and then have somebody yell out, “Stop thieves!” There sure would be a whole lot of thieves who wouldn’t want to be caught and would take off running. Why? Because they have robbed God. How did they rob God? Well, it all belongs to Him, but to Israel He said, “You keep nine-tenths, but I want you to give Me the other tenth to recognize Me.”
It is amazing how some of the great businessmen of the past were Christians who gave to God and gave to God generously. The founder of the Hershey Chocolate Company was a Christian who was very regular in giving to the Lord. William Wrigley, the founder of the Wrigley Gum Company also gave generously to the Lord. I’m talking about the founders of these companies, not about the present generation. The J.C. Penney stores were started by a preacher’s son whose father died when he was a boy. There were no arrangements made to care for his mother, except for people to say, “The Lord bless you.” As a little boy, he had to go out and collect the clothes which his mother washed for a living, and he said, “When I grow up, I’m going to make money and see to it that no preacher’s widow has to work like this.” He made good, and he established villages where retired preachers and their wives can live. God has blessed these men in the past who have recognized Him. I believe that this is still true today, but, my friend, you will have to do it out of love—that is the only way He will accept it.
Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye have robbed me, even this whole nation [Mal. 3:9].
Under grace God wants you to give as you are able to give. For some people that would be less than the tithe, and for other people it would be more than the tithe. And I’m of the opinion that a great many in this affluent society ought to be giving more to God.
Here in Southern California there are headquarters or semi-headquarters of three of the major cults. One of the things that they do is to put their people back under the Mosaic Law and insist that they keep the law, including the tithes—that’s part of the system. If you’re going to belong to their group, you’re going to give a tithe. Those three cults are very wealthy. We think that this little operation that we represent is great—we thank God for it—but we are actually a Mickey Mouse operation if you put us down by the side of these other organizations where millions of dollars are just rolling in. Even on the tithe, the old legal system, look at how much would come in. Doesn’t that tell you that God’s people who are under grace are surely not giving to the Lord’s work as they should?
This is one of the reasons that we do not see the blessing that should attend God’s work. Many churches have a minister who is teaching the Word of God, but they don’t seem to be going anywhere. God makes it clear that our giving is something that He looks at. If a church or an individual is not giving, God has not promised to bless them at all. I believe that God is going to bless any person who is devoted to Him—but not necessarily with material blessings. Paul tells us in Ephesians that we are blessed with “… all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ” (Eph. 1:3). Therefore God, in a very gracious manner, will bless those who are generous with Him. This is a great principle that runs through the entire Word of God. Many churches which were Bible churches have just dried up and died on the vine, and it can all be traced to the fact that the people were not giving as they should unto God. If we open our heart to Him, He’ll open His heart to us. Not for physical blessings—God promised those to His people Israel; He promises us spiritual blessings—“all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.”
God made good His promises to His people. In the time of Hezekiah there was a period of revival. In 2 Chronicles 31:10 we read: “And Azariah the chief priest of the house of Zadok answered him, and said, Since the people began to bring the offerings into the house of the Lord we have had enough to eat, and have left plenty: for the Lord hath blessed his people; and that which is left is this great store.”
In other words, the people were giving more than enough. At the time that Israel built the tabernacle, Moses asked for offerings, and he had to stop the people from giving because they were bringing too much! That is the only case on record that I have heard of people being stopped from giving—but they did it in that day.
Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it [Mal. 3:10].
Again I would remind you that we are not under the tithe system today. There are many humble believers with very little income for whom a tenth would be too much to give. There are others whom God has blessed in such a wonderful way that they could easily give even as much as the government will allow for deductions. There are those who have an income such that they could give that to the Lord, but we find very few who are giving like that. The tithe is certainly a yardstick by which you could measure yourself, but I don’t think that it is legal or binding at all.
“Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse.” There are many churches and some denominations which have said that the storehouse is the local church or the denomination. Frankly, just as the tithe is not for the church today, neither is the storehouse. The storehouse was a part of the temple. There were many buildings around the temple which were storerooms. When people brought their tithe, it was stored away in these storerooms. When Nehemiah came back to Jerusalem (sometime before the time of Malachi), he found Tobiah, the enemy of God, living in one of the storerooms that had been cleaned out. It had been cleaned out because the people were not giving generously, and they had made an apartment out of it for Tobiah! But Nehemiah cleaned up the place. He took Tobiah’s things and pitched them out the window and told him to get out of town. Then the people began to bring their offerings to fill up the storeroom again (see Neh. 13:4–9)
There is no such thing today as that which is called “storehouse giving.” That’s not quite the way we give, because Israel’s giving was in the form of produce. In fact, if you will notice the law concerning the offerings, God gave a certain part of the animal to the priests, and He always said that they were to eat it right there. They didn’t have any refrigerators, any kind of icebox, in which to freeze the meat. In that warm climate the meat would have gone bad in a hurry, and so God told them to eat it right there. But the other produce was stored until it was needed.
And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 3:11].
When they were generous with God, He said, “I’ll open up the heavens and pour you out a blessing, and I’ll rebuke the devourer.” “The devourer” evidently means the locust. The locust had a ravenous and insatiable appetite. He was a regular gourmet on green salad—so he just took all the green stuff that was ahead of him. Many of the plagues came to Israel through the locust, but now God says, “I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes.”
Even today judgment comes from God upon a nation when they reject Him. I think that this explains the fact that we are having so many shortages—not only an energy shortage but shortages in many areas. For years the shelves of our supermarkets were groaning because they were so full. My supermarket still does pretty well, but there are some things that are absent. You cannot always get the cut of meat that you would like to have. Even if they have it, you can’t pay for it unless you mortgage your home! No one seems to be interpreting these things as a judgment or a warning from God. I think it is a warning of that which is to come in the future; in other words, I don’t think we’ve seen anything yet.
“And he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of hosts.” In other words, their vineyards were to produce abundantly.
And all nations shall call you blessed: for ye shall be a delightsome land, saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 3:12].
When Israel was right with God, they became a blessing to the other nations of the world. Honesty with God—and you cannot have holiness without honesty—was the thing that made them a blessing to all nations. In Zechariah 8:13 we read: “And it shall come to pass, that as ye were a curse among the heathen, O house of Judah, and house of Israel; so will I save you, and ye shall be a blessing: fear not, but let your hands be strong.”
This looks forward to a future day, but God said at that time that He would make them a blessing to the nations. When Israel is serving God, it becomes a blessing to the other nations.
In verse 13 we come to the eighth and last sarcastic remark which the people of Israel make to God in response to His statements.
Your words have been stout against me, saith the Lord. Yet ye say, What have we spoken so much against thee? [Mal. 3:13].
The people respond, “We don’t recall that we have said anything against You!” In each of His responses God puts it right on the line—
Ye have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of hosts? [Mal. 3:14].
Israel says, “What good is it for us to serve God? It is an empty thing.” For them it was an empty thing because their hearts were not in it. And since their hearts were not in it, God had not blessed them. So they blamed God for the situation. They said, “It’s not worthwhile to serve God.” Well, the way they were doing it, it wasn’t worthwhile.
I want to make a very strong statement right now. There are some people who attend church who, very frankly, I think would do better if they would just take a drive on Sundays. Their hearts are not in it. They go to church to criticize. As someone has said, “Some people go to eye the clothes and others to close their eyes.” Some folk go to church because it’s a nice place to get a nap. If your heart is not in it, my friend, if you don’t love God, if you don’t want to praise Him and serve Him and worship Him, it is of no value.
Today our worship is on a very marvelous, wonderful plane. This is what the Lord Jesus said to the woman at the well: “… Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth” (John 4:21–24).
The Lord Jesus told this woman that the hour is coming when true worshipers will not worship God in that mountain; but believe me, they are still offering bloody sacrifices at that mountain. He said, “Nor yet at Jerusalem”— Jerusalem is not a place to worship God. Every form of so-called Christianity is found there, and most of it is as far from the message of the Lord Jesus and the early apostles as anything possibly could be. The Lord Jesus went on to say that true worshipers are going to worship God in spirit and in truth. They are going to love the Word of God. They’ll want to serve Him. They’ll want to obey Him. They’ll want to worship and to praise Him.
A man said to me one time, “Well, McGee, I guess you think that I’m going to hell because I play golf on Sunday.” I said, “No. You’re not going to hell because you play golf on Sunday. You’re going to hell because you’ve rejected the Lord Jesus Christ. Golf hasn’t anything to do with it. I know a lot of church members who I wish would go play golf on Sunday to get them out of the church because they are troublemakers. They are not worshiping God in spirit and in truth.” My friend, all of this outward religion is not good. The crucial thing is the condition of your heart and your relationship to Jesus Christ.
It was vain and empty for these people in Malachi’s day to worship God, but the problem wasn’t with Him—the problem was with them. I went to see a man in the hospital many years ago. Outside the door of his room, his wife told me that the doctors said that he was dying. I went in to see him, to have prayer with him, and to say a word, not only of comfort but that his wife might have the assurance of his salvation. He said to me, “Dr. McGee, I’m about to freeze to death. Would you get that blanket over there and put it on me?” And I did. That room was hot—oh, it was warm—but that man thought he was freezing to death. He blamed it on the room and said, “They never keep these rooms warm.” But the room was overheated. There are a great many people who say that the church they attend is cold. Are you sure that the church is cold, or is it maybe you who are cold? It might be well to cheek up, because the problem here was with the people—it was not with God at all.
I would like to look at a good definition of real worship which is given to us in the Scriptures in Isaiah 58: “Wherefore have we fasted, say they, and thou seest not? wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and thou takest no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast ye find pleasure, and exact all your labours” (Isa. 58:3).
You see, they had the same problem way back in Isaiah’s day that they had in Malachi’s day. They fasted and they afflicted their souls, and God didn’t do anything about it. “Behold, ye fast for strife and debate, and to smite with the fist of wickedness: ye shall not fast as ye do this day, to make your voice to be heard on high” (Isa. 58:4).
God says, “I don’t care about your fasting, your going through all of that ritual, and your wanting to debate religion.” They just wanted to have a religious argument. Quite frequently there comes to my desk a very fat letter from someone who wants to enter into a controversy with me or to straighten me out on some doctrinal point. Generally there are fifteen to twenty pages, sometimes closely typewritten or written in such a way that I couldn’t even read it if I wanted to. I never read those letters. I’m sorry—maybe I’m missing something—but I just put them into the wastebasket. We won’t get anywhere by arguing, my friend. You can differ with my interpretation if you want to. But if you believe that the Bible is the Word of God as I do, why don’t you just pray for me if you think my interpretation is wrong. And my interpretation could be wrong, by the way—you ought to test it.
Now here is our definition of real worship: “Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy rereward” (Isa. 58:6–8).
What Isaiah is saying is that when you come in to worship God, make sure you have a life to back it up. This is very important. God wants a life that will back up what you have to say. Here we have an Old Testament definition of real worship. The ritual itself has no value unless the heart is right before God. This is something that we need to remember and keep before us.
And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are set up; yea, they that tempt God are even delivered [Mal. 3:15].
It looked as if they could tempt God and get by with it, but as Habakkuk had found out in his day, God was moving in the life of the nation and was going to judge them. I am of the opinion that if we could see behind the scenes today and see the wheels of God that are moving, we would cry out to God to have mercy. He is moving, but we don’t seem to recognize it.
Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another: and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name [Mal. 3:16].
“Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another.” In other words, there was a little remnant who loved God and met together, and they feared the Lord. They spoke to one another—they were having fellowship.
“And the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name.” Running all through the Scripture, there is this idea that God keeps books. I do not think there is a book up there in which He is writing. God never forgets, and He doesn’t need that book, and He doesn’t even need a computer.
This matter of the book that was written is also mentioned in the Book of Revelation, and in chapter 3 we find the suggestion that He is apt to erase a name: “Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy. He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels” (Rev. 3:4–5).
This is about as strong a language as you can get, and it is, very frankly, one of the most difficult passages in the Book of Revelation to understand. I do not think that God has a set of books that He is keeping in heaven. But the only way that you and I can understand this is through this figure of speech that He uses. I can understand it when He says that He puts down in the Book of Life the names of those who are saved. I can understand that He puts down in a book those who will receive a reward or some recognition. This makes it clear to me. But I don’t believe that God has a literal book up there—though He may have. We are also told in the last part of the Book of Revelation that when the lost are brought before the Great White Throne, the books will be opened, and there are several of them. There is also the book of those who are saved (see Rev. 20).
I would like to illustrate it in this way: To me it is more or less like the report card I used to get in school. You get a report card if you are a student; all you have to do to get a report card is to enroll. You get into the Lamb’s Book of Life by accepting Christ as your Savior, and that will never be removed. You have a report card; you are in the Lamb’s Book of Life; you’re enrolled. Now you are going to start making grades. Now He’s going to put down how you are doing with your Bible study. What grade is He giving you on that? Are you making A’s these days? Or are you failing the course? How is your life for Him? How is your service for Him? He takes note of all these things, and they are recorded.
Therefore I believe that when He says to the church of Sardis that names are removed from the Book of Life, that names are blotted out; it has to do with service because that is what He is talking about there. It has to do, with the service that they render. There will be many of us who get a report card, but some are going to be a failure in the Christian life. Paul said in his Epistle to the Corinthians that our works are to be tested by fire (see 1 Cor. 3:11–15). If a man’s work is all hay and stubble and it is all consumed by fire, will he be saved? Paul says, “Yes. He’ll be saved, but so as by fire.” There are going to be a lot of people in heaven who will smell like they were bought at a fire sale—and they were—a brand plucked from the burning, if you please. They did nothing, and nothing was put on the report card.
“A book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name.” God simply doesn’t need a book to remember things because He is the One who really has a computer mind—it’s all there. The record is of their works, their service, their love for Him—those are the things that are recorded. Salvation is free. It is by faith, never by works. After you have been saved, that is when your works really begin to count, and they become all-important. This book of remembrance is a very beautiful and wonderful thing.
We find God’s “book” mentioned elsewhere in the Old Testament. In Psalm 56:8 we read, “Thou tellest my wanderings: put thou my tears into thy bottle: are they not in thy book?” The psalmist says, “Thou tellest my wanderings.” The Lord knows exactly where you’ve been all the time. Maybe your neighbors, your church members, and your pastor don’t know—but God knows. The darkness is light to Him. He knows where you’ve been, and He knows what you’ve done. “Put thou my tears into thy bottle”—I think that is a very lovely thing. My friend, that godly mother who is weeping because of a wayward child, God has put those tears into a bottle. Can you imagine that? How wonderful it is that He has taken note of them! The man who has served God but has been disappointed by how his brethren have treated him and has wept tears over it—to him God says, “I’ve put those tears in a bottle.” Finally, the psalmist says, “Are they not in thy book?” There is a book that records our lives, my friend. I have always thought that is probably going to be sort of like a movie that He will run through for us. You will see your life from birth to death, and it will all be there. It won’t be what the preacher said about you at your funeral, about how wonderful you were and what a great church member you were. God is going to run it just like it was. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to see mine. But I guess I’ll have to take a look at it someday.
And they shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him [Mal. 3:17].
Isn’t this a lovely way to express it? God is going to make up His jewels, and the church is going to be there. The church is the pearl of great price. Israel never valued pearls very much; Gentiles always have. And so the pearl of great price is His church purchased with His own precious blood. God is going to make up His jewels, and there will be many of them.
“And I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him.” This speaks of the remnant of believers that there will be during this time.
Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not [Mal. 3:18].
We are living in a day like the day in which Malachi lived and like it will be at the end of the age. You really won’t be able to tell the righteous from the unrighteous. However, in the day which God has appointed, the day of His judgment when He comes again, it will be evident who are the true believers and who are the make-believers.
CHAPTER 4
Theme: The prediction of the Day of the Lord and of the Sun of Righteousness
In the Hebrew Bible there is no fourth chapter of the Book of Malachi; it is just the end of the third chapter. However, in the English translations, these six brief verses are made a separate chapter. In chapter 4 we have the prediction of the Day of the Lord and of the Sun of Righteousness who ushers it in. The first verse is a vivid description of the Great Tribulation Period—
For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch [Mal. 4:1].
“For, behold, the day cometh”—this is the Day of the Lord
“That shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble!” In other words, they shall be consumed. In the Book of Revelation we read that at one fatal swoop one-fourth of the population of the world will be wiped out (see Rev. 6:8).
“And the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.” This hasn’t anything in the world to do with the doctrine that death ends all for the unsaved, that death for the unsaved is annihilation. The Bible doesn’t teach that. The Bible teaches that the body goes into the grave whether a person is lost or saved. Your soul and spirit go into eternity, my friend—either to heaven or to hell. This verse teaches that the unsaved are to be judged in the Great Tribulation Period and removed from the earth’s scene.
But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall [Mal. 4:2].
The Sun of Righteousness in the Old Testament is the same person who is the Bright and Morning Star in the New Testament. However, Christ is never called the Sun of Righteousness in the New Testament, and He’s never called the Bright and Morning Star in the Old Testament. We will look at this verse more closely in a moment and see the reason for this.
And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts [Mal. 4:3].
When He comes to this earth to establish His kingdom, the. wicked will be put down. He will break them into pieces like a potter’s vessel. That is the language of Scripture, and it is just too bad if you don’t like it.
Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments [Mal. 4:4].
Following this prophecy by Malachi, Israel is going to move into a period in which heaven goes off the air. God will not be broadcasting. There will appear another Zechariah [Zacharias] four hundred years later. He will be serving in the temple when the angel Gabriel will appear to him and announce the birth of John the Baptist (see Luke 1:5–25). The silence of four hundred years will then be broken. In the meantime, Israel is to remember the Law of Moses. It will be their life; it will be God’s Word for them. They were under the Mosaic system.
Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord [Mal. 4:5].
Revelation speaks of two witnesses who are to appear in the last days (see Rev. 11:3–12). I do not know who the second witness will be, but I am almost sure that one of them will be Elijah. At the Passover Feast, in the orthodox Jew’s home, a chair is put at the table in which no one sits. It is for Elijah who shall come. When John the Baptist appeared, the Jews thought he was Elijah, but John the Baptist was not Elijah in any sense of the word. The Scriptures do say that he could have been, but he wasn’t—and that’s the important thing. If Christ had established His kingdom, then John would have been Elijah. How could that be? I do not know because it didn’t happen that way. That’s an “iffy” question for which we cannot really have an answer.
“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of theLord.” John the Baptist was not the fulfillment of this prophecy because he was announcing the Messiah, the Savior of the world. John said, “… Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). That is a little different from announcing the great and terrible Day of the Lord that is coming.
And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse [Mal. 4:6].
The last word of the Old Testament is curse. The curse came when Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden and disobeyed God. At that time God said that the ground would be cursed and that the curse would rest upon them. The curse was sin, and it will not be removed until the Lord comes to this earth the second time. It is still in the human family today. All you have to do is to look about you to see that. If you are living in a place where you do not have snails, termites, or some other kind of blight eating away at whatever you are trying to raise—whether it is vegetables or flowers or trees—then you must have moved into the Millennium, my friend. And if you are living in a community where there is no sin, I’d have to say that you’ve already moved into the Millennium. But I’m of the opinion that, as we look about us today, we can recognize that the curse of sin is upon the human race and upon this earth.
This is a very doleful way to end the Old Testament, but it has been a book of expectations. Therefore, I think that the emphasis should be back on verse 2 of this chapter: “But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.” The Old Testament does not close with only acurse. It closes with a great hope that, although the sun has gone down and it is very dark, there is coming a new day. We are living now in the night of sin, and the world is dark. It seems that we are at the darkest moment today. But there is coming a day when the Sun of Righteousness will rise and spiritual light will break upon this little planet.
That Sun of Righteousness is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. I want to call your attention to something that is very remarkable and very important. In the Old Testament Christ is presented as the Sun of Righteousness. In the New Testament He’s presented in a different way altogether. There He is presented to us as the Bright and Morning Star. Listen to Him as He speaks in Revelation 22:16, and this concludes Revelation: “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.” “The root and the offspring of David” means that He is the King who will reign on this earth, but He is also something else—“the bright and morning star,” which is something new, by the way.
It is interesting that man’s attention has always been drawn to the heavens. Astronomy is the oldest science known to man, but like many other sciences, it had its origin in the occult and superstition, in the mythological and the mystical. Astronomy as we know it actually had its origin in astrology, that which is filled with superstition. You might say, “That was way back yonder in the Dark Ages when men were very superstitious, but today we’ve improved.” Have we improved? Right now there are probably more people in this country who are interested in the horoscope and the star under which they were born than are interested in the Bible, the Word of God, or anything else, for that matter. To those who are playing with the zodiac and its signs, may I say to you that it is something which borders on the occult. We’re seeing today the worship of Satan as we’ve never seen it before. It is quite interesting that research shows that some years ago only 3 percent of those interviewed believed in a personal devil. More recently the percentage had jumped to 37–48 percent who believe and are convinced that there is a devil. Apparently, some of them are not convinced that there is a God to whom they are responsible, but at least they believe in the devil.
The heavenly bodies are being observed by men today. At first they were observed with the naked eye because of curiosity about the beauty of the heavens. Then the mechanical eye came into existence, and now scientists are making a greater study of the heavens than they have ever made before.
Scripture does turn man’s attention repeatedly to the heavens. Psalm 8 reads: “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?” (Ps. 8:3–4).
The answer to that question is that man happens to be the astronomer. He’s the one who can view all of this and can give praise and glory to God. “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork” (Ps. 19:1). God said to Abraham, “… Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them …” (Gen. 15:5).
The Old Testament closes here in Malachi with God directing man to look toward the heavens, and it is well that man looks up. Malachi closes with a thud: “Lest I come and smite the earth with a curse,” and the curtain comes down before the human story is over. Darkness closes in on man, but the play is not over. There are the good guys and the bad guys, and the good guys haven’t won yet. God says, “Look up at the heavens. Don’t miss it.” It is important that you see, my friend. He says, “But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.” This is a promise of a sunrise. There is a song that says that the world is waiting for a sunrise—and I believe it is—but the church is waiting for something else. Kipling wrote a poem that has been made into a song which says in part, “An’ the dawn comes up like thunder outer China ’crost the Bay!” When Christ the Sun of Righteousness comes, that’s the way He’s going to come: out of the East He’ll come up like thunder to put down all unrighteousness.
The Old Testament is expectation. In one sense it is the most disappointing book in the world if it stands by itself. But it points to the heavens, and it speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Sun of Righteousness. This is a fitting figure for Him because He comes to usher in a new day and to end the night of man’s sin. The Day of the Lord is coming, and His kingdom will be established upon the earth. God is called a sun throughout the Old Testament. Listen to Psalm 84:11: “For the Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.”
Then in Isaiah 60:19 we read: “The sun shall be no more thy light by day; neither for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee: but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory.”
What a picture we have of Him in the Old Testament!
On the other hand, the New Testament is realization, and it closes with a little different hope. Let me repeat this marvelous verse: “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star” (Rev. 22:16).
Not only is He the Sun of Righteousness, but He is also the Bright and Morning Star. It is quite interesting that the New Testament does not open with the Sun of Righteousness. The first public announcement was made privately to Zacharias. Then there was a promise of the coming of a forerunner, John the Baptist. The forerunner of whom? Of the Messiah who was coming, who was to be born of Mary. Wise men came to Jerusalem seeking what? They said, “… Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him” (Matt. 2:2, italics mine). By the way, that is not an eastern star. If they had seen an eastern star, they would have ended up in China. The wise men in the East saw the star, the star was in the West, and they came that direction. Isn’t it interesting that the sun comes up from the East, but this star was in the West?
How did the wise men associate the coming of Christ with a star? Way back in the Book of Numbers, the heathen prophet Balaam, in the East in Moab, made this prophecy: “I shall see him, but not now: I shall behold him, but not nigh: there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel, and shall smite the corners of Moab, and destroy all the children of Sheth” (Num. 24:17).
Always the star is separated from the sceptre. The star is separated from the sun. The star is the sign of the coming of Christ to take His church out of the world, and the sun is the sign of His second coming to the earth to establish His kingdom. The Jewish apostles were told at the time of His ascension, “… this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11), and Zechariah tells us that His feet shall touch the Mount of Olives (see Zech. 14:4). The star, therefore, is the sign of His coming first to take His church out of the world, but He doesn’t come to the earth. When He came before, the entire mission of Christ was wrapped up in a star and not as the Sun of Righteousness. The emphasis is not on His birth but rather on His death. It is interesting that He never asked anybody to remember His birth, but He did say to remember His death. When He established the Lord’s Supper, over that Passover Feast, He took the dying embers of a fading feast, and He said, “… this do in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19). The death of Christ as well as His birth is in that star. The star speaks not only of where He was born but also of why He died. The star tells out who He is, why He came. He said, “… Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) …” (Heb. 10:7). The star points to a manger, but it also points to a cross. It speaks of the fact that He came to bear my sins and yours upon the cross.
A little boy was walking down the street with his father during World War II. He noticed that there were blue stars in many windows, but every now and then there would be a gold star in a window which meant that, someone had given a son to die for this country. It was in the early evening, and as they came to a vacant lot, the evening star was just appearing above the horizon. The little fellow said to his dad, “Look, Dad! God gave His Son!” Yes, God gave His Son, and the star speaks of that. The little fellow was right, by the way.
Certainly, in two world wars nothing was won—or in any war which we have fought since then. We thought we were going to make the world safe for democracy. Every president, from Woodrow Wilson down to the present time, has thought that he was going to bring peace into the world and make the world unsafe for dictators. Yet today over half the world is under dictators. We won the wars, all right, but we sure lost the victory. In the war against sin the Lord Jesus died to bring men life, to free men from sin, and to bring victory over the grave and death. “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” (1 Cor. 15:55).
The future is not in the stars, my friend. In Julius Caesar Shakespeare has Cassius say to Brutus:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings [act 1, scene 2].
Your future is not in stars out there and neither is your present. If you want help for the present, you need to live victoriously for Jesus Christ who said, “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulations but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). Are you defeated and discouraged? There’s no help in the stars for you, my friend! You’re nothing in the world but a pagan and a heathen if you believe that. Look to Jesus. It’s not some magic formula; it’s not lady luck; it’s not chance; it’s not fatalism; it’s not superstition. If you are defeated by life, if you are overcome by some habit—drink, dishonesty, temper, sex, or materialism—if you are cold and indifferent to spiritual things, may I say to you, He is the answer for you.
Somewhere beyond the stars
Is a Love that is better than Fate,
And when night unlocks her bars,
I shall see Him, and I shall wait.
—Author unknown
If you have no hope for the future, you can look back to the past to an historical event that took place over nineteen hundred years ago when Christ died on the cross for you and for me who were sinners. And you can trust Him as your Savior. Then you can turn your face to the sunrise because the Bright and Morning Star is going to appear one of these days.
Is there hope for the future? Oh, my friend, the bright and morning star appears right before the sun comes up. In my bedroom, I have four windows from which I can look out and see the sun come up. In winter the sun comes up on the extreme right; in the summer it comes up on the extreme left. I watch the sun as it marches back and forth from one window to another. Last March and April I was watching as the bright and morning star appeared nearly an hour before the sun came up. The bright and morning star appears first, then the sun comes up. So we are waiting for the Bright and Morning Star to appear. Christ is the Bright and Morning Star for the church today—that is important to see. Peter speaks of Him in that way: “We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts” (2 Pet. 1:19).
That day star speaks of the Rapture of the church when He will take the church out of the world. The Rapture could take place at any moment in time for there are no signs for it at all. John Wesley put it like this: “He will appear as the day-spring from on high, before the morning light. Oh, do not set us a time—expect Him every hour! Now He is nigh, even at the doors!” Job said that “… the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?” (Job 38:7), but then sin entered God’s universe. But the day is coming when that Day Star shall appear, and He shall take the church out. That will be the signal that the sun will be coming up pretty soon. However, the Sun is none other than the Sun of Righteousness, the Lord Jesus Christ.
We leave now the Old Testament where the hope is the coming of Christ to the earth to establish His kingdom. But in the New Testament we ought to be like the wise men who were looking for the star. We are still to be looking for the Day Star to appear when He will take His church out of this world.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(Recommended for Further Study)
Feinberg, Charles L. The Minor Prophets. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Gaebelein, Arno C. The Annotated Bible. 1917. Reprint. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1971.
Ironside, H. A. The Minor Prophets. Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, n.d.
Jensen, Irving L. Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.
Morgan, G. Campbell. Malachi’s Message for Today. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, n.d.
Tatford, Frederick A. The Minor Prophets. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Klock & Klock, n.d.
Unger, Merrill F. Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, Vol. 2. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1982.
Wolfe, Herbert. Haggai and Malachi. Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1976.