For the purposes of this devotional,
we’re going to skip the visions in chapter one and get to chapter two. As with much
of Zechariah, there’s much that Christians might debate over, based on each
person’s interpretation of what’s called the End Times. But again I think we
can get some application from this in our daily lives.
The vision starts with a man with a
measuring line in his hand. Zechariah asks him what he’s doing, and the man
tells him that he’s going to measure the perimeter of Jerusalem. An angel has
been accompanying the prophet, and then another angel comes to everyone with a
very important message: The days are coming when Jerusalem will be a city
without walls because it’s been filled to overflowing with so many people. But
I’d like to focus on vs. 5 for a moment.
The Lord says two things about his
relationship with the Jerusalem to come. The first is particularly relevant. As
I write this, large portions of Texas are being destroyed by an out of control
flame; this has caused millions of dollars of damage and has claimed at least
one life.
The
first part of the verse says he will be a “wall of fire” around the city with
his people in it. The first mention of fire in the Bible is another wall of
flame: It was a fiery sword
that surrounded the Garden of Eden to keep out our first parents out after they
sinned. This was a fire of judgment mixed with mercy: They couldn’t live
forever in human bodies infected with sin (which is mercy), but this also sentenced them to
eventual death.
Also God’s word is called
a “fire” in the book of Jeremiah. As we noted
before, the same fire has different effects on different materials: It hardens
wax, softens clay, consumes dross and purifies gold. So his word will help or harm you, depending on what type of person you are.
I sense a pattern here, don’t you?
Just like fire can be either your best friend (on a cold night) or your worst
enemy (as you watch your house burning down), so is the Lord.
The Lord is repeatedly pictured in
Scripture as coming in judgment like a fire, for example in Amos.
Of course the writer of Hebrews continues
this as well. And what’s the image of the final, ultimate punishment? A Lake
of Fire.
But the thing that strikes me here
is that in this verse the Lord is once again pictured as flame, but this time
he’s a ring of fire that surrounds his people in protection. Anything or anyone who wants to
do his people/city has to come through him, and of course that's never happening.
He’s the same God, the same
consuming fire. If we’re right with him, on the “right” side of him, he’ll be a
wall of flame that surrounds and protects us: we’ll be the apple of his eye. But
if we’re on the wrong side, then, well. . .
And then we come to the second thing
he says about the Jerusalem to come: He'll be the glory within it. This is
especially poignant, considering that just a few years prior, another prophet had
been forced to watch as the Lord’s glorious presence had departed the temple
and then the city. When the Lord left,
there was only something like a termite-eaten tree behind: It looked alive on
the outside, but inside there was only rot and death, and it only awaited the
final fall which would display to the outside world what had already happened
inside.
But that will be reversed in the
future. He will fill his city, and all the nations will see it and bring gifts
to offer to him. They will come and join his people, and all of them will
united into one body.
But we can’t forget that there’s a
practical application to all this. The Lord was encouraging his people to
return themselves from exile. To do so would entail some risk and faith.
Despite all the obstacles, however, they needed to know that God is in control,
and if they just trust him, everything will come out all right in the end.
The key words are “Trust” and
“Obey.”
Father--by your grace--I do, and I will.
You have so much in store for me, how could I not?
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