Plug Into Power!
Introduce the cast of characters and the scenario:
Ezra (Scribe), Nehemia (Engineer), Haggai (rugged outspoken prophet), Zechariah (Prophetic Priest) Joshua (High Priest) , Zerubbabel (Governor of Judah).
Zechariah 4:1-10 Now the angel who talked with me came back and wakened me, as a man who is wakened out of his sleep. (2) And he said to me, "What do you see?" So I said, "I am looking, and there is a lamp-stand of solid gold with a bowl on top of it, and on the stand seven lamps with seven pipes to the seven lamps. (3) Two olive trees are by it, one at the right of the bowl and the other at its left." (4) So I answered and spoke to the angel who talked with me, saying, "What are these, my lord?" (5) Then the angel who talked with me answered and said to me, "Do you not know what these are?" And I said, "No, my lord." (6) So he answered and said to me: "This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: ’Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ Says the Lord of hosts.
Essence of the Lesson:
The Holy Spirit is the perpetual power source for God’s People, enabling them to conquer insurmountable obstacles!
One New Year’s Day, in the Tournament of Roses parade, a beautiful float suddenly sputtered and quit. It was out of gas. The whole parade was held up until someone could get a can of gas. The amusing thing was this float represented the Standard Oil Company. With its vast oil resources, its truck was out of gas!
Isn’t it nice to have “cheap” gas again? Yesterday morning I got up early to take one of our vehicles to the tire store to be the first person in the door. I had an appointment and really wanted to get it done quickly. I drove to the tire store and one of the young guys who works there was going to drive me back home so he could take my van. We both got in and as I left the tire store, I realized I was below empty on gas! I had scooted out of the house right out of bed and I didn’t bring a check book, credit card or cash. When I gave the van gas it gave that familiar sputter that says “you’re almost out of gas you idiot!” The glowing “E” glared at me, mocking me for my lack of planning.
The kid who was riding with me laughed when I told him-and said “hey if I run out of gas I’ll call someone.” But-I knew I couldn’t do that to him. I remembered it was on empty yesterday afternoon and I had meant to get gas-but forgot.
Suddenly, I remembered-I have a whole dollar in my pocket! But wait, that won’t do much good. I looked in the console of the van and saw two quarters. A dollar fifty! A quick calculation told me that I could get almost a gallon, and my Toyota van would be able to do 18 or 19 miles on that! The tire store is two miles from the house. My energy crisis was solved!
Today I want to speak to you about our source of energy for life-your spiritual energy. Are you in crisis? Is your “E” light on-have you forgotten to fill up along the way?
Men have dreamed for centuries of perpetual motion machines-devices which could continuously tap bottomless energy resources which will never run dry and be continuously replenished. Leonardo Da Vinci argued against yet dreamed of it, classical music has been written about it. Even today engineers dream of the theory and scam artists peddle stock in a free energy company across the Internet.
But the sad truth of reality is that we are all experiencing an energy crisis. We’re all running slower and slower. We rebound and rebuild at a decreasing rate. The entire universe is subject to the law of maximum entropy. We’re expanding at a decreasing rate. Even the speed of light is slowing measurably. Perpetual motion and free energy in the physical world that we know, is not going to happen.
Ultimately, it means that all history is Holy History-we are not cycling through or working out our karma as Eastern religion would tell us. We are proceeding to a culmination of history. God’s timer on His creation is winding down, and His purpose is being accomplished!
As we come to Zechariah Chapter 4, the prophetic vision shows us an unlimited supply of energy available to God’s People, as they face the tests and trials of accomplishing His Holy Purpose! If we are tapped into the power source, the Lord will empower us to face the impossible, the insurmountable!
The true and never-failing source of limitless power is the Holy Spirit! The only way that we can accomplish God’s will in our lives and in the earth-is to plug into this infinite, perpetual, continuously renewing resource!
As we approach Zechariah chapter 4, we find the Prophet experiencing the fifth of eight very special visions that an angelic messenger took him to in the night.
Zechariah has been called the "prophet of the long-range vision." Taken together, the visions that he was shown some four hundred years before Christ are simply amazing-Zechariah by the Spirit saw clear and detailed visions of Messiah, the Cross, the end of the age and the Millenial Kingdom.
The name Zechariah means "The Lord Remembers." It was a prophetic name, given a baby born among prophetic people. He was a third generation prophet of Israel, and God was raising up a young man who would encourage His people and their leaders in a time of great crisis.
Sometime around 538 BC, the pagan King Cyrus of Persia obeyed the voice of the Lord, as prophesied by both Jeremiah and Ezekiel. He decreed for God’s People to leave captivity in Babylon and to return to their homeland to rebuild the Holy City. Not only did he decree for them to leave their captivity, but he financed the journey!
They left Babylon in the Spring, and towards the end of the seventh month (late September) the returning exiles were determined to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles, complete with burnt offerings and all the ceremony, all upon the new altar which had been constructed. The altar was the first order of business. These exiles wanted to re-connect with their God on an intimate level most of all.
At the Great Feast, there were shouts of joy from many, yet cries of lament from the older people who had seen the former Temple in all its glory. This new altar of sacrifice, constructed hurriedly and with crude resources, paled in comparison to Solomon’s grand Temple, one of the most lavish edifices ever constructed in the time!
Discouragement set in and began to take a dastardly toll. It became a mountain that seemed insurmountable. I want to ask you today-have you ever been discouraged? Have you ever seen something that you just don’t think you can conquer?
The second step began when jealous kings from surrounding territories began to notice the work that was going on. These people were serious! The Jews had returned to Israel! Jerusalem had been capital of the known world just seventy years ago, as Jehovah himself resided among His people, with His presence and favor resting upon them. The rebuilding of the Temple would certainly be the death knell for the sinister heathen rule of all of the region.
The enemies put on a ruse and offered to "help" in order to infiltrate the workers. They hired hecklers to discourage and frustrate the building process. Still, the work continued.
Finally they turned to politics and wrote a letter to King Artaxerxes who had now replaced Cyrus as the Persian monarch in Babylon. The surrounding kings played upon Artaxerxes’ emotions and he ordered the returned exiles to stop work. It was political leverage at its finest. Things had never looked so dismal. Fifty thousand people are discouraged and downtrodden; they are on a journey from nowhere to nowhere. There is no sense of destiny, there is no sense of productivity or encouragement. Should they simply return to Babylon?
For sixteen years, they languished in failure and chaos. The Jewish people concentrated on building themselves beautiful homes instead of rebuilding God’s House among them.
But, the Lord Remembers! He will be faithful to His promise!
Enter the prophetic priest whom God raised up as a lad from Babylon-Zechariah!
On the heels of his in-your-face friend Haggai’s short and powerful prophetic word against the enemies of the Temple, Zechariah began to deliver powerful visions that literally swept all through Holy History!
God began revealing things to him that were not only warnings for the present, Zechariah began to see God’s plan for the ages unfold in front of him like a scroll!
Ezra, along with Nehemiah and Haggai tell the story of that trying time. Ezra, the "pastor" and resident theologian of the times summed up the climax of the sixteen years-
(1) Then the prophet Haggai and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophets, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem, in the name of the God of Israel, who was over them.
(2) So Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and Jeshua the son of Jozadak [29] rose up and began to build the house of God which is in Jerusalem; and the prophets of God were with them, helping them.
Ezra 5:1-4
And the visions came!
Zechariah spoke the visions of the Lord over the lives of Zerubbabel, Joshua the High Priest, and over the people of God, and after sixteen years of malaise they "rose up and began to build the house of God which is in Jerusalem."
As we approach Zechariah’s fifth vision of eight, we see timeless, eternal principles from the Word of God that will demonstrate His power in our lives! It’s a vision and a message for-TODAY!
First and today, we find
A Perpetual Power Source
Zechariah’s angelic host introduced him to a lamp-stand, and he had no idea why. The lamp looked very much like the golden lamp-stand, the Menorah from Solomon’s Temple. Zechariah had probably seen pictures and replicas of it while receiving priestly training from his father and grandfather in Babylon. The temple menorah was of solid gold and had numerous bowls to hold oil and feed the lamps-
But- something was very different about this lamp; two olive trees stood beside it and continuously fed the seven lamps with fresh oil. Zechariah confesses to his host that he has no idea what this system is about.
And as if to say "let me give you the answer, and then I’ll explain the questions."
The angelic host utters words that will empower not only that generation, but will forever be catalogued in the pages of Holy Writ, energizing future generations, preparing God’s people for tests and trials and emboldening them against seemingly insurmountable tasks and odds-
"This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: ’Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ Says the Lord of hosts."
The Word of the Living God went forth like a holy flame! Suddenly Zechariah began to get his mind and spirit wrapped around what was happening here- his priestly and prophetic training told him that the lampstand was truly a symbol of God’s people and the oil, the energy source was provided by God to his people for service-it was pretty common knowledge among those trained in the Torah.
Today from this side of the cross we know that oil is symbolic of the Blessed Holy Spirit, and the lamp itself is a picture and type of the Church of the Living God.
"I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, and, What you see, write in a book and send it to the seven churches which are in Asia: to Ephesus, to Smyrna, to Pergamos, to Thyatira, to Sardis, to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea. Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band.
(Revelation 1:11-13)
The mystery of the seven stars which you saw in My right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands which you saw are the seven churches.
(Revelation 1:20)
Church, today we are the lampstands of God in this dark world! Jesus Christ himself stands among the lampstands at the very center of His Church. But what were those olive trees? There seemed to be a pipe running directly from the trees to the lamp. In the Tabernacle and in Solomon’s temple, the flames of the menorah burned continuously, and there was a never-ending processional of priests refilling the bowls. An entire family of priests, the Kohathites were in charge of keeping the lamps burning brightly with fresh olive oil.
It’s also interesting to note that in the Temple menorah, the solid gold lamps were fed by multiple bowls which fed olive oil to the flame, and they required constant, intense human effort and attention to fill the bowls so that God’s ministry could be served.
This system was quite different-it was bizarre! The olive oil was being produced by living trees, and directly piped into the brightly burning menorah! It was a never-ending supply, a living and self-maintaining system which would operate independent of human effort!
My friends, this self-perpetuating system-speaks to us of the Living, ever-present, ever-full source of power that comes from the Holy Spirit of the Living God!
It is a picture, some four hundred years before, of the coming Baptism in The Holy Spirit-where fresh oil would be poured out from on high upon God’s people-to empower them for life and service!
This new and fresh oil would be poured out upon God’s people in a never ending self-regenerating supply! Isaiah saw it prophetically in Chapter 61, and Jesus Christ proclaimed the year of the Lord’s Favor as fulfilled in Him!
"The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, Because the Lord has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives, And the opening of the prison to those who are bound; To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, And the day of vengeance of our God; To comfort all who mourn, To console those who mourn in Zion, To give them beauty for ashes, The oil of joy for mourning, The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; That they may be called trees of righteousness, The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified."
(Isaiah 61:1-3)
The "oil of joy for mourning" is that same fresh oil that Zechariah saw teeming through that odd lamp-stand with olive trees piped to it. It’s the joy of the Holy Spirit flowing through Christ’s Church! It shows US plugged into a perpetual source of power!
The Apostle to the Hebrews understood this infilling with a fresh, endless supply of oil when he quoted the prophetic Psalm and explained its relation to Christ in:
And of the angels He says: "Who makes His angels spirits And His ministers a flame of fire. But to the Son He says: "Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; A scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your Kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You With the oil of gladness more than Your companions.
(Hebrews 1:7-9)
And the Lord and Savior, the Anointed One who was the fulfillment of the Year of God’s Favor, and who was anointed above all with the oil of gladness, told his Disciples as he departed this earth that not many days hence, this infusion of Power-(explosive (dunamis (Gr)) power, would be upon them as it was upon Him.
But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.
(Acts 1:8)
He has infused His people with power from on high, a limitless, boundless
source of anointing and gladness; an inexhaustible power source with a living, dynamic source. It’s no longer by the efforts of human priests and human hands, continuously refilling the bowls of oil- It’s by my Spirit, says the Lord!
It’s all about the OIL!
JESUS is the Baptizer in the Holy Spirit!
Jesus Christ the Son of God, the Head of The Church walks among his church today-and the Holy Spirit fills His Church with a supernatural perpetual source of limitless power!
And when one hundred and nine people were gathered with eleven disciples in an upper room that first Pentecost following Jesus’ promise that perpetual power source became a living reality!
But this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:
"And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, That I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your young men shall see visions, Your old men shall dream dreams. And on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days; And they shall prophesy. I will show wonders in heaven above And signs in the earth beneath: Blood and fire and vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord. And it shall come to pass That whoever calls on the name of the Lord Shall be saved."
(Acts 2:16-21)
The promise is here today!
Picture, if you will, a refinery tank full of petroleum. That tank may provide fuel to run an engine for what seems like unlimited hours. It can run day and night for weeks, for months. But at the end of some period of time, the energy absorbed by the engine from the tank will be dissipated. The system will need to be replenished. The tank will need to be refilled, by some outside, human intervention. At some point the work done by the engine will be less profitable and will not justify the cost of the energy input to run it.
The system that the angel showed Zechariah that night, was a self-renewing one-it was a Living, dynamic, perpetual power source, it is the power of the Holy Spirit operating in and through God’s people!
"The believer who seeks to live the Christian life through self-effort is like the man who, in attempting to sail across the Atlantic Ocean, found his boat becalmed for days. Finally, frustrated by his lack of progress, he tried to make his stalled boat move by pushing against the mast. Through strenuous efforts, he succeeded in making the boat rock and so created a few small waves on the otherwise smooth sea. Seeing the waves and feeling the rocking of the boat, he assumed that he was making progress and so continued his efforts. Of course, although he exerted himself a great deal, he actually got nowhere"
(Michael Green)
Have you ever worn yourself out or pulled a muscle trying to start a small engine with a pull cord? I’ve done that too many times. Somehow we believe the extra effort will wake up an engine. Any mechanic will tell you “fuel, fire and air” are the three steps to getting an engine to start. Have you ever pulled and pulled only to think-“hmmm, I wonder if this thing has gas in it?” You take off the cap, have a look and you feel foolish!
Or, have you ever pulled and pulled, and then stopped to realize that you haven’t cranked this motor in two years-the gas is old and stale? You flush it out, drain your carb, put in some “hot gas” and the thing…starts the first time? It doesn’t take a mechanic or an engineer.
It’s all about the power source. It’s all about the fuel. No one gets anywhere without the energy, the power.
The fuel for our lives, for our daily walk, the process of becoming like Christ and our journey throught his life-is the limitless, boundless power of the Holy Spirit of God! Without it we will stall, we will falter and we will ultimately be defeated.
As we close, I want to invite you to make this prophetic vision from 2400 years ago, as relevant to your life as today’s newscast.
You need power. You are desperate for it. I have recently run near empty not just in my van, but in my life. I am going out on a limb and say that many of you here have too. We’re all going through something in our lives and at times find our source seems to be growing lean.
First of all let’s check-is there fuel? Are you plugged into the Source?
Next week, we will explore the possibilities that come when we are plugged in.
