Jexit: Judah Come Home
Don’t Despise the Small Things.
A sermon on Zechariah 4:1-14
We continue our series on Jexit – focussing on the history and situation of the Judahites when they returned from Bablyon.
The key Bible books which we will consider are Ezra, Nehamiah and Esther. We will also look at Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi.
Not all of the books, but a series of sermons taking selected passages from these books.
When we last looked at the returned exiles they were standing around the rebuilt foundations of the temple.
Haggai had spoken to them to encourage them to restart the temple building program.
The people had started.
But some older members of the group kept talking about the “good old days” and how great Solomon’s temple was.
The current temple looked so small.
Solomon’s temple was bigger and greater … and look at this tiny building!
So, again, discouragement had set in.
But God wouldn’t let his people remain discouraged. So two events happened.
Firstly the prophet Haggai gave the people this powerful reminder:-
But now be strong, O Zerubbabel,’ declares the LORD. ‘Be strong, O Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest. Be strong, all you people of the land,’ declares the LORD, ‘and work. For I am with you,’ declares the LORD Almighty. ‘This is what I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt. And my Spirit remains among you. Do not fear.’
Haggai 2:4-5
The particular reminder here is “I am with you.” He is the Emmanuel. He is the “God with us”.
Then, secondly to show that he was with them, God made sure that Darius of Persia decreed that no-one should prevent the temple from being built.
Darius provide workers.
Dairus provide finances.
Even though the start was small, God was with them.
God spoke to his people through Haggai.
On 24th day of the 7th month in the second year of Darius - 17th October 520BC
But then God also spoke to his people through Zechariah
Zechariah starts his ministry in the eighth month of the second year of Darius - November 520BC.
This means Zechariah is speaking into the same situation that Haggai was speaking into.
Which makes me think that the people really need to hear from God.
There is no other time when two of the minor prophets are speaking to the people at the same time about the same issues.
Zechariah has an important word for the returned exiles so, in this Jexit Series, we will spend a few weeks looking at some of what he has to say.
The part that we are going to consider today starts by opening to
Zechariah 1:7-8a which gives us a context.
7 On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month, the month of Shebat, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, the son of Iddo. 8 During the night I had a vision,
This is the beginning of the ministry of Zechariah.
We know exactly when it started.
24th Day, 11th Month, Second year = 15th February 519BC
Zechariah has a very serious dream on this night. Full of strange visions. Oracles. And an angel who keeps asking questions and giving answers.
Do you understand this …?
Do you understand what I am showing you ….?
The record of the dream doesn’t end until Zechariah 6:15.
Near the middle of the dream is the vision we are going to focus on today
Zechariah 4:1-14 (read)
Now if you are struggling with what is going on here you are in good company.
In response to the question of the angel who says Do you know what these are? Zechariah says no.
He is just as confessed as we are - and he is seeing the vision first hand.
If the person having the vision is confused, then we can allow ourselves to be confused.
But, through the confusion, there is obviously a message for the people.
The people who, just recently, had been standing around a small temple foundation and all these people are thinking, “Is what we are doing worth it?”
Zechariah speaks into that situation.
Don’t lose heart.
Yes it all just seems to be … well it is almost a little pathetic isn’t it.
Yes compared to the temple of the past this is not so glorious.
And when you find yourself in that situation there is the temptation to just try and work harder.
But, sometimes, all the hard work in the world will not bring about a single change.
Many years ago I had an XE Falcon which needed some work done on the engine. I can’t remember what was broken but to get to the area we needed to take off the fan. The fan is connected to car with a fairly good-sized bolt.
Well I tell you, there were two of us trying to get this bolt off. We tried everything but it just wouldn't budge.
In the end we rang the RACQ for an idea, they told us it was a reverse-thread. Which means you get it off by turning in the opposite direction. One try was all we needed to get the bolt loose.
All the hard work in the world was not going to change the situation because the work was going in the wrong direction. The whole situation illustrates nicely one of the key points that God is making in this vision. I’m thinking of the words of verse 6, ‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.
The word might here means “military strength” or “strength which comes because of a superior strategy and we have superior numbers”. When it came to undoing that bolt we had some good strategies, but they were the wrong strategies. You can’t always rely on strategy to win the day.
The word power in verse 6 is referring to “physical power” and “brute force”. There are times when you don’t need physical strength to win the day. If you have a spanner with 70kg of weight pressing on one end you can produce a lot of force. But if all the power is being used in the wrong direction it is never going to work.
Not by might (not by superior strategy).
Not by power (not by brute force).
but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.
Through this vision the Lord is challenging His people.
“Maybe you only feel like you have made a small accomplishment because your eyes are not focused in the wrong place”.
It is easy to lose focus isn’t it - we understand that.
The foundation of the temple is small.
The temple is in the mess and Jerusalem is a mess.
Certainly we can understand how the returning exiles feel.
Everything is small.
They only have a small bit of land to live in.
They are only a small number of people.
They are only having a small impact.
And the surrounding nations are creating such a push-back.
That is how the returned exiles were thinking.
But how many of us now are thinking “small”.
Your small evangelistic efforts.
Our small church.
The small response to the Gospel in Australia.
Our small impact on people.
Our small efforts at faithfulness.
Our small spiritual victories.
Do you feel like that? Small.
When we live in a world that focuses on success and numbers our efforts seems to be at times immaterial.
You can even get to a point where you think, “Why even bother?”
You can see how quickly the thought pattern comes. For them … and for us.
Which means the vision given to Zechariah is a vision that we also need.
This vision has, as a central focus The Golden Lampstand.
It is a bit hard to know exactly what the lampstand looked like.
It has a golden stem with an open bowl sitting on the top - this bowl is an oil reservoir.
The bowl has seven channels coming from it which leads down to seven lamps.
Each of the lamps is being fed oil from the main reservoir of oil.
A number of designs fit that description. But the main point is not the design, but the meaning.
To find the answer the best place to start is Revelation 1 which also contains a vision with golden lampstands. John tells us in verse 12-13 that he “saw seven golden lampstands, and among the lampstands was someone ‘like a son of man,’”
From John’s description we know that the One like the “Son of Man” is Jesus Himself. John is having a vision about Jesus standing among the lampstands. And what do the lampstands represent? Revelation 1:20 tells us that “the seven lampstands are the seven churches.”
When we have visions in the Scriptures and when there is a lampstand in that vision we can be sure that the lampstand represents God's people.
So the shining lampstand in Zechariah 4 represents the witness of God's people to the world.
We see it happening in Isaiah 60:1-3 where God is talking about the people of Israel and He says:-
Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you … Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn.
We see the same thing happening in Matthew 5:14-16 when Jesus says of believers:-
You are the light of the world ... let your light shine before men.
The lamp is the witness of God’s people.
God’s people are to be a light … a spiritual light … and through that light spiritual darkness will be conquered.
That is who we are. That is our identity. That is how God sees us.
God sees you as the lampstand.
God sees you as the light.
God sees you as the witness.
We might not see it this way.
But God sees it that way.
‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.
In other words your small thinking doesn’t come into the equasion. Because God can overcome your small thinking.
That is where The Two Olive Trees become important.
These trees tower over the lampstand; on the right and left of the main reservoir bowl. There are two branches protruding out of each olive tree and verse 12 says that these two branches are pouring oil out of themselves through two gold pipes into the main bowl.
The olive trees are providing the oil
This oil is stored in the reservoir.
This reservoir provide the oil for the lamps.
The oil shines and gives light to the world.
So what is the source of the light? It is the olive trees … with their branches.
So who are the olive trees? Have a look again at Zechariah 4:12-14
12 Again I asked him, “What are these two olive branches beside the two gold pipes that pour out golden oil?”
13 He replied, “Do you not know what these are?”
“No, my lord,” I said.
14 So he said, “These are the two who are anointed to serve the Lord of all the earth.”
Notice that verse 14 doesn’t specifically say who the two are.
Now it could be that the two are Jeshua the High Priest and Zerubbabel the Governor
We read a lot about them in Ezra, Haggai and Zechariah.
Jeshua deals with sin by administering the sacrifice. Zerubbabel reminds the nation that God still has a plan, especially because Zerubbabel is a descendent of David.
Many people interpret the text this way.
But the reason they do so is because many English versions don’t have the most accurate translation of verse 14 - I’m going to put up more literal translation.
“Then he said, ‘These are the two sons of oil who are standing by the Lord of the whole earth’.”
In this translation the two are not anointed, rather the two are those who help produce the oil.
Jeshua as a priest and Zerubbabel in the line of the king David would have been anointed. But they didn’t produce the oil.
Indeed at this point they are just as dejected as everyone else. Indeed it seems that this vision is given with a purpose of really encouraging Zerubbabel to get up and get going in the knowledge that God is with him.
Zerubbabel can’t be the oil … because he needs the oiling.
Which means that the next best candidates to be the two “sons of oil” are … Zechariah and Haggai. If you don’t want to agree that is ok - but there are good reasons to identify Zechariah and Haggai.
Because it is the task of the prophet to bring the word of the Lord … the word which fills the reservoir which lights the lamp to shine in the world.
And it is the task of prophets to anoint with oil.
Isn’t it the prophets who bring the word which enables people to move forward?
So, in the historical situation, everyone is looking at the temple, and how small it is, and they are all getting dejected. Then Zechariah and Haggai come along and say “Why are you looking down?”. Why see everything so small?
God uses the prophets to encourage.
God brings these prophets to get everyone, including Jeshua and Zerubbabel, to change their vision.
You need to stop looking down and start looking up.
Don’t despise the day of small things.
Do you think if you had a massive temple that it would make a difference?
Solomon’s temple was huge and full of splendour.
There was a great temple and still the people still went into exile. The temple wasn’t the answer.
Go forward 400 years to the days of Jesus. The temple which Herod build was four times as big as the temple of Solomon. And still it was not the answer. And eventually also that temple would be destroyed.
The temple didn’t bring people closer to God.
The primary relationship is not to the temple … not now … not even before.
It was always about the God who is bringing relationship through the temple.
You can have the biggest, most glorious temple, but if your focus is only on the building and not on God then nothing of significance is going to happen.
So when you look at a small foundation, which will eventually become a small and simple temple, don’t think you are going to be ineffective.
Haven’t you learnt the lesson from your time in Babylon?
I just brought you out of there.
There was no temple there. Yet I preserved my people.
Don’t be pessimistic. Don’t despise the day of small things.
Don’t think you are not going to have an impact.
Do you see what the Lord is doing in this vision?
He is getting all of his people to understand that small does not equal insignificant.
God forces Gideon to make his army smaller. From 32,000 … through a series of tests the fighting force goes down to 300.
They faced an army “as thick as locusts” who had more camels “than the sand on the seashore”.
Which army won?
David was smaller than Goliath. With a small sling and some rocks.
Who won the battle?
The widow’s offering that Jesus saw at the temple was “two small coins”.
Yet Jesus said that “she put in more than all the others.”
Jesus says “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” (Mt 17:20)
One death. One sacrifice. One man.
That is all it took to change the eternal destiny of all who call upon the name of the Lord.
Don’t despise the day of small things.
You don’t know the power of your smile or a quick kind word.
You don’t know the transformation that a small monetary donation will bring.
Having people over for dinner.
Not getting angry when you could have.
Helping your neighbour with their lawn.
Taking some time with those who no-one has time for.
Reading the Bible to a child.
Letting a friend know of your prayers for them.
An email. A text. A phone call.
Showing love to those who are called that they are unlovable.
We don’t have to be big to do this. We don’t have to be powerful. You don’t have to be wealthy.
But these are the things that transform the kingdom of God.
The kind word.
The gesture.
The arm around the shoulder.
These are the things that often bring effective transformation.
Why? Because ultimately our effectiveness is
‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.
God sees you as the lampstand.
God sees you as the light.
God sees you as the witness.
This is not who you are becoming. This is who you are right now.
We might not see it this way.
But God sees it that way.
And because God sees it this way
And that makes all the different to outcome.
Paul says to the Corinthians. A church in a mess.
Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things – and the things that are not – to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.
1 Corinthians 1:26-29
Who are we?
The ones with no influence.
We are the despised.
We are the weak.
We are the lowly.
But we are the ones God uses.
Do you think you are only making a small impact?
Don’t be disheartened by how you think things are.
Be driven by what God is going to make out of that which we think is small.
‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.
Prayer
