Carrot and Stick
Zechariah 1
IT was in 587 BC that Babylon conquered Jerusalem and took the Israelites into captivity. Then, in 539 BC King Cyrus of Persia instructed God's people to go up to Jerusalem and build the house of God.
The initial campaign to rebuild the temple did not proceed well. Much opposition arose. Then ceased the work of the house of God which is at Jerusalem. So it ceased unto the second year of the reign of Darius king of Persia we learn from Ezra 4:24. That was the year cited by the opening verse of the Book of Zechariah: In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the Lord unto Zechariah...Ó
As we go on with Chapter One, though, we'll find that the house of God to be built is really the body of believers. God's message comes in three sections:
The stick
It begins in verses 2-4 by expressing God's anger and disappointment with the people of old for their having ignored His repeated calls to turn from their evil ways and to come to Him. Starting in verse 5, He then uses three rhetorical questions to remind the Jews that their fathers had since perished:
Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever? But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not take hold of your fathers?
In the second half of verse 6, we find this encouraging response:
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.
Historically, this is the group that did proceed to rebuild the temple. Spiritually, they are a type of the body of believers, the remnant chosen by grace to whom God has given repentance.
The carrot
In the second section, God reiterates to Zechariah through a vision that He will liberate a remnant from this wicked and miserable mankind. In that vision (verses 8-17), He uses Jerusalem, Zion and the cities of Judah to represent those whom He would save. The prophet begins:
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.
The color red in the Bible is often associated with the devil. Not so in this case. You see, in the Old Testament there are seven Hebrew words that are translated red, but the one that appears twice in this verse, adom, connotes ruddiness. In fact, it is translated ruddy in Song 5:10-12, which passage clearly alludes to the Lord Jesus:
My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand. His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, and black as a raven. His eyes are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, washed with milk, and fitly set.
The man riding upon the ruddy horse is thus Christ. Why is He standing among the myrtle trees? Well, a clue is given in Isaiah 55, where we find in verse 11 the familiar promise that the word that comes from God will not return to Him void. In the succeeding verses, God uses several figures of speech to describe the result of the gospel going forth. Among them is verse 13:
Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.
We thus see that Jesus standing among the myrtle trees that were in the bottom reflects the truth that our Lord is standing among believers down here on earth. For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. (Matt. 18:20).
The Holy Spirit. Before we identify what the other three horses represent, let's first see what the Bible has to say in verse 10 about their assignment: These are they whom the Lord hath sent to walk to and fro through the earth.
Referring to those periods when there was a famine of the hearing of divine truth, the Bible often speaks of people running to and fro seeking the word of God in vain. We are living in such a time now.
But note that these three horses are sent to the earth by God Himself. For that reason, Zechariah 4:10 is a more appropriate scripture to compare it with. It reads, 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.
That those eyes represent the Holy Spirit is revealed in Revelation 5:6:
And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.
Now, we can better understand why the horses are described as red, speckled, and white. The red, as we have already learned, means ruddy; it points to the robust strength of the Holy Spirit. And white, of course, emphasizes the Spirit's purity.
Special blessing. Rarely seen elsewhere in the Bible, speckled is a word that appears nine times in Genesis 30 and 31. In Chapter 30 is the account of Jacob agreeing, after the birth of his son Joseph, to continue tending sheep for his father-in-law Laban. As his wages, he was willing to keep for himself only livestock that are speckled and spotted (which are normally undesirable). But God turned it into a great blessing. We read in Genesis 31:10-13:
And it came to pass at the time that the cattle conceived, that I lifted up mine eyes, and saw in a dream, and, behold, the rams which leaped upon the cattle were ringstraked, speckled, and grisled. And the angel of God spake unto me in a dream, saying, Jacob: And I said, Here am I. And he said, Lift up now thine eyes, and see, all the rams which leap upon the cattle are ringstraked, speckled, and grisled: for I have seen all that Laban doeth unto thee. I am the God of Bethel, where thou anointedst the pillar, and where thou vowedst a vow unto me: now arise, get thee out from this land, and return unto the land of thy kindred.
You see, the speckled rams that mated with Jacob's cattle, thereby prospering him, are a representation of the Holy Spirit that gives us sinners our new birth. Even as God had compassion for Jacob, He is merciful to us. As a result, we can get out of this world and return to the Kingdom of God.
Complacency. Next, we read in verse 11: 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. In other words, the Holy Spirit has found the world feeling secure in their idolatrous religions.
This angers God because not only has the world rejected Him, but they have been afflicting His Elect. Hence, we read in verses 14 and 15:
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. 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.
The Good News. God is going to put an end to that, though. He declares in verses 16 and 17:
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. 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.
The Messiah
In verses 18 and 19, Zechariah describes yet another vision in which God reveals how His promised delivery would come about:
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.
As God's answer implies, these horns are the power with which the whole heathen world uses to oppress God's people. But see from verses 20 and 21 what God will do with them:
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.
As Jesus was a carpenter when He was young, we can safely infer that the four carpenters here are pointing to the Lord who would come to cut down the horns of the Gentiles, thereby freeing and avenging His people.
God is faithful. What He promised in Zechariah 1 is recorded as an accomplished fact in Revelation 16. There, we see the vials of God's wrath being poured upon the world. The powers that used to be have been rendered altogether helpless. And so, we hear this song of praise sung in verses 5 and 6:
Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be, because thou hast judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy.