Building Zion Part 1 (Zechariah 1:7-21 and 6:1-8 January 14, 2018)

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1 Building Zion Part 1 (Zechariah 1:7-21 and 6:1-8 January 14, 2018) Building Zion Part 1 Zechariah 1:7-21 and 6:1-8 In the latter part of the 1800s, a movement developed among orthodox Jews scattered throughout the world. They believed that God had promised to gather His people from the ends of the earth back to the Promised Land and make them a great nation. The name of this movement was Zionism because their goal was to build Zion here on earth. Incredibly, against all odds, these Jews did return to the Promised Land. In 1948 the modern state of Israel was formed and the first Prime Minster David Ben- Gurion told the nation and the world that God had restored Israel and he selected the Menorah the seven-stemmed lamp as the symbol of the new state because they would be a light to the nations. However, from that moment on things did not run quite as they expected. The day after the state of Israel was established four Arab countries attacked her. The assaults have not ceased since. Israel has not had one day of peace since it was established. They have not been able to fully possess Jerusalem or the site of Solomon s Temple or expand the land. The new nation has not risen to lead the world and bring light to the world. Many Zionists wondered how this could be why would God bring them back to the land and not build Zion? How could the promises of God have failed? The disappointments of modern Israel are not the first time in history that a group of Jews read the promises that Zion would be rebuilt and became disillusioned when their expectations were not met. This series of events in our age is remarkably similar to those that led to the prophecy of Zechariah. Last week we began the book of Zechariah. 1

2 We encountered a group of Jews who had returned to the Promised Land filled with great expectations. They had been in exile because the nation of Israel had refused to heed the warnings of the prophets to repent. Finally, God acted and used Babylon to decimate the nation and cart the people into captivity. But our God is gracious. In the prophet Jeremiah, He also made a specific promise that after 70 years His anger would lift and He would return His people from exile. In a display of incredible power God did return around 50,000 Jews under the leadership of Zerubbabel and Joshua out of exile in Babylon back to the Promised Land. Then when the foundation for the new Temple was laid the 70 years was up. But as well as the promise of a return to the land, Jeremiah also made incredible prophecies concerning a rebuilt Zion a new Temple, a prosperous nation, the defeat of her enemies. Because of these promises the Jews believed that they were at the start of what would be the dawn of God s glorious kingdom on earth. But the anticipated glorious earthly kingdom did not come. Instead, they found themselves living in a very small area they were constantly under attack from the surrounding nations and they were struggling to survive in the midst of a drought. Life was anything but the expected paradise. And two things really compounded their despair. The first was looking at the newly laid foundation of the Temple. It was so small compared to what they remembered of Solomon s Temple. God had promised a great Temple theirs was small and insignificant like them. Second the Messiah the great leader who would raise the Jews to lead the world had not come. And so, for 16 years their resentment had grown. They believed that God s Word had failed and God had forgotten them. It was into this morass of disappointment that the message of Zechariah came. 2

3 This is a message of hope. Zechariah means God remembers. God had not forgotten His people. His message was summed up in Zechariah 1:3: Thus declares the LORD of hosts: Return to me, says the LORD of hosts, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. Nothing had changed when we repent and turn to God then He will return and draw near to us. Last week we saw the exiles heed this message and repent. From this point on what we will see is: God s sovereign plan to return and build Zion explained. God is crystal clear. His promise to rebuild Zion had not failed. His promises will come to pass. But and this is crucial the Jews in Zechariah s day made exactly the same error the Jews in 1948 would repeat. They read the promises to rebuild Zion as meaning God would build an earthly kingdom centred on Jerusalem. They read those promises with a picture of David s kingdom only greater in their mind. God sent Zechariah not just to say my plan to rebuild Zion still stands but to explain the nature of Zion. And I have to say this is a message we need to hear and hear regularly. It is where we find our hope and joy. Zechariah explains this plan in three ways: 3

4 Through Prophetic Visions 1-6 Through Prophetic Answers 7-8 Through Prophetic Events 9-14 Basically, what we will see is that exactly the same message is repeated three times using three different ways of telling the message. Zechariah tells it one way by using visions. Then he tells the same message using answers to a question. Then he tells it again using pictures of events associated with the life, death and return of the Messiah the King who will finally finish the task of building Zion. He repeats this message three times using different methods because we are so conditioned to expecting earthly blessings it takes this repetition for it to sink in Even today, it is so hard for many of us to grasp that the Zion to come is not earthly but heavenly. But what we will also come to see is that these three sections also have different emphases. God s Plan To Build Zion 1-6 God s Grace To Build Zion 7-8 4

5 God s Son To Build Zion 9-14 So, what is this message Zechariah makes so forcefully? It is this: God s plan is to build a heavenly Zion By destroying every enemy, sharing His glory and making us holy Through His Priest-King ZION WILL BE BUILT! The Jews were not mistaken God does plan on building Zion but they misunderstood a couple of rather crucial details. God is not speaking of an earthly Zion but a heavenly one. This city is not built with bricks and wood but with redeemed men and women washed in the blood of the Saviour. To build Zion God has to do three things. Destroy every enemy. Every sinful institution every demon every force opposed to God they all have to go. Then God has to move in as the glory of the city He is building. Finally, the task of making us holy will be finished and we can enter the city. And the One who will do all of this is the Messiah the Branch the Priest-King. Zion will be built when Messiah comes. But the Jews Zechariah was sent to were so conditioned to think of bricks and mortar the city of Jerusalem and Solomon s Temple Zechariah repeats this message over and over again and for many it still didn t get through. This morning we will begin to look at the first way Zechariah explains God s plan to build Zion and that is through: 5

6 Prophetic Visions. And what these visions reveal is God s Plan To Build Zion 1-6 I thought about just diving into the text here but one of my goals is to try and show you how to handle parts of the Bible that are not so familiar so I want to spend a few minutes talking a little about this section in general. There is no getting around the fact that visions like these ones are strange to us. We don t communicate like this it is way outside our comfort zone so we struggle to understand this series of visions. These visions are unusual. For example, in chapter 5 we will see a vision where two women with the wings of a stork carry a basket with another woman in it one filled with sin and iniquity off to Babylon. Unless you mix in some really weird circles this is not normal stuff for us. We read it and ask Really! I am supposed to understand this? Well yes you are! We will deal with each vision as we go and I trust you will find they are not as strange as they appear at first. A few little clues for understanding visions. Each vision is designed to communicate one main point and to help us often we are specifically told the main point. For example in our visions often an angel is asked what does this mean and the angel tells us. We don t have to guess it is spelled out. Where many people run into trouble is that they try and find some hidden meaning in every part of the vision. As well there are symbols and meanings that are drawn from familiar symbols and passages in other parts of the Old Testament. But these are usually not obscure they are well known. 6

7 Also, it is worth noting that often there are other ways the visions highlight what is important for us. If the next few minutes are a little confusing don t worry I hope it will become clear. Here in Zechariah the way the visions are structured is important. 1:7-17 Summary Vision 1: :1-13 3:1-10 4:1-14 5:1-4 5:5-11 6:1-8 Destroy Every Enemy (King) Share His Glory Make You Holy (Priest) Holy Power Make You Holy (Priest) Share His Glory Destroy Every Enemy (King) 6:9-15 Summary Enactment I know how confusing just putting something like this up there can be but hang in there. There are several important structural elements here. There is a fancy term for this type of repeating structure chiasm. 7

8 The visions are arranged in pairs that make exactly the same point. I put the pairs in different colours here so they stand out and you can see the linked pairs and the repeating structure. One purpose of this type of structure is to highlight certain parts. Here the structure draws our attention in particular to the beginning, the end and the middle. We are meant to get that these are crucial passages and to pay careful attention to them. Finally, I want you to notice a hint that helps us understand these visions through the roles they represent. In Israel, certain tasks were given to the King and others to the Priest and there were severe penalties if either tried to meddle in the task of the other. Destroying every enemy is a King task. David destroyed the Philistines and the Amalekites. Making you holy is a Priest task. The High Priest makes atonement for the nation on Yom Kippur the day set aside for this. Notice if you will that some of these visions deal with King tasks and some deal with Priest tasks but crucially, there are hints throughout that in the plan of God one person will come who is both King and Priest who will completely and for all time finish the King and Priest tasks destroying every enemy and making us holy. We will see this particularly in the middle vision the holy power vision and then in case we somehow missed it when we get to the summary enactment we are given 8

9 a vision of Joshua the Priest being crowned. We are told this is a picture of the Branch the Messiah who will come the One who is King and Priest who will build Zion. All that to say there is a clear structure to this first section the prophetic visions of chapters 1-6. If all of this has confused you if I lost you five minutes ago fear not. I believe the clouds will clear as we work out way through these visions. Let s begin by looking at the summary vision a vision that sets up this whole section. Remember we are looking at the first section chapters 1-6 where God communicates His message using visions and this is the summary vision. If you have your Bibles turn with me to Zechariah 1:7: On the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month, which is the month of Shebat, in the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, son of Iddo. We are now three months after Zechariah called on the people to repent and importantly exactly five months to the day since Haggai called on the people to show they had repented by restarting work building the Temple. The people responded to these prophets and had laboured hard on God s house. But the danger is that they might think that what they are doing building the city, the walls, the Temple that this was building Zion. God is going to show them Zion is something He builds and not with bricks and mortar. He chooses to initially make this point through a series of visions. These visions are like Charles Dicken s A Christmas Carol but on steroids. Remember, in Dicken s tale Ebenezer Scrooge has three Christmas Spirits visit him. 9

10 Here, in one sleepless night, Zechariah receives eight visions and instruction for one visual enactment. Verse 8 begins the summary vision. Zechariah looks into the night and sees a man on a horse amid a grove of myrtle trees and behind him are three more men on horses. Many people look for significance in the number of horsemen, the colours of the horses or the type of trees. You might have heard sermons where deeper meanings are found. The first horseman is Jesus the three are the archangels Gabriel, Michael and Raphael. The horse is red because of the blood of Christ. Look I don t want to say that it is not possible the numbers and colours bear some significance but trying to decide what it is has led to wild sanctified and unsanctified speculation. If you want to look for meaning I think the only thing that might bear meaning is myrtle in Isaiah myrtle represents God s restoration of Israel. Then, adding to the problem, it is unfortunate the way some versions translate this vision. For example, the ESV in verse 8 reads: I saw in the night, and behold, a man riding on a red horse exclamation mark. He was standing among the myrtle trees in the glen, and behind him were red, sorrel, and white horses. When we read red horse exclamation mark it makes us think we are supposed to view this as unusual this is important. Our minds think of red as in racing car red and indeed seeing a bright red horse would be unusual. However, the colour is not bright red it is chestnut. Also sorrel. Maybe 1 person in a 100 knows what colour sorrel is it sounds so exotic it must be important. But basically, it is plain old brown. The CSB translation of Zechariah 1:8 gives a better idea of how ordinary this scene is meant to be. Here is how it reads: 10

11 I looked out in the night and saw a man riding on a chestnut horse. He was standing among the myrtle trees in the valley. Behind him were chestnut, brown, and white horses. Zechariah sees this and he doesn t see some deep significance. He has to ask what are these horsemen? He is told: These are they whom the LORD has sent to patrol the earth. A number of times in the Old Testament we have pictures of angels going throughout the world to report to the Lord. It is not that God doesn t know what is happening in Africa unless an angel turns up to give the report. This is just a picture that is meant to convey that God does in fact know every minute detail of what is happening in His world. In our vision, this patrol is ready to report and Zechariah gets to hear what they have to say: We have patrolled the earth, and behold, all the earth remains at rest. That sounds good no problems to report peace on earth and mercy mild. But as verse 12 makes clear this is not a good kind of peace. Judah the people of God are not at peace. They are besieged, struggling. It is the godless pagan nations the ones that oppress her they are the ones at peace. They are doing just fine thank you. Remember, Judah thought that when the seventy years of exile were up, when God s anger lifted she would become the most powerful of nations and her enemies would be destroyed. That did not come to pass. They are in conflict and her enemies are at peace. They wondered has God even noticed how much we are struggling? Judah believed that somehow God had missed the fact they were besieged, starving and in grave danger. This report shows this has not escaped God s notice far from it. 11

12 How many times has someone said God doesn t seem to know what is going on in my life! My life is disintegrating and God doesn t care! Others have asked where is God Kim Jong-un is dangerous, bitcoin sounds like something out of Revelation, morality is lost the world is in peril and God doesn t know what is happening! Oh He knows. Isaiah 40:21 23: He knows. Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in; who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness. But if He knows does He care? Look at the question the angel of the LORD asks, O LORD of hosts, how long will you have no mercy on Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, against which you have been angry these seventy years? The seventy years of Jeremiah is up. But we are hurting and suffering. The pagans are doing well. When does our peace come? When does our blessing come? Where is our mercy? What happened to Your promises? If you have trials in your life if you ever question about what is happening in your life or the world this message is for you as much as for Judah God has a plan to bless His people and it will come to pass. Verses 13-15: And the LORD answered gracious and comforting words to the angel who talked with me. So the angel who talked with me said to me, Cry out, Thus says the LORD of hosts: I am exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion. And I am 12

13 exceedingly angry with the nations that are at ease; for while I was angry but a little, they furthered the disaster. I am exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion. I have not forgotten you. I have not abandoned My plan. I have noticed the nations are at ease and you are struggling. I used the nations to punish you but they went too far and now My anger is roused against them and My mercy toward you is kindled. Verses 16-17: Therefore, thus says the LORD, I have returned to Jerusalem with mercy; my house shall be built in it, declares the LORD of hosts, and the measuring line shall be stretched out over Jerusalem. Cry out again, Thus says the LORD of hosts: My cities shall again overflow with prosperity, and the LORD will again comfort Zion and again choose Jerusalem. The angel asks the question the Jews wanted to ask why haven t you poured out your mercy on us? God replies but I have returned to Jerusalem I have returned to you with mercy! Then He says I will rebuild Zion. I will build My house the Temple and bring prosperity to the land. Understanding this statement is crucial. What if God s answer to the question was this: My plan has not changed My plan is still to return to Jerusalem with mercy and build My house and bring prosperity. The Jews would have said Oh Okay we just got the timing wrong. We thought all of those things happened as soon as the seventy years were up. But what I hear you saying is wait a bit more Messiah will come. Soon the nations that oppress us will be defeated. Soon prosperity will flow through the land. Soon Zion will rise from the rubble. But that is not what God said. He said: I have already returned to Jerusalem with mercy. They asked when are you returning with mercy? God says I am here. 13

14 The Jews would have been stunned by this. This is mercy? Wow maybe we were better off with captivity! We are on the verge of being wiped out. We are starving. We are nothing. And You say You have returned You have drawn near Your mercy is being poured out You are already measuring up Zion for the rebuild! What we are going to see in the visions that follow is that the heart of the issue is that these Jews misunderstood the nature of Zion the city of God. They were looking for bricks and mortar. They wanted prosperity and prominence. That kind of Zion is past. They should be looking for something else as the sign of God s mercy and favour. They should be looking for a different kind of Zion. Zechariah reminds them that there are signs from Genesis on that Zion would be built in three stages: First there is the: Earthly Zion Spiritual Zion Heavenly Zion Earthly Zion This refers to Jerusalem and the Temple the glorious earthly city of David. But what is very clear in Scripture is that this was only ever meant to be a picture of the Zion to come a heavenly Zion. What God is going to finally build is not some better version of Jerusalem. Abraham realized this. Hebrews 11:10: [By faith Abraham] was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. So, when God speaks to these exiles and says He will rebuild Zion He makes it clear that He is not primarily talking about a city built with bricks and mortar. 14

15 They have to get the image of the mighty Jerusalem of David out of their mind. For example look down to chapter 2 verses 4 and 5. God says the city I am going to build is a city without walls and you won t need them because I will be your wall. I don t know how much clearer He can be the Zion that is my end goal is not earthly no walls no bricks. In other words God is saying I have come back I have set in motion My plan to build Zion it is just that what I am finally building is not a city you can see with your eyes it is not an earthly Zion. The earthly Zion was only ever a metaphor, a picture, a type of something far greater that God has in mind for them. Now this does not mean that Jerusalem will not be rebuilt. It will be. The Temple will be rebuilt. But Jerusalem will not be a world leader. The Temple will pale compared to Solomon s. But it will be rebuilt as a sign that the true Zion will be built. But, what only becomes clear in chapters 9-14 and in particular in the New Testament is that before the final heavenly Zion there is another Zion. God s plan is to build the final Zion in two more steps. Earthly Zion Spiritual Zion Heavenly Zion Spiritual Zion The mercy God will now send comes in the form of a person His Son. 400 years after Zechariah wrote Jesus the Branch the Messiah the Priest-King descended from David finally arrives. No armies, no wealth, no worldly power. When He is asked are You the Messiah because You don t look like a powerful King? Jesus says that is because My kingdom is not of this world. My kingdom is not bricks, gold, swords, armies. He says My kingdom is within you. 15

16 And I have begun to build it. In 1 Peter 2:4 6 we are told: You come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house For it stands in Scripture: Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame. Instead of building Zion with stones made of rock Jesus builds Zion with living stones with you and me. In other words Jesus came and by His death transformed us into living stones men and women filled with His Spirit and living stone by living stone He is building Zion. This is all over the New Testament. In 2 Corinthians 6:16 the Apostle Paul paraphrases this promise in Zechariah with these words: For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. The Temple and city of this Zion are not made with bricks but with redeemed believers. That is why Hebrews 12:22 can say to us to you and me right now: You have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. Right now today you and I every Christian are part of the Zion Jesus is building. But, even after Jesus came Zion was not finished. This world is still a mess. If this is Zion I m with the Jews this Zion is not that great. What we find is this. A day will come when the very last living stone is added to Spiritual Zion it is then that Jesus will finish what He began. Jesus the King of Kings and Lord of Lord will appear. He will vanquish Satan, the beast and every enemy. He will finish His work in us we will be holy. 16

17 And the kingdom of this world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever. (Revelation 11:15) Then the Lord will usher in His: Heavenly Zion Revelation 21 and 22 gives us a wonderful description of this. The holy city, the new Jerusalem, the heavenly Zion coming down out of heaven. God dwelling in that city. And then like a bride joining her groom we the living stones transformed by the blood of the Lamb are joined with God in the holy city to become the heavenly Zion where we enjoy Him for all eternity. That is the plan. I cannot tell you how much better that plan is than knocking down the Dome of the Rock and building a new bricks and mortar Temple in an earthly Jerusalem. Brothers and sisters, this is the plan of God to save the Jews, this is the plan of God to save you. It has not changed it cannot change. But the Jews in Zechariah s day were so fixated on an earthly Zion they failed to see the greater blessing God offered. Zechariah wants the Jews and us to know despite the destroyed city and the pitiful Temple foundation the plan of God to build Zion was right on target. God s people were back in the land. Zerubbabel was in the land. This had to happen so that a branch could spring from the line of Zerubbabel who would begin the next step in the plan of building Zion and then one day He will return and finish the work of building of Zion. The message is this God had returned and God was building His house and this is a great mercy. 17

18 This is a crucial lesson for us. Even though we live in the time of Spiritual Zion too many Christians find themselves longing for some kind of an Earthly Zion rather than the Heavenly Zion. Many Christians I speak to do not understand why God is letting His world go down the path to ruin. I hear well the same-sex marriage issue is just the thin end of a radical wedge. Now in Queensland no Driver s Licence will have gender, height, hair colour or eye colour as these are discriminatory. Where are God s Christian political champions to fight this movement? Why is the church being marginalized and becoming irrelevant? Because the kingdom God builds is not built by worldly might and power but by divine spiritual means. It is built in human weakness so God gets the glory, It is built one transformed heart at a time not one brick at a time. And the final result is a Heavenly Zion. Christians have to understand this. When we sing John Newton s famous hymn: Glorious things of thee are spoken, Zion, city of our God; He whose word cannot be broken Formed thee for His own abode. Saviour, since of Zion s city, I through grace a member am. Or Isaac Watts hymn: Then let our songs abound, And every tear be dry; We re marching through Immanuel s ground To fairer worlds on high. We re marching to Zion, Beautiful, beautiful Zion; We re marching upward to Zion, The beautiful city of God. We have to understand that God is not building some mighty, powerful, earthly kingdom but He is building a Heavenly Zion. So now I hope this summary statement makes more sense. God s plan is to build a heavenly Zion 18

19 By destroying every enemy, sharing His glory and making us holy Through His Priest-King We are going to see this same plan reiterated in each of the three sections. Now having looked at the Summary Vision. I want to look at the first pair of visions. These are the first linked visions in 1:18-21 and 6:1-8 and they make exactly the same point. Don t worry these are the shortest and simplest of the visions and won t take us long at all. Notice if you will that this is a King task and the point of these linked visions is clear: The first step to building His heavenly Zion is for God to destroy every enemy. Look at chapter 1:18-21 the second of the eight night visions. Zechariah looks and sees four horns. We don t have to speculate what these horns are because we are told. These are the horns that have scattered Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem. Horns represent the earthly powers that oppressed Israel and Judah. Horns like Egypt, Philistia, Babylon every enemy. But the main emphasis is on the horns that scattered Judah in other words the nation of Babylon. Then he is shown four craftsmen. This word is notoriously difficult to translate but basically they are some kind of workers. The idea is that these are four beings who serve God and do His bidding. 19

20 And what do they do? These workers have come to terrify the horns, to cast down the nations who lifted up their horns against the land of Judah. God sends these workers to destroy the enemies of His people. Now flip over to chapter 6 verses 1-8 the eighth vision. Instead of four workers he sees four chariots pulled by four strong horses. They emerge from between two immense bronze mountains. In first Kings 7 we are told that in Solomon s Temple there were two huge bronze pillars leading to the place here God dwelt. So, the idea here seems to be that these chariots are sent from the very presence of God. They go to the four winds every part of the world to do the bidding of God. In verse 8 we find that what they do is they set God s spirit at rest by defeating the powers opposed to God and His people. Remember in the summary vision the enemies of God were at rest now these chariots go out against the enemies of God they destroy them so that God s spirit is at rest. One chariot that pulled by the dappled horses are sent against the south country probably Egypt. Two chariots those pulled by the black and white horses are sent against the north country in this book the land to the north is identified as Babylon. The idea is these servants are sent by God to destroy every enemy. But we are not to only think of enemies only in terms of nations. By 520BC Babylon as a nation is no longer a concern to the people of God. They were destroyed by Persia in 538BC. So why the focus on Babylon? What we find is that even by Zechariah s day Babylon had become a symbol for every ungodly, worldly influence that opposes the people of God. They had left Babylon but part of their hearts were still in Babylon. After 70 years there they had been corrupted by the idols and the worldly ways and the practices. This was now a greater threat to them than any nation. This is our greatest threat. 20

21 But, these visions promise it is not just national enemies but none of our spiritual enemies will triumph. Judah and Israel had faced many enemies. Intractable enemies. Enemies who appeared invincible. Egypt, Philistia, Babylon to name but a few. God had brought them all to nothing. Here he is saying He will bring every future Babylon to nothing. But as I said, this goes way beyond national threats. In Revelation 17 we are given a vision of Babylon as an immoral woman trying to corrupt the people of God through sex, alcohol, wealth every lure. We are told the time before Christ returns the time you and I live in is a battle between those headed to Zion and those headed to Babylon. For us today the cry is for the people of God to come out of Babylon and not take part in her sins. But sometimes it feels like Babylon is winning it is so powerful. The lure of the world pulls on our sinful hearts and sometimes it feels like Babylon is destined to win. Zechariah says no God in Christ will defeat every enemy. One day the battle will be done. In Revelation 18 a mighty angel will announce Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great. Babylon the great city will be thrown down and found no more. And in Revelation we find the fall of Babylon leads to the rise of Zion. In 1 Corinthians 15:24 25 Paul gives us this wonderful glimpse: Then comes the end, when [Christ] delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. There is no enemy you face no problem, no sin, no circumstance that Christ will not defeat to bring you to Zion. If it were up to us we would never make it to Zion but it is not up to us it is up to Christ. Our task is to continually repent and turn to God. We have to fight sin and the world and the devil but in our own strength we will never have complete victory. 21

22 But He will. When He comes He will destroy every enemy, every rule and authority and power. Then there will be nothing left to oppress, corrupt, lure you away. Brothers and sisters I don t know what your hope is some earthly kingdom some political ruler some better life on this earth. I hope not. I trust your hope is in the heavenly Zion to come. Nothing else would get me out of bed each day than the thought of what God is doing in this world. I am no prophet or son of a prophet. I don t know who will be running Australia in 4 years. I really don t know who will be running US in 4 years Trump, Zuckerberg, Oprah. But here is what I do know the day will come when the earthly shadows are done. A day when the King of Kings and Lord of Lords He who judges and makes war He will appear and with the sword that comes from His mouth He will vanquish every foe Satan, the false prophet every institution and tendency opposed to God materialism, communism, mysticism every dictator, every tyrant, every abusive husband, every deceptive practice and then He will establish an eternal kingdom that cannot fail. That is my hope. I know that He will finish what He started. I know that Zion will be built. My hope is that despite my sin and my total unworthiness my God who is gracious and merciful will lead me to Zion. I m marching to Zion, Beautiful, beautiful Zion; I m marching upward to Zion, The beautiful city of God. 22

23 Building Zion Part 1 (Zechariah 1:7-21 and 6:1-8 January 14, 2018) Main Point: The first step to building His heavenly Zion is for God to destroy every enemy. Please pick a few relevant questions from each section and ensure the majority of the time is focussed on application. General Questions: 1. What is your hope? What gets you out of bed each day and keeps you going? 2. Why did it seem the promises of God had failed to the exiles? 3. Why do we find visual prophecies so hard to understand? How should we approach this type of prophecy? 4. What is Zion? How does this theme develop through Scripture? 5. How is God building Zion today in His church? 6. Why are we so fixated on an earthly Zion? 7. Why is it such a comfort to reflect on God destroying every enemy we face? 8. How does a vision of a heavenly Zion help us navigate the trials and problems of life? Application Questions: 1. When you think of heaven what is it that comes to mind? 2. Are there areas of your life or in the world that seem like God has failed you? What do you tell yourself when this happens? 3. What are the most prevalent enemies you face? How are you battling them now? 4. What is repentance? How does repentance bring God near? 5. How do you find comfort and strength in knowing that God will defeat every enemy? 23