Episode 178

From Idols to Shepherds: A Dive into Zechariah 13

The discussion centers around the prophetic messages found in Zechariah, particularly focusing on the significance of the phrase "on that day," which points to a future Messianic age. Ryan and Brian delve into the themes of cleansing from sin and the removal of idolatry as they explore Zechariah 13 and 14. They emphasize the prophetic imagery of a fountain that will bring purity to the people of Jerusalem, drawing connections to the New Testament and the wounds of Christ. The conversation also touches on the implications of false prophets and the seriousness of their role in leading people astray, highlighting the severe consequences for those who do not speak the truth. Listeners are encouraged to consider how these ancient prophecies resonate with contemporary faith and the ongoing struggle against spiritual impurities.

Takeaways:

  • The podcast discusses the significance of the phrase 'on that day' in Zechariah, indicating a future prophetic event.
  • Ryan and Brian emphasize the importance of understanding the cleansing fountain mentioned in Zechariah 13:1.
  • The conversation explores how false prophets will be dealt with in the Messianic age, highlighting their judgment.
  • Listeners are encouraged to reflect on the tension between truth and falsehood as a central theme in Scripture.
  • The hosts analyze the context of Zechariah's prophecies and their relevance to Christian theology today.
  • The episode concludes with a discussion on the remnant of God's people who will be refined and purified.
Transcript
Ryan:

Foreign.

Ryan:

Welcome back to Ryan and Brian's Bible Beastro.

Ryan:

I'm Ryan.

Brian:

And I'm Brian.

Ryan:

And this is season five of the Bible.

Ryan:

Be sure.

Brian:

Season five.

Brian:

Holy cow.

Ryan:

Season five.

Ryan:

Did you hear how excited my voice just cracked as I said that?

Brian:

They said we never last.

Brian:

They said we never last beyond a season.

Ryan:

They, they.

Brian:

The nameless, faceless they.

Ryan:

They.

Ryan:

The ones as I'm reading Greek.

Ryan:

Those ones.

Brian:

The Johanni Greek, the Johanian Greek, Gospel, John.

Brian:

Those ones.

Brian:

Yeah, he likes to.

Brian:

To use.

Brian:

Never mind.

Ryan:

Yeah.

Brian:

Anyway, he has a very idiomatic way of speaking, so.

Ryan:

Yeah.

Ryan:

Well, Brian, welcome back.

Brian:

Yeah, good to.

Brian:

Good to see you, Ryan.

Ryan:

I hope you had a great holiday.

Brian:

I did.

Brian:

And a good New year.

Brian:

Hope you did, too.

Ryan:

I did.

Ryan:

Got to spend some time with family.

Ryan:

Got to read some books.

Ryan:

I got books for Christmas.

Ryan:

Did you get any books for Christmas, Brian?

Brian:

Yeah, I got a couple of books.

Brian:

Trying to remember what they were.

Brian:

Yeah, I got a couple of books.

Brian:

How about you?

Brian:

What books did you get?

Ryan:

I did get a couple books.

Ryan:

I got the Abolition of Man by C.S.

Ryan:

lewis.

Brian:

Oh, that's a great one.

Brian:

That's a fantastic one.

Ryan:

It's a good book.

Ryan:

ng philosophical content with:

Brian:

What more could you want?

Ryan:

What more could a person want?

Brian:

So.

Brian:

And I keep telling you, you need to read the space trilogy along with that.

Brian:

I think you'd find that really enlightening.

Brian:

But you're not a big space trilogy person.

Ryan:

I am big, but I'm not a big space trilogy person, so.

Ryan:

Well, I'm glad to be back.

Ryan:

We're here to talk about some more things.

Brian:

Pick up some loose ends.

Ryan:

Pick up some loose ends.

Ryan:

Towards the end of last year, things got a little wild for me.

Ryan:

I was doing two classes at school.

Ryan:

You were busy, so we kind of had our ups and downs there a little bit.

Ryan:

But I'm only taking one class this semester, which is good.

Ryan:

So I'm going to have a little bit more time that we can dedicate to pumping out some content here.

Ryan:

But we're excited.

Ryan:

We're wrapping up the loose ends.

Ryan:

A couple loose ends here.

Brian:

Got to finish that for Ayah.

Ryan:

We got to finish Zachariah.

Ryan:

Yeah, we got to get to it.

Ryan:

And we've got some other things we've talked about that we're going to do and some, maybe some.

Ryan:

I don't want to say basic stuff, but kind of get back some of that building blocks stuff to help.

Ryan:

It might be helpful for you or helpful for someone that you know as well.

Ryan:

So with all that said, Brian, we left off Advent and we're coming back to Zachariah, you know, trying to keep.

Brian:

Everybody on the first chapter, Zachariah.

Brian:

And these are two that I really wanted to get to, especially 14, I really wanted to get to.

Brian:

So we'll finish up the Zechariah series and then move on to do some other things.

Brian:

So, okay, so start with 13.

Brian:

1, the very first three words of Zechariah 13.

Brian:

So this is basically going to be walking through Zechariah 13 if you want to follow along in your program or your Bible.

Brian:

But Zechariah chapter 13 begins with these three words on that day.

Brian:

And it's interesting because that phrase is repeated a couple more times in chapter 13.

Brian:

We're going to find it repeated seven times in chapter 14.

Brian:

So, you know, it's not.

Brian:

Well, you're the linguistic expert now.

Brian:

So it's not on this day.

Brian:

Right?

Brian:

It's on.

Brian:

It's on that day.

Brian:

So what, you know, what would the.

Brian:

Why, what's the emphasis, do you think, on that day first?

Ryan:

Okay, I'll answer your question.

Ryan:

Number one, if there was a visual representation of what Brian's doing right now, it'd be like a little knife that he's plunging into me and twisting it, just trying to goad me into something.

Brian:

What can I say?

Ryan:

You can say, yes, you're correct, that's what you could say.

Brian:

I heard a story the other day about some of the best podcasts are about the interpersonal relationship between the hosts.

Ryan:

I don't know if people want to listen to a podcast of two people fighting.

Ryan:

Brian.

Brian:

I don't know.

Brian:

It's worth.

Ryan:

Jerry Springer was very popular for many years.

Brian:

So maybe, maybe it's worth finding out.

Ryan:

Yeah.

Ryan:

All right.

Ryan:

Well, on that day leads me to believe it is a future day.

Ryan:

Not this day, that day, a distance away from me.

Ryan:

That's how I is a linguistic.

Brian:

I think you got it.

Brian:

You did it very well.

Brian:

So I think it's a future oriented thing.

Brian:

So think about this.

Brian:

We're getting toward the end of Zechariah and now the focus becomes on that day.

Brian:

On that day.

Brian:

And so in these last two chapters, about 11 times, we find that.

Brian:

But now look quickly before we get into 13, look at 14.

Brian:

1, chapter 14, verse 1.

Brian:

A day of the Lord is coming.

Brian:

And the phrase a day of the Lord is a prophetic phrase, right?

Brian:

This idea, this time when God's redemptive activity is going to move, something's going to happen in regard to God's redemptive activity.

Brian:

Day of the Lord.

Brian:

This is the only time that phrase is used in the book of Zechariah.

Brian:

But given this chapter 13, on that day, on that day, on that day, day of the Lord, and then seven more times on that day, on that day, on that day.

Brian:

I think we're looking forward to the Messianic age.

Brian:

So all this is kind of focused, in my opinion, all this is focusing very clearly upon the time when the Messiah will come and basically showing us what will take place on that day.

Brian:

So it's a forward looking prophecy.

Brian:

I think it's very, very much focused upon the time when the Messiah will come, the time when some of these other things we've been talking about will be done away with.

Brian:

So go ahead and read then for me, if you would, chapter 13, verse 1, because then we find out what's going to happen on that day.

Ryan:

On that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and impurity.

Brian:

Okay, so this idea of a cleansing fountain.

Brian:

Right, A fountain that will cleanse.

Brian:

Now I'm going to just go back to the last chapter.

Brian:

I know it's been months ago since we talked about this and some of our listeners will not have listened to it since then.

Brian:

But back in chapter 12, verse 10.

Brian:

And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication.

Brian:

They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him, as one grieves for a firstborn son.

Brian:

Again, I think that's talking, that's a prophetic reference to the Messiah.

Brian:

But this idea that this is going to be poured out upon them and they are going to respond with this idea of remorse, this idea of sorrow for their own actions is what we have.

Brian:

And so then chapter 13, this idea of pouring out, now we have this cleansing fountain, this fountain.

Brian:

And when you think about a fountain, it's kind of an idea of abundance, the abundance of this cleansing that's going to be available for them.

Brian:

Now, those two ideas and some others that are going to be coming.

Brian:

This idea of the one who's pierced looking on the one who's pierced, this idea of a cleansing fountain has for a long time been brought together by Christian theologians in order to.

Brian:

And with then this image, we get a very famous image in John 19, which we've talked about quite a Bit John's the only one who records this spear being plunged into the side of Jesus and this flow of blood and water that comes from his side, from within him, right?

Brian:

So that kind of in the imagination of the Christian theologians has kind of come together to be a reference to this idea that it's in Christ's death and symbolized by this water and blood that flows from the side of Jesus.

Brian:

It's in his death that we find this cleansing from sin for those who are sorrowful for their actions, right?

Brian:

So they'll look on the one that they appeared.

Brian:

And so the most famous example where all that's been brought together is in a hymn you might know.

Brian:

There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins.

Brian:

And sinners plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains, right?

Brian:

And so you can see where that comes from here.

Brian:

It's this image that we get in this being poured out on those who are supplicants, those who are sorrowful.

Brian:

This idea of, I'm going to open up this fountain.

Brian:

Now notice it says on that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David.

Brian:

Or it could be in the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

Brian:

Now we could be thinking about a fountain in the temple itself.

Brian:

And I'm not going to say much about that now because chapter 14 in the next one, we're going to have a little bit more reference to this as well.

Brian:

And it's going to talk about something.

Brian:

Chapter 14 becomes very, very important for understanding something later in the Gospel of John, I believe, and we've talked about that a little bit before, but I think this fountain is kind of preparing us for that.

Brian:

So again, it's going to cleanse them from sin and from impurity.

Brian:

So we're looking forward to a time where the sin and the impurity will be done away with.

Brian:

And this has been the problem we may need to set.

Brian:

You remember the historical context for Zechariah, right?

Brian:

You remember, it's been a while since we talked about maybe it's time to remind us of that.

Ryan:

I don't know.

Brian:

Remind us, Brian, I thought you knew it.

Brian:

I was trying to lob you one up there.

Brian:

It's a return from Babylonian exile, right?

Ryan:

It's rebuilding the temple.

Brian:

Yes, they're rebuilding the temple.

Brian:

They've kind of gotten stalled in this.

Brian:

So one of the things that they keep looking back to is remember what got us into that problem in the first place.

Brian:

Remember the sin and remember the failure to do what God has called us to.

Brian:

That God has taken into Babylonian exile anyway, and so here's this idea of the cleansing of the sin.

Brian:

Now go ahead and read verse two, because I think this is referring specifically to those issues that Israel's had in the past.

Brian:

Let me finish what I'm saying.

Brian:

I apologize.

Brian:

I got moving there.

Brian:

But this has been the problem for God's people is their inability to do the things that God has called them to.

Brian:

But now, looking forward, there's going to be this fountain opened in the house of David.

Brian:

That is going to be for the cleansing of sins and impurity.

Brian:

So what Christ is going to be able to.

Brian:

What the Messiah is going to be able to accomplish in the future is to bring in an age where we'll no longer be.

Brian:

How do I say this?

Brian:

Going back time and time again to these impurities and these sins.

Brian:

Right?

Brian:

Okay, so go ahead with verse two there.

Ryan:

On that day, I will banish the names of the idols from the land and they will be remembered no more, declares the Lord Almighty.

Ryan:

I will remove both the prophets and the spirit of impurity from the land.

Brian:

So I will banish the names of the idols from that land and they will be remembered no more.

Brian:

So this is going to be a complete wiping away of the idols.

Brian:

And again, use whatever Old Testament story you want to think about this.

Brian:

But idolatry has been such an issue for the people of God since they came into the promised land.

Brian:

The worshiping of, well, even before they came to the promised land, the foot of Mount Sinai is an example.

Brian:

Right?

Brian:

The first commandment is, well, you shall worship no other gods before me.

Brian:

You shall not make to me any graven image.

Brian:

Don't carve any idols.

Brian:

God is different than some kind of idol.

Brian:

And so the prophets, you know, this is the major thing that they're dealing with.

Brian:

Even all the way back to the time of the Kings, when you get Elijah and Elisha, you know, they're constantly calling the people back to the worship of the true God and away from high places, away from idolatry, away from the worship of BAAL and these other temples, you know, so that's, that's.

Brian:

This is looking forward to a time where all that's going to be done away with, all that's going to be banished and it will be no more.

Brian:

Let me go ahead and say this and then ask if you have anything you want to add.

Brian:

But idolatry is such a big problem for God's people in the Old Testament that it becomes kind of a.

Brian:

I don't say it's a way to talk about sin.

Brian:

Even in the New Testament, Paul calls greed idolatry, for example.

Brian:

It's this idea of anything that is a sin.

Brian:

And we sometimes use idols, even today in a figurative kind of way to talk about those things that we set up in place of God.

Brian:

So basically, anything that's going to pull us away from the ultimate placing, our full devotion to God is going to be considered an idol.

Brian:

Anything you want to add to that or think about, do you think, do.

Ryan:

We see a pendulum shift here?

Ryan:

We've got pre Babylonian exile, you know, we're really far over here coming back.

Ryan:

We've got Ezra, you know, you've got this reforms coming back.

Ryan:

Then we have this intertestamental period.

Ryan:

And then, you know, you come back and you have the Pharisees and the Sadducees, where it's no longer about necessarily worshiping BAAL or some of those others.

Ryan:

But like, you know, you talked about greed becoming an idol.

Ryan:

Did they almost.

Ryan:

Did they create new idols on the reverse as they tried to.

Brian:

Maybe.

Brian:

I think there's a strain of it.

Brian:

I get what you're saying.

Brian:

They had almost banished the formal idolatry.

Brian:

Now, not in the intertestimal period, because.

Ryan:

Not in the intertestimal period.

Ryan:

You know, Antioch's epiphany.

Ryan:

We still have that stuff going on, but we get to the New Testament, seems like they're less focused on the other God.

Ryan:

At least we don't have a lot of narrative about some of the other gods.

Ryan:

People of Israel.

Brian:

You're talking about the people of Israel, right?

Ryan:

Yeah.

Ryan:

I mean, obviously there's still polytheism going around them, but for them it seems to be less of that.

Ryan:

But then we see where those who were leading those reforms also become, you know, vipers, you know, like people that are leading away from that.

Ryan:

Just something I was thinking about as you were talking about that.

Brian:

I get what you're saying.

Brian:

So I'm going to tell you the way I've thought about it, and I may be thinking about it wrong, but from the time of Ezra, then we have this strain within.

Brian:

I'm going to call it Judaism, because you can.

Brian:

From the time of Ezra, for these people who have returned from Babylonian exile, you have this strain.

Brian:

And I think it's the Pharisees, I think it's the Hasidim during the period of Antiochus, Epiphanes, the ones who are the pious ones that are gonna.

Brian:

We're not gonna give in to Greek.

Brian:

But you might remember the whole thing with the.

Brian:

Not even Antiochus Well, I guess it is Antiochus Epiphanes.

Brian:

But even this idea that you're not gonna bow your knee to an idol, I think some of it, though, even in Pharisees times, goes back to remember what happened when we did this before.

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

I do think there's a righteous remnant, that that's the way they would see it.

Ryan:

Yeah.

Ryan:

So I'm not saying, you know, you know, we had this conversation.

Ryan:

We talked with Michelle, John Weatherly.

Ryan:

John Weatherly.

Ryan:

We talked about this.

Ryan:

Like, we talked about Luke.

Ryan:

We talked about Luke, about the Pharisees and that, you know, who were the black hats and who were the white hats, who were the good guys and the bad guys.

Ryan:

But the Pharisees in some ways were trying to get back to, like, hey, remember, this is how we got here in the first place was disobedient.

Ryan:

But like, I guess my thing, like, I'm thinking in their zeal for that to root out polytheism, did they make a new idol underneath that in their.

Brian:

Yeah, I think that's in their zeal.

Brian:

That's a good way to think about it is.

Brian:

And I don't know that I would use the word idol, but I get what you're saying now, I think is it became for them, in some ways, ironically, the obedience itself became the idol.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

I'm going to go through the actions and I'm going to do the things that I'm required to do.

Brian:

And this is what Jesus criticizes him for.

Brian:

You're doing a great job of cleansing the outside of the cup, but you're not cleaning the inside.

Brian:

You're whitewashing tombs, but inside you're full of dead men's bones.

Brian:

You're not changing your heart, you're changing the outward appearance.

Brian:

And so I think that may be the primary thing.

Brian:

Yeah, I get what you're saying.

Brian:

And so there's a way to think about that as an idol.

Brian:

Now, they would have, you know, dropped.

Ryan:

Dead before they would have said, absolutely right.

Ryan:

I'm not saying that.

Ryan:

But just like it be.

Ryan:

It became.

Ryan:

It took on a life that it was never intended to have.

Brian:

I think that's correct.

Brian:

I think they placed an emphasis on it.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

Yep.

Ryan:

Okay.

Brian:

So, yeah, that's fine.

Brian:

So this cleansing.

Brian:

This cleansing.

Brian:

And so there's not going to be any idols anymore.

Brian:

You know, I would call this basically what God is going to be able to accomplish through Christ to give us forgiveness of sins in an ongoing.

Brian:

So the idolatry of our hearts.

Brian:

However we want to see that no longer will be the consistent issue that we're dealing with, but it can be done away with because of Christ's sacrifice.

Brian:

And I usually would use the word sanctification for this.

Brian:

So not only is it that he is freeing us from our sins, but through the power of God, the Spirit begins to enter us and begins to transform us to be holy people as well, so that the idols are done away with in that.

Brian:

So this idea of the spirit of impurity will be removed from the land.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

That's kind of what he's talking about.

Brian:

He's talking about when the Messiah comes, we're going to take care of all of these kind of issues that we have dealt with in the past.

Brian:

Now what's a little bit more difficult is this.

Brian:

I will remove the impurities from the land.

Brian:

But before that, he says, I will remove both the prophets and the spirit of impurity from the land.

Brian:

Now, I think he doesn't call them false prophets here, he just calls them prophets prophets.

Brian:

So there's two ways we can understand this.

Brian:

And I'll go ahead.

Brian:

I was going to save one for a little bit later, but let me just kind of suggest at least two ways.

Brian:

There's at least probably a thousand ways we can understand this, but at least two ways we can understand this.

Brian:

Is one, that these are false prophets.

Brian:

Like we see in Jeremiah, one of the issues that Jeremiah has.

Brian:

Right?

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

Good.

Ryan:

They tell you you're going to get out of this and it's going to be easy.

Ryan:

And he's like, nope, they're lying to you.

Brian:

So they're lying.

Brian:

You need to, you know, even if the message you don't want to hear, you need to listen to the truth of God rather than to false prophets who are just basically telling you what you want to hear.

Brian:

And so it could be talking specifically here about false prophets.

Brian:

The other way to understand this would be basically along this lines that there's coming a time.

Brian:

And I'll look at it a little bit later because we're going to.

Brian:

This is just mentioned here, but I think we're going to get some other ideas a bit later.

Brian:

It could be a reference to this idea.

Brian:

There will no longer be any need for prophets, that any prophet a good one or a bad one.

Brian:

Because if you think about it, when prophets arise, it's in times of difficulty.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

And so if the Messianic age comes and the Messiah has made everything right, we don't even need prophets anymore.

Brian:

Right.

Ryan:

So it could be what is left to prophesy.

Brian:

Exactly.

Brian:

If impurity is done away with then speaking against that isn't necessarily an issue as well.

Brian:

So it can be understood in either of those ways.

Brian:

Now I'm going to tell you what I think.

Brian:

I think it's the false prophets, and I think verse three and what follows kind of leans that way.

Brian:

So go ahead and read verse three, if you would.

Brian:

This is Zechariah 13:3.

Ryan:

Yeah.

Ryan:

And if anyone still prophesies, their father and mother, to whom they were born, will say to them, you must die because you have told lies in the Lord's name, then their own parents will stab the one who prophesies.

Brian:

That's a Happy Thanksgiving.

Ryan:

I'm glad you're here.

Ryan:

I don't have to travel now.

Brian:

So the one who lies would indicate someone who's speaking falsehood in the name of Yahweh.

Ryan:

Right.

Brian:

In the name of the Lord.

Brian:

And so the, the seriousness of it, however, is, is that their own parents would kill them.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

Their father and mother would be the one to.

Brian:

To do this.

Brian:

The Old Testament is pretty severe about false prophecy.

Brian:

Deuteronomy:

Brian:

So no question.

Brian:

I think the reason.

Brian:

Well, what do you think the reason for the seriousness of that is?

Brian:

Why is it such a serious thing that death penalty is what needs to be involved?

Brian:

What do you think?

Ryan:

I don't know.

Ryan:

With the false prophet?

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

Why is it that the penalty.

Brian:

It's not like.

Ryan:

It's not like, don't do it again.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

Or cut out his tongue or something.

Ryan:

Yeah.

Ryan:

I mean, I think it's intentionally trying to mislead the people of God away from God.

Ryan:

In some ways it's a lie.

Ryan:

I mean, it's like against the nature.

Brian:

Of God, the falsehood.

Brian:

And I've said many times that one of the ways we can understand the entirety of Scripture and really the entirety of humanity, of the world, creation, is a battle between truth and falsehood, a battle between God's truth and the falsehood.

Brian:

Some people don't like the image of battle, but whatever, however you want to understand this a.

Brian:

A conflict or let me see, I guess that's still a battle, a tension between truth and falsehood.

Ryan:

Attention.

Brian:

But you get what I'm saying is that you're subverting the very word of God.

Brian:

If you think about the garden, that's what happened in the beginning.

Ryan:

That's what the serpent did.

Brian:

And that's in Some ways, the root of sin is this, is this idea of believing a lie.

Brian:

And so I think, yeah, it's a very serious issue, this idea of truth.

Brian:

And that your own parents would kill their child for doing this.

Brian:

Again, introduces the seriousness of this.

Brian:

Look at Deuteronomy 13:6 real quick.

Brian:

I think I've got this here, so let me just read this for us.

Brian:

Deuteronomy 13:6.

Brian:

If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, let us go and worship other gods, gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far from one end of the land to the other.

Brian:

Do not yield to them or listen to them.

Brian:

Show them no pity.

Brian:

Do not spare them or shield them.

Brian:

You must certainly put them to death.

Brian:

Your hand must be the first in putting them to death.

Brian:

And in the hands of all the people, stone them to death because they tried to turn you away from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

Brian:

Then all Israel will hear and be afraid, and no one among you will do such an evil thing again.

Brian:

So again, this is not playing around.

Brian:

This is pretty serious.

Ryan:

Public execution has a lasting effect.

Brian:

But did you notice that list?

Brian:

Like even the wife you love, your closest friend, your brother, it doesn't matter who it is.

Brian:

Most of us are brother or sister, we probably would put to death for about any reason.

Brian:

But I guess I shouldn't kid about such things.

Brian:

But you get what I'm saying.

Brian:

This is a big deal.

Brian:

And so I think that's what Zachariah is talking here, and I do think we're talking about false prophets is the way that I would see it.

Brian:

But again, the other thing about prophets is they always arise during times of turmoil.

Brian:

And that's true all the way back to Elijah.

Brian:

It's always times when basically the king think about Elijah, he comes along during the time of Ahab and Jezebel, right?

Brian:

And the word of God is being perverted.

Brian:

You have these false prophets, these false.

Brian:

The worshipers of BAAL that are kind of taking over.

Brian:

And so if we understand it this way, that we're just talking about prophets in general.

Brian:

In other words, in the time of the Messiah, there will no longer be a need for prophets of any kind.

Brian:

It would be similar to Jeremiah 3, 31, I think.

Brian:

Jeremiah 31, 31, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with people of Israel, with the people of Judah.

Brian:

It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt.

Brian:

Because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them.

Brian:

This is the covenant I will make with them.

Brian:

In that time, I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts.

Brian:

I'll be my God and they will be my people.

Brian:

So again, similar to what we saw, I'm going to make it so that they can worship me.

Brian:

I'm going to make it so that they can be true to me.

Brian:

No longer will they teach their neighbor or say one another know the Lord, because they will all know me from the least to the greatest.

Brian:

I'll forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more.

Brian:

So you get what I'm saying.

Brian:

It could be that the Spirit within us, he's basically saying there's no longer any need for this would be the other way to understand it.

Ryan:

So as we think about that day, it is the day of.

Ryan:

Of Christ's death, burial and resurrect.

Ryan:

Not the end.

Ryan:

Not the end day.

Ryan:

Because that would be.

Brian:

Yeah, so I'll tell you what I think.

Brian:

I'll tell you what I think, because.

Ryan:

I'm just saying, like, if there's falsehood and death here, how does that jive with our end time?

Brian:

I think this is one of the things.

Brian:

And again, this goes back to some of our conversations with Weatherly as well.

Brian:

And I know this is where I got this from, from him, but I think that.

Brian:

Well, and from somebody else that we both got it from.

Brian:

But I think that if you're looking at it from Zacharias perspective, the Messianic age is the end.

Brian:

Right?

Brian:

In Zechariah's day.

Brian:

I think you're looking forward to this final act in God's redemptive plan.

Brian:

And I think this is the problem that some of the apocalyptic literature in the New Testament has to deal with.

Brian:

It's like, well, if the Messiah, if Jesus in fact is the Messiah, and if the Messiah in fact has come, why are things continuing as they always have?

Brian:

This is how Peter puts it in 2 Peter, right?

Brian:

Why do things continue as they have from the beginning?

Brian:

Where's this coming that he's promised?

Brian:

Right?

Brian:

What is revealed to us in Christ is there is going to be this period of time that various New Testament writers use different phrases for the last days, the last day.

Brian:

John calls it the last hour.

Brian:

There's going to be this period of time where the kingdom of God has come, has been consummated, and yet at the same time, we continue to live in this world.

Brian:

And that's what's revealed to us in Christ is there's this period of time that we are citizens of two kingdoms, for lack of a better term.

Brian:

And that's a time of tension and a time of pulling us in a couple of different directions.

Brian:

So that's what I think.

Brian:

So one way I've seen this described is if you're looking down the road and you see all you see is kind of the next major thing, and there might be something else behind that, but it's.

Brian:

It's being blocked because you're viewing it not from the side.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

You're not seeing this period of time, but you're seeing it head on.

Brian:

And so that may be what's going on.

Brian:

Does that make sense?

Ryan:

Yeah, no, it makes sense, but I just.

Ryan:

When we think about on that day, thinking on this side of it, kind of going for us, kind of going, well, how could false prophets still be around in that day?

Brian:

It's a day in the sense of an epoch.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

A period of time, I think, is what we have going on.

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

So verses four and five, I believe, is where we are now.

Ryan:

A prophet.

Ryan:

I am a farmer.

Ryan:

The land has been my livelihood since my youth.

Brian:

So there's a couple ways to understand this.

Brian:

You were talking about one just before we began.

Brian:

We'll talk about here in a minute.

Brian:

But the way I think I would understand this is that even in the messianic age, even the false prophet is going to be ashamed of speaking falsehood.

Brian:

In that messianic age, it's going to be done away with.

Brian:

That's the way I would understand this is kind of saying I'm not going to be a prophet anymore.

Brian:

Instead I'm going to be a farmer.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

I'm not even going to attempt this.

Brian:

Now you.

Brian:

And let's talk about the garments.

Brian:

Elijah.

Brian:

This is kind of the image of a prophet.

Brian:

When John the Baptist wanted to look like a prophet, this is the way he dressed with a garment of hair.

Brian:

But you were talking about you'd looked up some stuff regarding this.

Ryan:

Yeah, just like some background stuff.

Ryan:

I mean, I had a background commentary here and just trying to understand near east, what's going on there, what was a garment.

Ryan:

And so they're just making the comment that, like, you know, while we don't necessarily know exactly what the garment of a prophet would look like, we don't have a lot of extra biblical ideas of what garments of a prophet would look like.

Ryan:

But typically, like they were just like animal hair, animal skin, you know, hairy, hairy looking things.

Ryan:

But like, there's, in some of the places we see, like, and this would be false gods had like lion heads, something like that.

Ryan:

But it's something that projected some kind of power or something from them.

Brian:

Okay.

Brian:

You know, and so, and then we.

Ryan:

Just talked about, you know, we talked about John the Baptist looking wild, you know, how he looked, you know, the camel hair and so forth.

Ryan:

But just there seems to be like a sense of this task and some clothing that are interconnected.

Brian:

What you're saying as well is, so basically he's hiding.

Brian:

Then he says, I am a farmer.

Brian:

In other words, he's trying to hide from being a false prophet because he's afraid of being killed.

Brian:

So again, back up at verse four.

Brian:

On that day, every prophet will be ashamed of their prophetic vision.

Brian:

That's the way I would say it is.

Brian:

They won't even speak.

Ryan:

They're trying to blend back in, you know, they're trying to like, oh no, no, you've got me confused with somebody else that looks identical to me.

Brian:

Six then becomes a pretty pivotal verse.

Brian:

And the question is, does it go with what came before and that's what you were saying with this, or is this connected to something else?

Brian:

And I'm going to tell you again, this is where again, theologians from after the time of Christ, looking back at this passage, are going to see this as fulfilled in Jesus.

Brian:

And so let's read a couple of ways.

Brian:

Let's talk about a couple ways that that can be done.

Brian:

Go ahead and read it.

Brian:

Verse 6.

Ryan:

If someone asks, what are these wounds on your body?

Ryan:

They will answer, the wounds I was given at the house of my friends.

Brian:

So this is again, so I think this goes back to they will look on the one they have pierced.

Brian:

In other words, these wounds that he will receive.

Brian:

And the wounds I was given at the house of my friends is often seen as, again, I would say in Christian tradition, this is understood to be a reference to the wounds of Christ which he received from those to whom he came from his own right.

Brian:

He received those in the temple.

Brian:

Not in the temple, but in Jerusalem, the ones to whom he came.

Brian:

And you were saying the other way to understand this would be if this is referring to this prophet.

Brian:

Go ahead, you want to say.

Ryan:

Yeah, so basically, again, Brian had given me the notes and I was trying to do some like my own work here before we got together.

Ryan:

So yeah, it wasn't total rando, but my question was, is, is this Jesus?

Ryan:

I don't Want to just say, like, I see Jesus in everything, but kind of going, like, does this go along with the prophet who's trying to hide.

Ryan:

And so we think about the wounds.

Ryan:

You know, some of this background commentary has talked about.

Ryan:

You know, we see in going back to Elijah dealing with baal, you know, we see them, they're cutting themselves, like they're wounding themselves and somehow trying to appease the gods.

Ryan:

You know, like, they're false prophets in this way.

Ryan:

And so, you know, for me, as I looked at it, I go, is this another thing like, oh, you know, this prophet saying, I'm a farmer of the land.

Ryan:

And then someone says, well, what about those wounds?

Ryan:

And they're like, right, right.

Ryan:

Well, you know, it's another thing like, my dog ate my homework.

Ryan:

It's another way of saying, like, oh, I was over a friend's house and that happened.

Brian:

Right.

Ryan:

And so we kind of bantered back and forth about that a little bit, kind of going, how do I understand this?

Ryan:

Because again, for me, I understand that early church fathers and so forth.

Ryan:

We look back on something, they're kind of going, when is it?

Ryan:

When are we reading it in there?

Ryan:

And when is the text saying it?

Brian:

Yeah, that's the tricky thing is how would this have been understood by those to whom Zechariah was writing initially and then now, as I said, how has Christian tradition used this?

Brian:

But those are the wounds on his body.

Brian:

And technically, I'll say this, it's not necessarily on his body.

Brian:

The word here is the idea of kind of a space between.

Brian:

And so some translations will even say, between my hands or something like that.

Brian:

So.

Brian:

So, yeah, but again, I think if this whole thing's referring to the age when the Messiah will come, I think this is, again, at least in Christian tradition, I know it has been understood this way.

Brian:

So we'll go with that for a minute.

Ryan:

Maybe you explore it a little bit from a Judaic perspective, you know what I mean?

Brian:

And that would be different.

Ryan:

How did they hear this?

Ryan:

How did the Jew hear this, this when they heard about these wounds?

Ryan:

Because obviously they have no frame of reference with Jesus yet.

Brian:

Well, and I'll tell you why.

Brian:

I tell you why in just a minute.

Brian:

We'll see kind of why I go this way.

Brian:

But go ahead and read verse seven then.

Brian:

So we get this kind of this prophetic word then we've had this on this day, on this day in these images, and now we get this.

Brian:

How do I say it?

Brian:

It's set off in poetic form.

Brian:

So go ahead and Just read verse seven.

Ryan:

Awake sword against my shepherd, against the man who is close to me, declares the Lord Almighty.

Ryan:

Strike the shepherd.

Ryan:

Stop.

Ryan:

Strike the shepherd.

Ryan:

And the sheep will be scattered, and I will turn my hand against the little ones.

Brian:

So the sword here probably refers.

Brian:

It's the way we use sword figuratively to talk about in a judicial context, right?

Brian:

The punishment that the government will bring about.

Brian:

So awake sword against my shepherd.

Brian:

Bring judgment against my shepherd.

Brian:

Now, we've had shepherds a couple of times.

Brian:

You might remember earlier in.

Brian:

Zechariah, back in Zechariah:

Brian:

And there he talks about, I'm going to send a foolish shepherd to guard my people.

Brian:

And he's talking about, I think, a bad ruler, bad leader.

Brian:

But then all the way back in Zechariah 9, 16, God says there, I'm going to shepherd my people myself.

Brian:

And I think the fact that it says awake against my shepherd here seems to be from the voice of God would lend to this.

Brian:

This to be the one that he's going to send this close associate, right?

Brian:

This one who's going to be with me in this, you know, this sword that's going to be given against him.

Brian:

Now that next phrase, strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered, should sound pretty familiar to you.

Brian:

Do you remember the context in which we.

Brian:

We heard that or where.

Brian:

Where we heard that before?

Ryan:

Do not.

Brian:

Well, well, so this is when Jesus is.

Brian:

The night before he is killed.

Brian:

This is in Matthew 26, for example.

Brian:

Then Jesus told them, this very night, you will all fall away on account of me.

Brian:

For it is written, I will strike the shepherd and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.

Brian:

But after I've risen, I will go ahead of you into Galilee.

Brian:

And of course, Peter says, even if all fall away on account of you, Lord, I never will.

Brian:

And Jesus.

Brian:

Well, really, Peter, it's not what I.

Ryan:

Heard just for reference here.

Ryan:

I did remember it from Matthew, but when you said remember, I'm thinking earlier in Zechariah.

Ryan:

Oh, sorry, I'm kind of going.

Ryan:

Do I remember this from earlier in Zechariah?

Ryan:

No, I do not.

Brian:

I apologize.

Brian:

I may have made that unclear.

Ryan:

When you say remember, and then, you.

Brian:

Know, yeah, Jesus, yeah, Jesus made this statement.

Brian:

So this is why I understand this again, at least Jesus understands this as some reference to himself.

Brian:

And of course, we get into this whole question you and I have talked about before, about how do we understand the interpretation of prophecy in the New Testament.

Brian:

Even Jesus way He used and interpreted Old Testament scripture.

Brian:

So anyway, here he says this idea.

Brian:

So I think the idea that the sword will be used, it's a governmental judgment that is brought upon the good shepherd, right?

Brian:

And.

Brian:

And when he is struck, it says that the sheep will be scattered and I will turn my hand against the little ones in the whole land.

Brian:

I declare this.

Brian:

So this is verses 8 and 9.

Brian:

Go ahead and read this then, and we'll be finished.

Ryan:

And the whole land declares the Lord.

Ryan:

Two thirds will be struck down and perish, yet one third will be left in it.

Ryan:

This third I will put into the fire.

Ryan:

I will refine them like silver and test them like gold.

Ryan:

They will call on my name and I will answer them.

Ryan:

I will say, they are my people.

Ryan:

And they will say, the Lord.

Ryan:

Lord is our God.

Brian:

So the idea of the one third again is remnant.

Brian:

This is remnant language.

Brian:

So there's going to be many who fall away, but there is going to be this remnant.

Brian:

And I'm going to.

Brian:

God says, I'm going to purify them, I'm going to refine them, so they are even more holy.

Brian:

So this is.

Brian:

We always talk about the righteous remnant, right?

Brian:

The ones who've been refined through their suffering.

Brian:

And then as a result, they are truly going to be God's people.

Brian:

So again, I think the image we get here is in the time when the Messiah comes on that day, on that day when the Messiah comes, God is going to be doing something in order to deal with their sin, in order to make them into a holy people that will truly and finally be what he has wanted from the beginning, which is people who are true to him and who are living in relationship with Him.

Brian:

And so that's kind of the way I would summarize this particular part of the prophecy of Zechariah.

Ryan:

Okay.

Ryan:

There's a lot going on there.

Brian:

Yeah, A lot of talking.

Brian:

I know.

Brian:

So any.

Brian:

Anything you want to go back to or.

Ryan:

Yeah, well, you know, let's talk about.

Ryan:

The 2 3rd will be struck down and perish like.

Ryan:

So how do you see that in the context of this, this two third that's going to be taken away in Christ's sacrifice, Right.

Brian:

1/3 and 2/3, a pretty.

Brian:

Pretty standard measure.

Brian:

So go back to the.

Brian:

To the Babylonian exile.

Brian:

All of the people did not return.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

It was only a portion of the people who returned.

Brian:

And they came in, like we talked about with Ezra.

Brian:

They wanted to be a righteous people back in the land.

Brian:

There are a lot of other people who are like, yeah, I'm happy where I am.

Brian:

And so I think the two thirds that are struck down is this idea of those who are not not remaining true to the vision of what God is doing.

Brian:

In the New Testament Book of Revelation, of course, these fractions are used frequently.

Brian:

And it can have the idea of judgment that's brought upon those who are wicked, those who are turning aside from God.

Brian:

And so I think that's the way I would see the struck down.

Brian:

If you're talking about specifically, we're talking about those who fail to follow the ways of the Messiah, the fail to see Jesus as the true Messiah, I think so.

Ryan:

Do you see this as a future eschatological statement post Christ or a realized in Christ eschatological statement?

Brian:

I think I would say.

Brian:

What would I say?

Brian:

I guess a little bit of both.

Brian:

But I think if you gave me that choice, I think I would have to say future eschatological.

Brian:

In other words, that's going to be the final judgment.

Brian:

But I believe.

Brian:

I don't believe in a postpartum opportunity for redemption or postpartum.

Ryan:

I'm a talk.

Brian:

I don't believe in a postmortem.

Brian:

I don't believe after death that we can.

Brian:

And I don't think there's an opportunity after death.

Brian:

But I do believe that there will be a judgment, that there will be those who receive punishment, that there are those who receive whatever form that takes.

Ryan:

So kind of how we look at prophecy, sometimes the timelines are not clean.

Ryan:

Sometimes, like they can be compressed.

Ryan:

Time is compressed or stretched and so forth.

Ryan:

Here, like where we think, like, well, this should go here and then this goes here.

Ryan:

You know, I'm thinking back to Revelation and the story of the dragon, you know, and the woman who gives birth.

Ryan:

Like, it's just like this.

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

A third of the stars were swept from the sky.

Ryan:

We have this very condensed almost.

Ryan:

You kind of go, is this the whole story of the Bible right here?

Ryan:

So do you see, like in this poetic seven through nine, do you see something.

Ryan:

I'm not saying it's the dragon, but do you see this very compressed narrative that kind of encompasses at least this Christ portion to Revelation?

Brian:

Yeah, I think so.

Brian:

Let's turn that around the other way.

Brian:

And again, I think this goes back to what I was saying earlier about from Zechariah's perspective, it's one of the same.

Brian:

It's all a day.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

I think when you talk about timelines are compressed and this kind of thing, I think we focus too much upon timelines rather than the primary Messages being gotten across.

Brian:

I think that's an U.S.

Brian:

issue.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

I think we think much more about this and then this and then this than what the scriptures are interested in.

Brian:

They're not interested in describing a timeline to us.

Brian:

They're more interested in describing the final state, so to speak.

Brian:

This is the result.

Ryan:

Yeah, I guess the reason for me is when I see two thirds will be struck down, future active will be struck down.

Ryan:

That to me, again, we are chronological beings that only exist in time.

Ryan:

And so for me it's kind of going, okay, I am post Christ, but pre.

Ryan:

Right, end eschatological time.

Ryan:

Because I'm a language nerd.

Ryan:

I'm trying to say it like you say it.

Ryan:

I can't.

Ryan:

So just trying to figure out like, again, knowing that scripture might see this as one.

Ryan:

I'm trying to understand it temporally.

Brian:

Yeah.

Brian:

So end time is a funny word, a funny phrase that you mentioned because I don't know what that means because I don't have any other frame of reference.

Brian:

But I think you're getting to a point of why this is kind of an issue is because what is the relationship between time and eternity?

Brian:

So if we're talking about the final, if we're talking about all that's going to be brought together into this, whatever eternity is, right?

Brian:

And I want to point out that the normal state of the universe, if I can say that, is eternal.

Brian:

And what I mean is this is God existed, eternity past.

Brian:

We believe that he is the one who is, was and will be.

Brian:

What is abnormal?

Brian:

Is this what I would see as a hollowing out of eternity so that we are again, I don't know what it means to be in time, but there is some way in which we can only think about this plane, this existence in that particular way.

Brian:

So we get hung up on the before and the after and this and that.

Brian:

But yeah, I don't know.

Ryan:

This is getting very interstellar.

Ryan:

The end of interstellar.

Ryan:

Like where am I at in time?

Ryan:

It's the fourth.

Ryan:

Fourth.

Brian:

Fourth plan.

Brian:

I should warn you, never ask me about time because I've thought about.

Brian:

I've thought about it.

Ryan:

I wasn't asking you about time, I was just trying.

Brian:

Well, you did well.

Brian:

You said timelines.

Ryan:

You drove me there.

Ryan:

Brian.

Brian:

This is my point.

Brian:

This is my point.

Brian:

I think we are the ones who get hung up on timelines.

Brian:

And again, maybe it is because, like you suggest, that we can only think about it in that way, but we do have, have the revelation of the eternal God where he is able to say Things like before the creation of the world, you brought me glory before the creation of the world, John 17, for example, or 1st Peter 1, the Lamb who was chosen before the creation of the world.

Brian:

And we get these kind of little phrases that make us go, oh, there's something bigger going on here.

Brian:

Or even John 1 in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God and all things were created through him, them.

Brian:

So I think the scriptures drive us to think beyond.

Brian:

It's kind of getting caught in the day to day or the everyday that causes us to not think about the big picture, I suppose, that we're in.

Brian:

So, yeah, we get bogged down in it, I guess.

Brian:

And I don't know what else to say about that other than, you know, sometimes that's so apocalyptic literature.

Brian:

And I do think Zechariah has apocalyptic features.

Brian:

But apocalyptic literature is pointing us to remember the universal story and not get caught up on how things are at the moment.

Brian:

That good does triumph over evil.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

That there are things that are more important than the day that it is on the calendar.

Brian:

Right.

Brian:

So I don't know.

Brian:

I guess that's what I'd say.

Brian:

That's good.

Ryan:

You're wise.

Ryan:

I'm asking these questions for a reason.

Brian:

I don't know if I'd say wise, but.

Ryan:

Well, I'm going to say it.

Ryan:

And you've worked through some of this stuff more than I have and probably some others of our listeners as well.

Ryan:

So appreciate your thoughts on that.

Ryan:

So this is great.

Ryan:

So next week we're going to be.

Brian:

Doing one more chapter 14.

Brian:

The whole reason I want to do Zechariah in the first place was to do chapter chapter 14.

Brian:

So here we go.

Ryan:

All right.

Ryan:

Chapter 14 and chapter 14's got some verses we got to get through here.

Brian:

It does.

Brian:

It's a long.

Brian:

It's much longer than 13.

Brian:

So, yeah, we can't get bogged down.

Brian:

Maybe we'll do two weeks on 14.

Brian:

I haven't decided, so we'll do this.

Brian:

Okay.

Ryan:

All right, sounds good.

Ryan:

Well, Brian, thanks so much.

Ryan:

I appreciate your time.

Brian:

Good to be back at it.

Brian:

Season five.

Ryan:

Season five.

Ryan:

And we might be doing a couple different things here.

Ryan:

I know we keep saying some of that, but we might be looking at another platform to put some stuff on, maybe do some engagement and some writing and so forth.

Ryan:

But appreciate all of you who are our listeners and those who are supporting us.

Ryan:

I really appreciate all of you.

Ryan:

And if you'd like more information, you can go to thebiblebistro.com you can find us on Facebook at thebiblebistro.

Ryan:

Or you can follow us on Instagram as well, hebiblebistro.

Ryan:

So appreciate it.

Ryan:

All right, Bryan, thanks so much.

Ryan:

And I look forward to chatting with you next week.

Brian:

All right, talk to you later.

Ryan:

All right, thanks.

Brian:

Bye.

Brian:

Bye.

Brian:

It.

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Ryan and Brian's Bible Bistro
A podcast about the Bible, theology, and all things related to the Christian faith. Hosted by Ryan Sarver and Brian Johnson..

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