[0:00] With that, go ahead and turn open to the book of Zechariah, a few chapters to the left of Matthew. And we're going to be in chapter 4. We're going to tackle an entire chapter this morning, verses 1-14.
[0:15] The Golden Lamp Stand, Dream No. 5. So let me pray for our time before we dive in. Father, it's good to gather.
[0:25] It's good to begin our week waking up and gathering with your people and seeking your face and worshiping you. And Lord, as we come to the time where we look in your word this morning, would you open our eyes that we would behold wonderful things out of your law.
[0:45] And we will give you thanks. Would you speak to us? Thank you that you don't leave us here without clear direction and telling us very personal things about yourself through your word.
[0:55] And so, Lord, we delight in gathering and yielding, submitting ourselves to your instruction. And I pray that you would give each of us something that we could reflect on, that would minister to us, that would stir our affections for you, Jesus, as a result of our time.
[1:13] And we'll give you thanks. We love you, Jesus. It's in your name we pray. And all God's people said, Amen. So for some of you, this is going to be a stretch.
[1:26] For others, not so much, depending on how old you are. But think back to your schooling days. And if you were ever one of those students that liked to pass notes in class.
[1:38] And that's sort of the metaphor I want to have us begin our thinking as we come to this particular section, that this vision, as it were, is like God passing Zachariah a note to give to someone else.
[1:55] So if you pass notes in class, you're in good company, because God does a very similar thing. Within the text that we'll be looking at together this morning. So we are in Zachariah.
[2:07] We're in the Minor Prophets, specifically this book of Zachariah. This book was written, a little review here for us, 500 years before Christ's first advent.
[2:18] I know some of you are like, where does it fit in? Because Jay took down the pillars. They'll be back. Trust me. I'm sure. Maybe not next week, but probably the week after. The pillars will return.
[2:29] But he wrote this 500 years before Christ's arrival. And he is prophesying during this rebuilding of the temple.
[2:40] He's ministering alongside another prophet, Haggai, however you want to pronounce that. In fact, we know that because it tells us in Ezra, book written during the same time, Ezra 5.1 says, now the prophets Haggai and Zachariah, the son of Edo, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel who was over them.
[3:04] Okay? So you have these two prophets functioning at the same time. It's a pretty good team. Okay? It's not like a Scott and Jay, but they do pretty good. All right?
[3:14] And so those are the guys that the Lord provided for Israel in this particular day. And they're prophesying and commissioning in this book specifically that the temple needs to be rebuilt.
[3:34] The temple was destroyed. Why does it need to be rebuilt? Because Nebuchadnezzar, or rather the captain of his guard, destroyed it. We learn that in 2 Kings 25.9.
[3:46] It says, and he burned the house of the Lord and the king's house and all the houses of Jerusalem, every great house he burned down. So everything's in disrepair. Jerusalem has been in exile or Israel has been in exile for 70 years.
[4:02] Jerusalem is in disrepair. Finally, the Israelites, the southern kingdom that was taken in exile, they have now returned.
[4:15] Probably 40,000 to 50,000 of them returning from captivity. God using not a Babylonian king but a Persian king to make that happen, King Cyrus. And God has made now a promise to this people that have just gone through this very difficult experience of being in exile for so many years.
[4:34] Land is in disrepair. And God comes to them and tells them at the beginning of this book in Zechariah 1, verse 3, hey, return to me and I'll return to you. Return to me and my blessing will return over your lives.
[4:48] And so really the context of this entire book is just that. God's saying to his very battered and broken people, I'm still with you. I will restore you.
[5:02] I will continue to preserve you so that Messiah King can come from you. And then he can come again to usher in his future eternal kingdom at his second advent.
[5:14] And so really the book of Zechariah is pregnant with expectation. It's actually a very positive book as far as prophetic books go.
[5:26] And so there should be encouragement for us even, although we are not this people in this day, that God is still saying the same thing to us, return to me or stay with me, okay, so that I can continue to be a blessing over your lives.
[5:41] And so as we encounter Zechariah, the most obvious thing that we get in this particular section of the book, chapters 1 through 9, is that Zechariah is not getting a lot of restorative sleep.
[5:58] He's having a very difficult night where he is receiving a series of eight visions. These visions occur five months after the temple rebuilding begins.
[6:11] Today we are going to be looking at the fifth vision, the golden lampstand, or as I began us, this personal note for Zechariah to give to someone else.
[6:25] So let's begin together here in verses 1 and the first part of verse 2. And we read, And the angel who talked with me came again and woke me, like a man who is awakened out of his sleep.
[6:38] And he said to me, What do you see? And I said, I see and behold a lampstand all of gold. So an angel comes to Zechariah.
[6:51] This angel here, this is not the angel of the Lord. We looked at that. This is not a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus, although he does make appearances here and there as we go through the section.
[7:04] This is simply an interpreting angel, speaking to Zechariah. We know that it is more of a vision versus a dream because Zechariah is interacting. He is awake.
[7:15] He's able to interact with this angel. Now, maybe for some of you, as we have been going through this section, and you've been sort of wondering to yourself, like, man, Jay, like, how come we don't get visions today?
[7:28] How come we don't get dreams today? And you're thinking it would have been so cool to be back in that day, you know, when everything was in disrepair. And the walls were broken down.
[7:40] And people were just trying to figure out life. It would have been so great. But I think that is an honest question, like, why don't we get more visions and dreams today?
[7:53] And I would say, first off on that particular point, we are so blessed because we actually have a very clear book until we come to sections that talk about visions and dreams, and then they're not so clear.
[8:05] But primarily, we have a pretty clear book where we understand God's heart on things. God's word is God-breathed, and this is God's typical means of communication to his people.
[8:18] He speaks through his word. That's why we are people of a book. Amen? We're people of a book. That said, he still on occasion does speak in pictures versus words, visions and dreams, as it were.
[8:34] You can jot this down. Look at it later. Job 33, verses 15 and 16, the young, wise friend of Job, Elihu, he talks about there that in a dream and a vision of the night, God opens the ears of men.
[8:48] And I believe that God still actually does that on occasion. I don't think that's his normal means of communication, but we have records of people receiving dreams and visions, as it were, from the Lord.
[9:01] An individual, Tom Doyle, wrote a book back in 2012 called Dreams and Visions. And in fact, Pastor Scott went on a mission trip with Tom Doyle. And he wrote this book about those in Muslim countries where they didn't have access to the gospel.
[9:18] And in that book, he records that many of them received a vision or a dream as a part of the process of their conversion experience. In our book club, we read a book by Nabeel Qureshi, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus.
[9:34] And in that book, Nabeel talks about part of his conversion process was a dream that he received where Jesus revealed himself to him. Another book, David Garrison, a missiologist, in 2015 wrote a book, A Wind in the House of Islam.
[9:49] He actually was like more of a scientist and he interviewed, more of a scholar on this, interviewed a thousand plus Muslim background believers.
[10:00] And his finding was that many of them had dreams and visions related to Jesus revealing himself to these individuals. But they almost always needed, in addition to that, scripture and a gospel witness.
[10:14] And so, in his kind of research, he found that dreams often acted as a bridge, but not the whole conversion process.
[10:27] And so, God may do that on occasion. But I think what's ironic is that many believers bellyache, they want more visions over words.
[10:37] I want something more cryptic God over something that is actually pretty clear. And sometimes it grows out of just, we're just lazy.
[10:48] I don't want to actually go and spend time in the book. Why is it that we're people of a book? Well, maybe God actually craves a relationship instead of just immediately downloading stuff to us.
[11:01] But I think sometimes we wrestle and we're thinking, man, I really want a personal word from God. I've thought that before. Man, I want a personal message from him.
[11:11] Well, we're going to look at a personal message that somebody receives as a result of this particular vision. And it's a personal word that Zechariah is supposed to deliver.
[11:22] Now, what does Zechariah see in this fifth vision? Well, we see here in the first part of verse 2, he says, I see and behold a lampstand of gold.
[11:37] Okay? So, this vision is about a lampstand. This is a familiar object to any Jew of the day. It would have been similar to what was used in the tabernacle. Exodus 25, 32 talks about what would this lampstand look like.
[11:52] In verse 31 it says it's made of gold. And then verse 32, and there shall be six branches going out of its sides, three branches of the lampstand out of one side of it, and three branches of the lampstand out of the other side of it.
[12:04] Okay? So, there was this lampstand that was there in the tabernacle. We know that then when Solomon built the temple, there were ten of them inside of the temple.
[12:16] 2 Chronicles 4, 7. You can look at that later. But an Old Testament lampstand is what we traditionally think of as a menorah.
[12:27] In fact, the Hebrew word for lampstand is menorah. And so, it is this, you know, this lampstand with a center, and then three branches on both sides.
[12:41] So, you have seven wicks, lights from this one lampstand. And these menorahs would be placed in the holy place of the tabernacle.
[12:51] That's the outer court to the most holy place. And it was the only light in that inner court. And it was one of the things that was there with the altar of incense and the table of showbread.
[13:05] But that light, that menorah, represented God's presence. Okay? His guidance. Right? And in this vision that Zachariah is getting, this lampstand is like God saying to Zachariah, Hey, I'm present.
[13:24] I'm actually with you. And I'm actually leading you. But here's the thing, friends. This is not just an ordinary menorah.
[13:35] An ordinary lampstand. It is a special edition lampstand. This is a lampstand with some significant upgrades. In fact, let's see.
[13:46] Going back to verse 2. Verses 2 and 3. Second part of verse 2 starts this way. It says, Catch that?
[14:19] You want one of these. I created an image. Thank you, ChatGBT. I used up all my freebies, so it took about three days to finally get what I want.
[14:30] But this is the best I could do, friends. Okay? I'm not saying, like, this is completely accurate, but I think we have a slide, and we can throw that up there and kind of give you an image of what Zachariah is receiving from this interpreting angel related to this very upgraded, we'll call it a super menorah, that Zachariah is seeing.
[14:55] We have the lampstand, and on top of it, there is a bowl, and that bowl is fed from two olive trees, and you can see there's some good pipe work in the house.
[15:09] You see that feeding into the bowl, and olive oil was the oil used to burn lamps in this day, and in the tabernacle, this lampstand would have had to have been filled on a regular basis by the priest.
[15:28] Not this lampstand. This one is, like, directly piped into two olive trees, and we learn that later in verse 12, where it says, and a second time I answered and said to him, what are these two branches of olive trees which are beside the two golden pipes from which the golden oil is poured out?
[15:45] Okay? This is what comes into Jay's brain when he reads the Bible. This is, this is, this, maybe this is exactly how it's supposed to look. I don't know. But that oil then goes into a bowl, a holding tank above the menorah.
[16:00] It's gravity fed to the seven channels, each containing, it says seven lifts, spouts, shafts, wicks, we don't know. There's some redundancy in here. There's some complicated things in here.
[16:12] In fact, it was like Friday, and I called up Dr. V. I'm like, okay, Dr. Reland, help me. Help you. Help me. And he's like, you're on your own.
[16:24] Basically. That's, I mean, that's a short version. This is the best I can do. There's a lot of scholars that think, well, maybe because there's seven, and maybe there's actually 49 flames.
[16:37] So I added wicks to each of these different lights, and there's a lot of fire here. I like fire, so I'm thinking, man, maybe that's what's going on here. Lot of flame.
[16:49] That's maybe similar to what it would have looked like. And this is Zachariah's response. Okay? Look at verse four. It says, and I said to the angel who talked to me, what are these, my Lord?
[17:02] And the angel who talked to me answered and said to me, do you not know what these are? And I said, no, my Lord. And I just think it's interesting that Zachariah's like, what are these?
[17:14] And I just love the angel's response. There's a little bit of just this incredulous kind of tone here. Like, you don't know? Come on, Zach. You don't know what this is?
[17:25] And maybe, maybe he's thinking, Zachariah, you're, you're actually from a priestly line. Like, you know what a menorah is. Why the question? Yes, this one's a little fancy, very upgraded, but it's still a menorah.
[17:38] Okay? And so then we're giving the explanation of this, because I know you're like sitting in the pew going, Jay, how is this going to help me walk with Jesus this week? I'm going to get to that.
[17:48] Okay? Go to verse six to 10. Okay? And he said to me, this is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts.
[18:01] Who are you? Oh, great mountain before Zerubbabel, you shall become a plane and he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of grace, grace to it.
[18:11] Then the word of the Lord came to me saying, the hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house. His hands shall also complete it. Then you will know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you.
[18:22] For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice and shall see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. These seven are the eyes of the Lord, which range through the whole earth.
[18:34] It just keeps getting more complicated. I know. That's why it was like Saturday morning, you guys are spreading bark and I'm still in my office going, what?
[18:45] What? This is the sermon commercial where we go, whose idea was this? All right. Back to the text. Okay.
[18:56] First, why is this vision, why is Zachariah supposed to pass this note in class to this other kid, Zerubbabel? Okay.
[19:07] Who is Zerubbabel? Well, Haggai one tells us in the, in the second year of Darius, the king, the sixth month on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai to the prophet Zerubbabel, the son of Shittil, governor of Judah.
[19:27] Okay. And to Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest. So Zerubbabel is who? He's the governor of Judah. Joshua is the high priest.
[19:38] And the instruction that Haggai brings is, Hey, build the temple. That's from God. Build the temple. These are the two key leaders at the time.
[19:49] Last week, we considered Joshua. Okay. The high priest. That was vision number four. Scott shared about that last week. Okay. And this morning, we're thinking about this guy, Zerubbabel, the governor, the political leader of Judah.
[20:04] Now, for those of you that are really thoughtful Bible readers and scholars, you're going, Governor? Israel's not had a governor for a long time.
[20:17] Like, where's the king? And I think that's important for us just to comment on. The time of the kings is over.
[20:29] Since the days of Nebuchadnezzar, his conquest of Jerusalem in 586 B.C., that began what Scripture terms the time of the Gentiles.
[20:42] And the time of the Gentiles goes on until King Jesus returns at his second advent. That began it. We are still in it today.
[20:54] Paul references this in Romans 11. He says this, verse 25, lest you be wise in your own sight. Who's Paul writing to? A very Gentile heavy church in Rome.
[21:05] Don't be wise, Gentile Christians. I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers. A partial hardening has come upon Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.
[21:18] That's the time in which we live. We're in the time of the Gentiles. And in fact, it's interesting because in Romans 11, verse 11, God says that he wants to use Gentile Christians to bring Jews to jealousy.
[21:34] As they see that we love the Old Testament Scriptures. As we see that we're talking about a Messiah that's come. God wants to use us in a really unique way to sort of provoke in them questions.
[21:46] It's like just planting seeds, planting pebbles in their shoe related to who the Messiah is. It's like me talking to that young Jewish professional in my car. And I got to share with her, Hey, Jesus, I believe is your Messiah.
[22:01] And it got very quiet because it was like, what? Who's this Gentile? What does he know? I had a conversation with a friend actually this week who's witnessing to a friend of his that is a Jewish man.
[22:17] And he's like, Jay, how should we go about this? I said, just go read Isaiah 53 together. And then ask him one simple question. Who's this about? Who do you think this describes, best describes?
[22:28] It's like, that's good. See, just keep it simple, right? But we are in this time of the Gentiles right now. And there are no more kings that will reign over Israel until the king returns.
[22:45] Okay? And that's when King Jesus returns. God is now stirring then as we look forward. We see the tribulation period. That is a time of revival for the Jewish people.
[22:57] And in fact, it says in Romans 11, 26, that's a time when all Israel will be saved. Now, does this mean every Jewish person alive on planet Earth is going to trust in Jesus as their Messiah and their Savior and Lord?
[23:10] Right? No. But it does mean that there will be Jews from every tribe that will come to know Jesus as Savior. Presently, there is a hardness, a resistance towards believing that Jesus was their Messiah.
[23:26] Okay? Okay? All right. Back to Zerubbabel. God gives to Zechariah. Give this note to Zerubbabel.
[23:36] Is Zerubbabel important? He's very important. In fact, he's the one tasked to rebuild the temple. And this was a project that stalled out after the foundation was laid.
[23:49] But it is now underway. Ezra 4, 24 talks about that it stalled out. The work of the house of God that is in Jerusalem stopped.
[24:03] And it ceased until the second year of the reign of Darius, king of Persia. Okay? So it stopped, but now it has started back up. It's been going on for about five months.
[24:14] And it stalled out for about 17, 18 years since the Jews returned to Jerusalem. Why did it stall out? Well, frankly, it was hard.
[24:25] It was hard work. Rebuilding a temple. There was opposition to this building project. Ezra 4, verse 4 says, So people were afraid to build.
[24:52] They had other nations around intimidating them. And so they decided to give in to the fear. And then they just made excuses. Haggai 1, 2 says, The time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord.
[25:05] That's what they were saying. They were just saying, Well, God hasn't told us. He had. It's sort of like a ball club that loses a game. They should have won. And then they have no excuse. They're like, It was the ref's fault. Right?
[25:16] I got to come up with something. And so they're like, Well, God didn't really say. But God did say. And then as we also learned at the first sermon in the series, not only were they afraid to rebuild, but they got distracted with their own stuff.
[25:30] I don't want to engage on that. They were, in fact, Haggai 1, 4, you jot that down. They were building their paneled houses and God's house lied in ruin. Right?
[25:42] And so essentially what was going on is for 17, 18 years, God was just getting leftovers. People were consumed with their stuff. And I think there's actually something very practical for us.
[25:53] Gee, I need something practical. Well, this is very practical. Because I think we can all do this as well. Amen? Right? Philippians 1, 21 says, To live is Christ. To live is ministry.
[26:07] And I think some of us come up with many excuses why we don't serve the Lord. Jay, you don't understand. This is the worst. And just check yourself. Well, it's the season of life.
[26:18] Friends, we all, every single one of us, have been in a season of life all the time. It's just this season, then the next season, then another season. And some are more difficult than others.
[26:29] Okay? Israel had a very difficult season. And yet God's saying, I want you to engage in this work. And I think we have to be careful here. Okay? It's not to say that our ministry may not look different in a different season.
[26:42] Yeah, it may. Okay? And I just think all of us have to guard against delaying service unto the Lord because we're just too busy.
[26:55] Amen? Ooh, that kind of hurts, Jay. I want Scott back. I know. I do too. Especially this week. None of us are too busy to serve the Lord.
[27:07] And when I talk about serving the Lord, primarily what I'm talking about is ministering to people. Okay? We all have capacity, but we have to guard against, I'm too busy right now.
[27:17] I'm in a season of life. I was super encouraged over the weekend. Not because I, it's not because I wasn't here. I wanted to be here. Okay? It wasn't like, man, I was so encouraged.
[27:29] I wasn't at church. No, I'm not saying that. Don't put words in my mouth. I was encouraged because I got to serve with some other folks. I was at a conference over on the west side. I got to serve with Greg Kokel.
[27:41] And it was super fun because at the end of our time, I told Greg, I'm like, Greg, you got to write more books because we've read every one of them and taught every one of them at our church. So could you get on that?
[27:52] He's like, don't worry, Jay. I've got a book on prayer I'm working on right now. I said, great, because fall's coming and we might use it. So please, talk to your publishers. But what I was encouraged by was, Kokel's 75.
[28:06] He's 75. And he's still writing. And he's still speaking. And he's, it was just like, it was just fun to be able to watch this guy's like, I am going to use every ounce, everything the Lord's given me to be used of the Lord as long as he'll allow me.
[28:23] So I was just blessed. He's 75. I was tired after, you know, a very long day on Saturday of presenting three times.
[28:34] And I'm like, I'm tired. But then I looked at Kokel. I'm like, I'm not tired. I'm good. I am really, really good. I'm a 56-year-old spring chicken. So, friends, ministry can be discouraging.
[28:48] Ministry can be hard. Zerubbabel, the governor, he had 50,000 beat up, weary, timid, former exile people that he was having to figure out, how do I motivate? So God gives him this note to encourage him, right, that I'm with you.
[29:04] And he gets a word from the Lord, you're going to finish. You're going to be successful, right? You've laid the foundation, it says in verse 9, of the house, his hands, your hands shall also complete it.
[29:18] And then I love this image that he's given from the Lord where God says to him, hey, this thing, verse 7, looks like a mountain, mountain of a task. I've got to climb this thing? No, no, no, no. It's going to become like a flat plain.
[29:32] Why? Because I'm with you. Just as I stood, like my presence there in the tabernacle, the temple, I'm with you, Zerubbabel. I see, I'm with you in this.
[29:44] And in fact, verse 7, there's a promise, you're going to put on the top stone, the capstone of the temple structure. It's going to happen. And friends, here's a spoiler, it happened.
[29:57] Four years later, Ezra 6, 15, and this house was finished on the third day of the month of Adar in the sixth year of the reign of Darius, the king. It happened.
[30:10] Just like the personal note, right, that was smuggled to Zerubbabel, hey, hey, be encouraged, be encouraged. I'm with you. You're going to do it. You're going to do it.
[30:21] Well, how does he do it? How did it happen? Listen, does Zerubbabel go, oh, I got the encouragement, I'm going to use some, some of the latest techniques, right?
[30:33] Or, I'm going to muscle this thing. I'm just going to grit, mmm, I'm going to fix this thing by applying more pressure. Gentlemen, don't raise your hands.
[30:47] But if you're a guy, have you ever tried to apply pressure to fix something in life? Don't raise your hands. Because women, all of the hands will go up. Because that's what guys do. We apply pressure.
[30:58] I over tighten every nut. And it's a problem. And I know this about myself. But just a little, just a little, ee, that didn't work out so well. Changing the oil on one of my daughter's cars years ago.
[31:09] And then I had to do other things. Tapping, I mean, it just got very complicated. But we do this not just with things, we do this in relationships. Yeah.
[31:22] If you want to fix any relationship in life, applying more pressure is not a great tactic, men. But you know what is? Listen to the word given to Zach, to Zachariah, for Zerubbabel, verse six.
[31:35] Not by might, and that's talking about human might. Not by human might, nor by human power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Some of you have heard this verse and you had no idea it was connected to a super menorah.
[31:51] And now you're like, forever like, man, we need to get that picture for our wall. Go right above that verse, right? Bam. I'm selling these. No. If you want it, I'll send it to you.
[32:08] Oil. From the oil trees. What does the oil represent? That's God's spirit. And he says to Zachariah, not by might, power, by my spirit. That olive oil represents God's spirit.
[32:20] And what do you have in this picture? You have an endless supply. Endless supply. As this lampstand is tapped directly in. And I just, we don't have time to get into it, but yes, God's spirit was active in the Old Testament.
[32:35] Different than we experience today, but still very active. We need God's spirit, friends. We need, we need to stay filled just like this menorah.
[32:47] There was a woman who asked D.L. Moody once, she said, hey, why do you talk so often about the need for being filled with the Holy Spirit? You always are stressing the need to be filled again and again.
[33:00] Why isn't once enough to be filled? And what was Moody's response? I leak. I leak. If we're in Christ, do we have the Holy Spirit?
[33:14] Yes, we have the Holy Spirit. Okay? Romans 8 and 9 says, if you don't have the Holy Spirit, you don't belong to Christ. If you're in Christ, you have the Holy Spirit. 1 Corinthians 12, 13 says, hey, we were all baptized by the Spirit into one body.
[33:27] Ephesians 1, 13 says, we've been sealed with the Holy Spirit. If we're in Christ, we have God's Spirit with us, but we have a choice every single day, just like D.L. Moody, to say, hey, am I going to be filled?
[33:44] Am I going to walk by the Spirit? Galatians 5, 16, so that I don't gratify the desires of the flesh. Ephesians 5, 18, don't be drunk with wine, be filled with the Spirit.
[33:56] So what does it mean to be filled? You don't lose the Holy Spirit. Okay? You don't actually need more Holy Spirit. None of us. The Holy Spirit needs more of us. The issue here is surrender.
[34:09] And I would just suggest for all of us, I would exhort all of us to make this choice every morning to say, Lord, fill me. That's the prayer as we wake up in the morning. Lord, and if you don't like the word fill, say, Lord, I surrender to you, to your leading, to your Spirit, to your prompting, to your help.
[34:25] I am submitting my day to you. And we have to do that every day because you know what happens? You get out of your house and all of a sudden you're around people or you're in your house and you're around a lot of people like me.
[34:38] And it's like you don't interact very well until it's like, Lord, be in charge of Jay. Be in charge of me today. I'm surrendering to you. And we have to do this afresh to the Lord every single day.
[34:54] I can do that, Jay. But I'm not like Zerubbabel. I'm not like Greg Kokel with his big speaking ministry. And you can just think, man, why do I need so much help?
[35:08] And I just say, man, you've got to stop comparing yourself to others. That was happening in the day of Zechariah. Israel, they're looking at this rebuilt temple that they thought was pretty pathetic, many of them.
[35:21] In fact, it says in verse 10, for whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice and see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. In fact, there was a whole group of individuals, old timers, that wept when they compared Zerubbabel's temple build with Solomon's.
[35:40] It says in Ezra 3.12, but many of the priests and Levites and heads of fathers' houses, old men who had seen the first house, it says they wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid.
[35:55] And they were comparing. And we can do that. We can do that with our own lives. God doesn't want a whole lot from me. What am I going to do? And we can do that as a whole church.
[36:08] You know there are flashier churches in Spokane. I know. Like last week we had pillars. Right? Like woo! That's, you know? I could get you up, Scott.
[36:19] We could do it for you. You're like, whoa! Whoa! Fourth has pillars? It's a happening place, friends. There's flashier, there's bigger churches in town. There's churches that did like five services on Easter.
[36:32] We did one. How could God use just this ordinary church? Friends, it doesn't matter. Some of you are in here like, I just teach Sunday school.
[36:46] And it's like a group of like five kids and over half of them, three of the two, don't even listen. Or maybe you're thinking, I don't need to battle that addiction.
[37:00] I don't need to battle that besetting sin. I'm nobody. It doesn't matter if I honor the Lord right now in my dating relationship if I'm single. No one knows.
[37:12] No one cares. Friends, theme of this vision, man, it doesn't matter what we're part of. It doesn't matter if it compares in scale or influence.
[37:24] What matters if we're a people actually surrender daily to God's Spirit. Amen? That's what God sees. That's worship. That's beautiful worship unto Him that we would be yielded to God's Spirit, growing in character, walking, relying on our God day in, day out.
[37:44] Be encouraged because your God is with you. This picture, those lights, it's like God sees. Right? Verse 10, these seven are the eyes of the Lord which range through the whole earth.
[37:56] Seven flames or maybe it's 47. I don't exactly know. With those, by the way, those extra flames, it's like H, like that's serious. L-E-D, I don't know.
[38:08] Whatever those really bright lights are on your car, some of you, I can't see when you're coming at me. That's what those are. God sees. God sees.
[38:22] I mean, I was reminded of that this weekend. I mean, I was serving with like three other guys that are all very accomplished in their fields. And then they invited me to speak at this conference and they're like, what do you do?
[38:36] Well, I have a car and I pick people up and then I drop them all. not a lot of people know how to drive or have passengers.
[39:01] But you know what? As we're yielded to God, the Spirit, He loves to use His people. God delights in what you do.
[39:13] He delights in what I do, the service unto Him. Just one conversation at a time for me. Rely on His Spirit. What do you want to do, God?
[39:24] Man, be encouraged. Parents, some of you like, this is like the season you should be discipling your family, your children. children. I'm an old pastor now.
[39:37] It's kind of a weird thing because I look so good. I know. It's strange. Not as good as Scott, but we're both working on it. Number one challenge, I think, that I've seen in all the years of pastoring is parents not really engaging in discipling children.
[39:59] Period. It's just, not calling anybody out this morning. It's just, it's very easy to coast at home, to rely on the professionals, maybe at the church or the youth meeting during the week somewhere or here and to not really be thoughtfully engaged.
[40:18] And man, that's powerful. That's powerful ministry because you are now multiplying yourself in the life of another.
[40:28] So we got to rely on his spirit. And maybe you're like, well, Jay, that's good. It's a little ethereal still for me. Okay, rely on God. Get things done.
[40:39] Okay. Well, you know what? This gets super practical at the end. Look at verses 11 to 14. Then I said to him, what are these two olive trees on the right and the left of the lampstand?
[40:51] And a second time I answered and said to him, what are these two branches of the olive trees which are beside the two golden pipes from which the golden oil is poured out? And he said to me, do you not know what these are?
[41:02] And I said, no, my Lord. Then he said, these are the two anointed ones who stand by the Lord of the whole earth. So, who are the two olive trees? There is a lot of confusion.
[41:14] There's a lot of like maybe, maybe not. And I lean 51% in a direction here. So, that tells you I really like the other interpretation a lot. The 49% interpretation of who these olive trees are, prophets of the day, Zechariah and Haggai.
[41:30] Okay? And these would be the two forerunners of the two witnesses, prophetic voices in Revelation 11. Woo, woo, woo, woo, during the tribulation. That's pretty cool. And in fact, in Revelation 11, those two are called olive trees.
[41:42] So, there's some good connection. I could make a case for that this morning, but I'm not because I talked to Dr. Breland and he helped me. He gave me 1% of confidence. 51%.
[41:53] Better fit contextually, however, are the two anointed ones. They're called two anointed ones in verse 14. The only individuals in the Old Testament that were anointed, only two offices, were a high priest and the king.
[42:08] Okay? Well, in this day, who are these two? Joshua, who you met last week, and Zerubbabel, who you were introduced this week. The priest and the governor who actually was of the line of David.
[42:21] He is the most king-like figure here, even though he's the governor. These are the two key leaders tasked to lead Israel in this time of rebuilding. King, priest.
[42:33] And I think they're forerunners of the king and the priest to come. Amen? Amen? Jesus. All of this points towards Jesus. But this image makes God's work very practical in this way.
[42:46] It's not just by God's Spirit that God works. It's actually by ordinary people filled, yielded to His Spirit that He works.
[42:57] Amen? And that's what you have here at the end. It's actually these two individuals who are filled with my Spirit. It's by my Spirit. But I use ordinary people. This is super helpful, friends, because God wants to use us.
[43:13] Zerubbabel, he didn't say, I'm going to be filled with the Spirit. No, because it describes him in verse 10 as Zerubbabel who had a plumb line in his hand. God loves to work through people. Loves to work through people.
[43:25] You can have ministry today with somebody. All this, I think, is wonderful. wonderful. But maybe you're still here thinking, Jay, this is great, this is great.
[43:38] But I feel like Zerubbabel got something that I don't get. He got a personal message from God. How come I don't have that? And I'm just here to tell you at the end, you get that all the time.
[43:51] No, I don't. Yes, you do. And I'm just going to end with just, this is going to take a little bit of a turn, but I just want to give this to you because it's ministered to me so often over the years as I think about this struggle of like, man, I want a personal note from God.
[44:07] I want God to give me a personal note. Pass one to Zechariah to give to Zerubbabel. I want that. Well, you got that. Here's four ways God's given you a personal note today. He gives you a personal note in His creation.
[44:20] Did you know that? God actually speaks through His creation. And mainly, the thing He tells you over and over is, hey, I exist. You look around, you know. You see just a beautiful spring day, the sunset, warmth of the sun on your face.
[44:35] God is whispering, hey, I exist. But He's actually doing even more than that. It's actually more personal than that because in Matthew 5, 45, here in the Beatitudes and Sermon on the Mount, you have where Jesus says, hey, He makes His Son rise on the evil and on the good.
[44:57] He sends the rain on the just and the unjust. So the context is love. God actually says to all of creation, I love you, to all people, whether you love Jesus or not, hey, all of this is for you.
[45:12] And I think as we feel the warmth of God, of God's creation, our faces like God whispering to us, hey, I love you. It's my common grace for all men. That's a personal note from God. Here's a second one.
[45:23] God gives you a personal note when you use your spiritual gifts. What? As you exercise your gifts, who are they from? They're from the Spirit. Okay? Who's a spirit? It's not an it. That's the Spirit of God.
[45:34] So God has given you a gift and as you exercise those gifts, what do you feel? Joy. That's God whispering to you, hey, this is from me. That's a personal note from God.
[45:47] So you're like, man, I haven't felt that in a long time. Well, have you served in a long time? Start figuring out, how can I be used of the Lord? And you will then experience something more of God's joy.
[45:58] That's God's whisper to you. Here's a third personal note. You want to get really personal? God convicts you of sin. That is a personal note from God Almighty directly to you.
[46:10] Because He's convicting you of sin that He's not convicting me of. Or they may be the same sin, but it's personally directed to me, it's personally directed to you. You ever done something you knew you shouldn't do and you're just like riddled with guilt?
[46:21] Guess what? All of us who convicts of sin, the Holy Spirit, John 16, 8, when He, the Holy Spirit, comes, He will convict the world concerning sin. It's the third member of the triune Godhead.
[46:33] So when you're convicted of sin, you know what God's telling you is like, repent, but He's also telling you this. You belong to me, you're my kid. That's a personal note from God Almighty to you. I never thought of conviction of sin as like God sending me a text message.
[46:48] Well, He is. He's telling you, hey, you're my kid. That's cool. I never thought of it that way. Well, now you will. And the last way, finally, God's clearest channel of communication to us is what, friends?
[47:02] His word. His word. It's all breathed out by God, 2 Timothy 3, 16. But what's remarkable is we have a book where God tells us personal things about Himself and I would just suggest if you're here this morning, you're like, well, God's been very silent.
[47:18] How long has it been? How long has it been? Begin afresh to abide. We're on the precipice of moving into a very outdoorsy time.
[47:30] So you're in God's creation. That's good. Creation tells you that God exists. This book tells you His name. And I would just exhort us, what are we going to do to draw near to be people that abide as we enter into summer months?
[47:42] I'm desperate for it. I need it. You need it too. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. Lord, thank you that actually you're like passing notes to us all the time.
[47:56] We just haven't really picked up that that's what's going on. Just like you did with the Zerubbabel. And for him it was just in the midst of a very difficult task.
[48:07] And Lord, I know that life can be challenging and there are very difficult days for all of us. Different seasons. Thank you, Lord, that you remind us that you're with us. Thank you for this image of this lampstand.
[48:21] Your presence. And Father, we are reminded of that as we soak in your wonderful creation. as we use our gifts and experience joy.
[48:33] That's your whisper to us. When you convict us of sin, you're telling us, hey, you're my son. You're my daughter. Turn from that. I love you. And then, Lord, we hear you all the time when we spend time communing with you in your word.
[48:47] Thank you that you tell us very personal things about yourself. Lord, would you encourage your people this morning? Lord, we want to enjoy you today and be of service maybe to someone else.
[48:59] And in that, pray that we would experience your joy. We say all this. Pray that all of this in the name of Jesus. Amen.