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[0:00] Amen. Well, good morning, Fourth. Good morning, Fourth. There we go. It's good to see you. Thank you.! Hey, Dr. V.

[0:13] Good to see you all here this morning. Happy Father's Day to our fathers and those that our father figures in the lives of others. It's an important, noble, often marginalized, not celebrated calling in life.

[0:32] But we need godly fathers. Amen? And so this morning for all of us, we have opportunity to draw near to the Lord, to hear from Him, to worship together.

[0:45] And I would encourage us, you know, let's be praying for the church in the summertime. There's a lot of ministry happening. We just got back from children's camp and Noah's going to be heading off.

[0:58] Marissa, are you going too? No? Okay. So we got to pray mostly for Marissa. But they will be out next week with our youth. And I think we have about 30 students we're sending up to Riverview.

[1:11] And yeah, I want to pray that the Lord would meet with our people, with our students, and they would grow hearts to make much of Jesus in this life.

[1:23] So we're in the book of Zechariah. You can go ahead and turn it open. We're going to look at the entire chapter of 11. We have approximately four more sermons in Zechariah.

[1:38] So we are nearing the end. And we have a very, very dense chapter that we will cover again this morning.

[1:51] Scott and myself sort of joke during the week on like who got Zechariah this week. So, and he's pretty happy about me taking chapter 11.

[2:02] So, let me pray for our time and then we'll spend some time hearing from the Lord. Father, thank you for just the gift of getting to be your people in this life.

[2:16] Lord, it's pretty remarkable that each of us here began life as rebels, as those not in relationship with you. And yet, in your providence and your sovereignty, you used others in our lives to draw us to yourself.

[2:34] You drew us and Lord, we trust it in Christ. And Lord, if there's folks here that have never done that, I pray today would be the day of their salvation and they would know your forgiveness, Jesus.

[2:44] They would know new life, that you can give somebody a complete reset, a new beginning. And I pray that salvation would come to those that have yet to bow their knee to you.

[2:58] But Lord, we know the promise that if we would draw near, that you would reciprocate. And so Lord, we want to do that now. We've done that in song and we want to do that now in study as we open your word.

[3:11] Lord, we want to do it in repentance. We want to clean our hands and purify our hearts. And Lord, this morning, that you would do a remarkable work in each of us. And Lord, we would leave here more zealous for you with greater joy, seeking to be a blessing to those around us.

[3:30] So we commit our time to you now. It's in Jesus' name and all God's people said, Amen. So we are in Zechariah 11. We know that Zechariah is this post-exilic prophet prophesied after the 70-year exile that the southern kingdom of Judah was experiencing there in Babylon.

[3:50] He ministered 500 years before the first advent of Christ. And his message really is, it's of all the prophets, he's one of the more hopeful.

[4:05] And he's bringing a message to a people that have felt perhaps forgotten, not seen. His name, Zechariah, means the Lord remembers you. And perhaps after 70 years of exile, they're feeling like, does God even see us?

[4:19] Does he even know that we are still here? I love the promise in Zechariah 1.3 where he writes, Therefore say to them, thus declares the Lord of hosts, return to me, says the Lord of hosts, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts.

[4:37] So it's a very hopeful book. Last week, Scott continued in this first oracle, the first half of the oracle, where we were considering the second king.

[4:50] No, it's not Alexander the Great, it's Jesus, the king of kings. And if you want to sort of think about a structure for this book, it's very simple. This book is divided into eight visions and two oracles.

[5:03] That's the book. Eight visions and two oracles. And these two oracles happen at the tail end of the book. The first oracle happens in verses, or chapter 9 through 11, and then next week we'll begin the second oracle, chapters 12 through 14.

[5:22] Okay? And you're like, well, Jay, what's an oracle? An oracle, this word actually means it's a weight or it is a burden. So we think of oracle, it's God's burden for his people.

[5:35] It's like a good father who is burdened for his children. Oh, you're hanging out with that one kid. Man, I'm burdened. They're going to influence you for evil.

[5:46] Or man, I've seen this behavior in your life, this pattern, and I'm burdened for you. And so God has this burden and these two oracles he ends on. And the one that we are considering here, we're going to finish up oracle number one this morning, and it's really broken up into good news and bad news.

[6:04] And unfortunately, the last two weeks, you already got the good news. We looked at Alexander the Great a couple weeks ago.

[6:16] And the good news at that point in the oracle is, hey, he's not going to destroy you. He's not going to actually destroy Jerusalem on his Mediterranean campaign in 333 B.C.

[6:27] Why? Because it says in Zechariah 9.8, then I will encamp at my house as a guard. God says, I'm going to guard Jerusalem. It's not going to be taken. That's good news.

[6:38] And then last week, more good news. Zechariah's words pointing towards future blessing that God promised to Israel. It said in chapter 10, verse 10, I'm going to bring them home.

[6:52] Gather my people. Bring them to the land. And we know that the beginning stages of that actually occurred in this last century.

[7:03] May 14, 1948, when the modern state of Israel was established after World War II. And it's remarkable, friends, that we have the prophecy in this book.

[7:16] 2,500 years before that event occurred, God's Word's talking about it. That should shock you. That should sort of unnerve you a bit.

[7:28] This is not a normal book. It's powerful. It's prophetic. 2,500 years ago, Zechariah says, hey, God's going to gather His people.

[7:42] Bring them back to the land. And we know since that date in 1948, 3.5 million Jews have returned since. And that will then culminate at the future thousand-year kingdom, at the return of Christ that's set up at the end of the tribulation period.

[7:58] That golden age for Israel that we talked about, this millennial kingdom, and if you want to read about it, go to Revelation 20, verses 1 through 7. They talk about it a lot.

[8:09] In fact, it's mentioned six times in those first seven verses. And then chapter 10 of Zechariah, it ends on this positive note. Zechariah 10.12.

[8:20] I will make them strong in the Lord, and they shall walk in His name, declares the Lord. Friends, the first part of the oracle is so good. Future blessing.

[8:32] A millennial kingdom to look forward to. It's so good. Chapter 10's wonderful. Chapter 9's wonderful. And now we're in chapter 11. And all that positivity is just going to leave the room.

[8:48] Happy Father's Day. Chapter 11 is a dark chapter on why God's blessing isn't necessarily removed, but it is going to be severely delayed in the life of Israel.

[9:04] The distant future is bright, but before that, there are difficult days ahead. And Zechariah has to deliver this difficult news.

[9:18] Now, when we deliver difficult news, many of us have different strategies. Some of you are like, if I got difficult news to bring, I just say it like it is.

[9:30] I just come in, and I just drop the bomb. Others of you are like, well, I have this strategy where I like build it up as really, really bad, and then when I deliver the bad news that's not quite as bad, people are like, oh, oh, that's not so bad.

[9:44] I've tried that. It doesn't always work. First time I had a fender bender, family car, I made it out to be some big, big accident. It was a little dent. My parents were upset, enraged, and they saw the dent, and then they were doubly enraged that I like made them enraged.

[10:00] It really worked out poorly for me. Zechariah has a strategy for delivering bad news. How does he do it? Well, he turns to poetry.

[10:15] Oh, yeah. Zechariah turns it into a poem. And let's read the poem, verses one through three. Open your doors, oh, Lebanon, that the fire may devour your cedars.

[10:31] Wail, oh, Cyprus, for the cedar has fallen, for the glorious trees are ruined. Wail, oaks of Bashan, for the thick forest has been felled, the sound of the wall of the shepherds, for their glory is ruined, the sound of the roar of lions, for the thicket of the Jordan is ruined.

[10:50] So he turns to poetry. This is the most poetic portion of this entire book. And even though he paints sort of this lush forest tree theme, this isn't the sort of poem that you would read to your children to get them to fall back to sleep at night.

[11:11] It would be, you know, that would be like, hey, let's sing about Ring Around the Roses, children. That'll help you sleep well. And dream about the black plague. This is actually a pretty dark poem.

[11:25] Even though you guys saw trees and you were excited, oh, cedars and oaks, I love trees. Yeah, it's a dark poem. We know it because Zachariah uses the word ruined three times.

[11:38] He uses it once in verse two and twice in verse three. And the word ruined could be translated to devastate. This is actually a poem about destruction.

[11:50] And it's describing devastation that is going to cover the entire land of Israel. All the way from Lebanon in the north to Jordan in the south to Bashan in the middle, this fertile region east of the Jordan River, known for its pasture lands and oak forests.

[12:12] And this imagery that we have here is really of a forest being decimated. He writes, fire may devour your cedars. And all three of these areas that are mentioned, Lebanon, Bashan, Jordan, they all had forest regions to them.

[12:31] And you have cedars talked about. What are cedars? Well, these are pine trees. Like, I didn't really know pine trees until we moved to Spokane. And it's a thing here.

[12:41] They just grow everywhere. These cedars were famous. Solomon used them to build his house and the temple. They're majestic. Cedars could grow up to 150 feet.

[12:54] They're actually used, the grandeur of them, Psalm 92, 12, the righteous will grow like the cedars of Lebanon. So they were a famous tree.

[13:05] They are going to be decimated. And then you have the cypress trees. What are cypress trees? Well, this would be fir trees. So think Christmas tree. They're smaller than the cedars. And then you have oaks.

[13:16] So you have trees of every shape and size and all of them, Zachariah's writing, are going to be destroyed. But the way that he writes it is interesting because he actually uses personification and makes these trees as though they're alive and have personality.

[13:34] Like they're wailing in anguish. And you sort of have to wonder if Tolkien thought about Zachariah, maybe he took inspiration when we have the Ents fighting the forces of Saruman, the trees wailing for their fallen kinsmen.

[13:52] Because that's what you have here in this poem. Verse 2, Wail, O Cypress, for the cedar has fallen. Your comrade, the cedar's down. Wail, oaks of Bashan, for the thick forest has failed.

[14:07] And so, what we're observing here is really destruction of everything within the borders of Israel. And catch this, it's so bad actually, but by the time we get to verse 3 it says that the shepherds are even wailing because their pasture lands are destroyed.

[14:26] Even the lions who lived in the woods near the Jordan are roaring as their homes, their habitats are destroyed. And so, you have to ask yourself the question, we have like this poem and it's really dark and it's like, it's kind of heavy and it's like, what is this referring to?

[14:44] What future event is Zachariah describing is he writing about? Both Jewish and Christian scholars interpret this poem as describing most likely in very illustrative language the future destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 70 A.D.

[15:08] by the Romans. And the thing that I want us to see here is this poem is very out of place in this book.

[15:19] This is a hopeful book. It's a book filled with blessing. The Lord's going to return. The king is coming back. A kingdom is awaiting you, Israel. And then we have this.

[15:31] What is it doing there? It's completely out of place. I still remember, I think I shared with you, it was opening day of hunting season and I got up and I looked out the window thinking, oh, is there a buck in the backyard?

[15:42] And I looked and there was two horses in our backyard just grazing on our lawn. I was like, what? I didn't even understand. Well, my wife did because she looked and she said, the Lord provides.

[15:58] We had to give them back. But it was so alarming because I'm like, what? What is this doing here? Friends, you should feel that as you read this poem.

[16:10] What is this poem doing in Zechariah? Something so shocking is going to occur with God's ancient people that God is actually going to bring swift devastation upon the nation and the land.

[16:31] Well, what is it that's so shocking? What sort of evil would God's people have to participate in to provoke God to this severe of a judgment?

[16:44] And I will tell you, they rejected their king. Messiah showed up. The good shepherd arrived and they said, thank you, but no thank you.

[16:58] Their Messiah, the deliverer, the snake crusher that was foretold, promised for the past 4,000 years since the first gospel presentation in Genesis 3.15 and he finally arrives, he splits time in half and you say, no thank you?

[17:19] Friends, post the fall in Eden, this is the worst decision in the history of man bar none.

[17:30] Without exception. And that's what our passage describes this morning. Let's look at it beginning in verse 4. And by the way, if you're looking for an outline, there is none.

[17:45] We're just going to walk through the passage because there's a lot here. Probably taking many of them one verse at a time. But then at the end, I'm going to give you an application, but I think you'll be able to figure it out before we get there.

[17:56] And if you do, keep quiet. You might have a friend sitting next to you that's a little more simple. And it's okay. Okay? We all take different amount of time. Alright, verse 4.

[18:08] Thus said the Lord, my God, become shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. Now, Zachariah's already been the poet.

[18:20] He's now changing his artistic flair and he's becoming an actor. Alright? He's moving from poetry to theater here. And in fact, God is having him play the part of a shepherd.

[18:35] Thus said the Lord, my God, become shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter. God is asking Zachariah to play the leading role of Israel's rejected shepherd.

[18:47] Like, wow, that's, that's a little strange, Jay. Well, God asked prophets to do some strange things. Okay? This is not out of the norm of what God asked for his prophets.

[18:58] Ezekiel, Ezekiel 4, he had a, God said, hey, I want you to lay on this side of your body for 390 years, or 390 days.

[19:11] And then, flip over on the other side for 40 nights, and I want you to symbolize Israel and Judah sin. But I love, like, that Ezekiel got, like, this sort of ministry.

[19:25] Like, God said, basically, I want you to nap so that people will learn. That was not my week this week. It took a lot to prepare Zechariah.

[19:36] There was no napping. Prophets did some crazy things. Isaiah, Isaiah 20, God said, hey, I want you to go barefoot and almost naked for 3 years.

[19:47] That's a sign that Egypt and Cush would be led into captivity. Jeremiah, Jeremiah 27, he was told to wear a wooden yoke, an ox yoke around his neck to symbolize submission to Babylon.

[20:02] So, God was totally into theater, illustrations. Some of you guys were, like, freaking out when Scott was here last week and he brought up his doll collection.

[20:17] We talk about it. I'm working on him. It's a process. I'm not going to say anymore.

[20:32] But maybe you're thinking, this is a little weird. Like, why is God having Zechariah now play the role, do theater? Well, God is a master teacher, friends, and he knows how we learn.

[20:48] And in fact, if you think it's weird that Zechariah is doing theater, we actually do theater ourselves every time we participate in baptism and communion. And maybe you've never thought of it that way.

[20:59] Those are theatrical events of the church where we highlight the death and the new life that we have in Christ. But the key is this.

[21:11] That's not theater seeking to make the pretend appear real. It's actually seeking to make the real really real in our hearts and in our minds.

[21:23] And so Zechariah is willing to put on this one-man play, and if you want to give a title to it, it's entitled Rejection of the True Shepherd of Israel. Hence, you have no shepherd, the sheep will be led to slaughter, which is why Israel is called the flock doomed to slaughter.

[21:42] Messiah arrived and they wanted a different sort of shepherd. Alright, let's go on. Verse 5. Those who buy them slaughter them and go unpunished, and those who sell them say, Blessed be the Lord, I have become rich.

[21:58] And their own shepherds have no pity on them. Those who buy them slaughter them.

[22:10] who is the buyer here? Who's the buyer of the flock doomed to slaughter? The buyer are the godless nations who oppress Israel.

[22:25] God handed over Israel to nations for judgment, but as you recall, oftentimes, those nations, they would go too far. Recall, Babylon.

[22:37] It says in Isaiah 47.6, I was angry with my people. I profaned my heritage. I gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy on the agent. You made your yoke exceedingly heavy.

[22:50] God exiled Judah for 70 years in Babylon. Babylon got proud, so God raised up then Persia to destroy them. That's who bought the flock.

[23:04] But maybe a more important question is, well, who's selling? And what's worse, the one that buys or the one that sells? And I would say the one that sells are Israel's own shepherds.

[23:19] And in fact, you have some sargasm here where you have shepherds saying, oh, God is good. We're getting rich. The Jewish leaders killed King Jesus thinking it would keep them in good standing with Rome.

[23:33] They're the ones that sold the flock. We read about it in John chapter 11 verse 47 says, so the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered the council and said, what are we to do?

[23:46] For this man performs many signs, speaking of Jesus. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe him. You would think that would be a good thing. And the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.

[24:00] nation. essentially, the shepherds were like, we want God, but we don't want his authority. We want God's benefits without God, without changing anything.

[24:19] And friends, this is the plight of man. It's interesting to me as I have now driven for Uber for about 10 years now, I think going on 11, I run into people that have all sorts of doubts.

[24:38] And there's three types of doubts, but it's not intellectual doubt that's the main doubt. That's like number three in line. Oh, I have a question, I don't understand this, I have conflicting things that seems like in the Bible, can you explain this to me?

[24:53] That's intellectual doubt. Above that is emotional doubt, I've experienced something, I've been harmed by a Christian, I've seen hypocrisy, that's emotional doubt. I see that quite a bit, but the thing that I find most, the leading issue is volitional doubt.

[25:08] That's number one. I don't actually want to change my life, even if God exists. I don't want to bow my knee. Light has come, but you know what, I actually love darkness, I'm going to be in charge.

[25:21] Volitional doubt is the central issue that I encounter as they interact with people. And that's what you saw in the leadership, the shepherds of Israel. We're going to sell out the flock to the Romans, because we want to maintain our place of authority.

[25:42] Let's continue, verse 6. For I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of this land, declares the Lord. Behold, I will cause each of them to fall into the hand of his neighbor, and each into the hand of his king.

[25:55] And they shall crush the land, and I will deliver none from their hand. Well, God's patience, it runs out.

[26:07] It says here, I will no longer have pity on the inhabitants of this land. I will deliver none. This is heavy. God's saying, I'm not going to deliver any anymore.

[26:17] I sent the shepherd. So Zechariah is forecasting in the future, right? In 500 years from now, the king, the good shepherd's coming, you're going to reject, and God's saying, hey, I'm not going to have pity on you anymore.

[26:31] And maybe for some of you, you're like, see, I knew it. God is very different in the Old Testament. He's so mean. He's not patient. He's not gracious.

[26:44] He's different than Jesus. And I would say, no, if he's different, I would even suggest that maybe he's even more gracious. Because actually, the word had been for the past 4,000 years, I'm sending a deliverer.

[27:00] I'm sending you a Messiah for 4,000 years. Warning them to return to the Lord. But Israel's response, we already read about it back in chapter 7 of Zechariah, because it says in verse 12, they made their hearts diamond hard.

[27:22] leading to the prophecy of the destruction of the city by the Romans then in 70 A.D. This is a curious phrase in here in verse 6 where it says, and each into the hand of his king.

[27:40] I'm going to send you into the hand of your king. But it's interesting because there was no king in Zechariah's day. Israel didn't have a king. So what's he talking about here?

[27:53] Well, the king arrives in the person of Jesus. But what does Israel cry out? In John 19 we find out, verse 15, they cried out, away with him.

[28:07] We don't want that king. Away with him. Crucify him. And Pilate said to them, shall I crucify your king? And the chief priest answered, we have no king but Caesar.

[28:23] That's your king. And I think that's what Zechariah is referring to when he says his king. Your king. The Jews put themselves into Caesar's hands when they said, you know what?

[28:37] We want Emperor Tiberius to be our king. We want him to be our king. And Rome's involvement in Israel, it just grew.

[28:51] Control grew. Taxation grew. There was just this creep. It just occurred. You know, from the days of Pompey in 63 B.C.

[29:03] when Jerusalem became this vassal state to the empire, tensions then came to a head when what is called the first Jewish-Roman war from 66 to 73 A.D.

[29:16] Culminating in 70 A.D. when General Titus Vespasian, the son of the current Caesar, crushed the land. And isn't that what Zechariah prophesied in verse 6?

[29:28] Your king is going to crush the land. And the Romans did. A hundred towns from north to south destroyed, including Jerusalem. And Josephus, the first century Jewish historian, claimed that 1.1 million Jews died as a result of that war.

[29:46] Now, modern scholars, they're not sure if that was a little bit of an exaggeration. They would say it's 300,000 to a million, somewhere in there. But regardless, there's a lot of bloodshed.

[29:58] There's a lot of loss of life regardless. And Zechariah predicted this, that God's going to work in history. He's going to discipline a rebellious people.

[30:10] And we know how the story sort of unfolded as we read our history books that ultimately then, by the time 73 A.D. rolls around, the Romans, they've wiped everything out.

[30:21] There's some Jews hiding out in the fortress Masada. And the Romans built this siege ramp to that mountain fortress where they got the final Jewish survivors, most of whom took their own lives.

[30:35] And it's tragic. It's tragic. And what I want us to see here, friends, is when mankind rejects God, it never goes well. And Zechariah prophesied that this would be the case.

[30:49] Verse 7, so I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to be slaughtered by the sheep traders. And I took two staffs. One I named favor, the other I named union, and I tended the sheep.

[31:02] So, Zechariah, he's agreed to play the role of this shepherd. He's agreed, I'm going to play the part, okay? I became the shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter.

[31:15] It's my debut acting role, my one-man play, and now he's giving props. God's like, you need some props to help Israel understand. He's got two sticks that he's given.

[31:27] Now, if you're a shepherd and you've got a stick, what is that for? Maybe you walk with it, you beat off like animals with, right? It's for protection. We know we have that kind of that image in Psalm 23, 4.

[31:42] You die rod and they staff, they comfort me, protect from thieves, animals. And each of these staffs was then given a name. This is so cool, right? You read all these like sagas of like, you know, medieval knights and they always name their swords.

[31:57] Well, God was doing it before them. And I've got two staffs. I've got one named graciousness and one named unity. All the great epics, they just copy God.

[32:14] Graciousness and unity. What is favor? It's graciousness. It's grace. What is union? It's unity. And I think these two staffs were really describing what the shepherd, the good shepherd represented.

[32:29] This is the sort of kingdom that I'm representing. It's one of grace and it's one that's going to bring unity. And so you guys, as you see the shepherd, this is who you're rejecting.

[32:41] A king who's so very kind. And one whose leadership is meant to unify and to bless. John 10, 16, he came so there would be one flock, one shepherd.

[32:54] The good shepherd's leadership will be marked by grace. And he came to make one flock. You, however, in the short term, you want a different king.

[33:11] You chose a different shepherd. A king from Rome. And that king, he will level your city. Friends, we worship a good God.

[33:26] We worship a very long-suffering, forbearing, gracious, kind God. I had a conversation with a gentleman about a week ago from Iran.

[33:37] He was in my car and taking him somewhere and talking about the difference between Yahweh and Allah, and they're very different. shepherd. And I got to share with him about Jesus.

[33:47] And I said, man, I think the Quran got it wrong. He's like, well, why do you say that? I said, well, the Quran is a seventh century book. Why not read the book written by eyewitnesses about Jesus?

[33:59] And he was like, you know what? That makes a lot of sense. Pebble in the shoe. Good shepherd. The kind shepherd. Look at verse 8.

[34:11] In one month, I don't know, I don't think this is a literal month. A short amount of time. I think it's just figurative speech here.

[34:21] In one month, I destroyed the three shepherds, but I became impatient with them. They also detested me. It's interesting that Zachariah is playing now this role as a shepherd of sheep about to be what?

[34:37] Slaughtered. Okay? Why were they to be slaughtered? Because the previous shepherds decided actually not to do their job. They didn't point to the true shepherd when he arrived.

[34:55] Who are these previous failed shepherds of Israel? There's like 40 interpretations. So I'm going to pick one. I could be wrong.

[35:07] But it's the one that I think makes the most sense. I believe that these three shepherds referred to here aren't necessarily three individual men, but really three types of individuals.

[35:24] Three types of shepherds. Symbolic. As we're considering this extended metaphor of shepherding. And in Israel, there were three groups that functioned in the role. And perhaps this is the best explanation that we're talking about the prophets and the priests and the kings that God chose to shepherd His people.

[35:42] And we can see in the history of Israel, especially the kings, the northern kingdom of Israel, they had no righteous kings. These were not good shepherds.

[35:56] The priests in Jesus' day, they wanted to crucify Jesus. These are not good shepherds. It says, in one month, I destroyed the three shepherds. In a short period of time, I will destroy the entire leadership of Israel.

[36:11] And in 70 AD, the end of all three categories of shepherds, that was it. No more human shepherds for you, Israel. You're now dealing with God Almighty directly.

[36:23] There's no human buffer. And it's not apples for apples, but I think there's a principle here. Man, it's much better to deal with human leadership, friends.

[36:35] Church, church leadership is a grace in your life. Way better to hear from Pastor Scott or the elders come and bring a correction. Much better than having to hear it directly from God Almighty.

[36:50] Amen? Because I know what it says in Hebrews. Hebrews 10, 31, it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. So, spiritual leadership is a grace in all of our lives.

[37:05] Well, the most severe words from Zachariah playing this role of shepherd, here it is, verse 9. This is just, I know, it just keeps getting really cheery, but here it is, verse 9. So I said, I will not be your shepherd.

[37:21] What is to die, let it die. What is to be destroyed, let it be destroyed, and let those who are left devour the flesh of one another.

[37:37] God is no longer going to restrain evil in protecting his people as a nation. And it's hard. This is so hard. God's judgment on Jerusalem, what's to die, let it die.

[37:52] And the city fell in 70 AD to Rome, and in fact, it's recorded that people actually resorted to devouring the flesh of one another. Josephus records it, this first century historian.

[38:06] The famine in that day got so bad that people actually resorted to cannibalism. And I'm not going to share you any of the gory details, but there are records that are just heart wrenching.

[38:19] He also writes about people searching sewers and dung heaps for food just to avoid starvation. persecution. And Zachariah says this is what's going to occur.

[38:36] Friends, when men kill God, he actually is destroying himself. And I think we can see this in culture. When we have a culture that rejects the author of life, you're not going to tell me the role I play.

[38:53] you're not going to tell me that I'm a man or that I'm a woman. I'm going to make that choice on my own. I'm independent of you even though you're the author. Well, I kill God, I say God doesn't exist, and what is now like, it eventually gets to the point where you actually have young people mutilating their bodies.

[39:10] It never goes well. When you reject God, you harm yourself. And that's actually what you see in Israel's past. the city fell.

[39:23] And Zechariah now depicts this wretched consequence of rebellion with the props that he's giving, starting with staff number one, it says in verses 10 and 11, and I took my staff favor and I broke it, annulling the covenant that I had made with all the peoples.

[39:39] So it was on that day and sheep traders who were watching me, sheep traders perhaps, this is the faithful remnant in Zechariah's day, watching, and it says they knew that it was the word of the Lord.

[39:54] So Zechariah playing the shepherd of the flock doomed to slaughter, he breaks the staff of protection, of favor. I am breaking, I am unknowing my covenant with all the peoples it says.

[40:09] God has a covenant with all the peoples in the sense that he has a covenant that he's going to protect Israel from all the nations. You rejected the shepherd who protects and blesses you and it's going to result in national destruction and in spiritual blindness.

[40:30] It will fall on Israel. And Paul talks about that in Romans 11 25, that there is a spiritual blindness even today on the Jews.

[40:41] And I've seen this as I've talked with Jews. I remember talking to an individual explaining to them Isaiah 53, reading passages verse 6, right, by his wounds were healed, verse 5, right, pierced for our transgressions.

[40:58] And then asking the individual, this Jewish individual, well who is this referring to? And they're like, well that's referring to Israel. So Israel is the one that is healing Israel.

[41:09] Israel is the one that's wounded for Israel. That doesn't make any sense. It's a blindness. It's a spiritual blindness. And when you have these interactions, it's so palpable, it's like, oh my goodness, God's Word tells the truth.

[41:24] And I think you see an allusion to the fact that this is happening here in Zechariah chapter 11. I'm taking that staff favor.

[41:36] It's gone. And recall Jesus entered Jerusalem triumphal entry, and he wept for Jerusalem. Right?

[41:47] Luke 19, 42, would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace, but now they are hidden from your eyes. The spiritual blindness. You rejected your shepherd.

[42:00] Friends, there's a day coming when Israel will recognize their Messiah. They will place faith in Jesus, but there is much heartache for this nation until that day.

[42:14] There's grave consequences for rejecting the author of life. But I want us to understand very clearly the promises that God made to Israel, they're not destroyed, but they are severely delayed.

[42:30] They're not destroyed, but they're severely delayed. Because the shepherd came and they said thanks, but no thanks. now, why again are God's promises to Israel delayed?

[42:44] Well, Zechariah tells them the exact event that will precipitate these consequences. Look at verses 12 and 13. Then I said to them, if it seems good to you, give me my wages.

[42:57] What are the wages? I don't know. For faithful ministry, maybe there's fruit, there's growth, there's worship, I don't know. But if not, keep them. And they weighed out as my wages 30 pieces of silver.

[43:10] Then the Lord said to me, throw it to the potter, the lordly price at which, I think that's our case, the lordly price at which I was priced by them.

[43:20] So I took the 30 pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the Lord to the potter. Zechariah, he's playing the role of the true shepherd and he's saying, pay my wage.

[43:33] I'm the true shepherd that you rejected. And he's basically saying to Israel, what am I worth to you? And their response, you're worth 30 pieces of silver.

[43:50] That was equivalent to the price of a common slave. Exodus 21, 32 talks about if a slave is gored by an ox, compensation 30 pieces of silver.

[44:01] This is what you're worth. Essentially what they're saying is you're worth nothing. Friends, this is the planet we live on.

[44:13] We have a planet that's rejected God. They can't even say thank you to the author of life. What do they do?

[44:24] Some benefit, some favor, some good thing happens in their life and they say, oh, I'm going to thank the universe. Disgusting. 30 pieces of silver.

[44:38] And as we know, the story goes, this is what the Jewish leaders paid Judas Iscariot to betray the true shepherd king, the part that Zachariah is playing.

[44:52] What am I worth? Judas became so guilt ridden that he threw the silver on the floor of the temple. It says in Matthew 27, 4, and 5, saying I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.

[45:04] They said, what is that to us? See to it yourself. And throwing down the pieces of silver into the temple, he departed and he went and hanged himself.

[45:17] The religious leaders then picked up and purchased a potter's field where Judas took his own life. And it says then, if you go down into the next verse, we're not going to read verse 6, they're like, well, that's blood money, we can't take that from you, so we'll buy the potter's field.

[45:33] We can't take, which is bizarre, because isn't that the same blood money they gave to Judas? It only became blood money once he said thank you.

[45:46] It's just the insanity, it's absurd, this scene, the hypocrisy. friends, this prophecy in Zechariah, it's shocking because this is made 500 years before that betrayal, before that event.

[46:03] This book, this is the story of reality. It should unnerve us a bit. The more we're in it, the more we should go, oh my, this is God's word.

[46:18] I'm not making this stuff up, I'm just trying to explain it. And as I'm studying this week, I'm freaking out. Look at verse 14.

[46:31] Then I broke the second staff union, annulling the brotherhood between Judah and Israel. First staff, favor, gone. Union, gone. This is how we know the consequence of rejecting the Messiah is talking about the Roman occupation.

[46:48] Because in that day, there was massive civil disunity. In AD 70 between the Jews. And I think it's actually what left them vulnerable to the Romans.

[47:00] Josephus records this, that many Jews were killed by other Jews during the revolt, especially during the siege of Jerusalem. The Jewish infighting weakened Jerusalem so that they were easy pickings for Rome.

[47:12] a city divided, right? Matthew 12, every kingdom divided will be laid waste. This is why Israel, friends, is in the state that it's in, even today.

[47:27] It all harkens back to an event 2,000 years ago. They rejected Messiah. They rejected their king. They rejected their shepherd, and Zachariah's in front of them.

[47:39] He's play acting this whole thing. He's saying, guys, look at me, watch this, learn. Well, how long will Israel be in this state of spiritual blindness until the shepherd returns again?

[47:53] And that's the good news. That's the good news in Zachariah. He's returning. His blessing's coming back, but for today, you have difficult days, but he's going to return.

[48:04] And guess what? You're going to read about it next week in Zachariah chapter 12. So this is just, this is like, this is the lull. Now, our chapter ends with Zachariah then switching roles.

[48:16] There's a lot going on. I'm, okay, I'm not the good shepherd anymore. He's going to put on a new garb. He's like, I'm the bad shepherd. Okay, I'm the wicked shepherd. And he plays like, this is just, hey, this is for free.

[48:30] This is the end credits. But guess what? Verse 15 to the end. Then the Lord said to me, take once more the equipment of a foolish shepherd. For behold, I'm raising up in the land a shepherd who does not care for those being destroyed, or seek the young, or heal the maimed, or nourish the wealthy, but devours the flesh of the fat ones, tearing off even their hooves.

[48:51] Woe to my worthless shepherd who deserts the flock. I may, who deserts the flock. May the sword strike his arm and right eye, let his arm be wholly withered, and his right eye utterly blinded.

[49:06] I mean, I told you this is a dark chapter, friends, and it just, it doesn't get cheery at the end. But this is what you get when you say, we want our king to be Caesar.

[49:20] We don't want Jesus to be our king. And it may be that this last section, and you can do study on your own, but I think this is actually pointing ahead to a future shepherd, a future antichrist that will inflict great evil on this nation during the tribulation events.

[49:38] Promising protection of the flock, and then ended up, what does it say here? Devouring their flesh, right? I'm here, I bring peace, three and a half years in, I'm going to break the covenant, break the peace.

[49:52] And I think this is pointing towards a future antichrist. Let's apply this passage. It's simple. Israel missed the good shepherd when he came.

[50:05] What was the result? Great difficulty. Great heartache. Friends, don't miss the shepherd in this life. Don't do it. 1 John 5, 12 says that if you have the Son, you have life.

[50:19] If you don't have the Son of God, you don't have life. You need Jesus. You need Jesus as your Savior more than you need anything in this life. You need Jesus as your Savior more than you need your next breath.

[50:29] Because the consequences of not having Jesus as your Savior is, guess what, you're paying for your sins, Jesus isn't. You don't want that. these temporal consequences we read about, they pale compared to an eternity apart from the good shepherd.

[50:47] Friends, forever is forever. And so in this life, make, get right with God, get right with Jesus. And then when you die, it's a, it's a, we're going to see you again.

[51:04] It's a reunion for those in Christ. we just celebrated Ray Chapel's memorial this week. And as, as sad as it is, we're looking forward to seeing Ray.

[51:16] Because Ray, when he was 40, got invited, this is, application, don't miss the shepherd. Second application, be people that tell others about the shepherd.

[51:29] And Ray's story is just that. People telling him about the shepherd. And there were three key people in his life. There was this cute blonde, who he then married. He was 40.

[51:40] He was lost. And she, she was like, this young gal, Nancy, I don't even know where she is. She's hiding, but she's in here. I know she's in here. There she is. She's hiding. And she's like, Ray, same apartment complex, Billy Graham's coming to town.

[51:54] You should come. You should join me. And Ray's like, I don't think so. And then, what does Nancy do? She's like, well, that's fine. You don't want to go, but you're not going to get to hear Johnny Cash sing.

[52:07] And he's like, well, if Johnny Cash is going, maybe I'll go. So then, God used Nancy. God used Johnny. And then, he wanted to hear Johnny Cash.

[52:18] And then, Billy got up and preached. And there's nobody that puts it on the bottom shelf like Billy Graham. By the end of it, Nancy's like, did you understand, Ray? And he's got tears coming down his face. Is that right, Nancy?

[52:29] Yeah. And he says, anybody could have understood that man. The Lord changed his life. He didn't miss the shepherd. We're getting to see Ray again. Friends, this passage tells us, don't miss the shepherd.

[52:42] Don't miss the shepherd. And let's be people that tell others about the shepherd. Amen? Amen? Father, we're thankful that you are so good and so kind.

[52:54] And Lord, we're thankful that you use people in our lives to direct us to you. You use the ordinaries. And you use the extraordinaries, but Lord, you primarily use the ordinaries. And Lord, I pray that we would be a people that tell others about the good shepherd.

[53:09] Lord, it's kind of a heart, heartbreaking passage to think about all the ways that you were trying to communicate to Israel, to get through to them, that there's a good shepherd who wants their good, who wants their joy, who wants their healing.

[53:26] And yet your ancient people said, thank you, but no thank you. We've got other things going on. We've got more important things. I don't got time for that now. Lord, I pray that we would not be those type of individuals.

[53:39] And if there's any here that has never really dealt with you, spoken with you, talked to you about their need for forgiveness for a Savior, that they would do that, even before the sun sets today.

[53:53] We love you, Jesus, that you loved sinners, that you died for sinners. It makes no sense, but we get to be your people in this life, but only because of you, Jesus.

[54:05]  In your name we pray. Amen.