God gives us Bible Prophecy not to scare us, but to warn us and give us hope. It’s a hope we can depend on. It’s not like the false hope that the world gives. We have a choice: follow Jesus, the Good Shepherd or follow Satan, the bad shepherd. Yes, it’s that simple. Zechariah lays it all out for us. Let’s dig in…
Zechariah 10 – The Lord Will Care for Judah
Ask the Lord for rain in the springtime;
it is the Lord who sends the thunderstorms.
He gives showers of rain to all people,
and plants of the field to everyone.
2 The idols speak deceitfully,
diviners see visions that lie;
they tell dreams that are false,
they give comfort in vain.
Therefore the people wander like sheep
oppressed for lack of a shepherd.3 “My anger burns against the shepherds,
and I will punish the leaders;
for the Lord Almighty will care
for his flock, the people of Judah,
and make them like a proud horse in battle.
4 From Judah will come the cornerstone,
from him the tent peg,
from him the battle bow,
from him every ruler.
5 Together they will be like warriors in battle
trampling their enemy into the mud of the streets.
They will fight because the Lord is with them,
and they will put the enemy horsemen to shame.6 “I will strengthen Judah
Zechariah 10 NIV
and save the tribes of Joseph.
I will restore them
because I have compassion on them.
They will be as though
I had not rejected them,
for I am the Lord their God
and I will answer them.
7 The Ephraimites will become like warriors,
and their hearts will be glad as with wine.
Their children will see it and be joyful;
their hearts will rejoice in the Lord.
8 I will signal for them
and gather them in.
Surely I will redeem them;
they will be as numerous as before.
9 Though I scatter them among the peoples,
yet in distant lands they will remember me.
They and their children will survive,
and they will return.
10 I will bring them back from Egypt
and gather them from Assyria.
I will bring them to Gilead and Lebanon,
and there will not be room enough for them.
11 They will pass through the sea of trouble;
the surging sea will be subdued
and all the depths of the Nile will dry up.
Assyria’s pride will be brought down
and Egypt’s scepter will pass away.
12 I will strengthen them in the Lord
and in his name they will live securely,”
declares the Lord.
Zechariah 11
Open your doors, Lebanon,
so that fire may devour your cedars!
2 Wail, you juniper, for the cedar has fallen;
the stately trees are ruined!
Wail, oaks of Bashan;
the dense forest has been cut down!
3 Listen to the wail of the shepherds;
their rich pastures are destroyed!
Listen to the roar of the lions;
the lush thicket of the Jordan is ruined!
Two Shepherds
4 This is what the Lord my God says: “Shepherd the flock marked for slaughter. 5 Their buyers slaughter them and go unpunished. Those who sell them say, ‘Praise the Lord, I am rich!’ Their own shepherds do not spare them. 6 For I will no longer have pity on the people of the land,” declares the Lord. “I will give everyone into the hands of their neighbors and their king. They will devastate the land, and I will not rescue anyone from their hands.”
7 So I shepherded the flock marked for slaughter, particularly the oppressed of the flock. Then I took two staffs and called one Favor and the other Union, and I shepherded the flock. 8 In one month I got rid of the three shepherds.
The flock detested me, and I grew weary of them 9 and said, “I will not be your shepherd. Let the dying die, and the perishing perish. Let those who are left eat one another’s flesh.”
10 Then I took my staff called Favor and broke it, revoking the covenant I had made with all the nations. 11 It was revoked on that day, and so the oppressed of the flock who were watching me knew it was the word of the Lord.
12 I told them, “If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.” So they paid me thirty pieces of silver.
13 And the Lord said to me, “Throw it to the potter”—the handsome price at which they valued me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them to the potter at the house of the Lord.
14 Then I broke my second staff called Union, breaking the family bond between Judah and Israel.
15 Then the Lord said to me, “Take again the equipment of a foolish shepherd. 16 For I am going to raise up a shepherd over the land who will not care for the lost, or seek the young, or heal the injured, or feed the healthy, but will eat the meat of the choice sheep, tearing off their hooves.
17 “Woe to the worthless shepherd,
Zechariah 11 NIV
who deserts the flock!
May the sword strike his arm and his right eye!
May his arm be completely withered,
his right eye totally blinded!”
Zechariah 12 – Jerusalem’s Enemies to Be Destroyed
A prophecy: The word of the Lord concerning Israel.
The Lord, who stretches out the heavens, who lays the foundation of the earth, and who forms the human spirit within a person, declares: 2 “I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that sends all the surrounding peoples reeling. Judah will be besieged as well as Jerusalem. 3 On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves. 4 On that day I will strike every horse with panic and its rider with madness,” declares the Lord. “I will keep a watchful eye over Judah, but I will blind all the horses of the nations. 5 Then the clans of Judah will say in their hearts, ‘The people of Jerusalem are strong, because the Lord Almighty is their God.’
6 “On that day I will make the clans of Judah like a firepot in a woodpile, like a flaming torch among sheaves. They will consume all the surrounding peoples right and left, but Jerusalem will remain intact in her place.
7 “The Lord will save the dwellings of Judah first, so that the honor of the house of David and of Jerusalem’s inhabitants may not be greater than that of Judah. 8 On that day the Lord will shield those who live in Jerusalem, so that the feeblest among them will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the angel of the Lord going before them. 9 On that day I will set out to destroy all the nations that attack Jerusalem.
Mourning for the One They Pierced
10 “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication. 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. 11 On that day the weeping in Jerusalem will be as great as the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. 12 The land will mourn, each clan by itself, with their wives by themselves: the clan of the house of David and their wives, the clan of the house of Nathan and their wives, 13 the clan of the house of Levi and their wives, the clan of Shimei and their wives, 14 and all the rest of the clans and their wives.
Zechariah 12 NIV
Bible Prophecy is ALL about Israel
That’s why you can’t find the United States mentioned anywhere in the Bible. Which is probably why we are slowly imploding. However, Zechariah’s prophecies — there’s more than one — are all about Israel. They center on Jerusalem. They call the Jews to return to God and follow Yeshua Hamashiach — Jesus, the Messiah.
Many of these prophecies came true in the 1st century with Jesus. Some were fulfilled in 1948 when Israel became it’s own independent state. Still others are yet to be fulfilled.
Key Points
- Chapter 10 opens with rain coming back and as a result, Israel is a leading supplier of fruits and flowers.
- Ephraim was one of Joseph’s sons who settled in the northern part of Israel, a very fertile area.
- 11:8 — God is right now gathering Jews from all over the world back to Israel. The latest group are the Ukrainian Jews.
- 11:12 — They shall walk up and down in His name. Who’s name? Well, Jesus, of course!
- Chapter 11 opens with the rest of Israel’s Arab countries wailing and in ruins. See, Jesus, in the end, returns in victory to claim His Promised Land.
- Then Zechariah writes about 2 shepherds. Zechariah becomes a shepherd with 2 staffs: “Beauty” or “Favor” (Grace) and “Bonds” or “Unity” (the Holy Spirit).
- He fires 3 shepherds who worked under him. These could be the prophets, priests and kings of the 1st century. Or, more specifically, the Pharisees, Saducees and the Herodians.
- They were all scattered in 70 AD, when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the temple.
- He broke his staff “Beauty” or “Favor” in 2. That represents Jesus dying on the cross and the breaking of a covenant. Pastor Sandy Adams explains…
Not the covenant God made with the Jews, but the covenant He made with the Gentiles. God said, “I will bless those who bless Israel, and I will curse
Sandy Adams
those who curse Israel.” (Genesis 12:3) Yet, here God suspends this covenant.
He gives permission to the Romans to harm His people without the fear of reprisal from Him. Rome will get a free pass for judging Jerusalem.
- 12:1 opens speaking of God and His work in the present tense because He was, He is and He is still to come! He is in control!
- 12:12-13 – Matthew recognized this prophecy in traitor Judas accepting 30 pieces of silver to betray Jesus. He later regretted it and threw the coins at the Pharisees and chief priests who used it to buy a potter’s field.
- 12:14 – When the Jews rejected Jesus and the Gospel, they were dispersed all over the world. For the next 1800 years, until 1948, they were divided.
- Next, since the Jews rejected the Good Shepherd, God is giving them a “foolish shepherd”, who doesn’t care about his sheep. That, friend, is the Antichrist.
- He will be struck down, but will rise again. See Revelation 13. Sandy Adams comments…
Perhaps this future charismatic leader will survive a foiled assassination attempt, but with a paralyzed arm and a blinded right eye. The world will see his recovery and hail it a miracle. They’ll consider him indestructible…
But the Jews alive at the time will remember this prophecy in Zechariah 11. This is what happens, not to the true shepherd, but to the worthless shepherd – and it will cause them to think. This will begin to prepare the Jews for one of the greatest reversals in human history.
Sandy Adams
Currently, we are in the Church Age. The next big event will be the Rapture of the true, born-again Christian believers. Then 7 years of Tribulation start.
- 12:2-3 – The “cup” represents judgment that is bitter. The people who reject Jesus and accept the Antichrist (bad shepherd) will drink the bitter cup of judgment.
- Jerusalem will be protected — no one can attack it. (Heavy stone or immovable rock.)
- The Jews who rejected Jesus in the past will at one point accept Him. Sandy Adams explains…
In Romans 11 Paul explains, when the Jews rejected Jesus they were benched for 2000 years, yet in the last days, God puts them back in the line up. Romans 11:26 tells us, “All Israel will be saved.” That means all Jews alive in the end, will believe in Jesus and be saved….
Put it all together and here’s the end time scenario… At first the Jews embrace the worthless shepherd, the Antichrist. They think he’s the Messiah, but he turns out to be a monster. He attacks Jerusalem and the Jews, and desecrates the (3rd) Temple. The Jews flee to the wilderness, to Bozrah, where they hide in the rock fortress of Petra. This is when Jesus returns to fight for Jerusalem. He destroys the armies of the earth in the valley by the Temple Mount. He delivers the Jews from Bozrah and establishes a kingdom that rules for a thousand years.
And somewhere an amazing transformation occurs. Jews who rejected Jesus begin to embrace Him as their Savior. Perhaps it’s their up-close dealings with the Antichrist… maybe it’s the special witnesses mentioned in Revelation… perhaps it’s “the sign of the Son of Man” Jesus speaks of in Matthew 24… but their eyes will open.
The Holy Spirit takes them to the cross. God tells the Prophet, “they will look on Me whom they have pierced.” Without the New Testament and the Gospel accounts, Zechariah’s prophecy would never made sense. God is spirit. How does spirit pierce or wound? That requires flesh. And this is what the Jews missed – God became a man and took on human flesh – that “by His stripes we are healed.” The Jews were blind to God’s incarnation.
Sandy Adams
It’s YOUR Choice!
Who will YOU follow? Jesus or the Antichrist (Satan)?
It’s a choice you need to make now before it’s too late!
Invite Jesus into Your Heart and Receive the Gift of Grace, Joy, Peace, and the Confident Hope of Eternal Life…
I highly recommend these 2 books by Amir Tsarfati. (Christianbook Affiliate)
