Israel: The Light of the World
Zechariah 4:1-14
If you have your Bible handy let's look at Zechariah Chapter 4 tonight. The fourth Chapter of Zechariah. Now I realize that our study of Zechariah is not light, that it's rather heavy. Some of you have been going out looking like Pilgrim on his progress with the burden still on your back, but we hope that the Spirit of God will bless the word of God to your hearts. And those of you who have a great to plum the depths of that word I know are rejoicing in what God is teaching us out of this wonderful Old Testament prophecy. And tonight we're going to look at the fourth Chapter.
Since the creation God has always spoken to man. In the case of Adam before the fall God walked and talked with him in the cool of the day, the Bible says, and man had a perfect knowledge of God's truth and perfect fellowship with God's presence. Then sin came and the consequence of sin was that man lost the knowledge of God and became ignorant, and in Ephesians 4:17-19, the apostle Paul outlines something of the results of the fall. He says, "Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart." One of the effects of the fall was that conversation and communion with God was hindered and man who had known the full knowledge of God and His full presence and fellowship and had had conversation with God was now in lonely isolation. But God was not going to give up with that and fall back into some kind of silence. To this ignorant world, a world that became a sinful world, God then began to speak and He sent His revelation to redeem sinners.
God from the very first time that Adam sinned began to speak and the first thing that He said was, "Adam, where are you?" I want to find you because I want to talk to you. God has always talked. God has always spoken. God has always communicated. And in the Old Testament time the vehicle of His communication was the nation Israel. After the founding of the nation they became His channel of information and revelation.
And if you'll look with me for just a moment, and if you don't want to turn to it, think with me in Romans Chapter 3, two verses: verses 1 and 2. The apostle Paul in reasoning through the logic of basic theology and asking himself questions which he proceeds to answer says, "What advantage then hath the Jew? Or what profit is there of circumcision?" In other words the message of Chapter 2 is that both the Jew and the Gentile are confirmed in sin and if that's true then what is the advantage of being a Jew? The advantage comes in verse 2. "Much every way, but chiefly because unto them were committed the oracles of God."
Further on in the book of Romans in the 9th chapter and the fourth and fifth verse the apostle Paul says, regarding his own kinsmen, his brethren in the flesh, "Who are Israelites, to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises, whose are the fathers and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen."
Now notice, the Israelites to whom pertaineth the covenants and the giving of the law and the promises. Israel was God's vehicle for the transmission of His revelation. God has always spoken to man. In Isaiah 43:21, God says regarding Israel, "This people have I formed for Myself, they will show forth My praise." In Deuteronomy 4:5-6, it says, "See I have taught you statutes and judgments just as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do thus in the land where you are entering to possess it. So keep and do them, says Moses, for that is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, 'Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.'"
In other words God wanted Israel to speak His truth so that the nations would know wisdom and endeavor to ascertain the source, which would bring them to Him. In I Chronicles 16:23, it says, "Proclaim glad tidings of His salvation from day to day." In Psalm 18:49, "Therefore will I give thanks to Thee among the nations, O Lord." In other words the responsibility of proclaiming God in the midst of the world." In Psalm 96:3, tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the people." In Ezekiel 5:5, "Then saith the Lord God, this is Jerusalem. I have set her in the midst of the nations and countries that are round about her. And she hath changed mine ordinances into wickedness more than the nations, my statutes more than the countries that are round about her, for they have refused mine ordinances and my statutes. They have not walked in them."
Now that is a sad diversion from all the intentions that I read in the verses preceding. God had said you're My people, you are to proclaim My truth, you are to tell people what I am and who I am and what My will is, but instead Ezekiel says they violated God's principles, they disobeyed his ordinances, they kept closed mouth about His commandments and failed in the thing that God had called them to do.
Now basically when God chose Israel in the Old Testament it was to be a witnessing people and they were to witness in two ways: by their lifestyle and by their proclamation, as we've seen in our past studies. It was not just a matter of speaking; it was a matter of living. There was to be a lifestyle so dramatically different that it was a testimony to God. And then they were to verbalize the things that God revealed to them. And the tragedy is they failed. That's all that can be said, they just plain failed and God had to set them aside. And Israel today is not God's witnessing nation and they haven't been since the time Jesus was on the earth. And that's why the Lord Jesus had to find a new group, a new witnessing people, and that new witnessing people is the church, you and I and all those who have been a part of the body of Christ. We are His witnessing people, we are His witnessing community, but as we come to Zechariah 4, we find the most marvelous prophecy that tells us that in the future Israel will be reinstated as God's witnessing nation and this is an exciting thing. There is coming a new day for Israel. There will be a hope realized in that all that God had originally intended for them is going to come to pass in the future.
Now as we look at Chapter 4, just a quick brief review: The chronology of this vision is in perfect sequence with the others. You remember that I told you at the beginning that Zechariah has eight visions all eight of which refer to the restoration of Israel both historically as they rebuild their city after the captivity and prophetically as they will be a part of God's wonderful coming kingdom. And the first of the visions that we looked at presented the outward promise of the kingdom. And then they talked about the restoration of the city and the temple. And then after there was the outward restoration, the visions moved to the inward and we saw the inward salvation that occurred. And we saw last time in Chapter 3 the saving of Israel and the figure of the cleansing of Joshua the high priest. Joshua is a picture of the nation and as Joshua was cleansed and purified so Israel is to be cleansed and purified.
So there is an outward presentation of the kingdom, but the outward kingdom will never come until the inward salvation occurs. And now moving away from that to the next in the sequence we find that this vision deals with the usefulness of Israel in the outward kingdom when the inward cleansing has taken place. God is going to restore them to a place of wonderful usefulness. That's always the way it is. God has a plan in the world, God has a design to accomplish, but the people who accomplish it will be the people who are saved and then they will be useful to God within the framework of His plan.
So the nation is saved in Chapter 3, prophetically and the nation is used as God's witnessing people in Chapter 4. Now let's look at the vision and see several points. It's really a very dramatic and unusual one. I want to first of all talk about, and I'll give you a whole lot of p's in the outline. The first one, the presentation of the vision. These are just hooks to hang your thoughts on. The presentation of the vision. Let's get right at it in verse 1. "And the angel who talked with me," and there we are with good ol' faithful interpreter angel whose leading us all through these visions, and leading Zechariah as well. "The angel who talked with me came again and waked me, as a man that is wakened out of his sleep." Now we've noted each time that after Zechariah sees a vision the thing is so astounding and so dramatic and so provocative and so profound that the natural response is to slump in a state of meditation and here he almost gets himself into a sort of a semi-coma of spiritual exhaustion over the exercise of his mind and the comprehension of what he has seen. It's beginning to build on him now and he falls into a state of exhaustion from which the interpreting angel comes and wakens him.
Daniel had a similar experience in the 10th Chapter of Daniel the 9th verse. Now having been wakened he sees another vision in verse 2. "He said to me, what do you see? And I said, well I have looked and behold a lamp stand," Some of your Bibles may say a candlestick, but that probably is not the best translation because they aren't actually candles as we'll see. "A lamp stand all gold with a bowl on the tope of it and seven lamps on it and seven," watch this one, seven conduits or seven tubes or seven "pipes to the seven lamps, which are on the top of it and two olive trees by it, one on the right side of the bowl and one on the left side."
Now you had no doubt the same reaction that I did the first time I read that. I was going to draw this for you but that would only confuse you. But let me see if I can draw the figure in your mind. Now what you have here is a lamp stand, now if any of you have ever seen what the Jews call a menorah that will help you. Outside the Kinnesit in Israel, which is the Parliament, the government, there is a huge menorah. It has a actually a base that goes straight up and then it has those candelabra like things coming out of it and there are seven of them and that was a rather typical lamp stand. So if you can see that in your mind you're all right.
Now also in addition notice there was a bowl on top of it. Now here we have this lamp stand all going out, fanning out like this and on the top of it is a great bowl. Now notice and seven lamps and seven pipes to the seven lamps so that it's going to get complicated because there are 49 pipes in all, all right? So out of this bowl to each of those little lamps comes seven conduits.
Now, look at verse 3, "And beside it two olive trees, one on the right side of the bowl and on the left side." Now watch. The lamp is lit by oil, okay? That's the way they lit their lamps, oil. Oil is flowing to each of the seven lamps on the one big lamp stand from seven pipes coming from a big bowl of oil, not watch, and the bowl of oil is getting its oil from what, the olive trees. This you see is an automatic lamp, as automatic as you get in Zechariah's time, folks. Now what we have essentially here is the seven-branched candlestick of the tabernacle and the seven-branched candlestick of the temple. It's the same thing, basically, however, there are three variations. Now watch: number one is the bowl of oil.
Now in the temple and the tabernacle the oil had to be supplied by the priests, so it was not automatic, but this is an automatic lamp. In the Holy Place, they were filled by the priests and they had to go in and trim the lamp, and trim the lamp, and trim the lamp, all the time, keep the oil in there, keep the oil in there because it would burn it up.
The second distinction is the seven tubes, or the seven conduits, or the seven pipes, and incidentally the Hebrew grammar and the Hebrew construction of the term here indicates that there were 49, seven going to each one. So there would be seven little pipes coming down to each lamp. Now in the Holy Place in the temple and the tabernacle no such pipes existed. And then you have the two olive trees on the right and on the left and flowing out of those is the oil going into the bull and then trickling down. And incidentally there are two great big giant golden tubes coming out of the olive tree. You say, "Where did you get that?" Verse 12, and it says, "I answered again and said unto Him what are the two olive branches which through the two golden conduits or channels or pipes or tubes." So let me reconstruct quickly: two great big olive trees living flowing olive trees. In fact an olive tree can last a long time. They tell us, if you're over there in Israel, that some of the olive trees are still producing oil were there as saplings when Jesus lived. They last a long time. Have you ever seen a little olive wood figure somebody brought back from Israel? It takes 40 years to cure that wood before it can be carved because the oil stays in it so long. It is an oily tree, and so there are these two olive trees, the oil flows down golden channels into this bowl and then into multiples of seven into the lamps.
Now you say, "What in the world is this trying to show?" Well it's trying to show whatever it is it has no human agency, right? It's strictly automatic. God is producing the life in the tree and out of that the thing is being lit without any human involvement. There are no priests to trim the lamp, there's nobody putting oil in it. It's strictly an operation by God. Keep that in mind. That's the presentation of the vision.
Now second, the purpose of the vision, verse 4. "So I answered and spoke to the angel that talked with me saying, 'What are these, my Lord.' And the angel who talked with me answered and said unto me, 'Knowest thou not what these are?' And I said, 'No, my lord.'" And you may be saying, "I'm with him." What is it? Well I'm not going to take a lot of time to give you all of the study of all of the rabbinical scholars who've commented on this because they all come out with the same answer. And the answer is this: the tradition Jewish interpretation and Christian interpretation is almost unanimous on this, that the lamp stand represents the combined testimony of Israel as a nation under God. That the lamp stand is Israel lit again to be the light of the world that God had intended originally for her to be. Now that's basically the simple interpretation.
Zechariah is seeing visions. The visions begin with a restoration of the people, a rebuilding of the temple, a rebuilding of the city, the salvation of the nations and then the witnessing ministry of the nation, and that's exactly what we see right here, a restored, revived, regenerated nation is now again God's witnessing people. They are the light.
Now ultimately, mark it, ultimately in the lamp stand you see a symbol of the one who is truly the light of the world. Who is that? The Messiah, Jesus Christ. Ultimately you'd have to see Him there. In Isaiah 49, I'll just give you a couple of verses here to compare with it, it says, "And now saith the Lord who formed me from the womb to be a servant to bring Jacob again to Him," isn't that great? Jacob will be brought back though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord and my God shall be my strength, and he said, it is a light thing that thou shouldest by my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel." Now watch, "I will also give thee for a light to the nations." And there it's referring to the Messiah. God is saying through Isaiah, I will restore the nation and I will make the Messiah the light that thou mayest be my salvation to the end of the earth. So basically the ultimate light is none other than Jesus Christ. In Luke Chapter 1, a long chapter incidentally in verse 78, "Through the tender mercy of our God whereby the dayspring on high hath visited us to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death." And there again the light refers to the Messiah. In Luke 2:32, it says of the Messiah, "He is a light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of thy people Israel." In John 8:12, Jesus says, "I am the light of the world."
So the ultimate light, the ultimate one who diffuses the glow and glory of God is the Messiah. In fact in John 8:12, when Jesus stood up in the court of the women, in the temple treasury and said, "I am the light of the world," it was a dramatic moment because right into the middle of that was this huge candelabra, that was used during the feast time and they lit it every night to sparkle its light out the open top of that place and be like a diamond in the sky. They were celebrating the glory of God in the wilderness and they lit that thing every night and now the feast was past and the candle was out but the big thing was still sitting there and Jesus walks up and says you may have your candle, but I am the light of the world. And he turns the moment and the scene to Himself, and He is the ultimate light.
So the lamp stand then pictures Israel in full fellowship with the Messiah. The blessing of God is on the nation, they are restored to the place of usefulness, and they are the testimony to the world. And this is going to happen, beloved, in the future. You say, "Well since their light is out now does God have a light?" Yes, in Revelation 1:20, we find this: verse 19, "Write the things, which thou hath seen, and the things which are and the things which shall be here after, that's the outline of the book of Revelation incidentally. The mystery of the seven stars, which you saw in my right hand and the seven golden lamp stands, now listen the seven stars are the ministers of the seven churches and the seven lamp stands, which you saw are the seven churches. The lamp stand in this day is what, the church.
But there's coming a day when the church will be removed. The true church will be raptured out of the world and the only thing left will be babble and the hoar, the prostitute, the false church and God will not use that church, and so He will restore Israel. The church is gone, He has no witness in the world and Israel will be reborn and regenerated and redeemed and placed in the position of being the light that God intended them to be all along.
Now what about the bowl? Zechariah says the, the angel, "What does this mean?" Well what did it mean? The angel really never gave him much of an answer. He really was saying to him, "Look Zechariah, think about it a little bit. Isn't it pretty obvious? What would the bowl full of oil represent?" What does oil symbolize in the New Testament and even in the Old Testament? The Holy Spirit! So the bowl on top symbolizes the Holy Spirit. This is a rather clearly defined symbol of the Holy Spirit because it's reiterated again and again as we shall in a moment.
But what's interesting to me is that fact that you have this bowl and out of this bowl flowing to the nation Israel in their millennial witness are 49 channels of the power of the Holy Spirit. You see the point that is being made? The point here is that there will be an unlimited supply of power from the Holy Spirit. And you remember the words of Joel where Joel says, "In the last days I will, what, pour out my spirit on all flesh and remarkable things will happen." And so in the millennial picture we see the nation Israel as the lamp stand, we see the Spirit of God being poured out in profusion so that the light becomes gloriously brilliant. And all of it really is a declaration of the one who is the light, none other than Jesus the Messiah.
And you note that it's all automatic. There's no human involvement at all. In the kingdom the witness of Israel will be spontaneous, it will be Spirit generated, there will be no other thing than the operation of the supernatural Holy Spirit. You know it's interesting to look into the kingdom pattern and you really don't find anything in the kingdom of an organizational nature. Everything there seems to be just the flow of the power of the Spirit of God through individual lives under the directorship of Christ Himself.
Now the two olive trees, what are they? Well they're mentioned in verse 14, and he's still asking the same question at the end. He says, "What are these? Basically, and then the angel says, "These are the two anointed ones that stand by the Lord of the whole earth.
Now the two anointed ones, hmm, who would that be? Now in Israel there were two specific people who were anointed. You remember who they were? One was the king and what was the other one? the high priest, or the priest. So what you have here then is this: You have the office of king and priest. Now historically, and you have to keep your thinking hat on now because you realize this has historical meaning and then a prophetic meaning. Historically the man who stood in the place of king was a man named Zerubbabel. He was the civil leader. And the man who stood in the place of priest was whom? chapter 3, Joshua. The responsibility of Joshua and Zerubbabel was to stand beside the Lord and to lead the nation in the proper path and to bring them back to a restored place, a place where they would rebuild the wall historically, rebuild the temple historically and become again, if even in a small sense, a witness to the power and the truth of God. But prophetically who is the ultimate king and priest? Messiah! He is the king priest. And in Zechariah look at Chapter 6 verse 13, it talks here about the Lord coming, the Messiah, called the branch in verse 12, and this is talking about the millennial period, the kingdom to come. "Even He shall build the temple of the Lord, and He shall bear the glory and shall sit and rule upon His throne and He shall be a priest upon His throne." Now if you've got a priest upon a throne what have you got? You got a king priest.
And so Zechariah recognizes this and he is seeing Christ here. So summing it up we have the light of Messiah provided by the golden oil, and it's called golden oil in verse 12 because of its preciousness, the light of Messiah provided by the golden oil poured into the lamp stand of Israel and that's basically what Zechariah sees. And the actual source of all of it is none other than the Messiah himself so the thing goes full circle.
Now Israel's going to have this place in the future, the place of wonderful blessing, the place of wonderful usefulness to God, where what God had intended for them all along will finally be accomplished. In Isaiah 62:1 we find this statement: "For Zion's sake will I not hold my peace and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest until her righteousness go forth as brightness and her salvation as a lamp that burns and the nations shall see thy righteousness and all kings thy glory, and thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord shall name." In other words God says I won't rest until this nation is my light to the world.
So we see the presentation and the purpose, but expanding the thought who in the world could bring this to pass? Who is it that has the energy and the power and the strength to bring Israel to this place? And so we come number three to the power in the vision. We've seen the presentation of the vision, the purpose of the vision, and here's the power in the vision. And I've already hinted at it but let's quickly look.
The power in the vision is in verse 6. And this is a great verse that you've heard many times. "Then he answered and spoke unto me saying, 'This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel saying, not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit saith the Lord of hosts." Now who is it that's the power for the whole thing to come to pass? The Spirit of God! One of the great verses in the Bible! I want to show you just a distinction here you need to make. Not by might, and in the Hebrew that refers to the strength of many, and not by power, and in the Hebrew that refers to the strength on one great one.
Now this, listen, the accomplishing of Israel's restoration will not be due to a collective operation on the part of strong men, nor will it be due to the efforts of one great and strong man. It will only be due to the effort of the Holy Spirit. There's no human agency at all. Human strength, human power, of every description physical, mental, moral, whatever combined or individual will never bring about the salvation of the nation Israel. There's no need for some preacher to think that he alone is going to save Israel. There's no need for some great leader to come along and think that he's going to pull Israel up from its quagmire and introduce it into the great golden age, because it'll only be accomplished by the Spirit. Not by might, that is the power of multiples of men, nor by power, that is the power on one great man, but by what, by Spirit. When it's done there'll be no comment able to be made but this: this was the work of God. So there's no problem with who gets the credit.
True witnessing, incidentally, is always done in the power of the Holy Spirit. Acts 1 says, in verse 8, "You shall receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be My witnesses." All witnessing must be, to be effective, done in the energy of the Holy Spirit. In Acts 4:31, they prayed the Spirit of God fill them and they spoke the word with boldness. Effective evangelism is not a matter of education, it not a matter of methodology, although those things make a contribution, it is a matter of the power of the Spirit of God unleashed in the life and the heart of a willing vessel. And so when Israel is restored to the kingdom, when Israel reaches that great place of usefulness to God it will not be because of any human agency, it will not be because of any move upon the part of men, but only upon the part of God's Holy Spirit.
Now you'll notice something interesting in verse 6. It says, "This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel." And here Zerubbabel was the chief ruler over Israel. We know that from Haggai where that is recorded for us. Haggai, I think you might want to look for just a minute at verse 4 of Chapter 2, "Be strong O Zerubbabel saith the Lord and be strong O Joshua, and there's those two, the one in civil authority and the one in religious authority, and so forth, and so these two people are the ones who stand in the power. In Ezra 2:2 you have a similar indication of the authority that has been given to Zerubbabel as one who is responsible for leading the people.
Now this man had a lot of obstacles in front of him and a lot of them piled up. He was trying to lead the nation to the rebuilding of the wall and he was trying to lead the nation to the restoration of the temple and he was fighting obstacle after obstacle after obstacle. But God says to him, "Zerubbabel, it's going to be done historically and it's going to be done by the Holy Spirit and it was. Now the Holy Spirit used a human vessel to build that wall. Who was it? Nehemiah, but he did it in 52 days and everybody said, "It had to be God, it had to be God." So historically note he says to Zerubbabel, God's Spirit is going to rebuild this place, but Zerubbabel also, like Joshua, is a symbol of the whole nation and as historically Zerubbabel would see the city res