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Zechariah, Prophet of God's remembrance, Part 5

In the Law of Tribulation, we read in Deuteronomy 28:47, 48,

⁴⁷ Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and a glad heart, for the abundance of all things, ⁴⁸ therefore you shall serve your enemies, whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, and in the lack of all things; and He will put an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.

The context shows that “an iron yoke” is defined as sending them into exile to serve their enemies in a foreign country. This was, of course, a last resort, caused by a continual refusal to repent. In the book of Judges, we read how Israel spent much time in lesser captivities, where foreign nations oppressed the Israelites in their own land. This lesser form of divine judgment was not clearly defined until the days of Jeremiah.

While prophesying judgment upon Jerusalem, God told the prophet in Jeremiah 27:2,

² Thus says the Lord to me—“Make for yourself bonds and yokes and put them on your neck.”

Jeremiah was then instructed to walk about the city with a wooden yoke on his neck, telling people to submit to the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar so that they might serve him in their own land without going into exile. But their spokesman, the prophet Hananiah, took that wooden yoke and broke it, giving a false prophecy of God’s deliverance without repentance (Jeremiah 28:10, 11).

As a result, God spoke to Jeremiah again, saying in Jeremiah 28:13,

¹³ “Go and speak to Hananiah, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, “I have put a yoke of iron on the neck of all these nations, that they may serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; and they will serve Him…”’”

In other words, the people of Jerusalem, led by the prophet Hananiah (their spokesman), had been given the opportunity to serve God’s seventy-year sentence in their own land. They would have had to pay Babylonian taxes and do what the King’s governor said, but they would not have been killed, nor would Jerusalem and the temple have been destroyed. Jeremiah offered them a wooden yoke, but they chose instead the iron yoke of exile and captivity.

Seventy years later, men of Judah and Benjamin returned under Persian rule to rebuild the city, the temple, and the land as a whole. This marked the point where the heavy yoke of iron was replaced by a lighter wooden yoke. The seventy-year exile was their iron-yoke captivity. But Babylon was only the first of four empires that God raised up to have dominion until the time of the end. Jerusalem was expected to submit to all of them and carry this wooden yoke.

The wooden yoke era finally ended in 70 A.D., after the people rejected the Messiah and refused to repent. The fourth beast empire, Rome, then destroyed Jerusalem and its temple, and sold millions of them into slavery. This marked the resumption of the iron yoke upon the surviving remnant of Judah.

God’s Jealousy

Zechariah prophesied in the early days of Jerusalem’s wooden yoke after the people were set free from God’s iron yoke. Zechariah 1:14, 15 says,

¹⁴ So the angel who was speaking with me said to me, “Proclaim, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, “I am exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and Zion. ¹⁵ But I am very angry with the nations who are at ease; for while I was only a little angry, they furthered the disaster”.’”

The angelic spokesman conveyed God’s jealousy regarding Jerusalem and Zion. This conveyed God’s displeasure with Jerusalem for its violation of the Mosaic covenant, that is, for its rebellion against the laws of God which the people had vowed to obey (Exodus 19:8). God had married Israel at Mount Sinai, and He will not share His wife with other lovers. So He does not tolerate idolatry or worship of other gods. God says in Exodus 20:5, “I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God.”

1 Kings 14:22 gives us an example:

²² Judah did evil in the sight of the LORD, and they provoked Him to jealousy more than all that their fathers had done, with the sins which they committed.

So the angel told Zechariah that He was “exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem.” There were two things that provoked God to jealousy: (1) Jerusalem had been unfaithful to Him; and (2) after giving Jerusalem her desire to follow after other gods, He was, as it were, overcome by jealousy and moved to re-establish Jerusalem as His wife. In other words, jealousy caused Him to judge Jerusalem and send her out of the house, but jealousy also caused Him to bring her back.

In addition, God was “angry with the nations” for judging Jerusalem excessively. God raises up ungodly nations to judge Jerusalem’s sin, but excessive oppression brings divine judgment upon their heads as well. The judgments of the law are precisely measured to fit the crime. This is why the doctrine of “eternal punishment,” as it is often mistranslated, brings God’s condemnation as well. Sin is debt in Scripture, and debtors who cannot pay their debts are to be “sold” into bondage until the debt is paid or until the Jubilee trumpet is blown. If slave owners do not set their slaves free but hold them against their will, it is excessive and evokes God’s jealousy.

The time of bondage is (Hebrew) olam, “a hidden, indefinite period of time.” It’s Greek equivalent in the New Testament is aionian, “pertaining to an eon or age,” not a known, fixed period of time. (See chapter 3 of my book, The Restoration of All Things.)

God’s Solution

The angel then conveys God’s solution to the problem of excessive judgment in Zechariah 1:16,

¹⁶ Therefore thus says the Lord, “I will return to Jerusalem with compassion; My house will be built in it,” declares the Lord of hosts, “and a measuring line will be stretched over Jerusalem.”

The purpose of “a measuring line” in this case was to measure precisely the length of time Jerusalem was to remain desolate as a result of God’s jealousy and judgment. Such measuring lines normally measure distance, but in the divine law it also measures time. Jesus alluded to this in Matthew 7:1, 2,

¹ Do not judge, so that you will not be judged. ² For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure [i.e., by your measuring line], it will be measured to you.

The law of God forbids double standards of measure (Leviticus 19:35, 36). He forbids using one standard to measure our own sins and another to measure the sins of others. In the end, He will judge us according to the standard by which we have judged others. For this reason, we ought to study the law carefully, so that our measuring line is in accordance with God’s nature.