“The Lord Will Again Comfort Zion” (Zech 1-2:5)

So they answered the Angel of the Lord, who stood among the myrtle trees, and said, “We have walked to and fro throughout the earth, and behold, all the earth is resting quietly.”

¹² Then the Angel of the Lord answered and said, “O Lord of hosts, how long will You not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah, against which You were angry these seventy years?”

¹³ And the Lord answered the angel who talked to me, with good and comforting words.¹⁴ So the angel who spoke with me said to me, “Proclaim, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts:

“I am zealous for Jerusalem
And for Zion with great zeal.
¹⁵ I am exceedingly angry with the nations at ease;
For I was a little angry,
And they helped—but with evil intent.”

¹⁶ ‘Therefore thus says the Lord:

“I am returning to Jerusalem with mercy;
My house shall be built in it,” says the Lord of hosts,
“And a surveyor’s line shall be stretched out over Jerusalem.”’

¹⁷ “Again proclaim, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts:

“My cities shall again spread out through prosperity;
The Lord will again comfort Zion,
And will again choose Jerusalem.”’” (vs11-17)

Spiritually, we’ve been oppressed, and God’s used it to get our attention, but now, He’s ready to save (vs17). He says, “The Lord will again comfort Zion, and will again choose Jerusalem.”  He hasn’t forgotten His church, but He has humbled us by affliction, and now, He returns to comfort us and to prosper.  This God gives us repentance, so that He can bless us with His presence. He saves sinners because He loves us enough to humble us, so that He can lift us again.  He says, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble”, therefore, “humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up” (James 4:6-10).  This lifting up - this returning to us again - is the BRIGHTER hope of tomorrow for all who believe Christ and His promises.

We didn’t listen when He warned us, so we were chastened.  Like Israel, who for seventy years endured bondage under the enemies power, sin has mastered us more than we’d admit to each other.  We were down and bound because we didn’t fear God, and we hadn’t learned to obey Him (vs4-6).  He says, “Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever? Yet surely My words and My statutes, which I commanded My servants the prophets, did they not overtake your fathers? So they return and said: ‘Just as the Lord of hosts determined to do to us, according to our ways and according to our deeds, so He has dealt with us.’”  Now, not because we have overcome Satan, but because God is weary of his oppression, He has lovingly returned to us in mercies, revealing Christ more clearly, and enabling us to obey.

We didn’t listen, but God never intended to destroy us. He warned us, and like Israel, He purged away the fat, but He’s had His eye on us, and He will restore our mercies because He hates sin and chooses us for good.

Don’t be ashamed of the past, as if the future has no hope or very little. I know the past makes you think, “I will be forsaken”, or at least, “I will be small all my life”, but don’t think this way. There is a time to pull down and a time to build.  There is a time to scourge us, and a time to comfort and heal us.  We have SUFFICIENTLY paid the debt of our chastisement, when we believe that God has turned us, again, freely.  Remember, Israel was released by the King of Persia, not themselves, so that God will save us by a power that we don’t have (Ezra 1).

Take the promise and enjoy.  

Finally, the Lord is why we shall be saved with power!  It is because He is a wall of protecting fire to us (Zech 1:18-2:5). He says, “Jerusalem (the church) shall be inhabited as towns without walls, because of the multitude of men and livestock in it.  For I’, says the Lord, ‘will be a wall of fire all around her, and I will be the glory in her midst”.  Salvation isn’t because of us, because we are able to do anything ourselves; it is because of God’s love, God’s turning us and Himself, and God keeping us from sin. It isn’t that I’m strong; it is that He is my strength, and He will assuredly save all who believe.

Do you believe, for Christ’s sake, that God is FOR you, even though you have been evil?  Do you believe He chastened you in love, so that He could turn you to Himself and restore joy producing power?  Do you believe God is WHY you’ll be saved?  Then you’ll be saved indeed!