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I've been studying the Book of Zechariah off and on for over 50 years. I remember having an assignment at Moody Bible Institute to look at the prophetic passages in the Book of Zechariah. And I still have that paper that I wrote so many years ago. So through the years, I've just had a fascination with this little Book of Zechariah. I published a book on that a few years ago. I think it's my best book because it's basically about the Bible. And so today we're going to be doing an introduction and overview of Zechariah. Oh, how about that? All right. Introduction and overview of Zechariah. That sounds kind of dry. We will be dealing with the text a little bit, but for the most part, we'll be dealing with introductory issues. The authorship, the date, the purpose of the book, how do we interpret the book, things that I think are essential as we move into the text in future sermons. We'll be dealing with that today. And to me, it's fascinating. I don't know if you'll find it fascinating, but, you know, I believe that every word of God is inspired. Every book of the Bible, every paragraph, every comma is inspired by God and is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness. And I certainly believe that that's true. The Little Book of Zechariah. Now, in order to keep you alert as we go through all of this technical stuff, we will be having a review quiz at the end of our sermon today. And there will be a prize to the best pupil. So pay attention, because you never know what's going to end up on the quiz. All right, the purpose of these sermons is threefold. First is to demonstrate that Zechariah is not a diminutive book. That is, it's not a small book. It's not. It's. It's not an unimportant book. Sometimes we tend to relegate the minor prophets, since they're the last 12 books in the Bible. They're, you know, they're tucked in after all these big, gigantic books like Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel and Daniel. Then we have these 12 minor prophets at the end. And there's a tendency to think, well, those are just kind of the leftovers. This is small potato stuff. But I certainly do not believe that is true of any of the minor prophets, particularly the Book of Zechariah. It's not small. It's small in length compared to some of the others, 14 chapters, but certainly not small in importance. In fact, Zechariah is one of the most important Old Testament books on the subject of Christology, the person and work of Christ and eschatology. So it's really packed with a lot of information. So it's not diminutive. The second reason for this series is to demonstrate that Zechariah is not difficult to interpret. Sometimes there's a tendency among believers, hopefully not in this fellowship, to kind of shy away from Bible prophecy because, you know, people think it's so difficult, it's so speculative. Everybody has their own views on things and tends to get a little bit wild. But I don't believe that Zechariah is difficult to interpret if we use the right kind of methods of interpretation, what we call hermeneutics, or what we called at Moody Bible Institute, Herman's New Tricks. So we're going to be looking at Herman's New Tricks today and trying to figure out the best method of interpreting this prophetic book. And if we do that, I think we'll not shy away from will be challenging. There is some symbolism in the book, particularly the night visions of chapters one through six, but the context will help us to understand their meaning. So Zechariah is not difficult to interpret. The third thing is it's not a discouraging book. Again, sometimes we shy away from certain prophetic books because there's all this judgment and death and mayhem, and we think, oh, man, I get enough of that on the news. You know, I don't want this. So we tend to be sometimes discouraged. And yes, sometimes there is some information in Zechariah that has to do with suffering and judgment. Even God's people in chapter 14, we see some suffering there. But the overall tone and purpose of the book is encouragement, and I think we all need that. As I was looking at the newsreel before this, the start of the. The service today, it's like anybody who doesn't believe that we are approaching the end times, that we're in the end times, and that the tribulation is about to overtake the world, obviously I believe that Christ is going to rapture us, deliver us before that. But any. Anyone who doesn't believe that is not really paying attention. Anyone who thinks that the world is getting better and better and that the Golden Age is about to be ushered in. You're probably smoking something that's not legal because as Paul says, times are getting waxing, waxing worse and worse, not better and better. So if you're looking forward to the Golden Age, you need to be looking beyond the age in which we live. And I could talk about that for a long time. So we are in the midst of birth pangs. Jesus in the Olivet discourse says that this. These are the beginnings of sorrows. And he talked about wars, rumors of wars. He talked about persecution. He talked about deception, he talked about alienation, on and on. So we are in the midst of the birth pangs. And for any of you ladies who've experienced birth pangs, you know they don't get better until the baby is born. And then because of the joy of that, you tend to forget the birth pangs. I think that will be the case when Jesus comes and when he establishes his kingdom. We'll hardly think about or remember the difficult days before that. But we are in those birth pangs, and we all need encouragement. And I believe that Zechariah can give us a hearty dose of encouragement to remind us that we're not only on the right side of history, but we're also on the winning side of history if we take a long view of things. Okay, in addition to that, two reasons why Christians should be interested in Zechariah in terms of content. One is because of the prophecies concerning Jesus Christ's personal ministry that were fulfilled in the New Testament. The Messianic prophecies in the Book of Zechariah are second only to those in Isaiah. Now think about that. Isaiah has, what, 66 chapters, and Zechariah only has 14. And yet Zechariah comes in second. When it comes to the amount of Messianic prophecies, that means it's pretty dense. There's a pretty good percentage of the Book of Zechariah that has to do with Messianic prophecies. Now, of course, we know that there are two categories. There are the fulfilled prophecies concerning Christ's first coming, and we'll see some of those in Zechariah. But second, there are prophecies concerning the end times that relate to Israel, the city of Jerusalem, the second coming of Christ, and worship in the kingdom. So we'll see all of that first, fulfilled prophecies, first coming, unfulfilled prophecies, second coming. Zechariah is the longest of the minor prophets, but is also the most frequently quoted of the minor prophets in the New Testament. So it must be pretty important. Okay, so the next question. Now we get into Herman's new tricks. Does the Book of Zechariah aid us in developing an eschatological hermeneutic or method of interpretation. I'm sure most of you went to bed last night wondering about that. How do we interpret Bible prophecy? And can Zechariah help us in developing that eschatological, which means last things, eschatology, the doctrine of last things, and the hermeneutic means basically method of interpretation. A question for those in academic circles is when we come to Bible prophecy, do we, do we toss out our normal method of interpretation? For example, when we look at Matthew 5, 7, Jesus, Sermon on the Mount, we have very straightforward teaching in regard to that. Sometimes he'll use symbolism, etc. But it's pretty straightforward. So when it comes to the didactic or the teaching passages in the Bible, we're pretty secure. But then when we get to the prophetic passage, it seems like there's all kinds of ideas and all kinds of theories in terms of how to interpret Bible prophecy and it leads to entire systems of thought. I'll give you some of the main names, we'll flesh those out. There's the amillennial view, that is that Bible prophecy cannot be interpreted literally, that basically we're in the millennium right now, it's the realized millennium, and that these passages that deal with end times really are just focused on what's going on in the world today. And then there's the postmillennial view, is that the church is bringing in the millennium and that the tribulation actually took place in A.D. 68, 70 with the siege of Jerusalem. So what we see in the Book of Revelation really is kind of an expanded version of what happened almost 2,000 years ago. So that's a different view. And I could give other variations as well. So when it comes to interpreting Bible prophecy, there's all kinds of views, all kinds of views. And so does Zechariah help us in developing that? And it relates to the question, should Bible prophecy be interpreted in a different way than the historical or didactic or teaching passages? And I think that the Book of Zechariah gives us some help in, in terms of developing that kind of a hermeneutic or method of interpretation, because it has a mixture of fulfilled and unfulfilled prophecy, in my view, is that as we look at the fulfilled prophecies in the Book of Zechariah, which we will and see how those prophecies were fulfilled, it gives us a clue as to the manner in which unfulfilled prophecies will be fulfilled as well. I think maybe there's a certain logic to that. So let me give some Examples of how different eschatological positions interpret the book of Zechariah. And so we'll just kind of try them on for size. Oh, I'm getting some help in the back. Okay, thank you. All right. This is a quote from Walter Elwell, who, as you know, is the general editor of the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. I'm sure you keep that by your bedside every night for devotions. But anyway, Walter Elwell, who is amillennial in his position, interprets Zechariah this. According to this outlook, there will be a continuous development of good and evil in the world until the second coming of Christ. Then the dead shall be raised and the judgment conducted. Amillennialists believe that the kingdom of God is now present in the world, and the victorious Christ rules his Church through the Word and the Spirit. They feel that the future glorious and perfect kingdom refers to a new earth and a new life in heaven. So to the amillennialists, which, by the way, was created by Augustine, St. Augustine in the fourth century, never taught, by the way, in the patristic or Church Father era. It's not the historic position of the Church. But amillennialists believe that we are now in what they called a realized millennium and that Christ is ruling the world through the Church. Now, isn't that a dismal thought? I mean, I was in church ministry full time for 30 years, and I'm telling you, if we really believe that Christ is ruling the world through the Church, we're in trouble, folks. Okay? But the amillennials believe that somehow Christ is ruling the world through the church and that the kingdom is being expressed in that way. And I would say this. If we believe that we are in the millennium right now, I'd hate to live in the tribulation. You know, this is. This is not the millennium that is described in the bible. Revelation, chapter 20, 21, 22. But that's the amillennial position, that Christ is now ruling the world through the Church. And so that's one expression of amillennialism. Thank you. Another amillennialist, a gentleman named Martin Woodstra, says this in regard to Zechariah 14, which is probably my favorite chapter in my favorite book, Zechariah 14. That's when really things come to a climax in a good way. So Woodstra says this from the mixed character of the imagery employed, referring now to cataclysmic upheavals, now to regular pilgrimages to Jerusalem. It seems to this writer that no such literal interpretation of the passage is intended. This prophecy has in view the aspects of the gospel age, with particular emphasis on its conclusion. So again, Woodster being a faithful amillennialist, he says this Zechariah 14 really has to do with the current age, the church age, and a particular emphasis on his conclusion. So Zechariah refers to the church age as opposed to the tribulation, the second coming and the millennium, which to a dumb literalist like me, it seems to be talking about the second coming, the tribulation and the millennium. But I guess amillennials have greater insights. Now we move to another famous amillennialist. Maybe you've heard of this one, this Gentleman, Martin Luther, Ph.D. in theology. Before he got converted, he was teaching theology to Catholic priests. Of course, after he came to understand the truth of the Gospel, the just shall live by faith, and got gloriously converted and led the Protestant Reformation. But this is what he said about Zechariah here in this chapter. I give up for I'm not sure what the prophet is talking about. So here we have an honest amillennialist who said, I don't have a clue as to what this is about. See, it didn't fit in with his eschatological system. He did not allow the Bible to create the system. Instead, he had a system that he tried to impose upon the text. And he honestly says, I don't have a clue as to what Zechariah 14 is about. I just don't have a clue. So if he didn't have a clue, with his background and his training, if we adopt the same system, how can we have a clue? How can we have an understanding as to what God has said? Now, let me say something about church history here. We of course know that Martin Luther broke with the Roman Catholic Church over the issues such as indulgences, the corruption in the Catholic church in the 16th century, as well as the sacramental system that corrupted the gospel. So his issues primarily had to do with salvation and church life, not eschatology. He didn't have the luxury of dealing with last things because he was dealing with the current things. And you remember the thirty Years War between Protestants and Catholics, a very intense time. A lot of people died over the issues pertaining to the Reformation, but they were not eschatological issues. They didn't have the luxury of taking a second look at prophetic passages and saying, now what is the Bible teaching? That was true of other reformers as well, such as John Calvin. They were amillennialists. And the churches they founded, denominations that they founded, such as Lutheran and Episcopal churches, continue to be amillennial today because that's what their founders believed and that's what they inherited from their background with Roman Catholicism. It was not until the 19th century that Protestant scholars had the breathing room and the opportunity to revise their views on eschatology. People such as John Nelson Darby, C.I. schofield, Lewis Barry Chafer and other Protestant scholars in the 1800s and the 1900s began to take a second look at Bible prophecy and began to revise their views more along literal lines. And out of that, there was a resurgence in premillennial and eventually pre tribulational doctrine. Now, those who say, well, those are just recent doctrines, no, they're biblical doctrines. They go back to the apostles and the prophets. But in the course of church history, sometimes doctrines get lost. Just like during the Middle Ages, the doctrine of justification by faith got lost in the midst of Roman Catholic superstition and sacramentalism that was recovered in the Protestant Reformation in the same way premillennialism and pre tribulational doctrine was recovered in the 18th and 19th century. It's not just the same as saying it was invented, it was recovered in recent times. And so, so we have a renewal now of the literal understanding of Bible prophecy that has unearthed, you might say, premillennial and pre tribulational truth. Now let me go to another one, another position. That is the preterist position. Preterists, by the way, are post millennials who believe that the tribulation took place in the past. Preterist means past. And what was that past? The past was the siege of Jerusalem and fall of Jerusalem at AD 68, 70. So preterists look at tribulation events, things that are described in the Book of Revelation, chapter 4 through 19, or the Olivet discourse, as things which happened almost 2,000 years ago in AD 68, the siege and the fall of Jerusalem. So this author, preterist author, says the preterist view of Zechariah is that Zechariah is a symbolic assortment of prophecies describing the destruction of Jerusalem at AD 70 together with the spread of the Gospel through the church age thereafter. In other words, prophecies concerning the second coming of Christ have been fulfilled in the past. Now we could talk a lot about preterism or post millennialism. It tends to wax or wane depending on how things are going in the world. During the Gilded Age, before World War I, there was a kind of a rise in post millennial thought because we thought that with the scientific age, that the millennium was about to burst forth, the church was about to kind of conquer the evil in the world. Then after World War I, the war to end all wars, it went into decline because we again saw the evil of man. During the 1980s, during the Reagan revolution, at least in the United States, we saw a resurgence of post millennialism because we thought, oh, everything's getting better the year of the Bible and that kind of thing, and a lot of post millennial conferences and books and that kind of thing. Now you don't hear too much about it because things aren't going very well in the United States or around the world. So it's a, it's a theology that tends to wax or wane depending on how things are going in the world. It's not solidly rooted in Scripture. And I will tell you very simply, as you look at Scripture, honestly, to think that the book of Revelation 4 through 19, in all of its detail is some kind of a symbolic expression or depiction of the siege and fall of Jerusalem, I don't think you're being honest with the text. Now, that was a terrible time and over a million Jews died. Terrible time. Josephus talks about it. But you cannot take those events and expand them out into anything similar to Revelation 4:19 or the Olivet discourse. Just my personal opinion. Okay, so having talked about some of the alternative views, I guess it's only right that I should talk about my view, how I interpret Bible prophecy and, and the Bible in general. My view is that Zechariah is to be interpreted according to the literal, grammatical, historical method. Literal means that we take the words for what they mean in their normal and plain sense. Grammatical means that we follow the normal grammatical rules of interpreting literature. Then the third part of that is historical. It means that we seek with diligence to determine the historical background and context before rendering an interpretation. Now let me unpack this before all of our eyes glaze over. By the way, if you're in a Bible college, you can take an entire course called Hermeneutics, where you have to wade through this for an entire semester. So I'm giving you a semester's worth of material in like three minutes. So, so let me first, first say that how we interpret Bible prophecy is very important because about 27% of the Bible has predictive material in them. Somebody with too much time on their hands counted 8352 verses that has prophetic material in it. So roughly one third of the Bible is prophetic or predictive. In nature, in that it has material in it that that applies to the future. Now, much of that has been fulfilled already, but is still considered prophetic. And these verses, these prophetic verses deal with 737 separate prophetic topics. Can you imagine? So it's a major part of Scripture, Bible prophecy. So let me unpack these words quickly before all of us go to sleep. Literal is defined as the sense in which the human author intended. In which his words convey. In other words, the human author, though he might not have understood exactly how his prophecy would be fulfilled when he used words, there was a sense that he intended these words to be used and there was a meaning that he intended it to convey. It was not some kind of a psychedelic vision that he himself did not understand. And although prophecy uses more figurative language, including symbols, figures of speech, allegories and parables more than the narrative or didactic prose, that is not to say that the words used are any less literal. So prophecy should be taken in its natural, straightforward, literal sense. Now, how do we know that? We know that because of fulfilled prophecy. How have prophecies that have already been fulfilled been fulfilled? In what sense? Let me give an example. In Zechariah 9, 9 we read shout, O daughter of Jerusalem, behold thy king coming unto thee. He is just in having salvation, lowly and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt, the foal of an ass. What do you think Zechariah 9, verse 9 is about? Anybody have a clue? What don't sound? The triumphant entry. Jesus came into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, a week before the resurrection Sunday on a donkey period. That's what it meant. There's no room for subjectivity in interpreting it. Fulfilled prophecy demonstrates that it was fulfilled literally. Now does it mean that Zechariah understood all of it? Where he would get the donkey, that he got it in Bethany, the exact day that this would take place? No, he didn't need to know that because he was inspired by God. The point is that fulfilled prophecies are fulfilled literally and specifically, not subjectively. So if that is true of fulfilled prophecy, should not we expect that unfulfilled prophecy will likewise be fulfilled literally and definitely not subjectively? I don't know. Maybe I'm just stupid enough to believe it that way. I don't know. So that's what I mean by a literal understanding. Then grammatical. We just allow the grammar of the text to express itself. We don't apply any special subjective view of that. Then we have the word historical means that we seek to determine the Historical background and the context by rendering an interpretation. So when we get to difficult passages like the eight night visions of chapter one through six, which we'll be getting to eventually, not today, but eventually has a lot of symbolism. How do we understand it? We look at the context. We look at what the author is intending, we look at his purpose, and then in the context of that, we interpret what he's saying. Doesn't mean that it's easy, but it is attainable. So that's the mini course on hermeneutics, literal, grammatical and historical is how conservative or evangelicals interpret the Bible. All of the Bible, including the prophetic sections. Now let's get back to the text. We're going to talk now about a very important decree that took place that became the springboard for everything in the book of Zechariah. And that is the decree of Cyrus. You may have heard of Cyrus. He was a Persian king that conquered Babylon in 539 BC and allowed the remnant of Judah to return, ushering in what we call the post exilic period. But when was Cyrus predicted? King Cyrus, he was predicted in 7700 B.C. by Isaiah and Isaiah 44:28. We read that saith of Cyrus, he is my shepherd. Interesting. He is my shepherd. Pagan king. He is my shepherd and shall perform all my pleasure, even saying to Jerusalem thou shalt be built, and to the Temple thy foundation shall be laid. So here Isaiah, inspired by the Holy Spirit in 700 B.C. predicted that somebody named Cyrus would come along and would decree that Jerusalem would be rebuilt and that the temple's foundation would be laid. Now why is that important to the book of Isaiah? The whole historical context of Zechariah is in the post exilic period. What does that mean? That Judah, because of its sin, was taken into Babylonian captivity As Jeremiah predicted. 70 years of captivity. But we also have at the same time Isaiah's prediction that they would be delivered from captivity by this man named Cyrus. So the whole historical context of Zechariah in the post exilic period is predicated on the decree of this Persian king Cyrus, whose decree enabled the remnant of Judah. You remember there were about 50,000 that were enabled, that were allowed by this decree of Cyrus to return to Judah after the Babylonian captivity, which was from 606 to 536 BC. That's 70 years. So it's predicted in 700 BC. It was fulfilled in 538 BC. That's what? Approximately 140 years. Okay, we're going to the fulfillment five, 38 BC. Here we go. This is from Ezra, chapter one, verses one through three, which is also post exilic book. Now in the first year of Cyrus, king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled. The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and put it also in writing. That's a key to remember. He put it also in writing saying, thus saith Cyrus, king of Persia, the Lord God of heaven hath given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he hath charged me to build him an house at Jerusalem, which is in. Which is in Judah. Who is there among you of all his people? His God be with him. And let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of the Lord God of Israel. He is the God which is in Jerusalem. Ezra 1, 1, 3. Now Ezra by the way, was contemporary with Zechariah. He helps to fill in some of the historical features of the post exilic period. So we have Ezra unpacking the fact that this Persian king would be basically led of the Lord to issue a decree which would allow the remnant to return. And it says in this quote that he wrote it down. Well let's talk about that in the 19th century. Can we back up one if we have one to back up? Okay, well I'm missing a slide, but I can read it to you. In the 19th century, the archaeologists discovery of the Cyrus cylinder confirms the historicity of the decree of Cyrus. This cylinder, inscribed in Babylonian cuneiform in the name of King Cyrus the Great was found in 1879 in present day Iraq by Mr. Harmud Rasam at Babylon. And it dates back to the 6th century. This cylinder describes not only the capture of Babylon, but also Cyrus permission for the people captured by the Babylonians to return to their homelands. You remember in Ezra chapter one it says that he wrote it down. Well where did he write it down? He wrote it down in the cylinder. This is a. It looks like a corn cob to me, but I think it's a little bit bigger than that. And this cylinder was discovered by this archaeologist back in the 1800s in Babylon. And apparently it has some kind of inscription that denotes that this was written by Cyrus, hence its name, Cyrus cylinder. It's housed in the London Museum. It's written in the Babylonian language. Let me quote a little bit from this cylinder. We read from Asser and from Susa, a God. Asuna, Zambon, Materna, Dare. As far as the region of Gutium, I return the images of the gods which resided there, I. E In Babylon to their places. I gathered all their inhabitants and returned to them their dwellings. I underline that because that's key to this. So here in the Cyrus cylinder we have the written historical record that Cyrus returned the inhabitants, those that had been taken captive in Babylon to their original lands. He released them from their captivity. Now Judah is not specifically mentioned in this cylinder, but it is implied in that there was a general dispersion of all who'd been taken captive in Babylon. So here we have a written record uncovered in these last days that indeed Cyrus the Great recorded the fact that he allowed the dispersion of Jews back to Judah after he captured Babylon. I think that's very, very significant. Again, as we move forward in time and archeology moves forward, we uncover and corroborate that which the Bible has stated. Now let's move on to the author of Zechariah. He was multi talented. He was a young man when he began writing Zechariah. He was not only a prophet, but he was a priest. He was born in Babylon of course, during the 70 year captivity and was among those who returned to Judah in 538 and 537 BC the first wave of those returning. The prophet's name itself has theological significance. It means Yahweh remembers. Yahweh remembers. Now in the context of the book of Zechariah, it denotes that Yahweh remembers his covenant promises to Israel and he acts to fulfill them. So what a perfect name for a prophet to unpack how Yahweh has remembered his covenant promises to Israel and he's acting to fulfill them in this post exilic period. Now Zechariah was not the only prophet at this time. He had a contemporary named Haggai. Haggai also has a book in the Minor Prophets. He continued his ministry long after Haggai. Zechariah is referred to as a young man in Zechariah 2, 4. So it's possible that Zechariah continued his ministry into the reign of Artaxerxes in 465 BC. So we have in Zechariah, Yahweh remembers. We have God's promised deliverance from Babylonian captivity leading to a functioning temple, a spiritually restored people which portends an even grander fulfillment of prophecies of salvation and restoration that would come through the Messiah. So we have in Zechariah not only a prophet, we know he's a Prophet, we have his book. But also a priest. Now, that takes us to the divine offices. I'm sure all of you know that. But just by way of review, there were prophets, priests and kings in the Old Testament in God's economy to his people. Prophets. The Hebrew word nebiim. Prophets would speak for God to the people. That's what Zechariah is doing. Then there were priests, Kohanim. They speak to God for the people. They represent the people before God and they intercede for the people. Then we have the kings, the Malachim. They stand before the people, ideally as God's representatives and before God, accountable. Now we know the dismal history of kings in Israel's history. We won't go into great detail, but of course we know after the divided kingdom took place. We have Israel, the ten northern tribes. And how many good kings did they have? Can anybody name number of the good kings? Do we have an example? No, there were none. Not a single one of Israel's kings were good kings in the northern kingdom. Then we have the southern kingdom of Judah. Two tribes. They were mostly bad. By my count, there were like eight good kings in a period of 300 years. So out of 40 kings in both northern and southern Israel, they were about 8. About 20% of their leaders were good. Kind of like congress. Okay, kind of like congress. Anyway, we'll get off of that. All right, so we have prophets, priests and kings. And of course, Zechariah was a prophet and a priest. Now, the date of the writing began with the resumption of the building of Zerubbabel's temple in 520 B.C. now, I said the resumption. The building was actually begun in 536 B.C. shortly after the first wave of emigrants came back into Judah. But because of external opposition, they halted the construction, which of course was a problem for Zechariah and Haggai. They prompted the people to resume construction. But for about 16 years, between 536 and 520, after the foundation was laid, they stopped work. They resumed work in 520 BC and the work was completed in 519 BC and the building dedicated in 516. So we have Zechariah's work began in writing, had to do with the resumption of the building 520, then the beginning of Zechariah's preaching, which also took place in 520 BC then we have Zechariah's Eight Night Visions. Eight visions in one night. It was a long night. He didn't sleep much. It's recorded in Zechariah 1:6, followed by Joshua's crowning as Judah's high priest in Zechariah chapter six as well. So 520 and 519 BC there was a lot of activity and a lot of writing. Then we have the urging of repentance, the promise of blessing from Zechariah 8 and 9, which was in 518 BC the dedication of the temple in 516 BC by the way, was known as Zerubbabel's Temple because he was the first governor of Judah and served in my opinion, as the general contractor for this temple. So it was known from that time forward as Zerubbabel's Temple until a man named Herod in the first century BC Made some embellishments and that became known at that point as Herod's Temple. That was the temple of Jesus Day. But it began as a kind of a humble a temple compared to Solomon's and it was known as Zerubbabel's Temple. Then we have Zechariah's final prophecy in chapters 9 14, which is about 480 BC so Zechariah had a long and fruitful ministry at least 40 years from 520 BC until around 480 BC now let's talk about the structure of the book. Chapter 1 1, 6 is the introduction and the call to repentance. Then we have the eight night visions, the balance of chapter one through chapter six, verse eight, then the symbolic crowning of Joshua as the high priest. Chapter seven and eight, questions about fasting, we don't talk about that at church. Then we have chapters nine through 14 which are the two prophetic oracles. Chapters nine through 11 is the first of those. And then chapters 12 through 14. Now this last section, chapters nine through 14 is where we have the bulk of messianic prophecy, both first coming and second coming prophecy. So we'll be spending a lot of time in chapters nine through 14. Now the theme of the book, the central theme of Zechariah is encouragement. Remember I said that Zechariah is not a discouraging book, it's an encouraging book. Primarily, Zechariah's task was to encourage the completion of the rebuilding of the temple, which he did. And then various means are used to accomplish this end and these function as subthemes. For example, great stress is laid on the coming of the Messiah and his overthrow of all the anti kingdom forces so that Christ's millennial kingdom can finally and fully be established on the earth. So Zechariah's prophecies were near term and long term. The near term, let's get this temple done. Let's restore the temple worship. Let's get our lives straightened out and become the people that God wants. And if you do that, in the long run, God will send his Messiah and establish his millennial kingdom. So the purpose of the book is to encourage saints of all ages, including ours, of Christ's eventual victory over all the forces of darkness that are arrayed against us. So it's not just a book to be gathering dust. It's applicable today. In fact, it's probably even more applicable today as the day in which it was written. Because some of these things are happening around us or the shadows of those things are happening around us. Okay, now, I promised a quiz. We have a little bit of time. So here's how it's going to work. Okay? I'm going to read the question, and then I'm going to go through the answers. Now, if you think the first answer is correct, you just raise your hand. There'll be no embarrassment. Okay? Just raise your hand. And then after I do that, I'll tell you what the correct answer is, and then we go to the next one. Keep track of your answers and there will be a special prize for the one who gets the most answers. Right. Okay. Pretty simple. There's only four questions. When was the decree of Cyrus prophesied? Prophesied. 750bc 700 oh, 750bc how many? 750. Okay. All right. I feel like an auction here. 700bc how many? Think 700bc okay, 650bc 600bc the correct answer. 700bc how many? Got that right. Okay, we have a few. All right, we got an astute class here, very attentive. All right, the next question. When was the decree of Cyrus pronounced? Pronounced? 606 BC any takers? 5, 86 BC okay, 586 BC 538 BC or 516 BC the correct answer is 538 BC that's when Cyrus made the decree and the Jews started heading back to Judah. 538 BC all right, they get harder. No, they don't. They get easier. All right, what does the name Zechariah mean? Yahweh cares. Yahweh remembers. Yahweh loves. Yahweh delivers. I think we all got that right. Yahweh remembers. Okay, And then our last. Our final question. What is the second temple called in the 6th century? Ezra's temple, Cyrus's temple, Herod's temple, Zerubbabel's temple. I think we all got that one right. Zerubbabel's temple. Okay, now how many of you got all of them right? Okay. I knew that there would be many. All right, how many? That. So I'm going to have to distinguish because I don't have enough to give to everybody. What I'm going to do is I'm going to give this to the youngest person in our congregation that got them. All right. Do we have any, like, people under 20 that got them? All right, I see a hand over here. Okay, and how old are you, young man? Eleven. Sorry, you have to forfeit it. You're 11. Anybody here that got them all right, that is younger than 11? Okay, young man, you can come on up. So you get a copy of the book and I have a DVD inside of it that has all the messianic prophecies in Zechariah. All right, give him another hand. Okay, we're not done. I have one more slide. We talked about the decree of Cyrus. Very important decree. But there's an even more important decree that we find in the book of Zechariah. And I call it the Decree of Yahweh. And it's right in the introduction to the book. And it's very important as a. As a foundation for what we'll be studying. The Decree of Yahweh. Therefore, this is what God says to Zechariah. Therefore say unto them, thus saith the Lord of hosts. Turn ye unto me, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will turn unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. Everything that would follow is based upon this decree. He's basically saying to these people in Judah who's just gone through 70 years of captivity, well deserved captivity, because of their sin, their rebellion. They were following idols. They weren't respecting the Sabbath year rest for the land. So they were taken out of the land for 70 years. Because for 490 years they didn't give the land rest. So God took them out for 70 years. They were idolatrous, rebellious people. God warned them over and over again through Isaiah, through Jeremiah, that if you don't stop, I'm going to send the cruel Babylonians and they're going to take you out of the land for 70 years. And you'll experience all kinds of deprivation. The temple was destroyed. Solomon's temple was destroyed. It was ransacked. So after 70 years, he says, okay, I'm giving you another chance. And these are the terms. You turn unto me, I'll turn unto you. You turn against me, I'll turn against you. It's the timeless command of repentance. It's not just to the Jews, it's always God's terms. Jesus said, I tell you, nay, but except you repent, you shall also likewise perish. That's one of the terms of the gospel. You have to repent. You have to turn from sin and turn to me. If you do that, God says, I'll turn to you. I'll be merciful to you. The first move is yours. Turn to me and I will turn to you. That's the decree of Yahweh, and that's the decree of Yahweh. Today, the gospel includes repentance. Except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. Turn to me, and I will turn to you. And so that's the foundation for this book. I think it's going to be a practical book. And I think this is a reminder for us Latter Day Saints, not in the Mormon sense, but in the biblical sense, that we have to turn to Christ. We're not going to make it through this any other way. As my friend L. A Marzulli says, there's no way out but up. We're not going to turn this thing around no matter how hard we try. And we should. We should be faithful witnesses. We should occupy until Jesus comes. We're not going to turn it around. There's no way out but up. And there's no way to get through without turning to him, turning to God, turning to Christ. So let's pray. Lord, we thank you for this book of Zechariah. What a wonderful book that you have inspired and preserved all these many years, 2500 years now. And Lord, there's a message here for each one of us, a message of encouragement, a message of assurance that you have, you know the end from the beginning. Everything is laid out in youn divine plan, and we just need to trust yout and follow youw every step of the way. I thank youk for this congregation, for each one. Lord, they love youe. They love youe Word. They desire to know your Word so that they might live in, have a light in dark places. And we are truly in a dark place. We are in the birth pangs of the Second Coming. And so, Lord, we need as much light as we possibly can. And so, Lord, help us to continue to be seekers of you, seekers after your truth, confident that your Word is truth and light. So we thank you for your presence with us. We thank you for your Holy Spirit's teaching. Guide us throughout this day. We pray for Pastor Matt that you'd give him a great vacation. May he return refreshed to continue to serve you and serve the body of Christ here. We pray this in Jesus name, amen.