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Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast. Powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the journey. Let's be honest, a lot of us are still treating digital ministry like it's a backup plan from 2020. But discipleship isn't just happening on Sundays anymore. People need gospel centered connection every day of the week. And if you're stuck juggling five different platforms, one for giving, another for sermons, something else for events, it's no wonder engagement feels off. That's not ministry. That's a mess. Subsplash changes that one platform. Everything you need. Media, giving, events, messaging, your app, your website built specifically for churches. No hacks, no workarounds, just clarity and simplicity. Because every day you wait, families scroll past your sermons, new guests click away from clunky sites, and real people miss real moments with Jesus. Don't waste another summer stuck in digital survival mode. Use it to get ahead, simplify, upgrade, get back to what matters. Head to subsplash.combible-dept and schedule a free no pressure demo. And let this be the summer your church gets focused and fully equipped family. Welcome to day 245 on the Bible department podcast. Man, we are diving into the Book of Zechariah. Now, Zechariah is one of the strangest, oddest books of the Bible. But honestly, like, we can tackle it. We can do it. Zechariah may be one of those books of the Bible that you kind of ignore like, you just kind of like, man, do we really need this one? But Zechariah is going to have over 4, 40 prophetic messages about the person of Jesus. The fact that Zechariah is the person who prophesies that the Messiah would actually enter into Jerusalem riding on a donkey and tons of other things. Zechariah also is kind of split up from chapters 9 to chapters 14. Zechariah gets really apocalyptic. Okay, so remember Ezekiel, Daniel, Zechariah. These are kind of like the fathers of apocalyptic literature. So the book of Revelation is going to lean on images from the Book of Zechariah heavily. It'll take us a couple days to get to that portion of the book. But those are just some quick facts about the Book of Zechariah. I'm going to give you some context clues so that you can begin to Understand Zechariah chapters 1, 2, and 3 just a little bit better because. Or those. Rather, those are the chapters assigned to us on the Bible reading plan for today. So if you haven't done the reading, stop the audio, pause the video, go to the reading, read Zechariah chapters 1, 2 and 3. You may be confused by what you read, but I'll help you to kind of make it plain. And if you have done the reading, let's dive into some context clues. All right, Context. Let's situate ourselves. In the book of Zechariah, there are three post exilic prophets. In the entire Bible, there are pre exilic prophets, exilic prophets, and post exilic prophets. That doesn't need a ton of explanation, but I do want to over communicate that pre exilic prophets are prophesying before the exile. So they are prophesying that the exile is going to happen. They're prophesying prior to 586 BC because in 586 BC, Nebuchadnezzar is going to march his army into Jerusalem and he's gonna burn the temple to the ground and he is gonna haul a bunch of Jews off into exile to Babylon. Okay, so pre exilic prophets are prophesying prior to 586 B.C. then you get a bunch of exilic prophets, right? Ezekiel is not prophesying from Israel to Israelites. No, he's prophesying from Babylon. Cause my man is in exile. Daniel is in exile, right? Nebuchadnezzar is throwing him into a well. His friends, he's throwing him into a lion's den, his friend into a fiery furnace, because they are in Babylon. So those prophets are prophesying during the exile. Then there are post exilic books. Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi are the three post exilic books. And we're going to dive into Malachi. Okay, so for context, okay, even more context. The books of Ezra and Nehemiah are going to really outline what happens when the people return to Jerusalem. I just want to kind of give you some numbers. There are about 1 million Jews that are living in Babylon, okay, Because of the exile. One million Jews. They're there for 70 years. They're in captivity. There are about a million Jews living in Babylon in captivity. Only 50,000 of them choose to come back to Jerusalem. And when they come back to Jerusalem, Jerusalem is in rubbles. Jerusalem is in shambles. Okay? Jerusalem is in ruins. So 50,000 out of a million. That, that I don't I don't know the math. I can't really do that math quickly, but 950,000. I actually just did do the math. Okay? 950,000 of these jokers are like, nah, we good. We like Babylon. Okay? So the crew that comes back to Jerusalem has to get kind of kicked into shape, kicked into gear, because, man, Jerusalem's rough. Ok, so Haggai is in the mix. Like, hey, you guys, like, you gotta prioritize God's house. Malachi's like, you're not tithing what's going on? And Zechariah is in the mix trying to get the people of God to actually act accordingly. So Zechariah and Haggai are actually prophecy buddies. The Bible is going to mention them side by side in books like Ezra and Nehemiah. Let's actually read from Ezra and Nehemiah. Nehemiah, chapter 12, verse 1 tells us that Zechariah is in the crew of people that comes from Babylon back to Israel. Now, I'll say this. Daniel and Zechariah are kind of like opposites. Okay? So Daniel is born in Jerusalem and then exiled to Babylon, where he's going to have a prophetic ministry. Zechariah is born in Babylon and then is going to travel back and return to Jerusalem, where he's going to have a prophetic ministry. Okay? So they are mirror images of each other. Daniel, born in Israel, exiled to Babylon, where he's going to prophesy to the exiles. Zechariah, born in exile, born in Babylon, travels back to Jerusalem where he is going to have a prophetic ministry. So Zechariah is of the priestly line. So Zechariah is probably in training to be a priest. Here's what Nehemiah, chapter 12, verse 1, tells us about Zechariah. Chapter 12, verse 1 is going to give us a setup. And then we're going to Skip to verse 16. It says this in Nehemiah, chapter 12, verse 1. These were the priests and Levites. This is one of those genealogies that you probably skip when you're reading the Bible. You see a list of names and you're like, man, I'm good. We all look at the list of names, okay? Because it's important. These were the priests and Levites who returned with Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel, and with Joshua. And it lists Sariah, Jeremiah, Ezra. And then we're going to Skip to verse 16 of Iddo, Zechariah. Okay? So Zechariah is here in a list of priests and Levites that's returning from Babylon to Jerusalem. Here's what Ezra 5:1 is going to say. It's going to say now Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the prophet, a descendant of Iddo, prophesied to the Jews in Judah and Jerusalem in the name of the God of Israel who was over them. Ezra, chapter 6, verse 14 says this. So the elders of the Jews continued to build and prosper under the preaching of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah, a descendant of Iddo. They finished building the temple according to the command of the God of Israel and the decrees of Cyrus, Darius and Artaxerxes, kings of Persia. All right, so hopefully you're acclimated. You got this. Okay. I want to remind you of just two dates, all right? First is that Cyrus declares decrees to the people of Israel in 539-bc-539-bc that they can go back. You can go to Jerusalem. Okay? The Persians have taken over from the Babylonians. And the Persians don't have the same. I don't know how to call it like, they just don't have the same policy. There we go. Policy is the word. They don't have the same policy as it relates to exiles. The Babylonians wanted exiles to stay in Babylon. Persians believe that all the exiles can go home. Okay, so the Jews are allowed to go home in 539bc they get home and they start building, rebuilding the walls in the temple. And about 538bc they're done building the altar in 536bc and then they're met with some opposition. You can read about that in books like Ezra and Nehemiah. And they stop building. They just stop. And when you get to a book like Haggai, Haggai is kind of upset because God's upset. He's like, how dare you rebuild your homes? And you haven't dealt with God's house. Why is God's house in ruins but your houses are looking fancy? And the people respond and say, well, we're poor. That's why we haven't prioritized God's house. And God responds with a line that I think we should preach more often. God says, it's not because you're poor that you haven't built my house. Because you haven't built my house that you're poor. Okay? When you prioritize God's house, God prioritizes your house. And God says, I'll open up the windows of heaven. So often when we preach about tithing. We just go to Malachi when honestly we could preach straight out of the book of Haggai. And I actually think Haggai has way more effective things to say, neither here nor there. And so Haggai is prophesying in 5:20. So think about this. 5:39 B.C. is when Cyrus declares that the people can go back. They don't build until 5:38. They're done building in 536. They build for two years and them suckers sit there for 16 years like this is hard. And then Haggai kicks him back in a year in 520 B.C. and gets them motivated again to continue building. So I want to kind of give you some dates, okay? Because we're going to get, I want to kind of see, let you see how the ministries of Haggai and Zechariah flow together. Haggai's first oracle is going to get preached on the 29th of August of 520 B.C. his second oracle is going to get give is going to get preached the 17th of October of 520 B.C. and then Zechariah is going to start preaching on the 27th of October, 520 B.C. and then Haggai is going to come back again on the 18th of December, 520 B.C. and then the 18th of December, 520 BC we're going to get another oracle from Haggai, same day. And then the 15th of February, 519 BC we're going to get some more preaching by Zechariah. And then a year later, the 7th of December, 518 B.C. we're going to get more preaching from zechariah. So from 5:20 to 5:18 BC we are going to see the active ministry of Zechariah. And a lot of his prophetic words are interwoven with his prophesying pal Haggai. A lot of people also believe that Haggai is an older man, that he's probably in his 70s or 80s and Zechariah is a young man probably in his 20s. So it's really cool that Zechariah and Haggai have totally different prophetic styles, but God teams them up together from totally different generations, but God teams them up together. And I don't want to steal my thunder on my timeless truth, but man, it is so the heart of God to team people up with different personalities, different skill sets, different gifts, but who complement each other really, really well. Family. The wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are sold literally today I Walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books a Million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of Scripture is actually knowing it in context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. Hey, are you looking for a really cool gift or just solid tools to support your faith in daily Life? Check out Mr. Pen. They've got no bleed Bible pens and highlighters that actually work on thin Bible pages. Journaling Bibles, Bible tabs and faith based journals. Even school supplies for parents, teachers and students. Mr. Penn was started by Christian teachers in Louisiana on a mission to serve the schools in their local community. And now They've got over 100,000 five star reviews on Amazon. I'm a huge fan of their Bible highlighters and pens. Super smooth and gentle enough to write notes in the margin of your Bible. Whether you're digging into scripture or stocking up for back to school. Mr. Penn has you covered. Shop the best Bible journaling supplies on the market and fantastic gifts for the ladies in your life@mrpenn.com that's M r p e n dot com. And guess what? Our audience here at the Bible department gets a special discount. Use code DEPARTMENT10 at checkout to get 10% off your entire order. All right, let's actually get into the meat of the book. Okay? I've given you a lot of context for the person of Zechariah. The time period, the history. Let's actually get into some nerdy nuggets. Zechariah is going to get split into three sections. Zechariah chapter one to six are all about these night visions, these dream visions. And Zechariah is going to have eight of them. He's going to have eight dream visions in the first six chapters of the book. Then in Zechariah chapter seven and eight, we're going to actually get a conclusion for all of those dream visions. And then Zechariah chapters nine to 14, we're going to get apocalyptic visions from Zechariah. I actually want to dive into the eight visions that Zechariah receives in Zechariah chapters 1, 6. Obviously today we're only covering Zechariah chapters 1, 2, 3, 1 to 3. Tomorrow we're covering 4 to 6, which means we'll knock out half today, half tomorrow. And whatever we don't cover today, we'll cover tomorrow. Cuz why in the world would you watch day 246 and not watch day 245? So there was ever a day where you weren't going to watch my multiple videos in tandem with each other? Today should not be the day. Okay, so dream visions, these eight dream visions are actually a mirror of their match. Okay, so we're going to get. Vision number one is Zechariah chapter one, verses eight to 17, which actually matches up with vision number eight. So vision number one and vision number eight are actually a reflection of each other. What we're gonna see in vision number one are four horsemen on patrol. And then in vision number eight, which is Zechariah six one eight, we're gonna get four horsemen on patrol. So those match up with each other. Vision number two is also out of chapter one. And we're gonna get four horns and four blacksmiths. And that matches up with vision number seven, which is found in Zechariah chapters 5, 5, 11. And that vision is a woman in a basket. Okay, so the four horns and the four blacksmiths match up with the woman in the basket. Vision number three and vision number six are going to match up with each other. Vision number three is a vision where Jerusalem is measured that is going to have the same meaning as vision number six, which is from Zechariah 5:1,4. And that vision is going to be of a flying scroll. And then vision number four, which comes from Zechariah 3:1, 10 is gonna be all about Joshua, the high priest, which is gonna match up with vision number five, which can be found in Zechariah 4, 4, 1, 14, which is all about Zerubbabel, the royal line of David. Okay, so these visions all match up. Visions 1, 2, 3 and 4 find their mirror counterpart in visions 5, 6, 6, 7 and 8. Okay, so that should orient you. That should help you kind of map out these visions. So let's dive into the visions. Okay, vision number one, we got four horsemen. This is Zechariah chapter one, verses seven to 17. These probable angelic figures are based on a common image in the ancient world, the vast empire. Seriously, it stretched from the edge of Greece to the Borders of India, okay, was the Persian Empire. Massive empire, was kept connected by a series of dispatch riders. They would have had bases throughout the empire, all with fresh horses, so that a messenger could reach one and then jump straight on a new horse and gallop to the next. These messengers are reporting obviously to their commanding officer. And who's on these horses? Angelic figures. And they are all reporting to the angel of the Lord. This, like, idea of four horsemen in Zechariah, we've got a red one, a brown one, a white one. This is gonna get used heavily in the book of Revelation. My pet peeve are people who try to interpret Revelation without going to the source that John is pulling from. So you gotta kind of understand what's going on in Zechariah in order to understand Revelation. So anyway, my other pet peeve is people trying to figure out when Jesus coming back. But we won't go there. All right, these messengers are reporting to the angel of the Lord. The message is that the wars are over, the exile has finished, and now Yahweh will choose Jerusalem again. This choice is a reference to Deuteronomy, where Yahweh speaks of the place where the Tabernacle and the temple will be as the place I choose to bear my name. This is Deuteronomy 14:23. Yahweh had chosen Jerusalem for this because of David, but Yahweh left during the exile. Remember, Ezekiel sees the spirit of the Lord in exile in Babylon with him and the rest of the exiles. But now Yahweh has chosen Jerusalem again. And Jerusalem will have the temple of Yahweh, and it will be the place that bears God's name. Okay, so that's the first vision, the four horsemen. It's going to have a counterpart in vision number eight, but we'll get into that tomorrow. Then Zechariah, chapter two. Oh, sorry. The second vision is also in Zechariah, chapter one. And we're going to get four horns and four blacksmiths. Now, remember, in the Bible, horns are a symbol of authority. Okay, so Daniel is going to be full of horns. Okay? An animal is going to have 10 horns, and then there's a little horn. Horns are a symbol of leadership, authority, power. The book of Revelation is going to lean heavily on this imagery because remember, Daniel, Ezekiel, Zechariah are like the forefathers of apocalyptic literature. And John is going to run with apocalyptic literature. So the four horns are actually not that hard to interpret. The four horns are Babylon, Persia, Macedon, which is Greece, and Rome. And then the four smiths are the people groups that God raises up to destroy those horns. So the smith for the first horn is Persia. So the horns are Persian. Sorry. The horns are Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. But then the smiths are Persia, Macedon, Rome, and then the kingdom of God. Okay, so each smith has a horn. Why? Because it is the Persian kingdom that destroys the Babylonian kingdom. It's the Greek kingdom that destroys the Persian kingdom and the Roman Empire that destroys the Greek empire. You get it? So you got four horns and then four smiths that destroy those horns. So the next horn is always the smith in the next vision. I hope that kind of makes sense. If I had some pictures, it would probably make a little bit more sense, but there we go. All right. The third vision that Zechariah sees is a man with a measuring line. And this man with the measuring line actually should bring back some memories of Ezekiel. Remember, there's an angel that appears to Ezekiel and measures out the new temple. And we need to know that in order to know what's going on here. Remember, in Ezekiel, he's measuring out the new temple. But here, man Zechariah gets a vision of a man measuring out Jerusalem, which is good news. That means that not only is God gonna grow the temple, but he's gonna grow the whole city of Jerusalem. Okay. And if you think about it, in this day and age, back in the ancient world, Jerusalem was probably four to six acres. I mean, it just wasn't a lot of land. When you go to Jerusalem today, oh, my gosh, it's hundreds of square miles. So God was faithful to his word. He has established Jerusalem. He has grown the city. So that's the next vision. The third vision is a man with a measuring line. And then the fourth vision comes out of Zechariah, chapter three, and we get image of Joshua the priest. The vision shows us a heavenly courtroom where the high priest Joshua stands accused, representing the remnant that had returned. His dirty clothes show the sins of the people, their uncleanness that had brought about their exile. He is accused by Hasatan, which is the Satan. I'll get to a nerdy nugget about that in a second. He's accused by Hasatan the Satan. By the way, in the Bible, it is not Satan. It's the Satan. But anyway, that'll turn into a whole nother video by itself. This is the same title from Job. Okay, Hasatan the Satan. And is used in the same way, not as a name, but as a position. Job so to speak, it is not Satan in Hebrew, but the Satan. Now and then he's given new clothes. And the vision actually mirrors the vision of Zerubbabel. So both visions are about leadership and that God is going to bring restoration to the remnant through the representative leader by the name of Joshua. All right, our last dirty nugget is that the use, this use of Satan is one of the earliest in scripture. There's only three books in the Bible that uses the term the Satan, and that is Zechariah, Chronicles, and Job. And all three were written in the Persian period. I know people like to say Job is one of the oldest books of the Bible. That's just. That's not true. I. I don't know. In school, no one ever says that, but in church, people say that all the time. Anyway, this video is getting long. All right. They are not clearly using the term as a proper name, as the New Testament will. So in the New Testament, it's not the Satan, but Satan. But in the Old Testament, in Chronicles, Zechariah, and Job, it is the Satan. We'll see from these books an important step in the development of spiritual language. In the Bible, you can see a shift has begun away from the sea and dragons to represent chaos and evil. And the language is turning towards that which will become Satan, the devil, demons, et cetera. The culture and worldviews are shifting, and so the language of spiritual warfare is also shifting. And you can see that just historically. And that's the power of kind of reading the Bible chronologically, as you can begin to see certain changes that are occurring in vocabulary. All right, what's our timeless truth for the day? Our timeless truth is that nothing beats a good team, man. If you were with us yesterday, it took us a day to cover the whole book of Haggai, and today we're getting into the book of Zechariah. Haggai doesn't have dream visions, but Zechariah does. And they're prophesying during the same time, which means God loves to team people up from different generations, different personalities, different specificities. Like Zechariah and Haggai have different ways of prophesying. Haggai is pretty, like kick you in the butt, like kick your rear end gear. And Zechariah is just way more of an encouraging, visionary prophet. And I think a lot of times people will begin to, I don't know, criticize people that are not like them. But the reality is that we're not here to criticize. We're here to complete one another. And God knew that it wasn't just Haggai that was necessary or Zechariah that was necessary, but both were necessary. Zechariah was called to capture the people's imagination and Haggai was called to kick their rear in gear. And so often when you're Haggai, you could be like, why is that right over there wasting time having dream visions. He needs to do what I'm doing. And I met a lot of people who are like, everybody needs to focus on marriage. Nah, bro, you need to focus on marriage because that's your part to play in the body. And I bet people are like, we need to focus on outreach. No, that's your part to play in the body. We need to do prison ministry. No, that's your part to play in the body. Just because that's your part to play doesn't mean it's my part to play. We need to do social justice. No, that's your part to play in the body. How about you play your part, Let me play my part. I think that there's a critical spirit that rises up, especially like in the evangelical world, man. People have all this trash to say. I can't believe Mike Todd is doing this. And this, this. How about you shut up? Like Mike Todd's playing his part. Joel Osteen don't preach the Bible. Da da da da da. How about you shut up Like Joel Osteen has a part to play and Mike Todd has a part to play. And just cause they don't do what maybe other people are good at, doesn't mean that they're not playing their part. Everyone's playing their part. And everybody really needs to like, drink water, shut up and mind their business. That's what everybody really needs to do. And Haggai is giving Zechariah space to be the kind of prophet that God wants him to be. And Zechariah is giving Haggai the space to be the kind of prophet that he's going to be. And I think we need more of that in the body. That's not just true for Zechariah and Haggai. That's not just true in 520 B.C. that's true today for all of us. We all just need to put pom poms on and cheer everybody on. Like just be a cheerleader, Just be encouraging. Get your pom poms, man. I'm happy. I may not be called to do outreach, but you are doing outreach. And I'm so happy you're doing outreach. I'm not out here, like, why everybody don't have a Bible literacy podcast? No, that's my, that's my, that's my role. I played that part in the body. I'm not out here, like, every pastor needs to be teaching the Bible verse by verse. Nah, Everybody needs to mind their business. And I'm doing what I'm called to do as my part in the body. And everybody else is going to do their part. And we need to celebrate everybody for doing their part. And that's my timeless truth for the day. Tomorrow we've got day 246. We got Zechariah, chapters four through six. Zechariah is going to have four more dream visions. We're going to talk about those and how they match up with the dream visions from today. If you're on a streak, I am proud of you. If you are on a streak, don't break it. I'll see you right here tomorrow as we continue to trek through the fantastic, strange and odd book of Zechariah. See you tomorrow. Love you. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show@thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram and at the Bible Department. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library of courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.