Hope in Times of Discouragement - Mark James

 

​I’m guessing that some of you have already failed at some of yourNew Year’s resolutions. If you haven’t yet, you almost certainly will within the next few months. Failed resolutions are just one of many things that can bring discouragement. You may be discouraged by recent election results, by the vast cultural divide that is ever widening in our society. You may be discouraged in your struggle against sin. Your kids may not be walking with the Lord, or your marriage hasn’t turned out like you dreamed. You got passed over for that job promotion, or your engagement has been broken off. The book of Zechariah is a book written to a discouraged people, and Chapter One provides us with three principles for overcoming discouragement. 

​Verses 1-6 teach us that discouragement is overcome when we turn to God. The year is 520 BC and 16 years earlier, the first wave of Jews had returned from exile and laid down the foundation for rebuilding the Temple of God. Nevertheless, they were discouraged and prevented from continuing the rebuilding efforts by those who opposed them. You can read Ezra chapters 3-4 to read about the opposition they faced in rebuilding the Temple. So, Zechariah is speaking to the church under age who have stopped in their spiritual task because of worldly opposition from enemies. They’ve let that opposition discourage them from rebuilding the Temple of God, so they’ve settled into their own homes while God’s house, the very center of Israelite worship and the place that represented God’s presence with His people, still lay in disrepair. Thus, God raises up Zechariah to speak forth His word to the Israelites and Zechariah begins with a call to repentance for a people who have grown idle and careless in their zeal for God. God’s message in verse 4 is a warning for this generation of Israelites not to be like their ancestors who refused to repent and were thus destroyed and sent into exile. The very lack of a Temple and lack of a rebuilt city was a daily reminder for these Jews of God’s promise of destruction and exile for His people if they refused to obey Him. And they are demonstrating by their idleness and lack of zeal that they are on the same road that led to destruction, so God graciously sends His prophet to call them to repentance while reminding them that He is the Lord of armies or your version may say “Lord of hosts.” 5 times in these 6 verses God refers to Himself as the Lord of hoststo remind His people with whom they are dealing and whose house they are supposed to be rebuilding. It’s a reminder that though there is no king sitting on the throne of David, God is still king over Israel. In short, it’s an encouragement. It’s a reminder that though they face worldly opposition from enemies, those enemies are nothing compared to the God who has called and made them His covenant people. If God is with them, who can be against them? Nobody. So repent, return to God and get to work. 

​Like us, the Israelites in their discouragement needed to be reminded of who God is. He is the King over all Kings and He is the Lord of armies. Frequently, our discouragement occurs because we have taken our eyes off of God. We can experience discouragement for spiritual reasons such as a lack of prayerfulness, a lack of refusing to forgive somebody who has sinned against us, losing our first love, giving ear to false teaching, or backsliding into habitual sin. The Israelites in the wilderness in Numbers 21 chose to complain against Moses for a lack of food and water rather than to pray to God and ask for His provision. In Jeremiah 8, the Lord says that the wise men will be discouraged because they rejected the word of the Lord. 

We can also experience discouragement due to circumstances of living in a fallen world. For example, we can see the success of the wicked and the oppression of the righteous and become discouraged. Read Psalm 73 to see how David experienced discouragement in that situation. The Israelites were discouraged by the taunts of the giant Goliath in 1 Samuel 17:10-11. Paul said that he despaired of life in 2 Corinthians 1:8-9 because of the afflictions he and his companions experienced. We can grow discouraged when we compare ourselves to others and see others having success and being successful yet don’t see the same thing for ourselves. We can grow discouraged because of problems in marriage, troubled family relationships, or a lack of realized hopes and dreams. You can probably add your own reasons why you become discouraged, but the beginning of the solution is turning to God to be reminded of who He is and repenting when our discouragement is due to sin. 

From verses 7-17 we see discouragement is overcome when we realize that God is jealous for His people. 3 months later, in his first vision, Zechariah sees a lead rider on a horse accompanied by 3 other riders on horses and they are in a garden scene. This is a vision of God’s heavenly throne room, probably modeled after the throne of the Persian empire as the king ruled from a garden palace. Notice that this lead rider is referred to as a man in verse 8, but in verse 11, it is the angel of the Lord. Zechariah is seeing the angel of the Lord in the form of a man. This is the pre-Incarnate Christ that Zechariah is seeing. God has pulled back the heavenly curtains to let Zechariah see what God is doing from His throne room. And what is God doing? Sending out his angels on a reconnaissance mission over all the earth and having completed their reconnaissance, the angels are now back in God’s throne room to report. All the pagan nations of the world are at rest and enjoying peace. Babylon has finally been completely destroyed by the Persian empire which is a partial fulfillment of Isaiah 14:7, and the Persian empire is the major superpower on the world scene. Now this is a stark contrast to the present situation of the Jews. They are unsettled, uprooted, experiencing opposition. They are not at peace. They are not settled. 

We look around today and we as the church are unsettled and not at peace. While the world goes on eating and drinking and being merry, indulging in all kinds of immorality, we face opposition and unrest. The church is under attack from both outside and inside, and it at times can feel like God has forgotten us does it not? We have the same cry as the angel of the Lord in verse 12, “How long O Lord?” Have you forgotten us your people? Look at how God responds in verses 13-15. A shift is coming. God’s anger is going to shift from His people to the pagan nations while His mercy is going to shift from the pagan nations (what we call common grace) back to His people. God is going to rouse Himself to restore His dwelling place, to re-build His house, and His presence among His people will cause them to overflow with blessing and comfort. This is what God had promised in verse 3 that if His people returned to Him, He would return to them and that is exactly what is taking place here. God had used the wicked nations as instruments of discipline upon His people,but the wicked nations went beyond what was appropriate and their evil destruction was out of proportion to the anger of God with His people (v.15). 

Here we see that our discouragement is overcome by God’s zealous love for His people. The Westminster Shorter Catechism says that as a king Jesus defends us, protects us, and restrains and conquers all of our enemies. Don’t let your physical eyes deceive you. When we look with the eyes of faith, we can be assured that God has not forgotten us, His people, and that He is zealous for us and will come back for us. His anger will not last forever. His discipline will not last forever. We will not be unsettled and lacking peace forever. The heavenly temple is right now being prepared for us, the body of Christ is being built up as living stones through sanctification in this life and toward glorification in the life to come, God is gathering His elect in from the four corners of the earth, and God is protecting us from the accusations of our adversary, the devil, through the perfect righteousness of Christ covering all our sins. Though we may not feel it now or see it now, we walk not by our feelings or by sight, we walk by faith, and we draw our assurance not from feelings or sight, but by the promises of God in His Word. Though you may be discouraged, remember that God is zealous for you as His little child even when He disciplines you and tries you, even as He is patient in delaying His judgment upon the wicked. He is faithful to His word and His presence is always with you, no matter the circumstance. 

Finally verses 18-21 show us that discouragement is overcome when we realize that God will not delay His judgment forever. We look around the world today and it looks like the bad guys are winning right? The wicked increase their money and power through evil means. The righteous are oppressed. The church is infected with heresy and false teachers. People in the church chase after celebrity pastors and rock concerts masquerading as “worship” rather than pursuing the ordinary means of grace and regular private and family worship in the home. It was no different in Zechariah’s day. He sees a vision of 4 horns in verse 18 and these horns represent military might, specifically the empires that have had a part in the exile of Israel and Judah. The use of the word “scattering” in verse 19 indicates that these are animal horns since animals were involved in the winnowing and threshing process during the harvest, so the 4 horns represent 2 animals, each animal having 2 horns. This would be Assyria and Babylon, the primary superpowers involved in destroying both the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah, but on a deeper level Babylon and Assyria become names to represent the entire world that is opposed to God and His people. Again, think of Revelation chapters 14, and 16-18 and “Fallen, Fallen is Babylon.” But then Zechariah sees 4 craftsmen who have come to destroy the power represented by the horns. Literally, the picture is one of men who have sharpened a blade to cut the horns off of an animal like a bull. You cut off the bull’s horns and it loses its ability to gouge and gore with its horn. It’s lost its power and that is the message of this second vision of Zechariah. 

The nations of the world, all those who oppose themselves against God, will one day lose their power. They will be overthrown and cast down when Christ returns bringing His kingdom with Him. Judgmentdelayed does not mean judgment forgotten. But in the meantime, we remind ourselves of the fate of the wicked and the fate of the righteous in order to battle against discouragement. The wicked will be condemned to eternal judgment and torment, while the righteous will receive the fullness of the promise of eternal life and eternity in the presence of Jesus Christ. So, whether you find yourself discouraged today because of your sin, the sins of others, or because of living in a fallen world, look to Christ and remember that He is your hope because of who He is and what He has done, is doing, and will do.