The Third Part

““It will come about in all the land,” Declares the Lord, “That two parts in it will be cut off and perish; But the third will be left in it. “And I will bring the third part through the fire, Refine them as silver is refined, And test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, And I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are My people,’ And they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’ ”” (Zechariah 13:8–9, NASB95)

This is one of the more understandable passages in the book of Zechariah. It seems to promise that one-third of God’s people? the people of the land? will be brought through a refiners fire. The result will be that the third part will call on my name and Yahweh will say They are my people and in turn the people will say The Lord is my God.

This is a picture of a return to faithfulness after a time of testing and trial. 

It isn’t clear exactly what this passage refers to in regards to the third part.

• The Ryrie Study Bible says “God’s judgment of Israel at the return of Christ will weed out all but one-third of them. These will constitute the “all Israel” that will then be saved (Rom. 11:26).”
• The Life Application Study Bible seems to think it refers to Israel throughout its history: “Throughout the history of Israel, whenever the whole nation seemed to turn against God, God said that a righteous remnant still trusted and followed him.”
• JFB takes it to mean: “It hence appears that the Jews’ conversion is not to precede, but to follow, their external deliverance by the special interposition of Jehovah; which latter shall be the main cause of their conversion, combined with a preparatory inward shedding abroad in their hearts of the Holy Spirit (Zec 12:10-14).”
• Baker Illustrated Commentary seems to think it refers to Jews during the Great Tribulation.

This is a good example of how difficult it is to interpret Zechariah because even in this relatively understandable passage, exactly whom it refers to and how it all plays out isn’t clear and there is a wide variation in interpretations.

I’m inclined to think that the passage refers to Jews and God’s promise to save “all Israel” in Romans, but it is a bit of a difficult passage.

“Who Gave Their Hearts to Seek Yahweh”

“Now those from all the tribes of Israel who gave their hearts to seek Yahweh, the God of Israel, followed them to Jerusalem, to sacrifice to Yahweh, the God of their fathers.”(2 Chronicles 11:16 LSB)

I love the way the LSB translates this passage. When Jeroboam and the northern ten tribes broke off from Rehoboam, the new king had a problem: the temple was in Jerusalem and he wanted to keep his subjects away from any connection with Judah lest they decide to return their loyalty to Rehoboam. His solution: idolatry.

Most of the people seem to have been content with the idolatry, I suppose finding it more convenient to worship a goat demon than travel all the way to Jerusalem to worship Yahweh. However…there were some who gave their hearts to seek Yahweh, who, it appears, moved to Jerusalem in order to continue to worship Yahweh there as they had been commanded. This would have required, not only the condemnation of their friends and neighbors and king, but upending their lives and turning their backs on their land. Given that the land had an intimate connection with God’s promises, this was no easy thing, yet those who were faithful to Yahweh did it anyway.

Sacrifice seems to be an integral part of the Christian faith, and sometimes it will cost us a lot, even the approval of those around us who mean the most to us. We will sometimes have to decide, are we going to follow God, or seek the approval of men?

Verbs of Apostasy

““But if you turn away and forsake My statutes and My commandments which I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will uproot you from My land which I have given you, and this house which I have set apart as holy for My name I will cast out of My presence and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples.” (2 Chronicles 7:19-20 LSB)

Yahweh speaks to his people in this passage upon the occasion of them dedicating the newly built temple to him. In our passage, Yahweh lays out verbs of apostasy that the people are to note carefully so that their faith does not flag and they do not turn away from him and his word. As we know from history, this they ended up doing and going into exile because of it.

What are the verbs of apostasy?

• Turn away – This is a 180 degree turn. One is going toward something and one turns completely away from it and heads the other direction. In this case what is turned away from is Yahweh’s statues and commandments.
• Forsake – This is a combination with “turn away.” One forsakes God’s good statues and commandments which were put in place so that the zeal of his people to follow him doesn’t flag and fail—an act of grace. We will watch God’s people do exactly this and suffer the consequences.
• Go and serve – In this case go and serve other gods that are no gods at all. The very first commandment that God gave to his people was “You shall have no other gods before me.” God’s people were well aware of this commandment and the reason for it, to go and serve any other thing or any other so-called god, was a frightening betrayal of their relationship with the God. We will watch them do exactly this as we go on in Chronicles.

Our passage ends up being, not just a warning, but a prophecy because the people do exactly the opposite of what God calls them to do, they blatantly accept idolatry, and God is true to his word.

We may not have the same approach to idolatry that the Israelites had, but we are certainly just as susceptible to it as they were. God is still God and he will still punish idolatry—an act of grace—as he seeks to shore up our flagging zeal for him. We would be wise to learn these verbs of apostasy and do everything we can to avoid living them out.

Jesus on Salvation

““And those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, so that they will not believe and be saved.”(Luke 8:12 LSB)

This verse comes from the Parable of the Sower and Jesus packs it with a lot of information which gives us vital insight into Christ’s understanding of his mission. Some things Jesus says here:

• The devil is real. It is the devil (διάβολος) that comes and takes away the word that has been sowed. Jesus himself brings up this subject without prodding from his hearers so we can be sure that whether or not we believe there is such a thing as the devil/Satan, Jesus certainly did.
• The devil has a plan and mission in mind, he is working to destroy the word when it comes into the individual heart. Jesus says that the devil comes and “takes away the word.” Jesus doesn’t say how the devil does this, but it isn’t difficult to figure out. The devil uses any and every means necessary to undermine the word that has been heard in order to lead a person away from faith and trust in Christ.
• It is “the word” in one’s heart that leads a person to believe in Christ. The “word of God” is the message of salvation by the sacrifice of Jesus for our sins in our place. Here is how Jesus will put this same truth elsewhere: ““Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.” (John 5:24, NASB95)
• Belief leads to salvation. How are we saved? We are saved by believing in Christ, in his sacrificial death for our sins, and we learn to believe in Christ when the good news of Jesus is communicated to us in whatever manner or form it comes.

We’ve only scratched the surface of what we find here, but you get the point. The devil is real. He is acting to undermine the good news of Jesus however and whenever he can. This good news is what reconciles us to God in Christ.

Greater Riches

“By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, regarding the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking to the reward.” (Hebrews 11:24-26 LSB)

Moses, who would have been well acquainted with the treasures of Egypt—and they were great judging from the tomb of a rather minor and short-lived Pharaoh named Tutankhamen—saw all of that great Egyptian wealth and put it on the balance scale with the reproach of Christ—what the Bible in Basic English calls “a part in the shame of Christ”—and found all of the temporal treasures of Egypt to be a poor choice in light of the reward that was coming in Christ.

A wise choice, this. Tutankhamen’s treasures lay moldering in the dust for 30 centuries before they were rediscovered with Tutankhamen nowhere in sight. They were useless to him. Meanwhile, Moses lies in the grave awaiting the great resurrection in Christ and the rewards promised to the faithful.

The CBL NT Study Bible comments here: “The world is still dazzled by the splendor and wealth accumulated by the royal families of Egypt. Moses was not. He took it all in and concluded that there was greater wealth available in the abuse which he would suffer for the sake of Christ.”

Vengeance

“‘And you shall strike the house of Ahab your master, that I may avenge the blood of My slaves the prophets, and the blood of all the slaves of Yahweh, at the hand of Jezebel.” (2 Kings 9:7 LSB)

God is ultimately a God of (righteous) vengeance and I am happy that he is and you should be also. Prior to this prophecy/command by Elisha through a son of the prophets to Jehu, to all outward appearances, the wicked Jezebel was crushing the worship of Yahweh. She had gone after the prophets and had some (a lot?) of them killed in her effort to establish the worship of Baal in Israel. No doubt some of the prophets and those who were faithful to Yahweh were asking: “Where is Yahweh? Why won’t he do anything? Why won’t he protect his prophets from the wicked Jezebel?”

In our passage we find out that, indeed, none of the wickedness of Jezebel was going unnoticed by God. He had waited for his own good and wise purposes, but now Jezebel had filled up the full measure of her sins and God would not allow her to escape justice. The latter part of the chapter describes the justice that God brings through unrighteous Jehu and Jezebel dies and her body is consumed by dogs.

When we see evil men who appear to have the upper hand in our own time and place, we can rest assured that God sees all and he will not allow evil to go unpunished. He will bring vengeance on unrepentant evil and justice will be done.

Also, doesn’t this passage make us grateful for God’s grace because, truth be told, there is evil in our own heart and were it not for God taking the initiative to make Christ the point of vengeance for our sins, then we would end up just like Jezebel, and rightly so. But Christ paid the penalty for our sins.

God of My Praise

“O God of my praise, Do not be silent!” (Psalm 109:1 LSB)

Psalm 109 is written by David, so we are not surprised when he begins the psalm with the simple words: O God of my praise. After all this man was known as the psalmist of Israel and by himself was responsible for almost half of all the psalms. We certainly have good examples of David working out praise to God in the psalms.

Indeed, Isaiah the prophet will write later: “I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols” (Isa. 42:8). David and Isaiah are in agreement, there is only one place and one place alone that our praise should go, and to one person: God. To give our praise to anyone or anything else is idolatry.

Our praise is to go where David’s praise went, to the God who watched over him and cared for him, who brought him through every difficulty and set him up as king over Israel. May we say with David: “O God of my praise.”

Speaking Redemption

“Let the redeemed of Yahweh say so, Whom He has redeemed from the hand of the adversary” (Psalm 107:2 LSB)

Psalm 107 is untitled, so we do not know who the author is, but we can be sure from the context that he is referring to Israel—God’s people—and apparently the saving work that God did bringing them into and then out of the wilderness in the exodus from Egypt. So God’s people, whom God has redeemed with his great hesed (lovingkindness) and wondrous deeds are to say so.

The author doesn’t explain how the redeemed of the Lord are to say so, but does he need to? They (we!) are to say it in any and every way possible: In their devotion to him, in their waking up and lying down to sleep, in the every day course of their lives, and when they have a chance to explain their redemption to someone who hasn’t experienced the redemption of God. In hundreds and thousands of ways, they (we!) are to proclaim our redemption from our God who is marked by his hesed (covenant love, lovingkindness).

Here is how Philip Bliss spoke of the Lord’s redemption:

I will sing of my Redeemer
And His wondrous love to me;
On the cruel cross He suffered,
From the curse to set me free.
Sing, oh sing, of my Redeemer,
With His blood, He purchased me.
On the cross, He sealed my pardon,
Paid the debt, and made me free.

Elijah, Christ, and Two Widows

“Then he called to Yahweh and said, “O Yahweh my God, have You also brought calamity to the widow with whom I am sojourning, by causing her son to die?”” (1 Kings 17:20 LSB)

Elijah here prays to Yahweh as he kneels over the body of the son of the widow of Zarephath, who was miraculously preserved by God during the great drought brought on by Elijah’s prophecy to Ahab.

How poignant Elijah’s words are as he wrestles with what God is up to here. How could God bring calamity on this widow and her son (after all, her son was her retirement plan) after he had kept them both alive miraculously? Elijah would find out in due course. Not only had God miraculously preserved the pair (alongside Elijah), but his love was on them even now, but Elijah didn’t know it.

Elijah prays over the boy’s body and, miracle of miracles—indeed a miracle to be repeated only by Elisha and then Christ himself—the boy is raised from the dead and restored to his mother. This sparks a beautiful confession of faith by the widow: “Then the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know this: that you are a man of God and that the word of Yahweh in your mouth is truth.””(1 Kings 17:24 LSB)

Elijah points us to Christ, for Christ will encounter a widow with a son in the village of Nain, and he will raise that son back to life and restore him to his mother. And of course Christ himself will be the son who is raised back to life and so brings life to everyone who believes.

One Thing

“And he [Abijam] walked in all the sins of his father which he had committed before him; and his heart was not wholly devoted to Yahweh his God, like the heart of his father David.”(1 Kings 15:3 LSB)…“And Asa did what was right in the sight of Yahweh, like David his father.”(1 Kings 15:11 LSB)

I’m into the book of Kings now and it begins to read kind of like the game of thrones as we essentially go through each king of Israel or Judah and talk about who their mother was and how long they reigned and maybe significant things that happened during their reign. Our passage refers to Abijam, king of Judah after Rehoboam, and then his son Asa.

The significant thing in this passage—and pretty much in all of the rest of the book when talking about the various kings—is that there is one criteria and one criteria alone by which the author of Kings judges the rulers: their faithfulness or lack thereof to Yahweh. It doesn’t matter how long a king reigned, whether he expanded his countries territory, how “blessed” the people were by his reign, or how many wars he won or lost, one thing matters and one thing alone: their level of faithfulness.

In our passage we see that Abijam was a failure because his heart was not wholly devoted to Yahweh his God. On the other hand, even though Asa wasn’t perfect, he is still commended because he got the one thing right, he did what was right in the sight of Yahweh.

While we are not kings of anything—well most of us anyway—it’s hard to escape the fact that faithfulness, or lack thereof, will be the one standard by which our lives will be judged. I don’t think God cares too much if we become famous or make a lot of money or live influential lives, or even get the Nobel Peace Prize. What he is after is faithfulness.

We are tempted to take this truth and immediately plot seven steps to perfect faithfulness because, let’s face it, that is who we are. The irony here is that, it takes Jesus inside of us to live faithful lives. I like the way the apostle Paul puts it: “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”(Galatians 2:20 LSB)

Will we be boasting about our faithfulness to God in heaven? I don’t think so. I think we will be boasting about Jesus’ perfect faithfulness and how it is that faithfulness that enabled our own.