Intro: I was reading the Old Testament prophet Zechariah. I love reading and studying the prophets. Almost always they endured lives of great trials and suffering, but God used them uniquely to speak truth. They loved truth more than they loved comfort.

In Zechariah 1, we have this passage:

In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, son of Iddo, saying, “The Lord was very angry with your fathers. Therefore say to them, Thus declares the Lord of hosts: Return to me, says the Lord of hosts, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. Do not be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets cried out, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, Return from your evil ways and from your evil deeds.’ But they did not hear or pay attention to me, declares the Lord. Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever? But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not overtake your fathers? So they repented and said, ‘As the Lord of hosts purposed to deal with us for our ways and deeds, so has he dealt with us.’” (Zech 1:1-6)

Context, Context, Context: Zechariah prophesied during the 500s B.C. This was during the time Cyrus the Great allowed the diaspora to return to Jerusalem from Babylon (present-day Iraq), where Nebuchadnezzar had exiled many Jews. So, now was the time (in Zechariah’s day) of return. The time was one of excitement and enthusiasm because people were allowed to return to their homeland. It was also a time for them to rebuild the temple that had been destroyed and desecrated. But here’s the crucial part: the temple was a picture, a symbol of the gospel, not an end in itself. It was to point the people to God. But then, just as now, so many people miss this point. Real estate is not the gospel. Buildings are not the gospel. God is the gospel. But then, just as now, many people worship a place, a thing, an idol, and miss the whole point.

Then Zechariah, the prophet of God, speaks forth God’s truth to all who will hear:

Cry out again, Thus says the Lord of hosts: My cities shall again overflow with prosperity, and the Lord will again comfort Zion and again choose Jerusalem.’” (Zech 1:17)

What is the prophet doing? Trying to get the people to understand that it’s the Lord–not a building–that’s crucial. It’s God who will again comfort Zion.

And how will He do that? Through the gospel.

The temple would again be rebuilt but it would also again be destroyed. Buildings come and go. But God abides forever.

Encouragement: Where will restless and suffering people find the comfort about which Zechariah prophesied? In Jesus. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted” (Mt 5:4). That’s straight from the lips of Christ in His Sermon on the Mount.

When Paul addressed the Areopagus in Acts 17, he said, “The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17:30-31).

See what the focus is? It’s not on Jerusalem; it’s not on a temple; it’s not on geography. It’s on Christ. Comfort comes by way of the gospel–and the gospel is Christ.