Zechariah

Eighth month, second year of Darius. My first message from the LORD: return to me, and I will return to you. Don’t be like your ancestors. The prophets before me told them to turn from their evil ways, and they wouldn’t listen.

Where are your ancestors now? And the prophets, do they live for ever?

Twenty-fourth of Shebat. At night I saw a man on a red horse, standing among the myrtle trees in a hollow. Behind him, red, brown and white horses. I asked the angel with me what they were. Riders sent to patrol the earth, and they reported back: the whole earth is quiet and at rest.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Then the angel of the LORD asked: how long, LORD, before you show mercy to Jerusalem and the towns of Judah? You’ve been angry with them for seventy years. And the LORD answered with kind words. Comforting words.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

What I was told to announce: I’ll come back to Jerusalem with mercy. My house will be rebuilt there. My towns will overflow with good things again, and I will comfort Zion.

A young man with a measuring line, off to measure Jerusalem. An angel had to run and tell him: Jerusalem will be a city without walls, because of all the people and animals in it. The LORD himself will be a wall of fire round it, and the glory inside it.

Whoever touches you touches the apple of his eye.

Then I was shown Joshua, the high priest, standing in front of the angel of the LORD. Satan was standing at his right hand to accuse him. And the LORD said to Satan: “May the LORD put you in your place, Satan!” Isn’t this man a burning stick pulled out of the fire?

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Joshua’s clothes were filthy. The angel said: take them off him. Then to Joshua: I’ve taken your guilt away, and I’m dressing you in fine clothes. And I spoke up: put a clean turban on his head. So they did.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Joshua, you and the priests with you are a sign. The LORD is going to bring his servant, the Branch. And on that day every one of you will invite his neighbour to sit under his vine and his fig tree.

The angel woke me, like you’d wake someone who’s asleep. A solid gold lampstand, a bowl on top, seven lamps. An olive tree on each side. I asked what they were. He said: you don’t know? I said no.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Then the answer, and it was for Zerubbabel. Not by might, not by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of Hosts.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Asked about the two olive trees again. He said: you still don’t know? Still no. The two chosen ones, anointed with oil, standing beside the Lord of the whole earth.

Who dares look down on the day of small things?

Haggai@haggaiTwenty-first day of the seventh month. The LORD had me ask: who’s left who saw this house in its first glory? How does it look to you now? Like nothing?

A flying scroll. Thirty feet long, fifteen wide. A curse going out over the whole land. On one side, thieves. On the other, people who swear falsely by his name.

Then a measuring basket with a lead lid. The lid came up and there was a woman sitting in it. This is Wickedness, the angel said, pushed her back down and shut the lid on her.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Two women with wings like a stork’s flew in and carried the basket off between earth and sky. I asked where. To Babylonia, to build it a house there.

The last of the visions. Four chariots coming out between two bronze mountains. Red horses, black, white and dappled. The four spirits of heaven, going out to patrol the earth.

Told to take silver and gold from some exiles just back from Babylon, make a crown, and put it on the head of Joshua the high priest. And to tell him: here is a man whose name is the Branch. He will build the LORD’s temple, and he’ll be a priest on his throne.

Replying to @sharezer.bethel

The answer came to me, and it starts with a question. Seventy years you’ve fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months. Was it really for him? And when you ate and drank, wasn’t that for yourselves?

Replying to @sharezer.bethel

What he actually wants: judge fairly. Be kind and compassionate to each other. Don’t push around the widow, the orphan, the foreigner or the poor. Don’t plot against each other in your heads.

Replying to @sharezer.bethel

And your fasts in the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth months will turn into festivals. Joy and gladness. So love truth and peace.

Old men and old women will sit in the streets of Jerusalem again, each with a walking stick because they’re so old. And the streets will be full of boys and girls playing.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

If it looks impossible to the few of you left, the LORD asks, does it have to look impossible to me?

One day ten men from every language will grab hold of one Jew by the hem of his robe and say: let us go with you. We’ve heard God is with you.

Rejoice, Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! Look, your king is coming to you. Right with God, and victorious, and humble. Riding on a donkey, on a colt, a donkey’s foal.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

He’ll take the chariots and war horses away. The battle bow will be broken. He’ll speak peace to the nations, and his rule will reach from sea to sea.

Come back to your stronghold, you prisoners of hope. Today he’s telling you: he’ll give you back double.

The LORD had me act out being a shepherd, over a flock headed for slaughter. I took two staffs and called them Favour and Union. I lost patience with the flock, and they couldn’t stand me either. I broke Favour in two. Then I told them: if you think it’s right, pay me. If not, keep it. They weighed out my wages. Thirty pieces of silver.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

The LORD said: throw it to the potter. What a price they valued me at. So I threw the thirty pieces of silver to the potter, in the house of the LORD. Then I broke Union.

The LORD says they will look on me, the one they have pierced, and mourn for him the way you’d mourn an only child.

Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.

The third that come through the fire, he’ll refine like silver and test like gold. They’ll call on his name and he’ll answer them. He’ll say: they’re my people. And they’ll say: the LORD is our God.

A day is coming when the LORD’s feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem, and the mountain will split in two. You’ll run through the valley, the way you ran from the earthquake in King Uzziah’s day.

Replying to @zechariah.prophet

Living water will flow out from Jerusalem, half to the eastern sea and half to the western, summer and winter. And the LORD will be King over the whole earth.

On that day HOLY TO THE LORD will be written on the horses’ bells. And every cooking pot in Jerusalem and Judah will be holy to the LORD.