Church: Reformed Baptist Church of Franconia | Text: Zechariah 1 | Date: February 15, 2026 | Speaker: Fred Zaspel

It’s always a frightening thing when the pastor asks you to open your Bibles and turn to one of the minor prophets, but if you would please turn to the prophet Zechariah. If you need, we’ll take a coffee break. I know here it’s not that bad. In a lot of churches, the minor prophets are pretty much foreign territory. I hope that’s not the case with you.

We have been for many months working through a series of studies in messianic prophecy to see how the Old Testament points forward to the Lord Jesus and the anticipation of this Messiah, this King who would come. And we’ve worked our way through many prophecies. We’re coming toward the end now.

We come to the prophet Zechariah. This will be the first of several from the prophet Zechariah. As we’ll see, this is perhaps the most messianic of all of the prophets, even though it is not the longest of the prophets. It is the longest of the twelve, though, the minor prophets. And tonight we’ll just take an introductory look at Zechariah’s prophecy, and then next time we’ll begin working through some of the specific messianic anticipations. Let’s begin with reading chapter 1, verses 1 through 4.

“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.”

The Historical Setting Of Zechariah

Some Old Testament professors have complained that for many Christians, nothing happened between the exile and the New Testament. That is, there’s the exile. Most know about that. Israel, in her disobedience, was judged of God and they were carried off into exile into Babylon. But then that was it until we come to John the Baptist, Jesus, the New Testament.

But there was a return to Judah, a return to Jerusalem. There was a reestablishment of the people in their homeland. There was a return of prophets coming to Israel during that period. We’ll see one of those this evening. So they were not just off to exile and then that was it until John the Baptist. There was a return and God did send prophets to that post-exilic community.

Ezra speaks of them—Haggai and Zechariah. There was also Malachi. I think he’s not mentioned in Ezra, though. But Ezra and Nehemiah came back, leading people back into Jerusalem from Babylon, and God did send some prophets: Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. I want to take some time this evening just to review that history for you, so that we can see Zechariah’s prophecy in its setting.

The exile happened in 586 BC. This was Israel’s crushing defeat from Babylon. We have this recorded for us in 2 Kings 24 and 25, and also in 2 Chronicles 36. God had threatened Israel over and over for centuries—through even back as far as Moses—that here is this covenant that I enter in with you, you have your obligations, and if you do not keep the terms of the covenant, I’ll judge you. I’ll judge you with the rod of men; I’ll send you away into the nations around you. And repeatedly, God sent prophets to Israel, warning them that if they continued in their idolatry, continued in their unfaithfulness to God, that God would judge them.

Finally, that came, and it came through the wicked army of Babylon under the wicked king Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar’s army came and they crushed Israel finally, and thousands of Israelites were led into exile back into Babylon. Several of the ancient military powers had a policy; Babylon was one. When they conquer a people, the last thing they want is the headache of a rebellion.

And so how do you keep people that you’ve conquered? How do you keep them from rebelling? Well, you recognize that what holds those people together are a number of things, primarily their land, their language, and their religion. You might not be able to stamp out their religion entirely, but if you take them away from their land, you go a long way toward it. You’ve taken them from their land, you might even change their language, and you’re taking them a pretty good ways away from their religion as well.

That was Babylon’s policy, so they took thousands of Israelites off into Babylon into exile. Primarily among those that were exiled were the upper class in Israel; they were the main ones who were taken away, although there were plenty of others as well. But among them were Ezekiel the prophet and Daniel. They were taken to Babylon as well. You read famously of Daniel serving in the royal court in Babylon.

Jeremiah the prophet was not taken. He remained in Jerusalem. And you’ll remember, of course, his famous book Lamentations, where he laments the fall of Jerusalem, sitting there in the ashes of it after it all happened. We saw last time in Daniel chapter nine that Daniel was reading the prophet Jeremiah. Jeremiah sent his prophecy to the Israelites in exile in Babylon so that they could read it there. Primarily to receive comfort, particularly the “book of comfort” as it’s called, Jeremiah chapters 30 and following, where God makes promises to Israel. Daniel is reading Jeremiah’s prophecy. We saw this in Daniel nine last time, and he sees where Jeremiah prophesied that this captivity would continue 70 years.

Daniel reads that, he does the math, he says, “Hey, the time’s about up,” and so he prays that God would bring the deliverance that he’s promised through his prophet Jeremiah. That’s when God sends the angel to him to give him the famous prophecy of the 70 weeks that we saw last time. Actually, Isaiah the prophet, 50 years or whatever it was beforehand, had prophesied the same, and he even named the one who would lead them into their freedom away from Babylon. He named Cyrus. Now, who in the world is Cyrus? At the time that Isaiah mentioned him, there is no Cyrus, there’s no Medo-Persian Empire, but Isaiah names Cyrus will do this.

Well, the time comes then, and we read of this actually in the historical section of Daniel, Daniel chapter 5, where the Medo-Persian army comes and finally overthrows the Babylonian army, and now Medo-Persia is the ruling force in that area of the world. We read in 2 Chronicles 36, and again it’s echoed in Ezra chapter 1, that Cyrus made his famous decree to allow the people to return to their homeland. They could rebuild there, and they could rebuild their temple. A very generous policy, and that’s why God calls through the prophet Isaiah—he calls the wicked king Cyrus “my anointed,” “my Messiah.” And so Cyrus has come into power now, Medo-Persia is ruling, Babylon has collapsed, they are no more, the people of Israel are allowed to go back. There are actually three main stages of the return to Israel.

First of all, in 538 BC, that’s the primary return. That’s when Cyrus makes his famous decree, and the people were led under the leadership of one Zerubbabel, also assisted in the leadership with Joshua the high priest. He was a successor to the Zadok priesthood and that was the leadership now establishing itself in Jerusalem. We read of that in Ezra chapters 1 through 6. The next wave of return was in 458 BC, this is about 80 years later, under the leadership of Ezra himself, and we read of that in Ezra chapters 7 and following, and you remember the story where they came back then. And then the third wave of return was in 445 BC, and that wave of return was under the leadership of Nehemiah. And you remember the story there where they are opposed by the Samaritans, and so on.

So now, by this time, the people are back into Israel, largely re-established. Some remain back, but largely the people have come back. And the temple—after some years of struggle with that—the temple is finally rebuilt. That’s what’s called, and you’ll read of this, the Second Temple Period. Solomon’s temple is gone, it’s now been rebuilt, and this is the second temple period that takes us up to the time of Jesus.

Those years between the return to Jerusalem and the New Testament are very important years, and very significant developments took place during that time. Politically there were massive changes. We have Babylon who is the power; they’re overthrown by Medo-Persian armies under Cyrus. You might remember that Daniel prophesied in Daniel chapter 2 and again in Daniel chapter 7 a succession of kingdoms. There’s Babylon, there’s Medo-Persia, after that will be the kingdom of Greece under the leadership of Alexander the Great, and then finally another kingdom, the fourth one, which would be the kingdom of Rome—the Roman power, which of course is in power in that area of the world in the time of Jesus.

During the Greek rule, Alexander made a massive, massive impact on that area of the world. Greek culture was spread. The Greek language was spread. That’s why our New Testaments are written in Greek. It became the, to use the expression we have today, the lingua franca of the age. This was the language everybody in that area of the world would understand, even if they still spoke their native tongues. Greek was the language. And so now that is in place for the times of the New Testament.

And it was not just a time of political change, but some religious aspects to it as well. During this time, after the time of Alexander the Great, his kingdom fragmented off into several different fragments. Most prominent were Egypt under the Ptolemaic rule, and then in Syria, the Seleucid rule under Antiochus. They became particularly harsh as overlords of Israel during that time. And there’s the famous revolt against the Syrian overlords under Judas Maccabeus. Finally, the revolt was successful and they rededicated the temple. There was a cleansing of the temple and a rededicating of it. And that’s a holiday that the Jews continue to celebrate today: the holiday of Hanukkah. Massive development. So that’s not just a political overthrow; there are massive religious overtones to it as well.

There were other significant religious developments during that time as well. The synagogue during this time became the center of Jewish life. That actually began back in Babylon. They’re away from their temple and so the synagogues were established, and this became central to Jewish life and to the religion as well. That continued during those centuries and that’s where we find synagogues so prominent when we come to the Gospels as well. Also during that time you have the development of various Jewish sects. You have the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes; you have, especially under Rome, the Zealots rebelling against the Roman overlords. All of this gives us a broad background to what we have in place when we open the Gospels to read them.

The Post-Exilic Prophets

Now we have then three of what are called the post-exilic prophets. Three prophets sent to Israel—Judah, the southern kingdom—as they’ve come back now from Babylon. And these three prophets are Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. They ministered in Jerusalem during these years. These are the last prophets that God would send before the time of Christ. And so this period is called, very appropriately, the 400 silent years—silent because God has not spoken. For all of these centuries, God sends no other prophet. The decree of Cyrus allowed the people to come back, to return to their land, to rebuild, and they’re soon oppressed by the Samaritans. Work was halted for some 14 years. But God sent these prophets back to these people in Judah. During and after them, it is silent.

I have a professor friend who wrote a commentary on the prophets Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, and he very cleverly titled the book, The Second to Last Word. Jesus being the final word, of course, but these are the second to the last word: Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.

So now back in Jerusalem, Israel was back in Jerusalem as God had promised they would. Jeremiah prophesied that in his book of comfort, Jeremiah 30 and following. Ezekiel had promised that as well. But the people are largely disillusioned. They’re slow to rebuild the temple. There’s opposition that puts it off even further. That project was set aside. People became rather apathetic about it. There was spiritual lethargy on all sides. God had promised they would come back, but not all of that promise was yet fulfilled. There’s no new covenant that had been enacted yet. There is certainly no renewed heart among the people, as the prophets had said there would be. And the people are largely indifferent with regard to spiritual responsibilities, with regard to the rebuilding of the temple.

It’s basically a time of spiritual lethargy among the people, and these prophets—Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi—a great part of their ministry was to call these people to repentance, challenge them with regard to their spiritual lethargy, and to call them to spiritual revival. Haggai in particular, you might remember, challenged the people to rebuild the temple. “You’ve spent your time and your energies and your money on your own indulgences, and you don’t have the time and the energy and the money to spend on rebuilding the temple. What does that say about you?” Very challenging words from the prophet there. He prophesied for only four months, but he stirred the people from their spiritual indifference to get to work.

Zechariah then began prophesying—this is probably about 520 BC—just two months after Haggai began his prophetic work. We read of this in Ezra chapter 5, that both Haggai and Zechariah were supportive of the ministry back in Judah under Zerubbabel and under Joshua the high priest. In Ezra chapters 5 and 6, we find that these two prophets, Haggai and Zechariah, worked closely together for the rebuilding of the temple. And in 516 BC, the building was finally completed.

An Overview Of Zechariah’s Prophecy

All right, well that’s some of the background. When we come to the prophet Zechariah, you’ll find that in chapters 9 through 14—this is the longest of the minor prophets, 14 chapters. Chapters 9 through 14 focus especially on the Davidic promise. And of course that’s what we’ll be looking at in this series.

The Babylonian conquest of Judah in 586 BC, plus 70 years of exile taken away from their homeland, might have seemed to the people to be proof that God was done with them. Now they’ve come back to their land. That’s a moment of hope. But then not much seems to happen when they are back. And so it seems that God has abandoned them. It seems that God’s covenant promises have failed. There’s no Messiah. There’s no universal kingdom. There’s no eternal kingdom. The state of Judah was reestablished, but they’re basically a puppet state under a foreign rule. They’re nothing like what they used to be. The temple is certainly not the glory of the Solomonic temple. And it’s certainly not the glory of the temple that God promised they would have. The temple that they did have was slow in coming, nothing like the glory that was promised.

Now there are some notes of future hope in Haggai and some in Malachi. We will pick up Malachi, the last of the prophets, after we’re done with Zechariah. But this matter of the future hope for Israel being rekindled and kept alive was primarily the task of Zechariah. Zechariah’s name means “God remembers.” By the way, Zechariah is one of about—this will surprise you—he was one of about 30 men in the Old Testament named Zechariah. I didn’t realize it was that many until I checked all this out. But he’s identified in chapter 1 here as the “son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo.” We read of that in Ezra chapters 5 and 6 as well. We learn in Zechariah chapter 12 that Zechariah is from the tribe of Levi, so he’s a priest as well as a prophet.

And his name, “God Remembers,” is reflective of his message as well in a couple of ways. One, Zechariah relies heavily on the former prophets—prophets that had gone before him. In fact, he makes mention of that here in chapter 1 and verse 4. He picks up on those previous prophets and he also picks up on their themes as well. His name, “God Remembers,” is reflective of his message, and that is simply: God remembers. Yahweh remembers his promise. God has made a promise. It doesn’t look real good right now, but God remembers his promise. And so he’s rekindling hope.

Zechariah is the longest of the so-called minor prophets—”minor” not because of minor importance, but minor because of their relative length to the other prophets. Zechariah is one of the most frequently quoted prophets in the New Testament to affirm the Messiahship of Jesus. 71 quotations or allusions from this short book in the New Testament are given. 27 of those are in the Gospels; mostly, this was the most quoted prophet in the passion narratives of Jesus, where they are given then to show that he is in fact the Messiah who was promised. We have 31 of these quotes in the book of Revelation. Zechariah is a major source for John’s apocalyptic book as well.

So, Zechariah is given in large part to reaffirm God’s covenant promises. One man writes, “No other Old Testament book is as messianic as Zechariah.” Zechariah has more messianic content than all of the minor prophets put together, and he’s second total only to the prophet Isaiah, who of course is much longer.

Broadly, two divisions. I’m not going to break this down any further, I don’t think, but in chapters 1 to 8, he addresses contemporary concerns largely. We won’t be spending a lot of time with that because our series has to do with messianic prophecy. Then chapters 9 through 14, he has eschatological concerns. It has to do with Israel, it has to do with the nations, the age of the Messiah; there’s some apocalyptic vision work here as well. And again, Zechariah is second only to Isaiah in the number of prophecies about the Messiah. He’s the shepherd king, and we’ll see all of that as we go through, and just many, many New Testament allusions and New Testament quotations. And it has to do with God’s judgment that is coming, but also God’s promise to bring this king, whom he has long promised, to David.

Leading Messianic Prophecies Of Zechariah

All right, I think for the rest of our time, all I’m going to do is read through some of the leading messianic prophecies of Zechariah. We’ll highlight the most prominent of them, and if you have your Bible, keep it handy, because we’ll look through them.

Look first of all at chapter 3. Zechariah chapter 3. The scene here is a heavenly temple. There’s the consecration or the ordination of the high priest Joshua. I mean Zechariah chapter 3 verses 1 to 10, but I’ll just read verses 8 and 9 here for the sake of time: “Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, you and your friends who sit before you, for they are men who are a sign. Behold, I will bring my servant the branch. Behold on that stone that I have set before Joshua, on a single stone with seven eyes, I will engrave its inscription, declares the Lord of hosts. I will remove the iniquity of this land in a single day.” So here’s a prophecy of the branch—that might ring a bell. You remember Isaiah used that language? We found that in a few places already. Here he picks that up.

We’ll see it again in chapter 6 now. Chapter 6 verses 9 through 15. Here we have Joshua’s surprising coronation and prophecy of the branch who would build the temple and reign as a king-priest. I’ll start with verse 9, chapter 6, verse 9: “The word of the Lord came to me. Take from the exiles—Heldai, Tobijah, and Jedaiah—who have arrived from Babylon, and go the same day to the house of Josiah, the son of Zephaniah. Take from them silver and gold and make a crown and set it on the head of Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest. And say to him, thus says the Lord of hosts…” So here we have a priest-king prophesied as well.

Chapter 9—here’s one that’s more familiar to you. It’s a prophecy of the arrival of the king. “Rejoice greatly.” This is in chapter nine, verse nine. “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; the battle bow shall be cut off and he shall speak peace to the nations. His rule shall be from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth.” Well, you recognize that immediately from the triumphal entry that’s recorded in all four of the Gospels at the beginning of Passion Week. Also, the reference in verse 10, putting away warfare from the nations. That’s reflective of prophecies that we’ve seen already, particularly in Isaiah 2 and Micah chapter 4.

Maybe across the page or the next page, chapter 10. The prophecy of one with many titles. Chapter 10, verse 3: “My anger is hot against the shepherds. I will punish the leaders for the Lord of hosts cares for his flock, the house of Judah, and will make them like his majestic steed in battle. From him shall come the cornerstone. From him the tent peg. From him the battle bow, from him every ruler, all of them together.” So here’s a prophecy of one coming who bears multiple titles, and we’ll see the significance of those when we come to that.

Zechariah chapter 11. I think I will not read through that one; that is the famous 30 pieces of silver prophecy, the rejection of Israel. We will come to that later on.

Zechariah chapter 12. Here we have a prophecy of Israel’s repentance at the sight of her Messiah. Zechariah 12—on that day, this is verse 9—”And on that day I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem and I will pour out on the house of David, on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy so that when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him as one weeps over a firstborn. On that day, the mourning of Jerusalem will be as great as the mourning for Hadad-rimmon in the place of Megiddo.” And then, by the way, we have reference to that verse specifically at the Passion of Christ in the book of John. “Look on me whom they have pierced.”

Chapter 13. Here we have a prophecy of the stricken shepherd. Verse seven: “‘Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who stands next to me,’ declares the Lord of hosts. ‘Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered. I will turn my hand against the little ones. In the whole land,’ declares the Lord, ‘two-thirds shall be cut off and perish, and one-third shall be left alive. And I will put this third into the fire, refine them as one refines silver, and test them as gold is tested. They will call upon my name, and I will answer them. I will say, they are my people, and they will say, the Lord is my God.'” Jesus, by the way, confirms this prophecy in Matthew 26, on the eve of his crucifixion, where he confirms that this is about him, where he says—Matthew writes—”Jesus said to them, ‘You will all fall away from me because of this night. For it is written…'” and here he quotes this passage in Zechariah, “‘I will strike the shepherd and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.'”

And then one more, Zechariah chapter 14. I’ll begin with verse 4. This prophecy has to do with the king and his kingdom. “…the other half southward and you shall flee to the valley of my mountains for the valley of the mountains shall reach to Azal and you shall flee as you fled the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah then the Lord my God will come and all the holy ones with him.”

Well, there’s highlighting some of the major ones, major prophecies of Zechariah regarding the Messiah. You will note as we go through—as we’ve seen many times—that is typical of the prophets, that there’s a blending of the first coming and the second coming of Christ looked at in a broad sweep. And we’ll see how that sorts out with many of the prophecies. But this highlighting of this, I think in a way just highlights what I’ve been trying to emphasize throughout this series: that the messianic anticipation of the Old Testament is not—it is not just a prophecy here, a prophecy here, and another one over there, and another one over there.

On the one hand, if you want to take that approach, that’s more or less what we’ve done here. You end up being very impressed that there’s one here, one here, one here, one here, one here, one here, one here, one here, and it just keeps going and going and going. It seems almost endless. But it’s more than that. That messianic anticipation is the whole shaping factor of the outlook of Israel in the Old Testament. Inspired writer after inspired writer, prophet after prophet comes, and the hope continually set before the eyes of the people of Israel is that there is this Davidic son who’s coming, and he’ll have a kingdom that is great, and it’ll be over all, and he’ll rule in righteousness, and he’ll rule everywhere, and he’ll rule forever. And then you come to the New Testament and we’ll see this too, how the New Testament writers and even Jesus himself pick up those prophecies and say that this Jesus and all that we as Christians make of Jesus is not an afterthought. This is something that God has told us about century after century after century. He is in fact the whole turning point of history as God has promised. We’ll work our way through that as we go.