God's Design in All things

God’s design in all things Zechariah 1: 17-21

The problems that dominate God, by such agents as he would appoint, would quell and bring down all those powers which had risen, or should rise, to oppress his people. Horns are a usual emblem of strength and power; and because those fierce beasts that have them, push and gore with them, and, tossing them furiously about, scatter and drive all before them, they aptly denote conquering and oppressive princes and states. (Dan 7; 8). But whether the number four is used indefinitely, or to denote that specific number, and what particular powers are pointed out by it, is not satisfactorily determined. The prevailing opinion . . . and perhaps the most probable of any, is, that the four great empires, the Assyrian or Babylonian, the Persian, Grecian, and Roman, by each of which the Jewish nation has been in turns oppressed, (Coke). There were four horns, because they arose from the four quarters of the world; for we know that the Jews were not harassed only on one side, but on the east and the west, on the north and the south. Since then enemies on every side joined their strength and their forces against the Jews, so that there was a cause for trembling from the four quarters of the world, that is, from all places around them (Calvin) Four horns; emblems of the enemies of the Jews, for strength, fierceness, and pride, and for their number, from all parts of the world. (Poole) Horns were a common figure for power specifically, of a Gentile king or world empire (Deut 33:17; Ps 18:2; 75:10; 89:17; Dan 2:36-44; 7:3-7; :24; 8:20-21; Rev 7:12) (Constable). A horn is a symbol of power (Amos 6:13; Micah 4:13; Jer 48:25); four indicates the four points of the compass; the four horns represent powers approaching from the four points of the compass. The expression is used of every direction or all directions. From all sides enemies crowded upon the Jews. (Wheldon) Certainly, the sources of the Church’s woe are many. It is not difficult to name four horns which rend and tear the Church in every age. Like sin, the flesh, Satan, the world, and death, which are our universal foes.

The provision that delivers The four carpenters represent those whom God makes his instruments in bringing to nothing the power of persecutors. (Challoner) - The term carpenter is used of workers in wood as well as in iron or stone. If the horns are thought of as made of iron (Micah 4:13) a blacksmith is the more suitable translation. The smiths may have had their hammers in their hands, ready to strike (Weldon) Evil agencies are counterbalanced by good--for there is a Divine providence always at work in this world. The prophet saw “four horns,” representing the powers by which Judah had been scattered; but at the same time he saw “four carpenters,” the instruments raised up by God to accomplish a Divine work. God’s works are creative. These are constructive agents. Building, not demolishing, is their proper work. In seeking our own spiritual and moral welfare, we cannot too often remember this important principle--the true method of destroying is by creating. Get good into your heart, and it will cast out evil. God’s works are also compensative. “Four.” Observe the number. It corresponds with the number of Israel’s foes. There is more of equality in men’s conditions than is often supposed. Everywhere evil is counterbalanced by good. Our mercies outweigh our miseries. (T. R. Stevenson.) The four horns were met by four carpenters. They were ready to act out of the unseen world, whether by energizing human means, or not--a system of counterpoises, and counter influences, and means of salvation, with Divine intentions.

Zechariah saw four horns; apprehending the terrible; and the terrible is not ignored by God; it is emphasized, it is explained. God puts their evil work against His people side by side with the work that He will do in their behalf. There was a matching of four against four. All evil meets its match in every part when God comes forth to work. If there be bad influences against you and yours, God can bring counter influences against them, and He can break the spell of evil already done. Why need you ever despair of restoration, of help, of salvation, be your cause ever so low? The “Son of God has come that He might destroy the works of the devil.” (P. B. Power) These craftsmen are God's instruments, who with their mallets and hammers break these hard and strong horns which would overthrow the Church, and declare that no enemies' horn is so strong, but God has a hammer to break it in pieces. (Beza) The four craftsman does not refer to rulers or military leaders or scholars but to people who work with their hands skillfully, but not with hands that grasp instruments of power, they were weavers engravers and carpenters who worked on the tabernacle and the days of Moses and the temple and the time of Solomon. They had come to terrify and throw down the horns power of the nations. At the heart of this vision therefore there was a strange conjunction of weakness and power. There four Horns (power) and four craftsman or carpenters (weakness) But God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong (1 Cor 1:27) These craftsmen are not as weak and ordinary as they appear to be on the contrary they are chosen instruments to manifest God‘s rule in the world and to judge the nations. Before this is dismissed as nonsense we must consider Noah he was just a boat builder but he was also a preacher. By is his simple act of building the ark , he condemn the world. Noah participated in God’s declaration of judgment by simply building the ark. He put the world on noticed. (Motyer). Four carpenters. What shall we say of them? First, that the help which God provides is suitable. These men were skilled workmen. They knew how to deal with horns. No doubt they had their tools with them. They brought their saws, and axes, and hammers, and would soon shear off the horns. Depend upon it, when God wants to fray a horn He knows where to find a carpenter. God’s instruments are suitable instruments, they are perfectly adapted for the work they have to do. God makes no mistakes. He never puts square pegs into round holes. He knows how to prepare the man for the work, and the work for the man. But again, God’s help is seasonable. These carpenters made their appearance just at the right moment. Their arrival was most opportune. God’s help always is. It is often late, but never too late. Finally, I observe that God’s help is sufficient. There were four carpenters, one for each horn. God forgets nothing and omits nothing. ‘His work is perfect.’ He does not send three carpenters to hammer four horns; He does not give you grace for six trials and then fail you in the seventh. He does not strengthen you against one temptation, and then leave you in the lurch to shift for yourself with another. Not so. Christ is a perfect Savior. Carpenters, did we say? Why, ‘is not this the Carpenter?’ Is not Christ the Alpha and the Omega, and His people’s salvation? Is He not made to us Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification, and Redemption? Certainly He is; and there is nothing too hard for Him. And note, it is by the Cross He saves. Here is His axe and His hammer and His saw. (Moore) There is here set before us by the Lord, the real condition of the Church at this day. Let us not then wonder if the world rage on every side against the Church and if storms and tempests arise from the east as well as from the west: nor is it a new thing that many enemies from various parts unite together; and that God’s Church should thus have to bear many assaults. Let this be our consolation, — that God has many workmen at hand. (Calvin)

The Providence that Develops

Psalm 75:4 the ministers of the Gospel, who are workmen; and whose business it is to fight or terrify the horns, wicked men, even men in power, the enemies of Christ's church and people; by their preaching, which has made a Felix to tremble; by their prayers, which they have been more afraid of than an army of men, as Mary queen of Scots said of the prayers of John Knox; and by their good lives and conversations, which made Herod stand in fear of John the Baptist; nay, even they have been a terror to the devil himself, and have been the means of casting him, and his principalities and powers, out of the Gentile world, and out of both the bodies and souls of men; and of casting down the strong holds of sin, and of breaking in pieces the kingdom and interest of Satan, and of building up the churches of Christ; (Gill). The world is made for the Church. Men read the history of nations without the slightest reference to the Church of the living God. They look at passing events and circumstances without believing that they are the development of a Divine providence at work in the world. The world was mapped out with a peculiar reference to the locality and home of the Church. The world was made for Christ, and therefore for the Church. The work going on in the world is in accordance with the Divine plan. In it you will see a Divine hand prescribing, the limits of conquest and the extent of a nation’s duration. There is, then, eternal order underlying the world’s disorder, and a Divine will subordinating all human wills. The great chapters of the world’s history have all been written beforehand. We have only seen parts of the plan. The work of God in this world is under Divine supervision and angelic inspection. Evil agencies are counterbalanced by good. In the natural world there are opposite forces, and laws that seem antagonistic, but these agencies are counterbalanced. We have darkness and light--we have night and day. All the forces in this world are adjusted by Divine wisdom, and thus the balance of the universe is preserved. There are opposite powers in the world. There is Satan, and there is Christ. “For this purpose was the Son of God manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.” There is sin; and yet sin is counteracted by grace. There is flesh, and there is spirit. The one seems to be the adversary of the other. But, flesh itself is to be transfigured, to be consecrated and hallowed. There is death in the world. All men die, though Christ has died; all men shall rise, because Christ has risen. Thus evil agencies are counterbalanced by good. If there are powers hostile to the Church and to us, there are powers that are directly “opposed to them, and that are at work for us, “the carpenters” (H. J. Bevis.) ‘Oh, child of God! There have been many horns which have scattered you. Year after year they have wrought sad havoc in thy plans and cost you bitter tears. But your Almighty Friend is very displeased with them that they have wrought so great a disaster, more than was necessary, and now they shall be frayed. When discipline has fulfilled its purpose, it is stayed; when the refining fire has purged out the dross, the smith no longer blows it with the bellows; when the winnowing fan has ridden the wheat of the chaff, there is no need to winnow it further against the evening breeze. “Comfort you, comfort you, My people, says your God. Speak comfortably to Jerusalem, and say unto her that her warfare is accomplished, her iniquity pardoned.”’ (Nisbet). God is the judge, but those who choose to preach the gospel are his instruments for putting that judgment into effect. The danger for the people of Zachariah’s time was that they might underestimate the significance of the work of rebuilding the temple that God had called them to do. There seemed to be so many big, more urgent matters, in the world that needed attention and that cried for greater resources than anything they themselves possessed. The really big issues in God’s administration of this world would have to be dealt with by mighty man on the battlefield and in the halls of political power. If God chose to use human beings to deal with these issues he would surely choose the mighty. The work of rebuilding the temple was at best a sideshow. So how could they give themselves to it with the enthusiasm and commitment required? The message of this vision is that the judgment of the world is already being put into effect wherever God deploys his workman. Through them God brings his kingdom into this world a kingdom that will eventually sweep away and replace every earthly power. In other words, precisely because it is the work of his kingdom it can never be a mere slideshow while the main game happens elsewhere. It is the main game!. By his sovereign providence he raises nations up and brings them down And he will call them all, finally, before the bar of his judgment on the last day. But that is not something somehow unrelated to and separate from what he does when he deploys people in the work of his kingdom here and now. It is precisely by doing this that he most clearly shows his hand as the world’s ruler and judge and begins to put his final judgment into effect. It is vitally important that we be clear about this in our own time, when there are so many wrongs to be right and so many urgent and good causes that clamor for attention, The time for building temples of brick and mortar is over for the reality they symbolize has now come in the person of Jesus the Messiah Jesus who came to tabernacle among us. He announced a new building program and initiated it by preaching the kingdom of God and training and equipping his disciples to do the same. He went to the cross that there might be a gospel to preach. But the preaching the gospel always seems weak and pointless to those whose minds have not been schooled by scripture to see the world the way that God does. Christians can and should be involved in public affairs, it is an indispensable part of loving our neighbor and being like our heavenly Father. But the great danger is it in doing these things we might come to regard evangelism as a rather quaint diversionary activity for Christians who have lost the plot so to speak and withdraw from a real engagement with the world in which they live. For the preaching of the gospel in the power of the Holy Spirit is a God-ordained means by which the powers of darkness or directly confronted, the church is built, and the kingdom advanced in this world. It is the means by which people are rescued from the domain of darkness and transferred into the kingdom of God. It is not a diversion from the real work of the kingdom but the work of the kingdom part excellent. It is the mission of God and of the church he founded. May God make us good carpenters in his building project. (Motyer)