Early morning on a stony road climbing south through terraced hills toward Jerusalem, a few small men far off walking with staffs, the half-built temple tiny on the far ridge, under a calm, empty pale sky.

Fasts to feasts

Zechariah 7

Darius’s fourth year, about 518 BC. Do you keep up a habit of faith that has lost its heart?

14 verses≈ 3 minBSB

Images are artistic interpretations.

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Where we are

1:1–6Return to MeA call to turn, in Darius’s second year
1:7–6:8Eight night visionsHorses, horns, a lampstand, a scroll, a basket, chariots
6:9–15The Branch crownedA crown for Joshua, and the Branch who builds
7–8Fasts to feastsJustice and mercy, and joy in ZionChapter 7
9–11Your King comesThe King on a donkey, and the Shepherd rejected
12–14On that dayThe pierced One, the fountain, the LORD King

A Call to Justice and Mercy

In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Chislev.

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The men of Bethel

The men of Bethel

Now the people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-melech, along with their men, to plead before the LORD by asking the priests of the house of the LORD of Hosts, as well as the prophets, “Should I weep and fast in the fifth month, as I have done these many years?”

God

Then the word of the LORD of Hosts came to me, saying, “Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for these seventy years, was it really for Me that you fasted?

God

Afternoon in the low rolling foothills of western Judah, abandoned: broken terrace walls, a small village on a low mound with its roofs fallen in, olive trees run wild, and an empty road.

Are these not the words that the LORD proclaimed through the earlier prophets, when Jerusalem and its surrounding towns were populous and prosperous, and the Negev and the foothills were inhabited?’”

Question

Quick question

Think back over verses 3 to 5 before you answer.

Which fast did the men of Bethel ask about?

God

Then the word of the LORD came to Zechariah, saying, “This is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘Administer true justice. Show loving devotion and compassion to one another.

Zechariah 7:8–9

God

God

Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. And do not plot evil in your hearts against one another.’

God

But they refused to pay attention and turned a stubborn shoulder; they stopped up their ears from hearing.

God

God

They made their hearts like flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the LORD of Hosts had sent by His Spirit through the earlier prophets. Therefore great anger came from the LORD of Hosts.

God

And just as I had called and they would not listen, so when they called I would not listen, says the LORD of Hosts.

God

A once-terraced valley of the Judean hills gone wild under a gray sky: broken terrace walls, thorn and scrub where vines stood, an empty road, dust lifting on the wind.

But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations that they had not known, and the land was left desolate behind them so that no one could come or go. Thus they turned the pleasant land into a desolation.”

0:14

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

Pray

LORD of Hosts, I can fast and feast for myself. Soften my heart before it turns to flint. Make me just and kind to the widow, the child without a father, the stranger and the poor. Amen.

You’ve experienced

Zechariah 7

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A verse to carry with you

This is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘Administer true justice. Show loving devotion and compassion to one another.

Zechariah 7:9

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