Lesson 60 The Prophet John

Luke 1

Peace be with you, listening friends. We greet you in the name of God, the Lord of peace, who wants everyone to understand and submit to the way of righteousness that He has established, and have true peace with Him forever. We are happy to be able to return today to present your program The Way of Righteousness.

Last time, we finished our journey through the first section of the Holy Scriptures, the section that contains the Torah {Taurat}, the Psalms {Zabur} and Writings of the Prophets. That first section is called the First Covenant, also known as the Old Testament. Today we will begin our study of the second section of the Word of God, called the New Testament, or the New Covenant.

Why did God separate His holy Book into two sections, a First Covenant (Old Testament) and a New Covenant (New Testament)? God had many reasons for doing this. Perhaps the first thing we need to understand is that all the words in the First Covenant were written before the Messiah was born, while the words of the New Covenant were written after the Messiah was born. Thus, the message of God's prophets in the First Covenant was: "God will send the Messiah!" But the message of the New Covenant is: "God has sent the Messiah, just as He promised through His prophets in the First Covenant!"

Is this important difference between the First Covenant and the New Covenant clear in your mind? Some people criticize the Holy Scriptures because it has an Old Testament and a New Testament. They think that New Testament means that someone has attempted to nullify and replace the original Writings of the Prophets with another book! But that is not the way it is. The New Testament, that is, the New Covenant, does not nullify what the prophets wrote in the First Covenant--it confirms what the prophets wrote! The New Covenant shows how God fulfilled the promises and prophecies and symbols of the First Covenant. In the First Covenant, all the prophets were announcing: "The Messiah will come! He will come! He will come!" But the message of the book of the New Covenant is: "The Messiah has come! The Messiah, of whom all the prophets spoke and wrote, has come! He has come!"

Yes, we should thank God with a joyful heart that the Holy Scriptures contain a First Covenant and a New Covenant. Because in those two sections, we can see that what God promised so long ago--He has accomplished! God has sent us a Savior, just as He promised our ancestors in the Torah, the Psalms and the other books of the prophets. As the seed of the baobab {the most common tree in Senegal} grows up into a mighty baobab tree, in a similar way the First Covenant comes to maturity in the New Covenant.

As you may know, the second section of the Holy Scriptures, the New Covenant, has another name. That name is the "Injil." Injil is an Arabic word which means the Good News {the Gospel}. Truly, the message of the book of the Gospel is extremely good news, because it tells how the Messiah accomplished (fulfilled) what the prophets announced (prophesied), thus opening for the children of Adam a door of peace with God forever!

Concerning the Book of the Gospel {Injil}, you need to understand that the Messiah Himself did not write it. Just as God used many men to write the book of the First Covenant, so He used many men to write the book of the New Covenant. God used four men to write the story of the Messiah who came to earth. Those four men were named Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Why did God inspire four people to write the story of the Messiah? Why did He not just use one person to write the book of the Gospel? Here is the reason: God wanted to communicate to us a message which would be beyond doubt and worthy of full confidence. He used four writers in order to confirm His word. Just as a table with four legs is more stable than a table with one leg, so four witnesses are more reliable than a single witness. God employed four witnesses, so that we might know that everything written in the Book of the Gospel concerning the Messiah is absolutely true! Just as God placed His words in the minds of the prophets, so God guided four men who lived in the same era as the Messiah to write what they had seen and heard concerning the Savior of the world. {Note: Actually, God inspired eight men to write about the Messiah. The letters of the apostles Paul, Peter, James and Jude are also part of the Injil--the Gospel Writings--and everything they wrote is in perfect and glorious harmony!}

Do you know in which language Matthew, Mark, Luke and John wrote the holy book of the Gospel? They wrote it in the Greek language. However, we will be reading it in English {Lit. Wolof} since most of us do not understand Greek! We thank God that He put it into the hearts of scholars to translate the Gospel from Greek into English as well as some two thousand other languages from around the world

Yes, sometimes we hear those who try to fight against the book of the Gospel, saying, "No one can trust it. It has been tampered with! It contains errors and contradictions!" Friends, the one who fights with the holy Gospel is fighting with God Himself. "An egg should not wrestle with a rock!" {Wolof Proverb}. The Holy Scriptures are worthy of our full confidence and obedience. Just as the Word of God is perfect in the Torah and the Psalms, so it is also perfect in the Gospel. The Holy Scriptures cannot be broken. God is great and is able to protect His Eternal Word! He has preserved His Truth for all those who seek after it with all their heart. No one can actually alter the living and enduring Word of God! That is what the Lord Himself declares in the Gospel when He says: "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away!" (Matt 24:35)

Now then, the moment for us to begin our journey through the book of the Gospel, the New Covenant, has arrived. In our last program, we read about the prophet Malachi who lived four hundred years before the Messiah. During those four hundred years following the time of Malachi, God did not send to the Jews any more prophets to write the Word of God. Why did God not send any more prophets? He sent no more prophets because the book of the First Covenant was complete. God had said everything He wanted to say through the prophets. Now God was waiting for the appointed hour when He would bring the Messiah into the world so that He might establish the New Covenant.

We have already read what the prophets Isaiah and Malachi foretold concerning God's plan to send a prophet before the Messiah to prepare the way before Him. Do you know which prophet that was? Yes, it was the prophet John {Qur'anic name: Yahya}. John's father was Zechariah {Arabic: Zakaria}. Zechariah was a priest who served God and the people by offering animal sacrifices on the alter of the temple in Jerusalem.

Let us now open the holy Gospel {Injil} and hear what Luke wrote concerning the prophet John's birth. Reading in chapter one, the Scripture says:

(Luke 1) 5In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. 6Both of them were upright in the sight of God, observing all the Lord's commandments and regulations blamelessly. 7But they had no children, because Elizabeth was barren; and they were both well on in years.

8Once when Zechariah's division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God.… 10And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside. 11Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. 12When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. 13But the angel said to him: "Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to give him the name John. 14He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, 15for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He is never to take wine or other fermented drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from birth. 16Many of the people of Israel will he bring back to the Lord their God. 17And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord." 18Zechariah asked the angel, "How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well on in years." 19The angel answered, "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. 20And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their proper time."

21Meanwhile, the people were waiting for Zechariah and wondering why he stayed so long in the temple. 22When he came out, he could not speak to them. They realized he had seen a vision in the temple, for he kept making signs to them but remained unable to speak. 23When his time of service was completed, he returned home. 24After this his wife Elizabeth became pregnant… 25"The Lord has done this for me," she said. "In these days he has shown his favor and taken away my disgrace among the people."

We see how God sent the angel Gabriel to Zechariah to announce to him how Elizabeth his wife would have a son. This son would become a great prophet who would prepare the way before the Messiah. Thus in the end of the chapter, the Scripture says:

(Luke 1) 57When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. 58Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy. 59On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child, and they were going to name him after his father Zechariah, 60but his mother spoke up and said, "No! He is to be called John." 61They said to her, "There is no one among your relatives who has that name." 62Then they made signs to his father, to find out what he would like to name the child. 63He asked for a writing tablet, and to everyone's astonishment he wrote, "His name is John." 64Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue was loosed, and he began to speak, praising God. 65The neighbors were all filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. 66Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking, "What then is this child going to be?" For the Lord's hand was with him.

67His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied: 68"Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. 69He has raised up a horn of salvation {Wolof: a mighty Savior} for us in the house of his servant David 70as he said through his holy prophets of long ago, 71salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us- 72to show mercy to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, 73the oath he swore to our father Abraham: 74to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear 75in holiness and righteousness before him all our days."

After Zechariah had said this, he turned toward John, the baby, and said, 76"And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, 77to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, 78because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven 79to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace."

Thus did Zechariah praise God following the birth of John because he knew that the time for the Messiah to be born had arrived! John, the son of Zechariah, was not the Messiah, but the one who would come before the Messiah, in order to announce the Messiah's arrival and prepare the way before Him.

Thank you for listening. We urge you to tune in next time as we read the story about how God sent His angel Gabriel to a virgin by the name of Mary to announce to her a very important message. The next lesson is loaded with valuable truth. Don't miss it!…

God bless you as you meditate on these words of Zechariah:

"Praise be to the Lord!…He has raised up [a mighty Savior] for us in the house of His servant David, as he said through his holy prophets of long ago!" (Luke 1:68-70)

Lesson 59 The Message of the Prophets Summarized

Malachi

Peace be with you, listening friends. We greet you in the name of God, the Lord of peace, who wants everyone to understand and submit to the way of righteousness that He has established, and have true peace with Him forever. We are happy to be able to return today to present your program The Way of Righteousness.

For a long time now we have studied the first section of the Holy Scriptures. This section is called the First Covenant. It is also known as the Old Testament. This first section contains the Torah, the Psalms, and the other Writings of the Prophets. As we have seen, God used more than thirty prophets over a period of one thousand five hundred years to write the book of the First Covenant.

Today we will complete our journey in the first section of the Holy Scriptures. However, before we look at the last chapters of the book of the First Covenant, we would like to talk a little about what we have gleaned from this holy book from the first day until now. We can summarize the message of all the prophets with three great thoughts:

One: God is holy and must judge every sin.

Two: All the children of Adam are born in sin and must face God's judgment.

Three: God planned to send down a holy Redeemer who would bear the punishment of sin for the children of Adam.

Those are the three truths which all the prophets of God preached. Let us repeat these three points.

First: God is holy, and cannot overlook sin.

Second: Man is unholy, full of sin, and has no way of saving himself from the penalty of sin.

Third: God has a plan to cleanse sinners and save them from judgment.

Have you grasped these three truths? Have these truths grasped you? Do you realize how holy God is? Do you recognize how great your sins are in the eyes of the One who must judge you? Do you know that God has a plan to cleanse you from your sins?

Indeed, God is holy and man is unholy. We have seen those two truths often in our studies in the Holy Scriptures. The holiness of God was the reason that God created the unquenchable fire for Satan and everyone who follows him. The holiness of God was the reason that He expelled Adam and Eve from the garden of Paradise on the day that they ate of the forbidden tree. The holiness of God was the reason that God commanded the sons of Adam to sacrifice animals as a burnt offering to cover sin. His holiness was also the reason He did not accept Cain's offering. Because God is holy He destroyed sinners in Noah's time with a flood of water and rained fire in Abraham's time on the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. The holiness of God is the reason that God has prepared a day when He will judge the world in righteousness.

Listen to what God's prophets wrote about the holiness of God and the unholiness of man. They said: "O Lord, are you not from everlasting?…Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong!" (Hab. 1:12,13) "All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags!" (Isa. 64:6) If God is so holy and man is so unclean, who then can be saved? How can we be saved from the eternal fire of hell? How can the children of Adam spend eternity in the presence of the God who is pure and holy?

The response to that question is the third point in the message of the prophets. After the prophets preached that God is holy and that the children of Adam are unholy, they went on to declare that God Himself had a plan to cleanse the children of Adam from their sin.

The most important message of the book of the First Covenant (the Old Testament) is that God promised to send into the world a righteous Redeemer who would die in the place of the unrighteous children of Adam to redeem all those who believe in Him. This was and is God's plan to save sinners. Only through the Redeemer's shed blood can God forgive sin and reconcile sinners to Himself, without compromising His holiness.

To advance His plan to send the Savior into the world, God called Abraham to make of him a new nation, from whom the prophets of God and the Messiah would come. God spoke to Abraham, saying: "You will be a blessing and all the peoples of the earth will be blessed through you." And so Abraham begot Isaac in his old age, and Isaac begot Jacob, and Jacob begot twelve sons who produced the tribes of Israel. Thus, we learned that when God called Abraham, He was continuing forward with His plan to send the Savior into the world, because it was from the lineage of Abraham, through the nation of Israel, that the Messiah was to be born.

Next we saw how the children of Israel moved from the land of Canaan and settled in Egypt where they became slaves of the Egyptians. But God did not forget the descendants of Abraham, the Israelites. God called Moses to free the Israelites and lead them to the land which God had promised to their ancestor Abraham long before. God also used the prophet Moses to give us the book called the Torah, which is the foundation of everything that God has made known since then.

After the time of Moses, we saw how God sent many prophets to the Israelites, but most did not heed the words of the prophets. However, the unfaithfulness of the Israelites did not hinder the faithfulness of God and the plan He had designed to send the Messiah into the world! Thus we saw how God chose David as king of Israel and the prophet who would write most of the lovely and profound hymns found in the book of Psalms. The prophet David wrote much concerning the Messiah and how the children of Adam would persecute Him and even pierce His hands and His feet. But David also prophesied that after the Messiah had shed His blood as a sacrifice that removes sin, He would conquer death and rise from the grave!

In our journey through the Scriptures, we also discovered that it was not only Moses and David who wrote about the Messiah. All of God's prophets announced the Messiah's coming. For example, the prophet Isaiah announced that the Messiah would be born in a way which, as you know, no one had ever been born. He said: "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, which means, 'God with us.'" (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23) The prophet Isaiah wrote this seven hundred years before the Messiah was born.

There was another prophet who lived at the same time as Isaiah. His name was Micah. God revealed to Micah the name of the town in which the Messiah would be born. Listen carefully to what the prophet Micah wrote. In the book of Micah, chapter five, we read: "But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times!" (Micah 5:2) Thus, Micah announced that the Messiah would be born in the town of Bethlehem, the hometown of King David! Three programs from now, we will learn how God fulfilled this prophecy, for it was in the town of Bethlehem that the Messiah was born, just as God's prophet, Micah, declared it hundreds of years beforehand.

Surely God prepared the arrival of the Savior of the world very carefully! God's holy Book contains hundreds of references by the prophets about the coming of the Messiah. Perhaps you are asking: Why did God place in the minds of the prophets all these thoughts concerning the Messiah before He came into the world? There is one very important reason. God inspired the prophets to write much about the Messiah before He came, so that when He came and fulfilled all that the prophets wrote concerning Him, we might know beyond any doubt that He and He alone is the Savior whom God sent. God does not want anyone to deceive you! God wants you to know who the Messiah, the Savior of sinners, is, so that you can believe in Him and follow Him and be saved from your sins. That is one of the reasons He gave us this wonderful, reliable Book called the First Covenant--so we might distinguish the truth from error.

Now to finish our journey in the First Covenant, we would like to read from the book of Malachi, the final book of the First Covenant. The words of the prophet Malachi are important for us, because they are the final words which God sent down to the children of Adam before the Messiah visited the earth. Only four hundred years remained before the Redeemer would be born.

Listen to what the prophet Malachi wrote in the last chapter of the First Covenant. He said,

"'See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,' says the Lord Almighty.…'I the Lord do not change…But for you who revere my name, the Sun of Righteousness will rise with healing in [his] wings!'" (Mal. 3:1,6; 4:2)

Thus the prophet Malachi prophesied that God planned to send a prophet before the Messiah to prepare His way. Do you know who that prophet was? In our next lesson, we will see that the one who would prepare the way before the Messiah was the prophet John {Yahya}

However, Malachi also wrote: The Lord Almighty says: "The messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come…I the Lord do not change!" (Mal. 3:1) About two hundred years earlier, the prophet Jeremiah had prophesied:

"'The time is coming when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their forefathers when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them,' declares the Lord. This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. 'I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts.…I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more!'" (Jer. 31:31-34)

With these words, God was announcing that the Messiah would bring a New Covenant which would fulfill the promises and conditions of the First Covenant. The New Covenant would not depend on man who had failed to respect God's covenant; it would depend on God who, in His faithfulness and mercy, would send forth the Messiah, the Messenger of the Covenant.

For thousands of years, God had required the sacrifice of animals so that He might forgive the sins of the children of Adam. Animal sacrifices were an important part of the First Covenant which God gave to mankind through His prophets. However, the Messiah would bring to the world the New Covenant, because He would fulfil the symbolism of all the animal sacrifices, thus setting aside the First Covenant.

The Messiah would not come to abolish the words of the prophets, but to fulfil them. That is why the prophet Malachi calls the Messiah "the Sun of Righteousness." How would the Messiah be like the sun? The prophets were like the moon or a candle which diffuses a little light in a dark world. However, the Messiah is the rising sun, because He came to drive out the darkness of our sin and set us on the way of righteousness forever! Who needs the light of the moon or a candle once the sun has arisen? The Messiah is the Sun of Righteousness! In our next lesson, we will hear that Zechariah, the father of the prophet John, spoke of the Messiah in a similar way, saying: "Because of the tender mercy of our God…the rising sun will come to us from heaven to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace." (Luke 1:78,79) Amen!

And so, friends, we have come to the end of our journey in the books of the First Covenant. Next time, God willing, we will begin the wonderful section which follows, that is, the New Covenant--the book of the Gospel {Injil}. It is in the Gospel that we discover how the Messiah fulfilled the words of the prophets.…God bless you as you heed this warning:

"We have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts!" (2 Pet. 1:19)

Lesson 58 The Prophet Zechariah

Zechariah

Peace be with you, listening friends. We greet you in the name of God, the Lord of peace, who wants everyone to understand and submit to the way of righteousness that He has established, and have true peace with Him forever. We are happy to be able to return today to present your program The Way of Righteousness.

Two programs ago, we learned how the prophet of God, Jeremiah, warned his fellow Jews that if they did not heed the Word of God and repent of their sins, God would allow the soldiers of Babylon to come in, destroy their country, and carry them far away. Most of the Jews paid no attention to Jeremiah's warnings. Consequently, the army of Babylon came from the east, destroyed Jerusalem, broke down the temple and took the Jews captives, transporting them to Babylon, just as the prophet Jeremiah had predicted. Thus the Jewish people were dispersed, because they refused to obey the word of God's prophets.

But could the Jew's unfaithfulness frustrate God's faithfulness? Never! Listen to what the prophet Jeremiah told the Jews, who were now captives in Babylon because of their sins. He said to them:

(Jer. 29) 4This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: 10…"When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfil my gracious promise to bring you back to [Jerusalem]. 11For I know the plans I have for you…plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

With this declaration, the prophet Jeremiah was informing the Jews that even if they had forgotten God, God had not forgotten them! After seventy years, God planned to bring them back to the land of their ancestors. That is what Jeremiah told the Jews who were captives in Babylon. Truly, God is faithful {Lit. the keeper of covenants}. God had not forgotten that He had promised to bless all the nations of the world through the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Israel. God had not forgotten that He purposed to entrust His Word to the Israelites so that they might pass it on to all the descendants of Adam. In our study we have seen how God chose His prophets from among the Jews, inspiring them to proclaim His holy Word and write it down for the people of future generations. We know how God placed the book of the Torah in the mind of Moses and the hymns of the Psalms in the heart of David. We have seen similarly how God inspired other Jews like Joshua, Samuel, Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel to write the Word of God. We have observed how all the Writings of God's prophets announce the wonderful plan which God designed to send forth the Savior of the world through the nation of Israel.

Today we will see how God brought the Jews back to the land of Judah where the Messiah was to be born, thus moving forward with His plan to bring the Messiah into the world. We will learn how the Jews returned to Jerusalem after seventy years of captivity, just as the prophet Jeremiah had predicted.

As we begin reading, let us remember that the land of Babylon was now called Persia, because Persia had conquered Babylon. Reading in the book of Ezra, chapter one, the Scripture says:

(Ezra 1) 1In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfil the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah, the Lord moved the heart of Cyrus king of Persia to make a proclamation throughout his realm and to put it in writing: 2"This is what Cyrus king of Persia says: 'The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and he has appointed me to build a temple for him at Jerusalem in Judah. 3Anyone of his people among you, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem in Judah and build the temple of the Lord, the God of Israel… 5Then the family heads of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and Levites, everyone whose heart God had moved, prepared to go up and build the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. 6All their neighbors assisted them with articles of silver and gold, with goods and livestock, and with valuable gifts, in addition to all the freewill offerings. 7Moreover, King Cyrus brought out the articles belonging to the temple of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem and had placed in the temple of his god.

Did God fulfil what He had promised long beforehand through the mouth of Jeremiah, His prophet? Of course He did! We have already seen how God allowed the king of Babylon to destroy Jerusalem, and break down the temple of God-precisely as Jeremiah had prophesied. And now we see how Cyrus, the king of Persia, commanded any of the Jews who so desired, to return to their land and rebuild the temple and the city of Jerusalem-again precisely as the prophet Jeremiah had prophesied. Truly, the Lord is the King of kings. He is the One who controls the times and the seasons. All that He declares will happen! The prophet Solomon wrote: "The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord; he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases." (Prov. 21:1)

Next, the Scriptures describe how a group of Jews left the land of Persia and traveled back to the land of Judah and the city of Jerusalem. A Jew named Zerubbabel was their leader. When they came to Jerusalem, they were troubled greatly because the whole city was destroyed, and the temple of the Lord which Solomon had built was in ruins. Nothing was left there except broken pieces of stone and ashes.

Thus the Scriptures relate how the Jews first had a meeting in the place where the temple of the Lord had been. There they rebuilt the altar of sacrifice and sacrificed some animals. Together they thanked and praised the Lord for protecting them in Babylon and Persia for seventy years and for bringing them back to their homeland. God was with those Jews, to help them and strengthen them--so that after many trials and many years of hard work--they were able to rebuild the temple of the Lord, the city of Jerusalem, and the walls that surrounded it.

Perhaps some of you are asking, "What relevance does the story of the return of the Jews to Jerusalem have for us?" Friends, the return of the Jews to their land is very important because it was in that land of Judah, the southern part of Palestine, that the Messiah would be born. It was necessary that the Jews return to the land of Judah so that the Redeemer of the world--your Redeemer--could be born there!

At the time of the Jews' return to Jerusalem, God provided a prophet by the name of Zechariah {Zakaria in Arabic}. This Zechariah is different from Zechariah, the father of the prophet John {Yahya in the Qur'an}. God sent Zechariah to strengthen the Jews' faith in God and His promises. Zechariah had an important message to deliver. The time appointed by God to send forth the Messiah was drawing closer! Only five hundred years remained before the Redeemer would come into the world.

Let us examine some of the words which God placed in the mind of Zechariah. Reading in the book of Zechariah, chapter one, the Scripture says:

(Zech. 1) 1The word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, the son of Iddo: 2"The Lord was very angry with your forefathers. 4Do not be like your forefathers, to whom the earlier prophets proclaimed: This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'Turn from your evil ways and your evil practices.' But they would not listen or pay attention to me, declares the Lord. 5Where are your forefathers now? And the prophets, do they live forever? 6But did not my words and my decrees, which I commanded my servants the prophets, overtake your forefathers?"

Did you hear the warning the prophet Zechariah gave to the Jews? He said to them, "The Lord was very angry with your forefathers! Do not be like your forefathers!" Why was God angry with the Jews' forefathers? God was angry with them because they did not heed the words of the prophets that He had sent to them. That was why they ended up as captives in Babylon. Their forefathers were religious, but God was not happy with them because they ignored the words of the prophets. The Jews of that time were like people of today who say, "Of course we believe all the prophets!" However, it is obvious that they do not really believe God's prophets, because they do not heed what the prophets have written in the Holy Scriptures. They have a religion, but they have no personal relationship with God Himself. That is what most of the Jewish ancestors were like. They did not appreciate the words of the prophets. They honored God with their lips but they did not receive His Word into their hearts. Therefore, God sent His servant Zechariah to the Jews, to warn them so that they would not follow the example of their ancestors who had "God, God, God!" on their lips, but ignored the Word which God had sent to them through His prophets.

After Zechariah warned the Jews, he began to tell them about the Redeemer who was to come. We do not have time today to read everything that the prophet Zechariah wrote concerning the Messiah, but we can read a few excerpts.

In the book of Zechariah, chapter nine, the prophet Zechariah prophesied that the Messiah would enter Jerusalem, riding on a donkey. He said, "Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey." (Zech. 9:9)

In chapter eleven, Zechariah penned a remarkable prophecy which we do not have time to explain in detail. One of the events Zechariah predicted was that the Messiah would be sold for thirty pieces of silver. The prophet Zechariah wrote: "I told them, 'If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.' So they paid me thirty pieces of silver…So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them in to the house of the Lord…" (Zech. 11:12,13)

In chapter twelve, Zechariah prophesied that the Jews would not only sell the Messiah, but would even kill Him! He said: The Lord says,

"And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son.…If someone asks him, 'What are these wounds on your [hands]?' he will answer, 'The wounds I was given at the house of my friends.'" (Zech. 12:10; 13:6)

With those words Zechariah predicted that the Messiah would have wounds (scars) in His hands. Where would He get these wounds? His fellow Jews would persuade the Romans to crucify Him. The Romans would then nail His hands and feet to a cross and later pierce His side with a spear. Everything happened exactly as Zechariah predicted. What the prophet Zechariah wrote is in perfect harmony with what the prophet David prophesied hundreds of years earlier in the Psalms, when He wrote concerning the Messiah: "They have pierced my hands and my feet." (Psa. 22:16)

Friends, God wants us to know that the death of the Messiah on the cross is the most important part of the plan that He had designed long ago to save the children of Adam from the penalty of their sin. The righteous Messiah had to suffer and die for the unrighteous! That is the message of all of God's prophets. Is all of this clear to you? Do you understand what Zechariah prophesied about the Messiah some five hundred years before the Messiah was born? Do you really believe the message of the prophets--that the Messiah would suffer and die and, as the first to rise from the dead, would proclaim forgiveness of sins and a place in Paradise to all who believe in His name? Do you believe the prophets? (See Acts 26:18-27) Or are you like the Jews, who honored God's prophets with their lips, but did not believe their message?

Concerning the message of the prophets, the Scriptures declare:

"Do not treat prophecies with contempt." (1 Thes. 5:20) "We have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts." (2 Pet. 1:19) "Do you believe the prophets?" (Acts 26:27)

Fellow listeners, thank you for listening. God willing, in our next program we will hear a word from the prophet who wrote the last book of Holy Scripture before the Messiah came into the world.…

God bless you as you seek to give an honest answer to this important question from the Word of God:

"Do you believe the prophets?" (Acts 26:27)