Zechariah's Vision Of The King. Day 1, Introduction

Who is Zechariah, the prophet to whom the Lord entrusted a vision of the coming King? The Bible introduces him like this, "In the eighth month of the second year of Darius, the word of the Lord came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, the son of Iddo." (Zechariah 1:1)

Now we know the time period in which he lived. It was during the reign of Darius 1 Hystaspes, otherwise known as Darius the Great, the third Persian king of the Achaemenid Empire. Darius followed Cyrus the Great and Cyrus' son Cambyses, and he reigned from 522 BC to 486 BC. (This Darius is not to be confused with Darius the Mede from the book of Daniel.) As we learned from our study of Daniel, Cyrus the Great of Persia conquered the Babylonian Empire and granted the captive Jews the freedom to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple and their homeland.

Cyrus, however, did not allow the Jews to re-establish their own monarchy. He intended for Palestine to remain subject to him, but he did not want to supply the manpower to rebuild the region which the Babylonians had so horribly devastated. So he gave the Jews permission to return and supplied the resources for them to begin the work. Rather than allowing them to have their own king, Cyrus appointed Zerubbabel, a prince of the line of David, governor of Judea. The books of Nehemiah and Ezra describe the difficulties the Jews encountered while trying to rebuild and the opposition that came against them. Over time they lost their enthusiasm and neglected to complete the construction of the temple. Ezra tells us that due to the extreme opposition of the enemies of the Jews, "Thus the work on the house of God in Jerusalem came to a standstill until the second year of the reign of Darius king of Persia." (Ezra 4:24)

What happened in the second year of the reign of Darius that caused the work to suddenly take a giant leap forward? For one thing, the Lord raised up men like Haggai and Zechariah to admonish the people for their lack of enthusiasm and to encourage them in their efforts. For another thing, while the people were getting their hearts right again, the Lord put a stop to the opposition of the people of the Trans-Euphrates. These people sent a letter to Darius questioning the authority of the Jews to rebuild the region, asking him to make certain whether Cyrus the Great had indeed given them permission to do so. Cyrus was a fantastic record-keeper, and Darius' men found in the archives a scroll upon which Cyrus had written his decree to allow the Jews to return to their land and rebuild the temple. So Darius ordered, "Do not interfere with the work on this temple of God. Let the governor of the Jews and the Jewish elders rebuild this house of God on its site." (Ezra 6:7) In addition, Darius decreed that these men of the Trans-Euphrates were to assist the Jews in their efforts. The orders of Cyrus the Great were to be carried out, and woe to anyone who hindered the work, for Darius declared, "May God, who has caused His name to dwell there, overthrow any king or people who lifts a hand to change this decree or to destroy this temple in Jerusalem. I Darius have decreed it. Let it be carried out with diligence." (Ezra 6:12)

It is at that time that the temple project has new life breathed into it. "So the elders of the Jews continued to build and prosper under the preaching of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah, a descendant of Iddo." (Ezra 6:14a) Zechariah, whose name means "the Lord remembers", had returned from Babylon with the appointed governor Zerubabbel and more than 42,000 exiles to restore the temple and the nation. In the second year of the reign of Darius, in the fall of the year, the word of the Lord comes to Zechariah. The Lord appoints him a prophet to the people at around the same time He appoints Haggai a prophet to the people. But he grants each of these men a different message. The Lord gives Haggai the task of stirring up the hearts of the people to return to the work, while He gives Zechariah the task of stirring up the hearts of the people to return to the Lord. The people had failed to fully carry out either of these commissions. Zechariah will begin his ministry by crying out to the people, "Return to the Lord and He will return to you!"

Zechariah must help the people get their hearts right with the Lord, for the King is coming, and His people must be ready to receive Him.