Zechariah chapter three. Zechariah
was one of those prophets who prophesied to the people of Judah
as they had come back from the Babylonian captivity. This is
probably around 450, 500 years before Christ, before he came
into the world. And Zechariah, his main message,
his prophecy was Mainly had several things, you know, of course these
prophets that came back with them from Babylon They were trying
to encourage the people to rebuild the temple. We talked about that
last week and in other prophets there to rebuild the temple to
reestablish the worship of God because that was the most important
thing in their lives and And there were other things, I mentioned
this last week too, how we all have things that we need, that
we're concerned with and need to be concerned with in this
life, but we never, never need to let those things eclipse or
cause us to deny the most important thing of all, that we're here
to glorify God. We're here to worship God and
to serve God. I'm gonna be talking about marriage
today. And when a man and a woman come
together in marriage, they both need to realize is that we're
together mainly to picture Christ and his church and to glorify
God. That's what marriage is all about,
really. And everything else is subservient to that. And so our
families, our children, all these things, our jobs, what we have
to do, our relationships with other people in the world, even
unbelievers. We're here to worship God. And that's what Zechariah's
message was to the people of Judah. We need to rebuild this
temple. We need to worship God. It's God who chose us. It's God
who established it. It's God who preserves us. It's God who sent us into that
captivity and it's God who brings us out. But the main thing is
that God is the God of salvation. But this salvation is not conditioned
on us. It's not us, it's based upon
the promise of the Messiah to come, that God's going to send.
And so Zachariah's main message in all of this, in all the details,
is don't look to yourselves for salvation. Don't look to the
earthly temple even though it's important you build that temple
because it pictures Christ and his church and how God saves
sinners by the blood of Christ. Don't look to that. Don't look
to the blood event. Look to the promise of the Messiah
to come. and rest in Him alone, who would
come to redeem the elect of God, not just the Jews, but Jew and
Gentile. God has a people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue,
and nation. Next week, Lord willing, I'm
gonna preach, I'm gonna do two messages from Zechariah. And
next week, I'm gonna preach from Zechariah 13, where that passage
is probably familiar to most of you, if not all of you, which
says in verse one, in that day there shall be a fountain opened
to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem
for sin and for uncleanness. And that's a prophecy of Christ.
He is that fountain. Oh, I can't, who was it? Can't
think of the one who wrote the hymn. There is a fountain filled
with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins. It's taken from that verse.
And I'll think of his name here in a minute, but some of you
may remember. That's where that hymn come from. And so Christ
is the fountain open. So you see pictures of that throughout
the book of Zechariah. The main message of the gospel
is stated in visions that God gave to this prophet. Visions,
sometimes they're called the night visions because they were
given at night. And one of the visions is here
in Zechariah chapter three. This is a vision. that God gave
to Zachariah. Some say it's a dream or whatever,
it doesn't matter. It's something that Zachariah
saw because God showed it to him. And this vision is a power,
it shows the power of God. unto salvation through the blood
and the righteousness of Christ. And look at verse one. He says,
and he, that is the Lord, showed me Joshua the high priest. Now
Joshua was a common name in the Old Testament. We know Joshua
who fought the battle of Jericho, who was the successor to Moses. And that Joshua was a type of
Christ. The name Joshua is transliterated
or goes into the Greek or the transliteration of the name Yeshua
or Jesus. And that's what it means, God
our Savior. God is salvation. So here's Joshua
the high priest. At this time, the man who was
the high priest of Israel was a man named Joshua. He was of
the tribe of Levi, the lineage of Aaron. And this Joshua here
gives us several ideas. Joshua as the high priest is
a type of Christ who is the great high priest of his people. Every
high priest of Israel was a type of Christ who is the high priest
of his people. So here's Joshua, the high priest,
standing before the angel of the Lord. Now I agree with most
gospel commentators, this angel of the Lord is the messenger
of the Lord and is speaking of Christ himself. So Joshua stands
as a type of Christ and then Christ himself stands as the
messenger of the Lord. He's called sometimes the angel
of the covenant. You see that. I think we'll probably
see that in Malachi when we get there. But Christ is the messenger
of the covenant. He's the surety of the covenant
of grace. He's the worker of the covenant
of salvation, the covenant of redemption. He's the redeemer.
That unilateral covenant whereby all of our salvation is conditioned
on Christ. And then we see Satan. Look at
verse one, and Satan. And if you've got a concordance
in your Bible, that word Satan, that name Satan means adversary.
And it says Satan standing at his right hand to resist him
or to accuse him. So here's the scene, Joshua the
high priest standing before Christ, all right, and Satan at his right
hand accusing him. Now what are the accusations
that Satan brings against the people of God? Well, here's what
he says, he says, Lord, they're sinners. And sin demands death. Here's Joshua, he deserves death
and hell and condemnation. He doesn't deserve to be exonerated
or acquitted, he's a sinner. And that's Satan's accusations. And that's, you know, Satan is
represented as the adversary, the accuser of the brethren.
You can see that over in so many passages of scripture. So, I
think about Revelation chapter 12 where he's called the accuser
of the brethren. And you know, that's the issue,
that's the problem with us by nature. We sometimes accuse ourselves,
we sometimes accuse other people, but we don't realize that the
accusation of being a sinful person, that's all of us. And
if God were ever to give any of us what we deserve or what
we've earned, it would be death and hell. So, you know, we think
about what's happened in the last couple of weeks with this
earthquake and thousands of people in Afghanistan and what is it? No, it's not Afghanistan. Where
was it? Turkey. And Syria being killed. And people, we wonder
why do these things happen? It baffles our minds. Did they
get what they deserve? Well, my friend, and I'm not,
listen, and you know false preachers. They'll come on, they'll say,
well, that was an evil place, and they deserved what they got.
Well, my friend, think about that. You know, Christ dealt
with that in Luke 13. You know, when he dealt with
those who were killed in a natural disaster, the Tower of Siloam
fell, and he looked at the people he was preaching to, and he said,
suppose you that they were greater sinners than what we are? You
see, that's the thing about it. We all deserve death and hell. But thank God for his grace.
Thank God that his mercy. He said, I'll have mercy upon
whom I have mercy. And why would he have mercy on
me? Well, I don't know. Other than
the fact that it's his sovereign will. It pleased the Lord. That's what the scripture said.
And whatever God does, he does all things well. even though
we might not see it immediately when we look at things like that,
but he does all things well. Well, look at verse two. Now,
here's the issue. He says, and the Lord said unto
Satan, the Lord rebuke thee, O Satan, even the Lord that hath
chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee. Is not this a bran plucked out
of the fire? Now, one thing that's really
important here to notice is that Joshua the high priest standing
there before the angel of the Lord does not say a word. And I think about Romans chapter
three in verses 19 and 20, where it talks about how that there's
no salvation by works of the law, for the law shows us our
sin, and the law shuts our mouths. And because if we go to defending
ourselves, all we'll do is condemn ourselves. I think about in the
book of Job, when Job was talking about presenting his case before
God, and it's like, I think it was Job who said this, it might
have been one of his friends, because they did have some good
things to say, even though they were miserable comforters. But
here's what, I think it was Job himself, he said this, he said,
if I were to defend myself before God, for everything that I could
say to defend myself, God could come back rightly with a thousand
charges. Who are we to debate with God,
to argue with God? So Joshua's here, his mouth is
shut. He can't say a word. But here's
the goodness and the grace of God. He has someone to speak
for him. And that's what you and I need.
We need an advocate. We need Christ, the mediator,
the advocate. When we sin, we have an advocate
with the Father. Who is that advocate? A sinful
person like we are? No, because that wouldn't do
us any good. Who is that advocate? Jesus Christ, the righteous.
1 John 2, 1 and 2. He's our advocate. And here he
is speaking for Joshua. So here's Joshua standing before
the Lord, And Satan accused him, and Christ steps in and says,
the Lord rebuke thee, O Satan. God, the righteous judge, God
who knows us better than ourselves, God who sees our thoughts and
our hearts' desires, he steps in and he says, the Lord rebuke
thee. What if he would have said, well,
Satan, you're right, let's just damn the whole bunch of them.
See what I'm saying? Now, here's another point. He
has two points of defense for Joshua, the high priest. Two
points of defense. And you know what they are? The
election of grace and the redemption by blood. Look at what he says in verse
two. The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan, even the Lord that hath chosen
Jerusalem rebuke thee. God chose this man. God chose
his people. Now, you know, a lot of commentators
will say, well, this is just replying to the people of Jerusalem,
the people of Israel by nation. No, it's not. Now, God did reserve
them in a temporal, ceremonial, temporary way for a while. But
that didn't last. He chose a people before the
foundation of the world, according to his sovereign will, and gave
them to the Lord Jesus Christ, his son. You see, how important
is this thing of election? People say, well, we believe
election, but you don't have to preach it. Well, Christ preached
it, and he preached it as one of the major terms of defense
for his people. God chose this man. God chose
us. God elected a people. Thank God
he did or none of us would be saved. He didn't elect everybody. He elected a particular people
of his own sovereign choice. And he doeth all things well.
You can say that's not fair. You can say whatever you want
to say and arguing about it, but it's not gonna do any good.
Because when you stand before God, the judge, What are you
gonna plead? So there's the election of grace.
God's electing grace. He chose a people to save, and
he's not willing that any of them should perish, but that
all of them should come to repentance. And you can read about that.
I've got scriptures here listed in your lesson you can refer
to. But here's the second point of Joshua's defense. God chose
him, Christ redeemed him. That's what this means. Is not
this a bran plucked out of the fire? Well, what is the fire?
It's the fire of God's wrath. And this is a brand plucked out
of that fire, redeemed, brought out. And that speaks of our redemption
by the blood of Christ, what Christ accomplished on the cross
when he went under the fiery judgment of God's wrath as our
surety, our substitute, our redeemer, and he paid the price for his
sheep, Jew and Gentile. He delivered us from our sins.
He suffered the just for the unjust. He redeemed us with the
price of his precious blood. He's the Lamb of God. The Lamb
slain for us. So there's the two points of
defense. Election and redemption. Now, look at verse three. Now
Joshua was clothed with filthy garments and stood before the
angel of the Lord here. Joshua, you know, if you were
going to court, you'd want to wear your best, wouldn't you?
You'd want to look your best. Well, I got news for you. This
is man's best before God. Filthy garments? Why didn't he
wash them? Well, first of all, he's incapable
of doing that. We're all sinners. And the word
filthy here, it's not just a little spot of dirt here and there. The actual word, and I'm not
trying to disgust you all, but it is disgusting, it means excrement
covered. That's what that word filthy
means. I think about the Apostle Paul when he was brought to repentance
and he said, when I saw the glory of God in Christ and the righteousness
that Christ brought out, he said, I count all my works but dung
that I may be found in him. That's what that word filthy
is. Excrement covered clothes. And he's standing there before
the angel of the Lord. Well, being clothed in that way is
a metaphor, not just for the sins of God's people, but also
in this case, it's a metaphor for their sins, our sins imputed
to Christ, whom Joshua is a type. So it's like Christ standing
there covered with the sins of his people, how? Not that he
was made a sinner, he wasn't. Not that he was contaminated
with our sins, he wasn't. not with our sins imparted to
him, or imbued to him, or in any way like that. He suffered
the just for the unjust. He was the spotless lamb of God,
but he had the sins of his people imputed, charged, accounted to
him. He was made sin, the scripture
says. God was in Christ, reconciling
the world unto himself, not imputing, not charging their sins to them.
But what did he do? He made Christ to be sin. There's
sin offering, there's sin bearer. And Christ stood there, like
Joshua the high priest is typifying here, as a guilty person. Because he was guilty, but only
in one way. By imputation. The legal charge
of the debt of God's people. And over, I've read this verse
several times, to make sure we understand this, over in Hebrews
2, if you want to turn there, go ahead. But when it says in
verse 14 of Hebrews 2, or no, I mean verse 17, rather, of Hebrews
2, it says, wherefore in all things it behooved him. Now that's
a word for debt. Christ was indebted to be made
like unto his brethren. that he might be a merciful and
faithful high priest in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation
for the sins of his people. See, Christ had our sins imputed,
charged to him before the foundation of the world. How can you say
that? Because he was made to be the
surety of the covenant of grace. And what does a surety do? He
takes responsibility to pay the debt of another person or another
people. So Christ had that debt laid
upon him in the covenant of grace. And he was made surety for his
people and all of the responsibility of paying that debt to God's
law and justice, all of the responsibility of our salvation and all the
blessings of it was placed upon his shoulder. The government
was on his shoulder. He bore the load, all right? And I hear preachers talking
about, well, he was made a mass of sin. Well, sin's not a mass
of anything. Sin is transgressing the law. Sin is falling short. Sin is
running up a debt. And that's what was imputed to
Christ. That's what was charged to him. And so what we have here,
now Joshua, verse three, was clothed with filthy garments.
That's a picture. That speaks of our sins. And
Joshua, this high priest, he personally was a sinner who had
nothing to recommend him unto God, but this is a picture of
Christ standing before God the judge, having our sins charged
to his account. Now look at verse four. And I've
got in your lesson here before. This shows us how salvation is
first and foremost a legal matter. Concerning how God can be just
to justify the ungodly, how can God punish his holy, harmless,
righteous son for sins when his son knew no sin, did no sin? It's only by imputation. God
made him sin, and it's a legal matter, and it's the heart of
the gospel. And so in verse four, listen
to what he says here in verse four. He answered and spake unto
those that stood before him saying, take away the filthy garments
from him. And unto him he said, behold,
I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee. Hear what that says. God caused
his iniquity to pass. Now Joshua didn't do anything
here. This, how did he cause the iniquity to pass from him?
He purged our sins away. He took them away. He made an
end of them. How did he do it? By his death
on the cross. He shed his blood. There is a
fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins and sinners
plunged beneath that flood lose all their guilty stain. Take
away the filthy garments. Isn't that grace? Grace reigns. Because Christ took them away,
he put them away. By one offering, he hath perfected
forever them that are sanctified. And he did it by paying the price,
paying the debt of those sins that were imputed, charged, accounted
to him. And so take away the filthy garments. On what basis could God take
those filthy garments away? He couldn't just ignore them.
He couldn't just act like they're not there. How did he do it? He had to cause the iniquity
to pass from us. And how did he do that? By sending
Christ to be our surety, our substitute, our redeemer. And
he took him away. And what's the result of that?
Look at verse four. And I will clothe thee with change of raiment. Change of raiment. Think about
it. Now that's the imputed righteousness
of Christ. He took away our filthy garments
and he gave us a garment of perfect righteousness based upon the
successful work of Christ as our surety, substitute, and redeemer. He paid our debt in full. He
drank damnation dry. He paid it all. And this is not,
I've got in your lesson here, this is important. This is not
a potential cleansing. waiting on a response from the
sinner. It's an actual cleansing. It's
an actual redemption. And those for whom it was made
must go free. He didn't say, now Joshua, will
you take off that filthy garment and put on this? No, he said,
take them away. I've caused their sins to be
purged away. Put them on new robe. And that's
the righteousness of Christ. And that's what's pictured here.
His righteousness imputed. I will clothe thee with change
of raiment. And this issue of clothing, this
issue of raiment, this issue of wearing a robe is common throughout
the scripture. From Genesis to Revelation, it's
not just a one-time thing. We see all kinds of ways that
this is shown. And look at verse five, he says,
and I said, let them set a fair mitre upon his head. So they
set a fair mitre upon his head and clothed him with garments,
and the angel of the Lord stood by. Now that fair mitre, you
remember the priest in the Old Testament, the old covenant,
he wore a mitre that was like a turban. A fair mitre means
like a pure turban. And on that mitre, there was
a gold plate, and what was put on it? Holiness unto the Lord. And it was put upon the head,
and that was on his forehead. And that represents the mind,
the heart, you see. And so, I thought about this. You know, there are a lot of
people who argue against imputed righteousness, claiming that
salvation is, quote, more than a legal matter, unquote. Well,
they have no valid argument because they're right. Salvation is more
than just a legal matter. But that legal matter is the
heart of it and the ground of it. Christ taking our sins and
him giving us his righteousness. That's how God can be just and
justified. But salvation doesn't stop there. Salvation is a matter
of redemption. But it doesn't stop there. Out
of his righteousness imputed to us comes life from the dead. Comes the knowledge of God. Comes faith and repentance. This
is the work of the spirit in the new birth. And that's what
that fair mitre represents. God in principle in our minds
and our hearts our affections and our holiness to the Lord. This is what separates God, the
true and living God, from idols in our minds. He's a just God
and a savior. He saved me by his grace and
his grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ
our Lord. And that's the issue. The gospel truth. of being clothed
by God in righteousness that runs from Genesis to Revelation.
And these garments, you say, well, the garments are plural
here. Well, that includes Christ's righteousness imputed as the
ground, but it also includes all the garments of salvation.
Look over at Isaiah chapter 61. And look at verse 10. I'm gonna
read this verse to open our worship service at 11. Verse 10 of Isaiah
61. The prophet says, I will greatly
rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my
God, for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation. Now
what is that? He hath covered me with the robe
of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments,
and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels. That refers
to Christ's righteousness imputed, that's pictured over here in
Zechariah 3. But it also includes all the benefits and blessings
of salvation. And it's represented as a garment.
And when it's represented as a garment, that's not literal
language. It's not just something we wear on the outside, as people
try to say. Or it's not, as one old guy said,
it's not post-it note, really, and God puts a post-it note on
it. No, that's a metaphor. for his righteousness imputed,
but it leads to all the glorious blessings of faith and repentance
and perseverance, the power of life within, the knowledge that
God gives us, that he's holy. Now let me just read through
these last verses and I'll hurry. He says in verse six, he says,
and the angel of the Lord protested unto Joshua, saying, and what
that means is he's emphasizing this. Thus saith the Lord of
hosts, if thou will walk in my ways, and if thou will keep my
charge, my ordinance, then shalt thou also judge my house, and
shalt also keep my courts, and I will give thee places to walk
among these that stand by. In other words, walking in the
light of God's grace, walking in the gospel, it gives us a
perception we didn't have before. We know what salvation is now.
We understand the testimony of people who either believe or
don't believe as far as we can because we're limited. We can't
see into the hearts of people, but the Bible says that the expressions
of the heart are brought out in their speech, their doctrine.
What do you believe? What is your hope? And we see
that. And then verse eight, he says,
here now, oh Joshua the high priest, thou and thy fellows
that sit before thee, that's talking about the succession
of high priests, for they are men wondered at. And that means
they're types. That means they're signs of something
greater, someone greater. And who is that? For behold,
I will bring forth my servant, the branch. Isn't that Christ?
That is. You're a type of Christ, that's
what he's saying. Men wondered at, men of signs, men of types. In other words, you're not here
just for yourself. You're picturing someone much greater, the glorious
son of God incarnate, the great high priest of his people. And
then verse nine, for behold the stone that I have laid before
Joshua, there's Christ, the living stone. the chief cornerstone,
the foundation. Upon one stone shall be seven
eyes. Seven eyes, you see that in Revelation,
you see it here, that's talking about his omniscience. He has
perfect vision. He sees into the heart. That's
what the seven eyes represents. And behold, I will engrave the
engraving thereof, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will remove
the iniquity of that land in one day. What is the engraving? Well, on the high priest breastplate,
he had the names of the tribes of Israel, and on his amulets
on his shoulder, he had the names of the tribe of Israel. Well,
our names are engraved upon the heart of our Savior, and upon
the shoulder of our Savior. He died for us, he bore the load,
and he loves us to the end. And that's what that means. We're
on his heart, we're on his shoulders, we're in his mind. He came to
save us from our sins to the glory of his father. And he did
it in one day, the day of the cross. By one offering he hath
perfected. And said in verse 10, in that
day saith the Lord of hosts, shall you call every man his
neighbor under the vine and under the fig tree. The vine, this
vine and fig tree, there's a reference to it back in first Kings four.
concerning the peace and prosperity that existed under the reign
of Solomon. And that was true. But this is
mainly a prophecy of Christ and the rest and the peace and the
prosperity of the kingdom of God, spiritual Israel under his
reign, the vine and the fig tree there, picturing the people of
God in Christ, okay.