I don't know how often I've actually
thought about a verse as much as I have, or a few words as
much as I have, for these past several weeks now. I've spent
sometimes hours just contemplating what it means for God the Father
to say, I will strike the shepherd." It's just a remarkable thing
to think of what is going on in the counsels of God in eternity,
but especially at that remarkable time when the Lord Jesus was
nailed to that cross. And so in Mark chapter 14, they
sang a hymn, and as we looked last night, the Lord Jesus went
out. The Lord Jesus went out as a
triumphant warrior against the enemies of the souls of all God's
people. He went out to the Mount of Olives.
He went out to Gethsemane. And then, as we saw over these
last few weeks, the Lord Jesus is continually doing and saying
things to comfort His people. In Mark 14, 27, He said to them,
All of you will be made to stumble because of Me this night. For
it is written, I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will
be scattered. I want to go back and look more
about the apostles and their involvement in it, in what happened
over this next few hours. But the Lord Jesus took them
as he does so often and he takes us again and again. He takes
us back to the Word of God to see that what happens is always
the fulfilment of what God has promised. Zechariah wrote these
words well over 400 years before these events in that garden and
the events of Jerusalem over this next 24 hours. but they
are still as fresh today as they were 2,400 years ago. Let's pray.
Now, Father in Heaven, we do pray that you would make your
Word alive to us, that you would take us to see what happened
to your dear and darling Son, what happened to our blessed
Saviour. that remarkable event when He was made sin for us that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Help us, Heavenly
Father, to see things from Your Word that cause us to look to
Him again and again to find our life hidden in Him and hidden
in Him with You, our Father. Father, help us to know what
sin is, and the only way we can know it is from the cross of
the Lord Jesus. Help us to know what salvation
is, because salvation can only come as our Saviour bears our
sins. Please comfort us and guide us
and direct us this morning, our Father. Turn our thoughts to
our Saviour and to your wonderful love for your people. We pray
in Jesus' name. Amen. So my message is fairly
simple. You have an outline before you
there. I was just going to look at those
words in that verse in Zechariah 13, 7. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd,
against the man who is my companion, says the Lord of hosts. Strike
the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered. Awake, O sword. Simon showed
us something of what happened in the garden. as Adam and Eve
sinned against the Lord God. And in Genesis chapter 3, there's
a final part of God's purposes in that awful event, God's purposes
in bringing the Gospel to us in that event. He drove the man
He drove out the man and he placed Cherubim on the east of the Garden
of Eden and a flaming sword which turned every way to guard the
way to the Tree of Life. If you are going to live forever,
if anyone is going to live forever, you must get to the Tree of Life. You must have access to the Tree
of Life. As Simon said, it's a representation
of our Lord Jesus. There's a flaming sword there,
and a flaming sword which turns every way, and it guards the
way to the tree of life. And this sword is a sword of
the Lord, isn't it? It's just remarkable in the Hebrew
that it's The closest you can sort of picture it to is that
you have to get through a doorway and spinning in front of the
doorway is a helicopter blade, spinning so fast that to get
through is impossible. And of course the Gospels in
Genesis, and the Gospels have been given to us a few verses
earlier and it says that the seed There will be enmity between
your seed and her seed. He shall bruise your head. He shall bruise your head. This
is God's judgment on Satan. And you shall bruise his heel.
There is a time coming. There was a time coming. The
time has come when Satan would be bruised. But this sword is the sword of
the Lord, according to Judges 7. It's the sword that the man who
met Joshua on the way into the promised land. When they were
in that promised land, that man who met Joshua, the Lord Jesus,
had a sword drawn in his hand. It's the sword of divine justice. In Deuteronomy 32, 41, And 42 it says, if I wet my glittering
sword and my hand takes hold on judgment, I will render vengeance
to my enemies. I will repay those who hate me. I will make my arrows drunk with
blood. My sword shall devour flesh with
the blood of the slain and the captives from the heads of the
leaders of the enemies. This sword is typified as an
offensive weapon of war. And God, the Father, says, Awake,
O sword. That sword, in a sense, was the
judgment that came upon Egypt on that Passover night. That
sword of God's judgment in a real sense, came upon the world in
Noah's day. In a sense, the sword has never
really been asleep, but there is a real sense in which that
sword, to the world's eyes, seems as if it has been asleep. And in that Old Testament time,
there was a real sense in which Satan could accuse God and Satan
could accuse God's people. Satan could accuse God of injustice. Just imagine yourself in Jerusalem
just after Nathan had come to David and you are Uriah's mum
and dad and it's been exposed what David has done to your dear
son and you walk down the street and you meet with Nathan Nathan,
the prophet of God, the man who speaks God's words to these people. And you say to Nathan, what's
justice going to do to David? And Nathan says, the Lord has
taken away his sin. you would have every reason,
as your eyes mum and dad, to say, where is justice? Where is the God of justice in
that? How dare you let David go scot-free? Until Until such time, Romans
3 describes it wonderfully, doesn't it? It says that God, God in His forbearance, He's passed over, Romans 3.25,
He's passed over the sins that were previously committed. See, the reality is that David's
sins were dealt with by God in eternity. But so much of the
outworking of the Gospel is the manifestation of who God is. The Gospel is a declaration of
the character of our God, and especially the character of our
God as it's revealed in His Son. Until the Lord Jesus comes, that
criticism can be levelled against God. How dare you save Noah and
punish all those other people? Noah is wicked like them. How
dare you let Manasseh go to heaven when Manasseh was so wicked? How can you save Solomon who
seemingly for a big part of his life set his heart to break every
one of God's laws and lead others to do so. See in a sense the sword seemed
to be asleep. The sword seemed to be resting
in its scabbard until this due time. So it's the Lord's sword,
and he commands the sword, says Amos 9.4. And he commands the
sword against my shepherd. The Lord Jesus is the one who
was the shepherd of God's people from eternity, in that eternal
covenant that Simon has been speaking so well to us about. In that eternal covenant, the
Lord Jesus took responsibility for everything for his sheep. He took responsibility for their
righteousness. He took responsibility for their
sin. He took every responsibility
to bring all of God's flock, all of His children. He says
in Ezekiel 34, 31, You are my flock, the flock of my pasture. He's the Good Shepherd. He's
the Great Shepherd. He's the Chief Shepherd. But
remarkably he is my shepherd. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd." The shepherd is described also
as the man, not just a man. Blessed is the man who walks
not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of the scornful. The man, the Lord Jesus is described
in Zechariah 6, 12 and 13, behold, the man whose name is the branch. From his place he shall branch
out, and he shall build the temple of the Lord. Yes, he shall build
the temple of the Lord. He shall bear the glory, and
shall sit and rule on his throne. He shall be a priest on his throne,
and the council of peace shall be between them both. Council of peace between the
priest. and the council of peace between
the king. They are one and the same. He is always in the scriptures
described as fully man. He had to be 100% man as Adam
was man to bear the sins. He had to be made like Adam to
bear the temptation, to carry the sin that Adam had. He had to be a man that he could
die, but he had to be the man who was God as well. And that's what God says about
him. God says, a Waco sword against my shepherd, against the man
who is my companion, who is my fellow, the man who is my equal,
sharing a common nature, sharing a common purpose, sharing common
attributes. He's that man that we sing about
at Christmas time. Unto us a child, is born. Unto us a son is given and the
government will be upon his shoulder. What sort of government? Any
government you like to name is upon his shoulder. The government
of this universe is on his shoulders. His name will be called Wonderful,
Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Because
He is those things, the increase of His government and peace,
there will be no end upon the throne of David and over His
kingdom. To order it and establish it with judgment and justice
From that time forward, even forever, the zeal of the Lord
of hosts will perform it. This one is the man. He is my
companion, says God. And the word was made flesh,
and he dwelt among us. That word was with God, and the
word was God. So this is the shepherd. This
is the shepherd. This is the man who God says,
awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who is my companion, says the Lord of hosts. These
are God's words about God's Son. And then those words that have
seemingly been burned by God into my conscience for this last
couple of weeks. Strike the shepherd. God the Father says, to this sword, this sword
of justice, this sword of judgment, this sword that speaks of God's
holiness. It says, you awake, you arise,
O sword. You strike the shepherd. You
strike him with a heavy blow. It implies someone being hit
ferociously, implying severe damage. We saw in Zechariah earlier that
the religious world and the moral world believes that if we give
people rules and regulations we will get them to be more holy. We tell them to do things and
give them instructions. Our will produce holiness and
goodness and morality. It has never happened throughout
history. The one thing that according
to God motivates holiness, motivates affection toward God and love
toward others. The one motivating thing is the
power of the Gospel. It's looking at the Lord Jesus
and looking at Him especially as He was hanging on that cross. Strike the shepherd, said God. Strike this one who God says
in Hebrews 7, 26, is holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from
sinners. Strike this one that the psalmist
in Hebrews 1 says is a man who loved righteousness and hated
wickedness. This sword is only made to be
awake because God in justice, when he finds sin, must punish
sin. He who justifies the wicked and
he who condemns the righteous, both of them alike are an abomination
to the Lord. Will the Lord commit an abomination
in striking this remarkable shepherd? As we've gone through Mark's
Gospel, we have just witnessed him again and again being gracious
and truthful and loving and compassionate and kind and understanding. Just the most remarkable testimony
of what humanity should be, we saw in the Lord Jesus. And yet,
here God says, strike this shepherd. So you can't see and understand
what sin is. the sin that we are and the sin
that we do, we'll never see it unless God gives us eyes to see
it by looking at the Lord Jesus on the cross. We'll never be
horrified by sin unless we see what sin did to the Lord Jesus. He was made born of a woman,
born under the law, that he was made a curse for us. He became a curse, for it is
written, Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. No wonder those Pharisees were
so anxious to get the Lord Jesus crucified. The Jewish way of
killing someone was to stone them to death. But the Romans had come along
just a few years beforehand with this brutal and cruel way of
killing someone. But for the Jews it would have
been very special. And in their hatred of the Lord
Jesus, It would have just given them such a thrill. If we can
get this man hanging on a tree, we can prove to you that he's
a man who is cursed of God. You people are all saying he's
blessed of God. You just give us an opportunity.
we'll find a way to prove Satan and his minions rejoiced when
he became cursed. And as he was lifted up into
that cursed position on this earth, God in justice poured
all of our sins All of the sins of all of God's elect were poured
in one horrible, seething, evil mass upon the Lord Jesus. And God says, awake our sword,
strike this shepherd. I don't know how we'll ever understand
it or feel what we ought to feel about it until God opens our
eyes to see it. We stand as a fellowship who
want to say to this world that when the Lord Jesus suffered
on that cross, he really did suffer the justice of God for
his people. There was not any justice, any
of the activity of that sword that was awakened against this
shepherd that didn't have an eternal purpose from God the
Father and a perfectly just reason for him to be slain. It was justice
that slew him. It was God who slew him, God
who is infinite in knowledge. For those people who want to
maintain that somehow all that happened on the cross was that
Jesus showed people a moral example of how to live a good life or
how to sacrifice yourself for your friends. For those who say
that Jesus died for the sins of all of the world, I don't
know what this verse means to them. How can it mean what God
says it means? We should be horrified by the
blasphemy of universal redemption. We should be horrified by the
blasphemy that said that all that the Lord Jesus did when
this sword pierced his soul. And people say all he did was
create a possibility. You can say that in classrooms
and you can say that intellectually. To say that at the foot of the
cross that he was trying to save every human being when he did
it and he bore the sins of all the people in all of the world
and then he failed in what he did. It's the most horrible,
wicked blasphemy against this remarkable man who is our Saviour
and is our God. It's a blasphemy against him
and it's a blasphemy against his Father for unjustly punishing
his son. And it's a blasphemy against
the blessed Holy Spirit who wrote these words for us today. If you turn in your Bibles to
Isaiah 53, we'll look at some of the descriptions of what God
said happened to this one who is his shepherd
and his companion. We know the passage well, don't
we? But this is what it means for the shepherd to be struck.
Isaiah 53, 4. Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken. Same word. He was smitten by
God and afflicted. He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace
was upon Him. By His stripes we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone
astray. We have turned everyone to his
own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. So he was led, verse 7, as a
lamb to the slaughter. This is graphic language. He
was taken. He was cut off from the land
of the living. He was stricken. Yet, verse 10 says,
it pleased the Lord to bruise him. He has put him to grief. When you make his soul an offering
for sin, he shall see his seed and prolong his days. All of those words in Isaiah
are descriptions of what happened when the Lord Jesus was smitten
by God, was struck by God. God put his darling son to grief
as the Lord Jesus enters Gethsemane in our passage through Mark's
Gospel. These are the horrors that gripped his soul He wasn't
troubled about Roman soldiers. He wasn't troubled about Judas
and that band of men. But this man who hated wickedness
and loved righteousness was in a few hours' time going to be
made sin, the one thing that just horrified him, just horrified him. So he went
out. like that lamb that was taken
out and its blood was shed in that Passover event in Egypt. He went out to be struck by the
infinite wrath of Almighty God. See, the biggest problem we have
as sinners in this world is not our sin, but God. we have a problem with God. And
unless God sorts that problem, we have an infinite and eternal
problem with God. You see, it was God who went
through on that Passover night. In Exodus 12, he says, I will
pass through the land. I will execute judgment. The Lord will pass through to
strike. When that sword is awakened against
the shepherd, the striking is the striking of the wrath of
God. Zechariah doesn't leave us to
doubt the efficacy of it. Will it work? Will it achieve
its purposes? Is it just a possibility? Is
it just a hope? Not according to our God. Not according to our God. He'll strike the shepherd. The
sheep will be scattered. For these apostles have meant
that night that they were going to be scattered, hiding in nooks
and crannies. ashamed of their betrayal, ashamed
of their proud boasting. But see, the Lord Jesus, before
he went to the garden, when he went out to do battle, he wanted
those he loved to know that God was going to bring them through.
If you look down in verse 8 and 9 of Zechariah 13, It'll come to pass on that land,
two-thirds, the two-thirds in it shall be cut off and die.
See, there will be the rejection and ruin of unbelieving Jews. I will bring one-third through
the fire. To get to heaven, you're going
to have to go through fiery trials, according to 1 Peter 4.12. But
he brings them through the fire, like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.
The fire takes away our ropes of binding, but it doesn't do
us any harm. I will bring them through the
fire. I will refine them as silver
is refined and test them as gold is tested. The end result of
it is they will call on my name. And I will answer them. I will say, this is my people. And each one will say, the Lord
is my God. See, he can call us his people,
like he called the shepherd, my shepherd, because he doesn't
see any difference. between the shepherd and us. Our sins became the shepherd's
sins and he took responsibility for them. The Lord punished our
shepherd for our sins. until that sword of divine justice
cried out, enough, it is finished. It buried itself forever in our
Savior, and it can never, ever be brought against God's people
ever again. Our sins are gone completely. And as 1 Corinthians 5.21 says,
And we now can be called his people. We can now be like his
companion. We are his family. We are his
children. Because we are holy, spotless
and undefiled. Blameless. Death day. Blameless. The rest of the world
will accuse us of all sorts of things. God says blameless. When we hear about our sins and
we are conscious of our sins, God's children go back to that
amazing day when our Saviour was struck by the sword of divine
justice. And divine justice says, holy,
blameless, these are my people, these are my children, don't
you dare touch them. My shepherd will look after them.
He'll guide them and he'll bring them. He's going to refine them
and he's going to bring them home because he's the good shepherd. He's not a hopeless shepherd.
He's a good shepherd. He's not a try-hard shepherd.
He's a good shepherd.