Alright, let's turn in our Bibles
to Zechariah chapter 1. Zechariah chapter 1. And I'm
going to deal with the last few verses of this chapter. This
is the second vision. As you know, Zechariah had eight
visions in the night. In one single night, God gave
him eight visions. All of these visions are for
the comfort and encouragement of the people of God in pointing
them to Christ who was to come, the future. And this is the second
vision. It says in verse 18, he says,
Then lifted I up mine eyes, and saw, and behold, four horns. And I said unto the angel that
talked with me, this is the interpreting angel, What be these? And he
answered me, These are the horns which have scattered Judah Israel
and Jerusalem. And the Lord showed me four carpenters. Then said I, what come these
to do? And he said, saying, These are the horns, referring back
to the four horns, which have scattered Judas, so that no man
did lift up his head. But these are come, these four
carpenters, these four carpenters are come to fray them, to terrorize
them. And he says, to cast out the
horns of the Gentiles, which lifted up their horn over the
land of Judah, to scatter it. Now, I've entitled this message,
Four Horns and Four Carpenters. Four Horns and Four Carpenters. What in the world do you suppose
he's talking about? Well, you probably have some
idea given our study of the book of Daniel, but let me introduce
the message this way because it's something important here
that we need to understand. If you're going to climb into
a passage like this and see the reality of what the Lord has
for his people and for us today through the prophet Zechariah,
And that is this, you've often heard Brother Mahan say, I can
remember him saying this quite a bit in his messages and in
his teaching, that the scriptures are oftentimes bifocal. Bifocal. And when we say bifocal, it's
not that the scriptures have two separate or two different
meanings. You know what a bifocal lens
is? It allows you to see up close. I've got those lenses like this,
you know. I can read with them. And then
I can see far away. But I'm seeing the same thing.
If I look at the bottom of my glasses, I can see Paul Kuhn
back there. I can't see him very clearly. But when I look at the
top, I see him clearly. But I'm seeing the same person,
not two different people, you see. And that's what I mean when
we say the Scriptures are bifocal. It doesn't have two meanings,
but it has two perspectives. You might even say two applications.
And bifocally, this passage, as all the Old Testament prophecies,
has an application to present-day Israel, to present-day Judah
and their situation. And then it has an application
to us today, to the future, prophetic. But it's the same message, the
same message. Now understand this. First of
all, the nation Israel in the Old Testament, was not the true
church of the living God. When we talk about the church
now, they were a gathering of people in a nation, but they
were not the true church of the living God. The true church of
God, we read about it in Ephesians 4 there, read about it in 1 Peter
2, the building of God. The true church is made up of
God's elect out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation.
That's four in it, tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation. You'll see
that phrase quite often in the scriptures. And what he's doing
there, he's showing that the gospel of God's grace is not
to be preached to and not to be applied to just one class
of people, like one nation, one ethnic group, one socioeconomic
group. In Christ, there's neither Jew
nor Greek, there's neither bond nor free, there's neither male
nor female. In other words, the distinctions
that men glory in, you know, we all glory in our distinctions.
The people from the south, they glory in their southern heritage.
The people from the north, they glory in their northern heritage.
The people in this country glory in this. So we glory in those
distinctions. But what he's saying there is
that when it comes to salvation by the grace of God and the mercy
of God, those distinctions mean absolutely nothing. Nothing. Doesn't matter. God's
church is made up of his elect people. Chosen before the foundation
of the world written in the Lamb's Book of Life out of every tribe,
kindred, tongue, and nation. Justified in Christ. There's
no justification. There's no declaring not guilty.
There's no being declared righteous before God. Accepted except in
the beloved. Accept in Christ. God forbid
that I should glory save in the cross. That's the testimony and
the motto of every member of the true church. Not just local
bodies now, but I'm talking about every member of the true church
which have been redeemed by the blood of Christ. Christ redeemed
every one of them. And then the true church are
those who are called out under the preaching of the true gospel
now, not a false gospel, and we need to make that distinction.
Now you may have heard some things that kind of struck your attention
under a false gospel, but you weren't converted under a false
gospel. Because you see, the Holy Spirit works in connection
with the word of life that drives a sinner to Christ. It tells
me the truth about God and who he is, his holiness and his justice,
as well as his mercy and grace. It tells me who I am, a sinner,
ruined in the fall, condemned in Adam, without hope, without
God in the world. spiritually dead and trespasses
and sins, so much so that even my best efforts cannot save me.
And then tells me the truth of Christ and who he is in his glorious
person and his finished work. And that's the word that the
Spirit uses. Now God may providentially bring us under the sound of the
gospel through many different things, you see, but we're born
again, begotten again by the word of truth. That is by the
Holy Spirit who makes that gospel the power of God unto salvation.
But the true church is made up of those who are born again by
the Spirit. In fact, the word church means called out. Called
out of what? Called out of everything but
Christ. Called out of religion, called out of the world, called
out of everything but Christ. You're called to Christ out of
everything else. Now the Old Covenant. Now, my
point was that the nation Israel is not, in the Old Testament,
was not the true church of the living God. Now, the Old Covenant
didn't provide for any of that. Didn't do it. That's the provision
of the everlasting covenant of grace. And that's shown and expressed
in the language of the Old Testament and the New when it talks about
the New Covenant. When he talks about, I'm going to make a new
covenant, that's not like the covenant I made with their fathers
at Sinai, it's a different covenant. The nation Israel now was not
the true church, but the nation Israel was a type of the true
church. A type, all right, of the true
church. Spiritual Israel. Think about
it. God chose them just like he chose
his true church. God brought them out of the bondage
of Egypt just like he brought us, his true church, out of the
bondage of sin and Satan and the curse of the law. God delivered
them over into the land of promise through the Red Sea. God delivers
His true church over to the land of promise, which is salvation
by the grace of God through the blood of Christ, the Red Sea
of His blood. And so we can talk about, they
wandered in the wilderness for 40 years. Well, we're wandering
in the wilderness. The true church is wandering
in the wilderness right now. That's what you're doing right
now. We're wandering in the wilderness of this fallen world. That's
why we have so much problem. That's why we have so much trouble.
Because of the world, the flesh, and the devil. We're in a constant
battle. This world is not our home. We're pilgrims. You see,
all that language is typified in Israel, wandering through
the wilderness. God preserved them, and He's preserving us,
you see. Their preservation was temporal.
It was ceremonial. It was physical. Our preservation
is eternal, spiritual, in Christ. You see the difference? So, they
were a type of the church. And so when you look at that,
passages like this, that's the way we're gonna look at them,
bifocally. We're gonna look at it as it applies to the nation
Judah, right here, they're coming back from captivity, been in
captivity 70 years. The temple was in ruins, the
city was in ruins, they were commissioned to rebuild the temple
and rebuild the city, they were derelict in their duty as we
often are in many ways. And God sent his preacher, his
prophet, His governors, Mansa Rubble we'll read about, to inspire
them, to build a fire under them, as it were, to rebuild that temple. And so we're gonna look at it
up close, and then we're gonna look at it far away as it applies
to us, spiritual Israel, spiritually and eternally, as it applies
to us in and by the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, throughout its history,
the nation Israel was plagued with persecution and attacks
from foreigners, from enemies, whose goal was the total annihilation
of Israel, that people that God chose. And you know that some
of that even continues today with the Jews. We can see it
in our own recent history with Adolf Hitler who wanted to annihilate
the Jews. We can see it with many of the
Muslims in the Arab countries. They want to annihilate the Jews.
And so that continues on. But God, even amidst all their
persecution, all their enemies, all the ones who attacked them,
and amidst all their failures, you know what happened? God kept
them together. in spite of themselves until God, according to His purpose
and according to His will and according to His plan, brought
final judgment against them because of their sin. What was God's
goal? It was to bring the Messiah through
them. It was, according to the flesh, it was to fulfill His
purpose of salvation and His promise to Abraham. Remember,
He told Abraham, He said, all nations will be blessed through
you. Not just one nation, but all nations. Now, of course,
that doesn't mean every individual in every nation because every
individual in every nation is not blessed. If that were the
case, then we'd have to say our God is a failure and that's blasphemy. He's not a failure. God blesses
all whom he promises to bless. Well, that's how it applies to
national Israel. They were persecuted, attacked,
but God preserved them. Here they were in Babylonian
captivity for 70 years, yet God preserved them. And he did it
miraculously and wondrously through means. We can go back and look
at Daniel, we can look at Zechariah, we can look at Ezekiel. That's
an amazing story, isn't it? How God gave a man like Daniel
favor with several heathen kings who had no No thoughts towards
the true and living God and His promises to Israel, but God preserved
them. Well, now think about this. Now,
look at it as it applies to us. Throughout history, the true
church has always been battered by storms of persecution outside
of itself, weaknesses within. We can go all the way back to
Abel on that one, can't we? Abel was attacked and murdered
by Cain. Isn't that right? There were
times in the history of the true church when evil men, evil tyrants,
tried to eliminate Christians, tried to wipe God's Word from
the face of the earth. But the tyrants died and the
church lives on, the Word of God lives on. God preserves us. There have always been false
teachers within the church spreading destructive heresies, confusion
that lead a lot of people astray and expose false professions.
The church here on earth has been plagued by divisions. It
has. That's the church here on earth.
That's the church yet to be perfected. Paul spoke of a great falling
away in 2 Thessalonians 2, an apostasy of what has come to
be known as the, quote, Christian, unquote, church. People don't
even know what Christianity is. That shouldn't surprise us. The
Apostle John said, brethren, the world will not know us. Yet,
Satan has attacked the church, men have attacked the church,
even true believers. What happens? The flesh gets
in the way all too often, doesn't it? all too often of our growth
and our spiritual prosperity, yet through all of that, Christ
builds and preserves his church. Through all of that, he builds
it. God has always had and will always
have a faithful remnant, faithful to him in spite of all these
problems, in spite of all these negatives, in spite of all these
attacks. Look at Zechariah chapter 1, look at verse 15. That's what
this is saying in the first vision, you remember this? He said in
verse 15, he said, I'm very sore displeased with the heathen that
are at ease. Remember the world at ease? He
said, for I was but a little displeased and they helped forward
the affliction. Who's he talking about? He's
talking about mainly those who persecuted Israel. As it applies
to us, he's talking about those who persecute us, the church,
and all the way down through history and into the future.
He says in verse 16, Therefore thus saith the Lord, I am returned
to Jerusalem with mercies. There's the foundation of our
salvation, God's mercy. His mercy endureth forever. If
it didn't, we'd be lost, we'd be doomed, we'd be destroyed.
It's of the Lord's mercies that we're not consumed. Lamentations
chapter 3. My house shall be built in it.
Now, look at it bifocally. As it applies to present day
Judah, what's he talking about there? He's talking about the
temple. He said, you go back, you rebuild the temple. I'm sending
Zerubbabel, I'm sending Ezra, I'm sending Nehemiah. Back with
you. Joshua, the high priest, rebuild
the temple. His house is going to be built.
The worship of God is gonna be established. Now, when we look
at it far away, how does it apply to us? He's talking about the
church. My house, God's house, shall
be built in it, in it, in that land of grace and promise. Even
despite the captivity, even despite the attacks, even despite the
weaknesses of the flesh that we have, God's gonna build his
church. And he says, saith the Lord of
hosts, he can't be defeated. He can't be stopped. And a line
shall be stretched forth upon Jerusalem. That's the measuring
line. That's the gospel. How's the church going to be
built? By the preaching of the gospel and the power of the Holy
Spirit. Go in all the world and preach the gospel. God's gonna
call his people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation
into his church. And he says in verse 17, cry
yet saying, thus saith the Lord of hosts, my cities through prosperity
shall yet be spread abroad and the Lord shall yet comfort Zion
and shall yet choose Jerusalem. That's his church. Like I said,
now that applies to this nation here in the city of Jerusalem,
in those places in that country, but it applies to us spiritually
in the church. God's gonna build his church.
Christ said, upon this rock I will build my church. What is that
rock? It's the rock of His glorious
person. Who is He? Godman. Our Savior
is the man of sorrows. He's God in human flesh. And
anything that's built upon a rock like that cannot be destroyed.
It's the rock of His finished work, the precious blood. He
redeemed His church with His precious blood. He justifies
us in his righteousness imputed. That can never change. That's
better than what Adam had in the garden before the fall. Did
you know that? That righteousness Adam had in the garden before
the fall was a creature, human righteousness. We have the righteousness
of God in Christ. Unchangeable, eternal. And so
he said, upon this rock I will build my church and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it. And like the man who builds
his house upon a rock, spoken of in Matthew chapter 7, the
church built upon Christ will not fall when the winds come
and the rains come and all of that. He speaks of it in Ephesians
chapter 2 as that which he brought together in one new man. Jew
and Gentile, believers, all under the headship of Christ. And he
said we're founded and put together by the grace of God and Christ
is the chief cornerstone. Everything is measured by him
and he holds it all together. The gates of hell will not prevail
against it. Now that's what this second vision
is about and that's what the third vision is about in chapter
2. It expands upon what he says here in Zechariah 1, 15 through
17. God will defend, he will protect,
he will bless his chosen people in his time. Remember, God remembers.
That's what Zechariah means. God will bless Barakiah, his
father, at his appointed time, Edo, his grandfather. That's
what that means. God remembers his covenant. He
remembered the covenant he made with Abraham as it applies to
these people. God made Abraham physical promises,
temporal promises, but he made Abraham eternal promises too.
Those eternal promises are for the elect of God, the true church
in Christ. But God will defend, protect,
and bless his chosen people in his time. And as that applies
to physical Israel, it applies as they return to the land of
promise until the Messiah comes, the time of reformation spoken
of in Hebrews 9. And it applies to spiritual Israel
in the church. This second vision here, in this
last part of chapter 1, amplifies what he said here in Zechariah
1, 15. He's displeased with the heathen
that are at ease. He says, for I was displeased
but a little, and they helped forward the affliction. For God
brings his just wrath down upon the nations, even those nations
he had used as instruments of his judgment. Think about that. And that may seem unfair to a
lot of people, but it's not. We have to understand that as
God purposed all that and meant it for good, these evil ungodly
nations meant it for evil. And therefore they deserve the
wrath of God. Well, what do we, any of us deserve apart from
Christ? The wrath of God. That's what
we deserve. That's what we've earned. That's God's sovereign right.
That's justice. And so God in His sovereign purpose
and plan, He overrules the evil of men to accomplish His purpose. To accomplish what He sets out
to accomplish in all of His purpose and His plan. And with that in
mind, this is what He's talking about. Zechariah says, I saw
four horns. What are those four horns? Well,
the horn here symbolizes nations and their power. Even though
used of God to persecute and punish Israel for her sins, even
though used of God as a chastisement for her sins, they'd gone too
far and from evil motives with evil goals sought their own way. As this applies to the nation
Israel, The number four makes you think of the four empires
of Daniel, doesn't it? Back in the book of Daniel, remember
Nebuchadnezzar's dream? Spoke of the four world empires,
Gentile empires that persecuted Israel through that time period.
Babylon, Medes and Persians, Greeks and Rome. As it applies prophetically to
the church, what do these four represent? These four powers,
these four ungodly evil powers, well, they represent all ungodly
nations all over the world, north, south, east, and west, four,
the number of the earth. All ungodly nations and ungodly
powers dominated and inspired by Satan in opposition to Christ,
his church, and his gospel. It's the spirit of Antichrist.
That all over the earth stand against Christ and His church.
The book of John, 1 John chapter 5, let me just read this to you.
Listen to how John concludes it here in verse 19. He says
in 1 John 5, 19, And we know that we are of God, and the whole
world lieth in wickedness. That is, in the wicked one. Well,
as he's saying church, he's saying it's us against the world. Well,
could we flee to the north and find relief from the world's
persecutions? No. Could we flee to the south? No. Could we flee to the east
or the west? No. It's all over the world,
all four directions, four horns. That's it. There's no relief
from it. For us, they represent the powers
and nations of the earth and the people of the earth opposing,
afflicting, persecuting, and scattering God's people. And
then he says he saw four carpenters. He listed those four horns, that
scattered Judah, that no man did lift up his head. What he's
saying there in verse 21 is that Judah couldn't save itself from
this. No man could lift up his head. What a great picture of
us in sin, man by nature in sin. persecuted by Satan, accused
of Satan, dead in trespasses and sin. What does that mean?
We can't lift up our head. We can't save ourselves. The
church can't save itself. No individual member of the church
can save himself. Salvation's by grace. It's not
by the power of men. It's not by the will of men.
It's not by the goodness of men. You can't even lift up your head
in your natural condition. God must lift you up by his grace
and his mercy in Christ. That's why Christ had to come
to this world and assume human flesh, human nature without sin,
because we can't get to Him. We can't even look up to Him,
let alone climb up to Him. Salvation by grace. And so, he
saw four carpenters. What are these carpenters? Well,
it's actually skilled craftsmen, artisans. Now some translations
translate it blacksmiths, workers in iron and gold and silver,
things like that. But it's carpenters, that's a
good translation of it, but it's skilled craftsmen. What is he
talking about? He's talking about he's sent
four carpenters to build up. Now the four horns are meant
to take down, to destroy. But these four carpenters are
sent to build up. What are they building? They're
building the church. What are the four horns trying
to destroy? They're trying to destroy the
church, the people of God. What are the four carpenters?
They're building up the church. That's what he's talking about.
How do they do it? Look at verse 21. He says, then said I, what
come these to do? These four horns, and he spake
and saying, these are the horns which have scattered Judah so
that no man did lift up his head. But these, these four carpenters
are come to fray them. The four carpenters build up
the church, number one, by destroying the enemy, and number two, by
bringing the church within itself, gathering together. They fray,
they terrorize the four horns. Now when you get into this and
you read commentators on this, you're going to see that the
Four Horns and the Four Carpenters had a lot of people disagree
over who they're talking about, what they're talking about. Some
say this applies to the world empires, like we mentioned in
Daniel, Babylon, Medes and Persians, Greeks and Romans, and who destroyed
one another. The Medes and Persians destroyed
Babylon. The Greeks destroyed Medes and Persians. Rome destroyed
Babylon. And then when they come to the
fourth one, they have a hard time. They say, that's Christ who will
destroy the revived Roman Empire, as it comes forth in Catholicism,
false gospels, false religion. Some say the four carpenters
are represented by Zerubbabel. Remember, he's the governor in
the line of Judah. He's not sitting on the throne,
but he's in that line. He's a type of Christ, our king.
And then Joshua, he's the high priest. We'll read about him
in chapter 3. And then Ezra and Nehemiah, that
they're the four carpenters. Well, they're ministers of Christ. I know that. But let me give
you this. These four, the four carpenters
here, prophetically, as it applies to the church, the first application
to it, we can apply it to Christ himself, the destroyer of all
our enemies and the builder of the church. That's the first
thing. Christ himself. What did he say
again? Upon this rock, I will build
my church. Now, somebody says to me, well,
there are four carpenters here and Christ is only one. He's
the carpenter of Nazareth. Is this not the carpenter's son?
And there's four here. Well, let me tell you something. He, Christ, I believe here, is
symbolized under the number four because of his power over all
the earth. North, south, east, and west.
Now, let me explain that to you. How many gospels are there? Four
gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And each of those gospels emphasizes
something of the glorious nature of the person and finished work
of Christ. For example, Matthew emphasizes
Christ the king. He's the king of kings, the Lord
of lords. He's the mediator, the mediatorial
king. He's the king of the Jews. He's
the king of his church. He's the one who descended from
on high and took the position of a lowly servant, but he's
still king. And he's exalted now as Lord
over his people in his mediatorial advocacy. He's the advocate of
the church. He's the king who conquered all his enemies. And
even in his supposed defeat in the eyes of the world, The king
was victorious. They put upon his cross the king
of the Jews. They put it there in Greek, Latin,
and Hebrew. Three languages. Because this
thing went out all over the earth. And so even in his supposed defeat,
as the eyes of the world would judge it, he was victorious because
on the cross, having our sins charged to his account, what
did he do? He finished the transgression,
he made an end of sin, He brought in everlasting righteousness. He's the king of righteousness,
the scripture says. That's how Melchizedek typifies
him. He's the king of peace. He's
the one who brought peace between God and his church. Peace is
made by the blood of his cross. He's the king. The book of Mark
emphasizes Christ the servant, the servant of God, the servant
of his church. And as the servant, as the suffering
servant, written down in Isaiah 53, the man of sorrows acquainted
with the grief, we esteemed him not. He was smitten, stricken,
all of that, smitten of men, despised and rejected. But he
was the servant of the Father, doing the Father's will to save
his people from their sins by his obedience unto death. Philippians
chapter 2, made himself of no reputation. All of that. to save us from our sins. In
the book of Luke, his humanity is emphasized. He's the son of
man. For he identified with us in our name and our nature. He
took not on him the seed of angels, but the seed of Abraham. He is
Jesus who shall save us from our sins, His people from our
sins, because He is Emmanuel, God with us. He's the Word made
flesh dwelling among us. He's very man of very man. He
is all man in every attribute of humanity, even with the infirmities
of the flesh, yet without sin. He suffered and died on the cross
to pay our sin debt. He did it as God-man. If he had
not had a human nature, body, and soul, he could not have done
that. God cannot die, but this person who is God did die. That's
to be attributed to his humanity. There's a man in glory. There's
one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. We talked about him in the first
vision that Zechariah had. He was the man who stood among
the myrtle trees. In the bottom, remember that? In Zechariah 1, the first vision,
he was the man riding upon the red horse, that's the horse of
war, his just vengeance against sin, but also the blood of redemption. But he's the man who stood among
the myrtle trees, his church, his people in the bottom. He
came to where we are. You see salvation by grace. True
Christianity is not God looking down and say, begging you to
come where He is. It's Christ coming down into
the bottom, into the very bottom of sin and depravity and bringing
us where He is, justified in Him. In the book of John, His
deity is stressed. He's the Son of God. In the beginning
was the Word. The Word was with God and the
Word was God. The Word was made flesh, dwelt
among us. He is God. He's the I Am. You have the great
I Am statements in the book of John. You see, all four represent
that carpenter from Nazareth. That skilled artisan, skilled
to do what? Not just to make a chair or to
saw a board, but skilled to put away my sins. He's God in human
flesh. He's the one whom God appointed
before the foundation of the world, the Lamb, without blemish
and without spot. He's the surety of the covenant.
My sins were laid upon Him and His righteousness imputed to
me. And He came in time and as a skilled artisan, He kept the
law on every jot and tittle, not one inch Out of place. Not one speck out of place. He defeated all my enemies. He
defeated Satan. He defeated sin. He defeated
the curse of the law. All the horns of power that would
come against me and hinder my salvation. Christ, He frayed
them. That's what it says there. He
frayed them. He terrorized them. That means He killed them. He
put them away. And every enemy that plagues the church then
and now and in the future, he will eventually put away because
all his enemies will be made his footstool. He will preserve
his church. He's God in human flesh. All of his power for his people. And also, I believe that he's
symbolized under the number four here because of his influence
all over the world, northeast, south, and west. Remember in
John chapter 10 and verse 15, he talked about he gave his life
for the sheep. And he said this in verse 16,
he said, other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also
I must bring and they shall hear my voice and there shall be one
fold and one shepherd. He's building his church there.
In Mark 16 verse 15, he commissioned his disciples, go into all the
world and preach the gospel to every creature. In Mark 13 and
verse 9, when he's talking about how his disciples in going out
and preaching the gospel were going to face opposition from
powers that be, he says in verse 10, the gospel must first be
published among all nations, north, south, east, and west,
all four corners of the earth. And so that's the first application
of this to Christ himself. But lastly, The last application,
I believe, is we can apply it to all ministers of Christ. The ministers of the gospel,
commissioned by Christ, gifted by Christ, equipped by Christ,
who have the authority of Christ, who go to the four corners of
the earth to witness for Christ, to lift him up, to do like John
the Baptist did, to point sinners to Christ. to tear down all that
opposes God's truth in his church, all false refuges, all false
hopes, and to build up the church by preaching the gospel. We read
about it in Ephesians chapter four there, how he's given some
apostles and pastors and evangelists and teachers for the perfecting
of the church. We are his instruments, we're
his signpost, as it were, who point sinners in need, who need
mercy and who need grace, to the way of mercy and grace, that
Christ is the way, the truth, and the life, no man cometh unto
the Father but by him. Paul referred to himself this
very way in 1 Corinthians chapter 3 and verse 9. He said, we are
laborers together with God, you're God's husbandry, you're God's
building, he said, according to the grace of God which is
given unto me as a wise master builder. I have laid the foundation,
and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how
he buildeth thereon. God's ministers, his preachers
like skilled artisans whom God chose and equipped to build the
tabernacle. You remember that when God was giving Moses the
instructions to build the tabernacle? He told Moses that I've appointed
and equipped certain men with the skill that it takes to build
these things and to shape these things and to mold these things
in exactly according to the pattern that God gave. Everything had
to be the right dimension. Everything had to be the right
length. I mean, it all had to be the right material. And God
equipped certain men, and through the power of the Holy Spirit,
He endowed them with the gift to be a skilled artisan, like
a carpenter, like a blacksmith, like a silversmith, and a goldsmith,
to make those things exactly as God instructed. They couldn't
use their own volition. They couldn't use their own opinion.
They couldn't fudge here, fudge there. It had to be exact. You want to know why? Because
all of that typified and represented and symbolized salvation by Christ,
who He is, what He did, why He did it, and where He is now.
And that's the way God does His true preachers, like the skilled
artisans that God chose back then. God chooses and He equips
His ministers to preach His gospel, not their own. His word, not
their own. And what for? For the building
of the church. And you know, another point of interest is
this, you know, the number four in scripture is the number of
creation, the number of the earth. And that's why we talk about
the four elements, you know, earth, wind, fire, and water.
We talk about the four directions, north, south, east, west. That's
all earthly, that's all creation, you see. Well, if any man be
in Christ, what is he? He's a new creation. What is the church? The church,
Ephesians chapter two talks about it. We are His workmanship created
in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before ordained
that we should walk in them. This new creation comes under
the preaching of the gospel, the measuring line which we'll
read about in the next vision. And the hammer they use is the
gospel of Christ. Carpenter has to have a hammer,
doesn't he? Well, that's the gospel. Jeremiah said it, Jeremiah
23, 29. He said, it is not my word like
as a fire, saith the Lord, and like a hammer that breaketh a
rock in pieces. Breaks our wills, breaks our
sin, and brings us down. Well, blessed be the Lord. He
has four carpenters with a mighty hammer in their hand by which
they build the walls of Zion and smash the horns of Zion's
enemies to powder. What do you mean, just four?
No, he's got more than four, but they are all over the earth,
north, south, east, west, represented by four. And how do they do this? How do they smash the enemies
of Zion to powder? By the preaching of the gospel
and the power of the Holy Spirit. By lifting up Christ. That's
all you gotta do. Just lift up the banner of Christ,
the horns of evil, The powers of evil and ungodliness and unbelief
will always, always be frayed. Afraid and frayed when you lift
up Christ. Now you stand there in your own
power, they won't be afraid of you. Remember those demons in
that demoniac thing? When the disciples tried to get
him, they said, we don't know who you are. We know the Lord
of glory. We know Jesus of Nazareth, the
Holy One. All of this. And this is all
prophesied. Listen to two verses and I'll
close. Isaiah 58, 12. It says, And they that shall
be of thee, be of God, shall build the old waste places, just
like Israel coming into Jerusalem there. Thou shalt raise up the
foundations of many generations. See, not just one generation.
He's talking about the future. And thou shalt be called the
repairer of the breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in. How do
we do that? By preaching Christ. Isaiah 61.4,
we read this Sunday morning, Isaiah 61, talking about the
joy that we have in Christ. It says, and they shall build
the old waste, they shall raise up the former desolations, and
they shall repair the waste cities, the desolations of many generations,
not just one now. You see, there's more of an application
there than just one generation, many generations. What's he talking
about? He's talking about all the church of the living God
in Christ, all under His headship, all under the redemptive blood
of Christ justified in Him.