March 10, 2019 – Looking Backward and Forward from Zechariah – Rescued and Empowered

Rescued and Empowered

Deuteronomy 12:8-14 - New International Version (NIV)

⁸ You are not to do as we do here today, everyone doing as they see fit, ⁹ since you have not yet reached the resting place and the inheritance the Lord your God is giving you. ¹⁰ But you will cross the Jordan and settle in the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, and he will give you rest from all your enemies around you so that you will live in safety. ¹¹ Then to the place the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for his Name—there you are to bring everything I command you: your burnt offerings and sacrifices, your tithes and special gifts, and all the choice possessions you have vowed to the Lord. ¹² And there rejoice before the Lord your God—you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levites from your towns who have no allotment or inheritance of their own. ¹³ Be careful not to sacrifice your burnt offerings anywhere you please. ¹⁴ Offer them only at the place the Lord will choose in one of your tribes, and there observe everything I command you.

What are the Israelites not to do in the Promised Land (verse 8)?

Where have the Israelites not yet reached (verse 9)?

Who is giving the Israelites the land across the Jordan (verse 10)?

In your opinion, what is “the place the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for his name” (verse 11)?

What are the Israelites to do in this place (verse 12)?

In your opinion, why should the Iraelites “be careful not to sacrifice your burnt offerings anywhere you please” (verse 13)?

Where are the Israelites to present their burnt offerings (verse 14)?

What else are the Israelites to do (verse 14)?

In your opinion, what happened to change Naomi’s situation so drastically?

Zechariah 9:1-17 - New International Version (NIV)           

¹ A prophecy:

The word of the Lord is against the land of Hadrak
    and will come to rest on Damascus—
for the eyes of all people and all the tribes of Israel
    are on the Lord—
² and on Hamath too, which borders on it,
    and on Tyre and Sidon, though they are very skillful.
³ Tyre has built herself a stronghold;
    she has heaped up silver like dust,
    and gold like the dirt of the streets.
⁴ But the Lord will take away her possessions
    and destroy her power on the sea,
    and she will be consumed by fire.
⁵ Ashkelon will see it and fear;
    Gaza will writhe in agony,
    and Ekron too, for her hope will wither.
Gaza will lose her king
    and Ashkelon will be deserted.
⁶ A mongrel people will occupy Ashdod,
    and I will put an end to the pride of the Philistines.
⁷ I will take the blood from their mouths,
    the forbidden food from between their teeth.
Those who are left will belong to our God
    and become a clan in Judah,
    and Ekron will be like the Jebusites.
⁸ But I will encamp at my temple
    to guard it against marauding forces.
Never again will an oppressor overrun my people,
    for now I am keeping watch.

⁹ Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion!
    Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
    righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
    on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
¹⁰ I will take away the chariots from Ephraim
    and the warhorses from Jerusalem,
    and the battle bow will be broken.
He will proclaim peace to the nations.
    His rule will extend from sea to sea
    and from the River to the ends of the earth.
¹¹ As for you, because of the blood of my covenant with you,
    I will free your prisoners from the waterless pit.
¹² Return to your fortress, you prisoners of hope;
    even now I announce that I will restore twice as much to you.
¹³ I will bend Judah as I bend my bow
    and fill it with Ephraim.
I will rouse your sons, Zion,
    against your sons, Greece,
    and make you like a warrior’s sword.

¹⁴ Then the Lord will appear over them;
    his arrow will flash like lightning.
The Sovereign Lord will sound the trumpet;
    he will march in the storms of the south,
¹⁵     and the Lord Almighty will shield them.
They will destroy
    and overcome with slingstones.
They will drink and roar as with wine;
    they will be full like a bowl
    used for sprinkling the corners of the altar.
¹⁶ The Lord their God will save his people on that day
    as a shepherd saves his flock.
They will sparkle in his land
    like jewels in a crown.
¹⁷ How attractive and beautiful they will be!
    Grain will make the young men thrive,
    and new wine the young women.

Where are the eyes of “all people and all the tribes of Israel” (verse 1)?

What will the Lord do to Tyre (verse 4)?

What will those who are left become (verse 7)?

Where will the Lord encamp (verse 8)?

Why is Daughter Zion to “rejoice greatly” (verse 9)?

In your opinion, what does it mean that “he will proclaim peace to the nations” (verse 10)?

Why will the Lord “free your prisoners from the waterless pit” (verse 11)?

Who is to return to their fortress (verse 12)?

Who will “sound the trumpet” (verse 14)?

How will the Lord God save His people (verse 16)?

In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?

In your opinion, how is the inheritance promised to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 12:8-14 different from the salvation that is promised in Zechariah 9:1-17?  How are they similar?

John 12:12-19 – New International Version (NIV)

¹² The next day the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. ¹³ They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting,

“Hosanna!”

“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!”

“Blessed is the king of Israel!”

¹⁴ Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, as it is written:

¹⁵ “Do not be afraid, Daughter Zion;
    see, your king is coming,
    seated on a donkey’s colt.”

¹⁶ At first his disciples did not understand all this. Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize that these things had been written about him and that these things had been done to him.

¹⁷ Now the crowd that was with him when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to spread the word. ¹⁸ Many people, because they had heard that he had performed this sign, went out to meet him. ¹⁹ So the Pharisees said to one another, “See, this is getting us nowhere. Look how the whole world has gone after him!”

What heard that “Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem” (verse 12)?

How did the meet Him (verse 13)?

What did Jesus sit on (verse 14)?

Who is “coming, seated on a donkey’s colt” (verse 15)?

In your opinion, why did Jesus’ disciples not understand all this at the time (verse 16)?

When did they understand (verse 16)?

Who “continued to spread the word” (verse 17)?

What did people do when they heard that Jesus “had performed this sign” (verse 18)?

How did the Pharisees react (verse 19)?

In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?

In your opinion, how do some of the people that are mentioned in John 12:12-19 honor the command of Moses to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 12:8-14 to “rejoice before the Lord your God”?

In your opinion, how do some of Zechariah’s prophecies about the king who comes “lowly and riding on a donkey” in Zechariah 9:1-17 enrich our understanding of what it meant for Jesus to enter Jerusalem riding a donkey in John 12:12-19?

Ephesians 3:14-21 – New International Version (NIV)

¹⁴ For this reason I kneel before the Father, ¹⁵ from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. ¹⁶ I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷ so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸ may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

²⁰ Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, ²¹ to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Who does Paul do before “the Father” (verse 14)?

What does “every family in heaven and on earth” derive from the Father (verse 15)?

Through who does Paul pray that “out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power” (verse 16)?

In your opinion, what does it mean that “Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith” (verse 17)?

What does Paul pray we may have the power to grasp  (verse 18)?

What “surpasses knowledge” (verse 19)?

How does Paul want us to be filled (verse 19)?

What is God able to do (verse 20)?

Where should there be glory to the Father (verse 21)?

In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?

In your opinion, why are the instructions that Moses gives the Israelites before they enter the Promised Land in Deuteronomy 12:8-14 about what they will give to God and the instructions that Paul gives to the new church in Ephesians 3:14-21 about what they may receive from God?

In your opinion, why does Zechariah 9:1-17 focus more on what God will do for the people who will be rescued and Ephesians 3:14-21 focus more on the vastness of God’s love and being filled with God? 

In your opinion, how does knowing that Jesus voluntarily road a donkey into the city where he would die on on the cross in John 12:12-19 help us understand the width, length, height and depth of His love as Paul prayed in Ephesians 3:14-21?

In your opinion, what do these passages from Deuteronomy, Zechariah, John and Ephesians show us about the difference between “everyone doing as they see fit” and being filled “to the measure of all the fullness of God”?

In your opinion, how can we move from being people who are rescued to people who bring glory to the Father through “his power that is at work within us”?

(sprucewhispers.blogspot.com)