Zechariah 7

CHAPTER 7THEME: Historic interlude; question concerning a religious ritual (fasting); threefold answer; when the heart is right, the ritual is right; when the heart is wrong, the ritual is wrong

Zechariah 7:1

HISTORIC INTERLUDEIn chapters 7 and 8 we have what I have labeled a historic interlude. It is very similar to what we also have in the little prophecy of Haggai. In the middle of that prophecy, Haggai was sent to the priest to ask concerning a law: When anything that is ceremonially clean touches that which is unclean, will it make it clean? And, of course, the answer is that it will not. And when that which is ceremonially unclean touches that which is clean, will it make it unclean? The answer is yes, it will. In this historic interlude here in Zechariah, we have the same problem approached from a little different angle. QUESTION CONCERNING A RITUAL (FASTING)The impressive thing here is that again Zechariah is going to have a message for these people, and it is a very important message. He makes it clear that it is not his own message, but it is “the word of the LORD.” “In the fourth year of king Darius …in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chisleu.” If you want me to put this in terms of our calendar, it was December 4, 518 B.C. This is the same period in which Haggai was speaking to the people in a very practical way.

Zechariah 7:2

David Baron’s comment (p. 210) will help us better understand this verse: “It will be noticed that, together with the Revised Version, and almost all modern scholars, we discard the rendering given of the first line of the 2nd verse in the Authorized Version, namely, ‘When they sent unto the House of God.’ Now, Beth-el does mean literally ‘House of God’; but it is never used of the Temple, but only and always of the well-known town of Ephraim, one of the great centers of the Israelitish idolatrous worship set up by Jeroboam the son of Nebat.” In other words, what we have here is a delegation of men sent from Bethel, which means “house of God.” It was called the house of God by Jacob at that time in his life when he thought he was running away from God as well as from his father and his brother Esau. He spent the night at this place, and God gave him a vision. Jacob said of Bethel, “…this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” (Gen_28:17). Bethel was located in the northern kingdom of Israel and is the place where Jeroboam put one of the golden calves to be worshiped. This delegation was not made up of men of the tribe of Judah. They were probably of the tribe of Ephraim. The fact that this delegation came down from Bethel indicates that people from the ten so-called “lost-tribes” were not lost at allsome of them were living at Bethel. If you will read the Book of Ezra very carefully, you will find that many people who returned from the Babylonian captivity returned to towns that were actually north of the Sea of Galilee, an area that belonged to the ten tribes which constituted the northern kingdom of Israel. All twelve tribes were represented in those who returned, although very few actually returned, less than 60,000 all told. My friend, there are no “ten lost tribes of Israel.” Those who returned from the Captivity naturally went back to the places from which they had come, and many of them went to the northern part which was the kingdom of Israel. They happened to be folk born in the Babylonian captivity (Sherezer and Regemmelech are Babylonian names) who returned as Jews back to their own tribe. If you feel that Anglo-Saxons or any other gentile race makes up the “ten lost tribes,” may I say to you, you are very much lost in the maze of Scripture. You may be lost, but the ten tribes are not lost.

Zechariah 7:3

These men have come down from Bethel to speak to the priests in the temple at Jerusalem, and they have come with a question. The question has to do with a ritual: Is a ritual right or is a ritual wrong? The people had begun to fast before the Babylonian captivity and had continued to do so during the Captivity. Psa_137:1-2 says, “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.” They just sobbed out their souls there, and that became a religious function. Actually, God had never given them fast days; He gave seven feast days.

It was their own idea to fast. They had set aside days of fasting and days of weeping and mourning during their captivity, and they continued it after the Captivity, but God was not blessing them. A certain amount of prosperity had come; many of them were building their homes and were getting very comfortable, even affluent. Yet they were weeping and mourning, and they said, “We’ve been doing this but God hasn’t blessed us.” The question here is of the right and wrong of a ritual. This is an important question for us because we are seeing today a recrudescence of ritualistic religion. There is a movement toward formalism, toward adopting a ritual. Formalism is always in evidence when people cease to think. When people get away from the person of Christ, they start either getting up and down or marching aroundthey have to start doing something. This indicates a time of spiritual decline. There was a time when people fought over the prayer book in Europe, as if that were importantwhether you should stand up or sit down or kneel or just how you should pray.

There are many people who want a liturgy or an elaborate ritual. There are religions that are called Christian religions that are ritualistic or liturgical. Even we nonconformists who have come out of the Reformation say that a ritual is repugnant, we despise it, we see in it evil continually, but our services have a certain amount of ritual. We open with the doxology, and everyone stands up for that. We close with a benediction, and somewhere in between there is an offering and a sermon. God gave to the nation Israel a religionit is the only religion He ever gaveand it was ritualistic. Is a ritual right or is a ritual wrong?that is the question of these people. They say, “We’ve been fasting and weeping and wailing, and it looks pretty silly now. It’s gotten very boring. After all, it is a religious rite we are going through, and we’re not getting any results. God doesn’t seem to be blessing us. Should we keep on doing this?” THREEFOLD ANSWERZechariah will give the people God’s answer concerning this question. God doesn’t come out and say that it is wrong to fast, nor does He say it is right. He doesn’t answer the question directly, and yet He answers the question. We will find that there is actually a threefold answer to this question concerning a religious ritual. The first answer is that when the heart is right, the ritual is right (vv. Zec_7:4-7).

The second answer is that when the heart is wrong, the ritual is wrong (vv. Zec_7:8-14). The third answer is found in chapter 8: God’s purpose concerning Jerusalem is unchanged by any ritual. That will answer a great many folk today who are saying, “Let’s do this or that to hasten the coming of Christ.” My friend, you cannot move it up one second by anything you do. Don’t you know that He is running this universe? Anything that you do is not going to interfere with His plan or program.

These people thought that a ritual might have something to do with changing God’s plan. In chapter 8 God will let them know that He intends to accomplish His purpose.

Zechariah 7:4

WHEN THE HEART IS RIGHT, THE RITUAL IS RIGHT"When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh month"that would be the months of August and October. “Even those seventy years"that is, while Israel was in captivity. “Did ye at all fast unto me, even to me?” God says to them, “When you went through your ritual, did you do it for Me? Did you do it to honor Me and to praise Me? Or did you do it as a legalistic sort of exercise that would build up something on the credit side which would make you acceptable to Me and cause Me to bless you?” God does not approve nor does He condemn the ritual. He inquires into their motive. The people say that they have been fasting “these so many years.” Oh boy, you can read between the lines there! Worshiping God had really become boring to them. And the Lord is saying to them, “If you really want to know the truth, I was bored with you also. I thought you were very boring.” I think there are a lot of so-called Christian services which cause God to yawn. I think that He says, “Ho hum, there they go again, jumping through some little hoop as though they think that it will please Me.”

Zechariah 7:6

God says, “You didn’t fast unto Me, and when the fasting was over, you couldn’t wait to get to the table. And when you were eating, did you do it unto Me?” Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “But meat commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse” (1Co_8:8). He went on to say later, “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God” (1Co_10:31). If you can fast to the glory of God, go ahead and fast, but if you are doing it for some reason other than that high motive, don’t do it. Our Christian faith is not a Sunday affair. The test of the Sunday service is the life that is lived the next day.

In the last part of this chapter, God is going to deal with Israel on the very specifics of their business dealings, their social contacts, and their amusements. These were the things that revealed that they did not live their lives unto the Lord at all. There is something more important than the ritual which will determine whether the ritual is right or not.

Zechariah 7:7

“The south [the Negeb] and the plain.” That section all the way up from Beer-sheba, whether you go to Hebron or over to the coast toward Ekron, looks like a big pasture land. It reminds me of the plains of West Texas where I lived as a boy in the days before they irrigated that land. When a wind would come through, it could really blow up a sandstorm the likes of which you had never seen or heard of before. The plains around Beer-sheba are the same kind of land. God says to the people here, “You went through all these rituals before when you were in the land, and what happened? You went into captivity because you did not obey Me, you did not listen to the voice of My prophets.”

Zechariah 7:8

WHEN THE HEART IS WRONG, THE RITUAL IS WRONGBeginning with verse Zec_7:8, God is going to show that a ritual is wrong if the heart is wrong. This is not another way of saying the same thing as He has just said. God will put down on the people’s lives specific commandments, the commandments that have to do with a man’s relationship to man as well as to God, and it will show that their hearts were not right. My friend, it is wrong to think that we can serve Christ and go through a little ritual of doing something while we are not really right with Him. What the Lord Jesus said to Simon Peter following His resurrection is truly beautiful. Do you know what I would have done if I had been in the Lord’s place and had come to Simon Peter?

I would have bawled him out for denying me. I would have told him what kind of fellow I thought he was. But the Lord Jesus said to him, “Do you love Me?” My friend, it is not the ritual you go through, but it is the attitude of your heart that is important to Him. To some church members, religion is a rite or a ritual or a legalistic and lifeless form, a liturgical system marked by meaningless and wearisome verbiage. There is a lot of religious garbage in our so-called conservative and evangelical churches also. There is a ceaseless quoting of tired adjectives and a jumble of pious platitudes. We so often hear people say, “We want to share our faith.” My friend, most people don’t have enough faith to share. It’s not your faith when you share about how wonderful you are or what wonderful things God did for you. You are to witness to Jesus Christ, who He is and what He did for you.

In talking about salvation, people say, “Commit your life to Him.” If you ask them what they mean, they say, “Yield your life to Him.” Do you really think He wants your life? He says that our righteousness and even our so-called good deeds are filthy rags in His sight. God doesn’t want your dirty laundry, my friend. I am afraid that we have gotten into the habit of using words that take away the real meaning of the gospel. There is another word that is surely being worn out and whose tread is really becoming thin. Love is a high word of Scripture, but it has been worn out on the freeway of present-day usage.

It has been emasculated of its rich, vital, virile, and vigorous Bible meaning. It’s been degraded to the level of a bumper sticker which says, “Honk if you love Jesus!” The other day I noticed that the people ahead of me were honking and going around a little car that was being driven very slowly in the fast lane of the freeway. Car after car had to detour around this man. As I came up to him, I thought that I would honk at him also, but then I saw his bumper sticker which said, “Honk if you love Jesus!” As I went around him, I gave him a hard look. If I could have had an opportunity to speak to him, I would have told him that if you love Jesus, you don’t run around honking your horn. If you love Jesus you’re going to live a life of obedience to Him, and you will be courteous to other people. My point is that today there is a great deal of “churchianity” that is bland and bloodless, tasteless and colorless. It is devoid of warmth and feeling. There is no personal relationship with Christ that is meaningful and productive. One liberal pastor wrote that it made him sick to hear people talk of a personal relationship with Christ. I would surely make him sick if he would listen to me because the thing you have to have, my friend, is a personal relationship with Christ. Your ritual and your liturgy are not worth the snap of your fingers unless you have a life that is related to Jesus Christ. If there is no deep yearning for a life that is well pleasing to Him, if there is no stimulating desire to know Him and His Word, church membership is just like a young man falling in love with a furnished apartment and marrying an electric stove, a refrigerator, a vacuum cleaner, a garbage disposal, and a wet mop! That is just about all it amounts to. A maiden lady was asked why she had never gotten married, and she gave a very interesting answer. “I have a stove that smokes, I have a dog that growls around the house, I have a parrot that cusses, and I have a lazy cat that loafs around all day and then is out half the nightso why do I need a husband?” May I say to you, that is the kind of relationship that a great many folk have to God and to Christ. Let’s stop playing church today and start loving Christ and living for Him! I want to share with you two of the most remarkable letters that I have received in many a day. The first comes from a little town in Tennessee: I discovered your program out of Memphis only about six months ago, just when I needed it most. Isn’t that just like our lovely Lord? I am a born-again Christian, only two years old. That is truly something for a 55-year-old grandmother to have to admit. My husband is a retired regular army dentista heart patient. We moved 33 times in 26 years before retiring on this little farm here in the boondocks.

We played church. I even taught a women’s Sunday school class, and my husband was a deacon. I can’t speak for him, but all I had was head knowledge and very little heart knowledge. The young minister in the church where we have gone for 14 years is so liberal he thinks the belief in the virgin birth unnecessary and sees no conflict between transcendental meditation and Christianity. We stuck it out for a year and then left the church. I would be less than honest to say I don’t miss a church home since I’ve had church homes like that. The other letter comes from Southern California: I am a wife and mother under 30, and I’ve been a Christian since I was 3½. I have often thought of writing but didn’t think I had anything meaningful to say. Well, I’ve changed my mind. Several years ago I knew a lady quite well who was constantly pushing your program at me. This lady was a terrible housekeeper, had an unhappy husband and marriage and five unruly children. But she listened to her Christian programs from morning till night.

Naturally, I associated her fanaticism with you and would not listen. During the past three years, however, I have been listening to you weekdays and sometimes on Sunday before church …I love the study of the Word. I get so much from your theology and your knowledge of the Scriptures. I wish that I could find a pastor locally who preached as well. Our time is so short, and I’m glad you’re filling each minute with vital news of God. I wish I could have seen past that lady’s disorderly life a long time ago.

God bless you in your work, thou good and faithful servant. Here was a woman who listened to all the Christian programs, who was a fanatical Christian, but who had a home and a life that were a disgrace to the cause of Christ. My friend, a ritual is no good to a person like that. Likewise, there’s nothing wrong with a ritual if you are right with God and if you love Jesus Christ. This reminds me of the little girl and the story of the three bears. The little girl’s mother was having guests for dinner and she sent the little girl upstairs to go to bed early. She gave her instructions, telling her she knew how to undress, put on her pajamas, and kneel down to have her prayer. The next morning at the breakfast table, the mother asked the little girl how she did. “Just fine” was the reply. “Did you say your prayers?” “Well, kind of.” “What do you mean ‘kind of’?” the mother asked. The little girl explained, “Well, I got down on my knees to say that prayer I always say, and I just thought that maybe God got tired of hearing the same thing all the time, so I just crawled into bed, and I told Him the story of the three little bears.” I think God enjoyed that evening when that precious little girl already sensed that there is something wrong with a ritual when the heart is not in it. I think God listened to the story of the three bears. I wish that some church services today could be that interesting, and I think it would get God’s attention. Why do we have all these problem churches today? Why do we have all these problem Christians today? It is because we are going through a rite, we are going through a ritual, we are performing a liturgy without a heart for God Himself.

Even we in fundamental churches open with the doxology, close with a benediction, with something in between, and we feel like we’ve been to church. Have we really? Have we been drawn to the person of Christ? Do we know Him? Do we love Him? You can go through any ritual you want to, and it will be all right if you are right with the Lord, my friend. The importance of ritual is still a very moot question for people today. Should I go through this ceremony or should I do this or should I do that? I believe that certain ceremonies, certain rituals are important. I believe there are two sacraments in the church, and I believe they are all-important. One sacrament is baptism, and the other is the Lord’s Supper. The important thing is that baptism is believer’s baptism.

The emphasis should be taken off the mode and put on the heart of the one being baptized: Is he born again? I personally believe in immersion although I was raised in a church that taught otherwise. I have been both sprinkled and immersedthat way I can’t miss, as you can see. My wife was Southern Baptist, she was immersed, and she still thinks that was pretty important. I like to kid her, “It will sure be embarrassing for you if you and I get to heaven and find that immersion was not the right mode. I’ve had the other, and you haven’t.” I say that facetiously, and I say it for this reason: As important as the sacraments are, they are no good, my friend, unless you’ve turned to Jesus Christ and you have a personal relationship with Him and your sins have been forgiven.

I am also afraid that the Lord’s Supper is absolutely meaningless for many peopleit would be better for them if they didn’t go through with it. But if your heart is right, the Lord’s Supper is absolutely important. It was Lange who made this statement: “God’s eye of grace and our eye of faith meet in the sacraments.” Before the Captivity, God judged Jerusalem when the hearts of the people were far from Him although they were going through the rituals. In verse Zec_7:7 God said to them, “Should ye not hear the words which the LORD hath cried by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and the cities thereof round about her, when men inhabited the south and the plain?” In effect He said, “You went through the rituals before the Captivity, and I sent you into captivity. Why? The ritual had nothing to do with it. It was because your hearts were wrong, and the heart is the thing that is important.” In the last section of this chapter, God very specifically spells out those things the people were doing which alienated them from Himself. He will be dealing with that part of the Ten Commandments which have to do with man’s relationship to man. The previous section of the chapter had to do with a man’s relationship to Godwhen the heart is not rightly related to God, the ritual is wrong. In this section the ritual is wrong if the heart is wrong. By putting these commandments right down upon their lives, God will specifically reveal the things they were doing wrong. We are not dealing with sin today as we should. If you knew me like I know myself, you would not continue to read what I have to say. But wait a minute, if I knew you like you know yourself, I don’t think I’d bother to write to you. May I say to you, we are sinners. When I was a pastor in downtown Los Angeles, I knew a dear little lady who had been a Bible teacher. Whenever I would talk about the fact that we are saved sinners, she always wanted to correct me. She would say, “Dr. McGee, after we are saved, we’re not sinners.” “I don’t know about you, but I’m still a sinner,” I would tell her. “If your sins have been forgiven, you’re not a sinner.” “No, I’m a saved sinner, I’m a forgiven sinner, but I’m still a sinner, and I will be a sinner as long as I live on this earth. ‘Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is’ (1Jn_3:2). In that day when you see Vernon McGee, I won’t be a sinner, but until that day, I’m a sinner.” My friend, both you and I are sinners. All of us are sinners before God, and I am delighted to know that this belief is coming back into style. I have a clipping of a prominent doctor of psychology who states that he used to go along with Freudian psychology which teaches that the reason you are such a lousy person is because your mama didn’t give you the proper affection that you should have had or that maybe you weren’t a breast-fed baby and that is the reason you have gone in for promiscuous sex. My friend, what nonsense that is! Now this doctor has changed his position, and he writes, “The realities of personal guilt and sin have been glossed over as only symptoms of emotional illness or environmental conditioning for which the individual isn’t considered responsible. But there is sin which cannot be subsumed under verbal artifacts such as disease, delinquency, deviancy.

There is immorality. There is unethical behavior. There is wrongdoing.” In other words, my friend, you and I are sinners. I have been saying that for years. Even when I studied psychology in college, I did not buy behaviorism. I frankly believe that God alone knows about humanity and about our hearts. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jer_17:9).

Only God knows it, and He alone knows it. If we could see ourselves as God sees us, we couldn’t stand ourselves. Only God could put up with us. Oh, if we would just come to the Word of God and rest in the Word of God! God is going to be specific with them and put these commandments right down upon their lives. This is what we need to do also. I do not mean to step on your toes, but I am trying to tell you what the Word of God says.

Let me illustrate my point. If all the church officers in this country would simply read the Pastoral Epistles (1 and 2 Timothy and Titus) to see what are God’s requirements for being an officer in the church, and if they would simply follow those requirements, over one-half of the church officers in this country would resign before next Sunday. The church would be better off, and I think a revival would break out in many places. When I teach those epistles, I receive less mail from my listeners than during any other period of time. Why? Because they do not like to hear what the Word of God has to say.

Even some of us preachers would have to walk out of the pulpit and never enter it again if we really followed what the Word of God says. There is little wonder that the church has the problem that it has. There is little wonder that it is filled with a bunch of babies, sucking their thumbs, crying loud and long unless they are given some attention, a rattle to play with, or maybe a yo-yo. They take some little course of instruction and think that that makes them a full-grown child of God in a few weeks. These little courses are not even an all-day sucker for the babe. During the Second World War when there was a shortage of officers, they instituted a ninety-day course to produce second lieutenants. They were called “the wonder boys.” We sure have a lot of “wonder Christians” who know nothing about the Word of God. Again let me illustrate what I am talking about. Although I have taken as long as five years to teach the entire Bible, I feel like I am a babe as far as the Word of God is concerned. I’ve missed so much even teaching at that slow pace. I hesitate to teach the Book of Revelation, although I consider it the most mechanical, the most simple book in the Word of God. I approach it with fear and trembling. Yet there are pastors and teachers who have been in a church or with a group for just a short period of time who are already teaching Revelation.

My friend, there are sixty-five books that come before Revelation, but prophecy is popular and made to be sensational. Sir Robert Anderson calls this “the wild utterances of prophecy mongers.” Many of us are willing to settle for the better things of life when God wants us to have the best things. Oh, that we would put our lives under the spotlight of the Word of God. Zechariah isn’t just giving his opinion. He is saying to the people, “This is what God has to say, and this is God’s answer to you. The ritual is wrong if the heart is wrong.” Now God is going to put the spotlight down on the people

Zechariah 7:9

It will be helpful for us to take a close look at the last of the Ten Commandments. The first four commandments have to do with a man’s relationship to God. The next commandment is a bridge and has to do with man’s relationship to his parents. There is a period in his life when that little fellow in the home looks up to his mama and papa; they are actually God to him, and that is the way God intended it to be. The reason children are to obey their parents when they’re growing up is so that later on they will be able to obey the Lord Jesus. Now notice the last five commandments: “Thou shalt not kill.

Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s” (Exo_20:13-17). You are not to covet his Cadillac nor the lovely home that he lives inyou are not to covet these things at all. Notice how we can put these commandments right down upon our lives. “Thus, speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment"don’t bear false witness. “And shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother"you are not to steal, not to lie, not to covet. “And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor"oh, boy, this is getting right down where we live. “Let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart.” The Lord Jesus brought all the commandments up to a higher plane, although He only cited two commandments as illustrations. But He said that if you are angry with your brother, you are guilty of murder. God is saying that although Israel went through the rituals, you ought to have met them on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday! On Friday night they started through the rituals again, and they would weep and mourn and fast and bring sacrifices. In the Book of Malachi God says to them, “You say that those sacrifices made you sick. You ought to have been in My positionthey nauseated Me.”

Zechariah 7:11

The people did not want to hear what God wanted them to hear, and there are people today in the same position. They “pulled away the shoulder"how vivid this is! When I was a little fellow in southern Oklahoma, the little country school put on a program. I think I was in about the fifth grade, and my class was sitting down front. I was causing some kind of disturbance (I don’t know whyI was such a good boy!) and my father, who was sitting in the back, walked down and touched me on the shoulder. I turned and pulled that shoulder away. Oh, what a brat I was to do a thing like that!

My dad took me by the hand, led me out the side door, and he said, “Son, I’m going to give you a whipping.” That wasn’t anything new, but he went on to say, “I’m not going to give it to you because you were making a disturbance. I’m going to give it to you because you pulled away from me when I put my hand on your shoulder. You were disobedient.” Then for the next few minutes he impressed upon me that I wasn’t to do that sort of thing. God says of Israel, “I touched them on the shoulder, and they pulled away the shoulder.” There are many people in our churches today whom God is touching on the shoulder and saying, “Wait a minute. Don’t do that. Don’t live that kind of life.” They pull away their shoulder, they stop their ears, and they don’t want to hear what God has to say. I was baby-sitting my little grandson out in the yard when he did something he shouldn’t have done. He got into my flower bed and was ruining one of my camellias. I told him to get out, but he looked at me and said, “I’m not going to get out.” (He takes after his grandmother quite a bit, as you can see!) He started back in, and I put my hand on his shoulder to stop him. He did that same thinghe pulled away. It reminded me of another little boy about sixty-five years ago. I knew what my dad had done, and since I’m his grandfather, I took him and turned him across my knee, and I gave him quite a little lesson. My daughter applauded me for it and said, “I thought you had him so spoiled that you’d never correct him.” “But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.” This is what these spoiled brats who had come down from Bethel had been doing; in fact, the whole nation had been doing it. The reason Israel had gone into captivity was not because they didn’t have light. God had put His hand on their shoulder, the prophets had spoken to them, but they “stopped their ears, that they should not hear.” In other words, they turned their backs on God. They had broken the commandments which relate to God, and they were guilty before Him. Going through a religious ritual will not do you a bit of good if your heart is not right, my friend. Until you get your life straightened out, there is no use becoming religious. Actually, that will only make you a member of the crowd the Lord Jesus called hypocrites. Have you ever noticed that He never called a believer a hypocrite? In the Bible, you’ll never find a real believer called a hypocrite. It is those who pretend, those who have religion, those who have, as the Lord Jesus said, washed the outside of the cup while the inside is still putrid, who are called hypocrites (see Mat_23:25-26).

This was the problem with the people of Israel. God simply put down on their lives the Ten Commandments, beginning with the commandments which relate to man. How were they acting in their business and social and home lives? When He did this, it really showed them up, and it showed the reason why God had not heard and answered their prayers.

Zechariah 7:12

“Therefore came a great wrath from the LORD of hosts.” The destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and the carrying away of these people into Babylon was a sad thing, a tragic thing, an awful thing. They were religious, they were going through a ritual, but their hearts were far from God, and they were a disgrace to Him.

Zechariah 7:13

God says to these people, “I cried to you, and I pled with you, but you would not listen to Me.” Then when they got into trouble, they said, “We don’t want to go into captivity. We’ll come back to You.” And God now says, “I didn’t hear you.” There are a lot of prayers today that God doesn’t hear. I get a little weary of this sentimental rot that is shown on our television screens. In these weepy sob stories, some reprobateeither man or womanlives any kind of life he wants, but when his little child gets sick, he goes in and kneels by the bed to plead with God for the life of the child! I don’t think God hears that prayer, my friend. I’ll be honest with you: you’ve got to get right with God yourself before you are going to get anywhere with Him by praying. God makes it clear that the other is nothing in the world but religious rot, and it will not get you anywhere at all.

Zechariah 7:14

I want you to note that God says that He made the pleasant land desolate. He not only judged the people but also the land. Many people go to that land today and are greatly disappointed because they’ve heard that it is the land of milk and honey. It was that at one time; it was like the Garden of Eden. But I think people are trying to kid themselves when they say today, “Oh, isn’t this a beautiful land!” My friend, it is rocky, it is dry, it is a most desolate place. If you can find anything pretty on the way down from Jerusalem to Jericho and the Dead Sea, I wish that you would point it out to me.

It is as bad as the desert in eastern California and in Arizona. It is really a desolate place, and there are very few beautiful spots in that land. It was the pleasant land, but it’s the desolate land today. One of the proofs that prophecy is not being fulfilled today is the fact that the land has not been restored. I know that the Jews have moved back there and have become a nation, but they have been in trouble ever since. At the time I am writing this, I have just heard from a friend who has recently returned from there. He tells me that taxes in Israel are higher than in any place in the world. Are you going to call that “the promised land,” and are you going to hold God responsible for that? I don’t think He has returned the people back to that land at the present time.

My friend also reported to me that a great many of the people who are there now want to leave the land. What is that going to do to these Bible teachers who are trying to date everything in prophecy from the beginning of the modern nation of Israel? My friend, Israel is still a desolate land today, but it’s going to become the pleasant land again someday.