The LORD Shall Be King Over All The Earth

I'm going to ask you to turn in your Bibles into the book of Zechariah, in chapter 14. I read the full chapter last week, I'm just going to read verses 1 -11, and we will be chiefly concerned with verses 6 -11.

This is the Lord's holy and infallible word. Behold, the day of the Lord is coming, and your spoil will be divided in your midst. For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem. The city shall be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished.

Half of the city shall go into captivity, but the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city. Then the Lord will go forth and fight against those nations, as He fights in the day of.

Battle.

And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which faces Jerusalem on.

The east.

And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, from east to west, making a very large valley. Half of the mountain shall move toward the north, and half of it toward the south. Then you shall flee through my mountain valley, for the mountain valley you shall reach to Azal.

Yes, you shall flee as you fled from the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Thus the Lord my God will come, and all the saints with you. It shall come to pass in that day that there will be no light.

The lights will diminish. It shall be one day which is known to the Lord, neither day nor night, but at evening time it shall happen that it will be light. And in that day it shall be that living waters shall flow from Jerusalem, half of them toward the eastern sea, and half of them toward the western sea.

In both summer and winter it shall occur. And the Lord shall be king over all the earth. In that day it shall be the Lord is one, and His name one. All the land shall be turned into a plain from Geba to Ramon south of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem shall be raised up and inhabited in her place, from Benjamin's gate to the place of the first gate and the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananel to the king's wine presses. The people shall dwell in it, and no longer shall there be utter destruction, but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited.".

May the Lord be pleased with our study and meditation upon His word. Please pray with me. O Lord, we acknowledge and rejoice that you are king. We thank you for apocalyptic passages of scripture which are hard to understand, but the message is simple.

You O Lord have the ultimate victory. You O Lord reign and shall reign. Encourage these, your people today O Lord. Cause them to walk in greater obedience and allegiance to you, and fill them with joy.

And gladness.

And we ask these things in Jesus' name, amen.

Please be seated.

As we progressed through the book of Zechariah, we were challenged often to understand some of these tricky phrases and interpretations, and of what time frame do these things speak, and these kinds of questions that arise when you're studying the prophets, and we've been blessed to consider this very Christological, very Messianic book in Zechariah.

And when we get to chapter 14, we realize that the end is in view. And there are two ends. There's the end of Israel as it was, decimated in AD 70, and the end of all things, yet future for us. Both of these are at play in Zechariah 14, and in fact, I believe the AD 70 destruction of Israel, Jerusalem, is a foretaste of what will come upon the disobedient apostate nations.

They're going to be utterly destroyed. Kiss the sun, lest his wrath is kindled but a little. But what about today? The King is coming. It started the chapter this way, behold the day of the Lord is coming.

The King is going to return. He's going to renew his creatures and his creation, and there's a very powerful picture of this in the very beginning of our section. He is the light of the new creation. He is the fount of living water.

He is the limitless supply of mercy and grace and life, and he reigns over all the earth. And his worshiping people will dwell in safety, prosperity, and peace, even though now, if need be, they will be grieved and have to endure various trials.

Let's consider our text, beginning at verse 6. It shall come to pass in that day that there will be no light. What did God say in the beginning? Let there be light. Something so cataclysmic is going to happen that the sun is going to be wrapped in sackcloth.

The stars are going to diminish. The twinkle, the sparkle is going to go away because the glory of Christ is going to overshadow, overtake them all. His glory is greater than all the stars of heaven. He is, after all, the light of the world.

Now, this is almost an inversion of the creation account, isn't it? In the beginning, God said, let there be light. And now, this season, there's something about this language that says this is going to end and it's going to be different.

And, of course, this language is very prominent in Revelation. He's going to be the light that fills the city. We're not going to have need of sun or moon because Christ in His glory, He's going to be the light.

The heat, the light that we need is going to come emitted from Christ in His person. It shall be, verse 7 says, in one day, this greater day, this judgment day, which is known only to the Lord, neither day nor night, but at evening time, it shall happen that it will be light.

Now, some of you may have the ESV and they do some things to try to help understand the interpretation of this. I think Calvin's explanation of this may be one of the better ones that I've read. And it's basically this.

There is a glory that overtakes the sun, the moon, and the stars, the glory of Christ. But there's an icy mist today. We don't see the fullness of what's happening. The reality is that this is the king's earth.

We don't see it fully. The unbelieving man doesn't recognize it. The church is the redeemed in Christ, and yet she's sometimes weak and sometimes strong. It's the reality of the world in which this is real for us.

One day, which is known to the Lord, neither day nor night, but at evening time, it shall happen that it will be light. It's not supposed to be light at evening time, but the light's going to burst forth.

It's going to pierce through the icy mist, and all of this will be revealed. Now, I want to pause here because I was thinking about something related to this, and I was thinking about our title of our message, and it's The Lord Shall Be King Over All the Earth.

And I was thinking that language of shall be is future in our minds, that someday the Lord shall be king, and this is probably the dominant position, even now in reformed circles. There's never been a day when he's not been the king, and in fact, it's been an unveiling from the beginning.

He's the king of glory before there's a creation. He's the king of all of the earth on the day of creation. It's his creation. He reigns and rules over it. The incarnation of Christ is a greater unveiling and realization that God himself is king, but he's never not been king.

And what about the cross? What about the burial? What about the resurrection? What about the ascension of Christ? We see a greater unveiling of the incarnate one, the second person of the Trinity. His kingship is magnified and enlarged in these events.

We learn more and more of his kingship. And so too, the enlargement of his kingdom, the recognition of the nations that he is king is progressively moving to a day when everyone's going to know it. It's never not been true.

He's always been king, and now as time goes on, we're seeing more and more of the fullness and revelation of his kingship. And we also have to remember, when considering these things, we like to affix dates and times and there is mysteries to this, and that's affirmed here in verse 7, this one day when all of this will be resolved, this day is known only to the Lord.

One day, that day, the glorious day, the glory of Christ, his light is going to overtake and outshine all the others. The presence of God, who is light, all earthly light, one author says, will grow pale.

And this language is riddled throughout the scripture, so this language that is mysterious, it's hard to discern and understand. It's finding its realization, this prophetic language, this apocalyptic language finds its realization in Christ on his day.

Joel 3 says, the sun and moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. That means that the new creation is overtaken, the creation that we can see. There's a transfiguration of the existing order into greater glories.

I don't believe it's the disposal of the old world, but it's transfiguration into the glorious new heavens and new earth. Isaiah 24 says, the moon shall be confounded, and the language of this is so amazing, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem.

Isaiah 13 says, behold, the day of the Lord cometh. The stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light. The sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to.

Shine.

You say, well that sounds spectacular and amazing, and the Lord Jesus himself attributed this partial fulfillment, at least, in Matthew 24. It says, immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened.

The moon will not give its light. The stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken. These things happen in a progression in time. Judgment coming upon Israel, very prominent theme in Zechariah.

This cannot be questioned. That is a huge theme in Zechariah. It comes to pass. It was the end of the world for them. But there's a yet future day when all the wicked will endure a similar fate, the day of the Lord in the future.

There's going to be a time when all of the rights, all the wrongs will be righted, all of the injustices will find justice, the name of Christ and his people will be vindicated on the earth, and in this we have great assurance.

We should have great confidence and great hope. There is a dawning of a new creation. As I think about this, I think about you dear saints. Someday, you're going to be glorified in heaven. Today, you have a perfect union with Christ, but someday it's going to be more perfect.

Today, your sins are forgiven, but you walk in sin sometimes. This already and not yet is the world in which we live. We are citizens of heaven. We are princes in the king's court, and yet here we are mucking about in this world.

We're sinners, we fail the king, we have divided allegiances, we have disloyalties. Someday, all of that will be removed and we will forever, with all of his saints, dwell in his glorious presence, free from the bondage of all of this.

But we possess it now. It's ours now because we've been united to Christ. Let's continue on to the second point. I didn't give you my outline. The first is the new creation, which I just finished. Second will be the living waters flowing out of Jerusalem.

Look at verse eight. It says, in that day, it shall be that living waters shall flow from Jerusalem. Now, you and I hear that and we go, it's okay, it's great. We love this idea of waters flowing out of Jerusalem.

But I think the author's intent, the Lord, the Holy Spirit, also wanted us to pick up something that maybe the original audience would have captured. Water comes to Jerusalem from outside of Jerusalem.

There are seven little mountains around Jerusalem. And the picture that everybody thinks of when they think of Jerusalem, and you've seen this picture I'm sure, is you're looking at the city and you'll see a little gold dome, the dome of the rock where the temple is.

That picture shows that Jerusalem is below the mountains. There is an aqueduct system that brings water into Jerusalem. It's in the mountains, but it's not on a mountain. So this is going and defying even natural laws of physics, that this valley between the seven mountains is Jerusalem, and out of Jerusalem, the water is going to flow uphill in every direction out of Jerusalem, the holy city.

This living water is given to us very powerfully in John's gospel. John 4 .14 says, Jesus speaking to the woman at the well, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.

John 7 says, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. And in John it even says, this is spoken of concerning the spirit.

Jeremiah 17, O Lord, the hope of Israel, all who forsake you will be put to shame. Those who turn away on earth will be written down. This is very prominent in A .D. 70 and on Judgment Day, because their names are going to be written down, the scripture says and continues, because they have forsaken the fountain of living.

Water.

Revelation 21, I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of water of life without cost. Then he showed me a river, Revelation 22, of the water of life, clear as crystal coming from the throne of God and the lamb in the middle of the street.

On either side of the river was the tree of life. Isaiah 55, O everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. Song of Solomon, chapter 4, you are a garden spring, a well of fresh water and streams flowing from Lebanon.

Joel chapter 3 again, different reference, and in that day the mountains will drip with sweet wine, the hills will flow with milk, and all the brooks of Judah will flow with.

Water.

And a spring will go out from the house of the Lord. Jesus is the living water. Jesus is the light of the world. Jesus is the living water. Living water makes life abounding and fruitful. This living water, we learn multiple times in scripture, the supply of which is inexhaustible.

It springs forth regardless of the season. Look down at the last half of verse 8, another observation, Israel, Jerusalem, Judea particularly, it rains from October to April. It almost doesn't rain at all in those intervening months.

Early in the latter rains, it rains a little bit more in October, November than it does in December, January, February, it rains a little bit more in March and April. Look what it says in verse 8. This goes against the topography.

The high pressure systems come in in the summertime and they stay there drowning out, bad term for this I guess, squeezing out all of the moisture. But on that day, in both summer and winter, rivers of living water are going to flow out of Jerusalem from the source of Christ himself.

And you know, it says elsewhere, that if you believe, in chapter 7 of John it says, out of your heart will flow rivers of living water. And also the reference to the spirit, the outpouring of the spirit at Pentecost, the picture of that baptism and all the things that happen there is the beginning of the water going out of Jerusalem and being taken to the four corners of the earth.

So there's topographical, geographical things, they can look at the mountains, they know how the water works, and Zechariah, like the prophets, ties the world that they can see with their own eyes to the future in this prophecy.

What a glorious day it already is, that since Pentecost, the fountains of living waters have flown from Jerusalem, do you believe that? Half of them toward the Eastern Sea, it doesn't work with physics, it transcends physics, the water can't flow from the Dead Sea to the Mediterranean.

The Dead Sea is 1 ,200 feet below sea level. Living water is going to come into the Dead Sea, it's going to be teeming with fish and life when this picture of the living water of God coming from Jerusalem.

I wonder how much we appreciate that concept. This isn't just a last day prophecy, the living waters spring forth now, and us His people. When the Gospel is preached, when believers believe, when they disciple their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, when they raise them up in the faith, when the Gospel triumphs in the heart of man, living waters are springing forth out of them.

This happens against all odds, it doesn't follow with physics and seasons, it flows even in non-rainy seasons. This fruit bears its fruit in all seasons because of Christ and His mercy. So here's the picture, Christ is ushering in at His incarnation a new creation.

There's something else that's happening in His resurrection and His ascension, another layer of His authority is being unveiled to us. As the church begins to take more and more ground, as you can see now, there are more Christians living on the earth today than have ever before.

Now I don't know if it corresponds to a percentage of population, there may be at another time when there are more Christians by percentage, but there have never been more Christians on the earth than there are today.

That's progress. The living waters have gone out. The kingdom has expanded. Look at verse 9, the title of the message in our third point, And the Lord shall be king over all the earth. In your mind, don't shout this out audibly, it's a trick question, it's like a professor type question.

When was Satan defeated? Or when will be Satan defeated, if you have that understanding? Just think about that for a second. When was Satan defeated? Or when will Satan be defeated? Two different perspectives, some people believe He's defeated and some people believe He will.

Be defeated.

His end is not good, either side. When was He defeated? Was it at the cross? It's a good answer. Very good answer. The resurrection, the ascension, that whole event, yes, it's a good answer. I believe that Satan was defended when the promise was given in Genesis chapter 3.

It hasn't come to pass fully in Genesis 5 or 10 or in Isaiah, but the declaration by God that His seed, Christ, would bruise the serpent's head, that was the beginning of the end for Satan. Have you ever thought of it that way?

It's a done deal, it has to happen in time, it has to happen in history, but Satan's doom, as Martin Luther penned, is sure, Genesis 3, and it's worked out in the progression of history, the incarnation of Christ and His victory of the cross.

The Lord, brethren, He shall be king over all the earth in ever-increasing glory, but He's always been the king of the earth. Do you believe this is His world? He created it. He set all of the natural laws in place.

He gave us all of the ethical, moral laws, His law, to follow. He hung the sun and the moon and the stars. The rain today falls from the heavens at His command. Is it His world or not? It absolutely is.

The Lord is king over all the earth, and like we mentioned a couple weeks ago, the great military campaigns of the Caesars, they rolled into town, guess what? Your nation has been conquered. That's what we're saying to the world out there, you've been conquered by the mercy and grace of Jesus Christ.

Come and submit to your new king. Come and drink of the living waters. You're dead in your trespasses, He's going to make you alive. What a message we have. Come align yourself, join in league and concert with the king.

The Lord is king over all the earth, Psalm 110, Psalm 2, we all know it so well. But I'd like to focus now a little bit on verse 9. It says, In that day it shall be, the Lord is one, and His name one.

All of the prophecies about the sun and the moon and the stars find their fulfillment and realization in Christ, and the earliest confessional statement, the foundation stone of the Jewish people, that statement finds its realization in the person of Christ too.

Let's turn back to Deuteronomy chapter 6. This may be the only turn I have you do today, Deuteronomy chapter 6. The Shema is that first word of verse 4, Hear, Hear, O Israel. The Lord our God, the Lord is one.

The book and the chapter that speaks so much of Christ and His fulfillment, His kingship, His messianic office, the future, the destruction of Israel, is now, it's applied to Christ. The covenant name of God, the capital L-O-R-D, is applied to the person of Christ.

Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. This is known as the Shema. This prayer today is spoken daily by those who adhere to the Jewish tradition, but they don't know who the Lord is. Jesus, you'll remember, used it at the beginning of His answer to the question about the greatest commandment.

He uses the Shema, He invokes the language of the Shema. What does verse 5 say? You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. Does that sound familiar to you, children?

It's the greatest commandment. And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart, a heart circumcision, a law written on hearts. You shall teach them diligently to your children. You shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, when you rise up.

You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your.

Eyes.

You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. We have two of a politically correct view of Kings. I didn't watch it. I couldn't bear to watch it. The coronation of King Charles of England.

Now the coronation has historically been a decidedly Christian event, but I understand he incorporated some other religions into his coronation. He's a king who has divided allegiances and loyalties. The Shema, the Jewish people understand, we are to understand that the Lord demands our complete devotion.

We say we love the Lord, our God, with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our strength. We're saying with everything that I am, I love and obey and serve and worship and adore.

The Lord.

We must hear him. We must love him with all our heart. We must have a singular allegiance to him. And as of yet, it's not perfectly fulfilled, is it? Christ fulfills it. He's the Shema keeper, but you and I have not fulfilled it perfectly.

Someday we will. Someday we will love the Lord, our God. And this language of Deuteronomy, I don't know if you can catch how powerful it is in Zechariah, but basically it's like the law and the prophets find their realization and fulfillment in the person and work of Christ.

The beginning of the world and the end of the world find their purpose and realization in the purpose of Christ. My wife was listening to her Bible reading plan this morning and it was the Luke 24 passage.

Jesus encounters the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. And in this interaction, Jesus shows the disciples from the law and the writings, the prophets, every bit of scripture that he is the Christ who's fulfilling all of these things.

The Hebrew Shema finds its yes and amen and fulfillment in Christ. And we need to hear, oh Israel, the Lord, our God, the Lord is one. The foundation of their doctrine and lives realized in the person and work of Christ.

Let's go back to our text. It's raining so I can preach longer. It's a very big question. I think everyone, every Christian would say that they believe the Lord is or shall be king over all the earth, but we need to, in ourselves, probe that.

That has big implications for us and the way we live our lives every day. Is he king or not? Satan's defeat began in Genesis 3 with the promise of Christ and his salvation, the cross, the resurrection and ascension of Christ is the inauguration of his comprehensive reign.

That takes us to the fourth and last of our points today. Jerusalem shall be raised up and safely inhabited. Look again at verse 10. These landmarks are obscure to us, but they're not obscure to the original audience.

And we don't have to understand fully all of the intricacies of all of these landmarks. We have to see something though. Look, all the land shall be turned into a plain from Geba to Ramon south of Jerusalem.

Presently there are seven mountains, higher peaks, that surround Jerusalem. These places are places that we can say, over there at Wekiva Springs, over there at Blue Springs, over there in Mount Dora, places that we may be able to put a connection to.

These locations were known to the people who are reading this. But here's what it says. The land, which is mountainous, they're baby mountains, they're not like the Great Rockies, they're small mountains, are going to be turned into a plain.

And here's the part that's interesting. Jerusalem shall be raised up. Right now, she's in the mountains, but she's not on a mountain. The mountains are around her. She's below the mountains. What's happening here is Jerusalem is going to be elevated, and literally, the second part of verse 10 says, she shall be raised up and inhabited in her place.

From Benjamin's gate to the place of the first gate and the corner gate, from the tower of Pananel to the king's wine presses. I don't know if you all agreed with me, but I argued very forcefully in previous chapters that I believe Jerusalem is the church, symbolically here at the end of the age.

The church is going to be raised up and inhabited in her place. All false worship, all the idols will be taken away. She, the bride of Christ, will be raised up. We've already seen a little of this in our own lives, haven't we, in the life of the church.

We have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God. You and I proceed and we walk into a holy of holies, which was formerly unapproachable. There have been dramatic things that have happened since the king has come to rescue his bride.

Dragons have been slayed. The king has pulled his bride from the fiery mouth of the dragon. Now she dwells in safety and security. Look at verse 11, the people shall dwell in it and no longer shall there be utter destruction, but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited.

Jerusalem's historical and impending future tumult, namely AD 70, that destruction, is going to give way at last to a never-ending location where peace and prosperity and security and communion with God dwell, and that's in the body of Christ and the church.

These things are fantastical, cataclysmic, but they're also very comforting. The language of the iciness and the dimness of light says that the church is going to endure trials and suffering. Your life is filled with trials and sufferings.

This pattern of life serves to get us, as we learned a couple weeks ago, to where we need to be, to be purified, to be refined, to be sifted, to be crushed, that the good fruit, the precious metal, might result.

The king has come to restore his creation, he's made a new creation. In Christ, living waters of salvation have flown and started a never-ending, ceaseless, abundant flow of grace and mercy out of Jerusalem.

Brethren, the Lord our God, the Lord Jesus Christ, has always been the king, but he shall yet be the king over all the earth. And you, the glorious people of God, are going to be raised up and find a safe habitation.

There.

This is glorious. These are glorious things, meant for our encouragement and also for our boldness and hopefulness and clarity about the future. I have a couple words of application and I'll close here.

Brethren, the reality of the world that exists is a bright shining of Christ's glory. And you and I have to strain our eyes to see more and more of it. It's through a glass dimly, it's misty, it's a little dark, it's a little twilight, but I assure you the glory is there.

And the revelation of that glory will be the dimming of the stars and the wrapping of sackcloth around the sun. That's how glorious it is and that's the reality of who Christ is. Christ is the fount of living waters and he's made you his dwelling place.

He has united himself to you and our time of communion is the probably greatest earthly expression of that. The spring of his mercy is inexhaustible. Be united to him. Drink freely from the living waters.

Drink the sweet wine that's dripping off the mountains. Third, you may not be living today like Jesus is the king. You may have tried to make yourself a little king or you want to bow down and serve another king.

Kiss the sun today. All glory, laud, and honor belongs to him, our redeemer king. Worship him, obey him, serve him, love him. Find all of your enjoyment in him. Brethren, I don't know where you are today and how you're feeling about things.

There might be a lot of angst, a lot of fear, a lot of uncertainty about the future, but we know how this ends. The people of God are secure in him. We have to pass through many trials, but we're absolutely secure.

Let's face those things with greater faith and hope.

Amen?

Let's pray together. Oh Lord, we thank you that you are a king who conquers with love and mercy. We ask for the renewal and refreshment of these, your people, and oh Lord, I pray that we would truly feast at the supper and be a great cause of our rejoicing.

We ask these things in Jesus' name, amen.