by Lynn Austin
It was what Zechariah hoped for, longed for. Not only would God’s presence return, but the Messiah would come to this temple. And unlike the kingdoms of the world that God was about to shake from their places, His kingdom would never end.
Haggai turned to walk back into the crowd, and once again Zechariah chased after him. “Haggai, wait! May I speak with you, my lord?” The prophet looked exhausted as he shivered in the cold, autumn rain. “Let’s go someplace dry,” Zechariah said. “The yeshiva is vacant today because of the holiday. We can go there and talk. Will you give me a few minutes to change out of my robes and meet you there?” Haggai agreed and a short time later they sat together at one of the yeshiva’s study tables.
“I know you’re a prophet because your words carry the anointing of God,” Zechariah said. “It isn’t you we hear speaking, but the Almighty One. Did you notice that we’ve obeyed God’s word and resumed the construction?”
“Yes, I did notice. Clearly, God has stirred men’s hearts.”
“But even before you spoke that first time, I felt something . . . unusual . . . going on in my life. When I was a boy back in Babylon, I once felt the Holy One’s presence in a very dramatic and powerful way. The experience made me decide to come here and help rebuild the temple so I could worship in His presence again and again. I’ve been searching for Him all my life, and ever since I discovered that I could know Him through the Scriptures, I’ve been reading and studying them with renewed diligence. Whenever I open the pages to read, He is there. Not quite in the way I experienced Him as a boy, but I hear Him speaking to me, teaching me, just the same.”
Zechariah paused, afraid to ask if he was making sense. But Haggai nodded and said, “I understand. Go on.”
“And now, even when I’m not reading but ministering as a priest—especially then—I hear His voice clearly and forcefully. It’s like I’m hearing Scripture verses that I’ve memorized . . . ‘Thus saith the Lord’ . . . But the words I hear aren’t found anywhere. I’ve searched all the prophets and the writings.” Zechariah gestured to the Aron Ha Kodesh, where the Torah and the other sacred scrolls were kept. “I keep looking for the words I’ve heard to no avail. I’m beginning to think that maybe I’ve studied too much and I’m losing my mind. But along with the words in my head I felt an urgency to start rebuilding the temple, even before you spoke to us. An urgency to tell the others that we need to return to God. To seek Him with all our heart and soul and mind.”
“You’re hearing the same message from God that I’m hearing.”
“I know! When you spoke that first time I wanted to shout along with you. We should be dissatisfied with the stale, routine way we’ve been worshiping and seek His presence. We should build the temple and build a relationship with Him that’s genuine and real.”
“Yes. Exactly.” Haggai listened intently, leaning toward him. His dark eyes seemed to read Zechariah’s heart. “Go on.”
“I thought this . . . this craziness I’ve been experiencing would end once we started building, once the others decided to listen to you and obey God. But if anything, it’s becoming more intense. The words surge through my mind like . . . like a pot boiling over on the hearth. I can hardly stop them from coming, let alone ignore them. And God’s presence and warmth always come with them, the same way I experienced Him as a child. And so I wanted to ask if . . . if you can help me figure out what’s going on. Am I losing my mind?”
“No, Zechariah. Far from it! From what you’ve described, I believe the Holy One wants to speak through you the same way He speaks through me. He’s calling you to be His prophet.”
“His . . . His prophet?” Zechariah shook his head, unable to grasp it. “That’s impossible. I’m not old enough or mature enough . . . Certainly not righteous enough!”
“None of that matters. You said yourself that you’ve learned to know God and to understand what He wants from us. Now you need to open your mouth and allow His words to flow through you.”
“Is . . . is what I described . . . is that what happens to you?”
“Not exactly, but it’s similar enough.”
Zechariah hesitated, wanting to pepper Haggai with questions, yet he was afraid of exposing his own shallow faith. “May I ask . . . how did you know it was the right time to come forward? Where did you get the courage to speak?”
“You’re afraid that people will ridicule you,” Haggai said.
“No, I’m not afraid of ridicule, exactly. . . . My concern is that everyone knows me. They’ve watched me grow from a boy of twelve into a man, watched me become a priest, watched me make mistakes. Many of these men are the rabbis who taught me the Torah. Prince Zerubbabel and the high priest are both older than I am, and have far more wisdom and maturity and experience. How dare I come along, saying outrageous things, daring to speak for God? You came as a stranger to nearly all of these men. Your anonymity gave you a measure of credibility. They listened to you.”
“It’s the Spirit of the Almighty One speaking through me that gives me credibility. Speak His words, Zechariah. People may laugh, they may refuse to listen, but every prophet of God has faced those reactions.”
Zechariah had read the stories of Jeremiah and Isaiah and Ezekiel. He knew Haggai was right.
“But if God wants to speak through you,” Haggai continued, “how can you keep silent? Trust His Spirit. Be faithful to the message He puts in your heart and on your lips. After that, every man who hears you is accountable to God for heeding His word or for ignoring it. If they judge the message by the messenger, that’s to their shame, not yours.”
“May I share with you what I hear God saying? To confirm that I’ve truly heard?”
“Certainly.”
Zechariah inhaled. “I believe the Almighty One is saying, ‘Return to me!’ We’ve slowly drifted away from Him and become distracted by things in our lives that just aren’t important. We’ve allowed fear of our enemies and our own lack of faith to distance us from Him. We’ve been enticed away from Him by the temptations of the surrounding nations, first in Babylon and now here. God says ‘Return to me.’ He’s waiting to bless us when we do.”
A slow smile spread across Haggai’s face. “Yes. You’ve heard from God. I see His Spirit in you. We’ll accomplish His work together, my friend. The Almighty One now has two witnesses to speak for Him.” He stood and embraced Zechariah as he prepared to leave.
“Wait . . . I have one more question. How will I know when it’s time to speak?”
“You’ll know. The Holy One will tell you.”
Haggai’s words both encouraged Zechariah and terrified him at the same time. Was it truly possible that he, Zechariah son of Berekiah, son of Iddo, was called to be God’s prophet? It seemed impossible, like counting the stars. He told no one about his conversation with Haggai—not his grandfather, not even his wife. But he continued to pray, asking for God’s will, offering himself as His servant.
Work on the temple site resumed after the feast, and Zechariah met his grandfather there at the end of each day so they could walk home together. The noisy site bustled with activity, and he could see the rapid progress they’d made, the piles of stones that had been cut and shaped, the newly repaired crane ready to lift them into place, the support timbers sized and waiting. Today, like many days, Zechariah had difficulty getting Saba to quit and come home. As they descended the stairs from the temple mount, Saba asked him, “Will you come with me to the house of assembly tomorrow morning? Jeshua and Zerubbabel called for a meeting after the morning sacrifice, and I’m dreading it. I’m too old to waste my remaining years and dwindling strength arguing with dolts.”
Zechariah couldn’t suppress a smile. “Which dolts is the high priest meeting with?”
“Jeshua described them as ‘concerned citizens’ from several Jewish villages. He suspects that their concern is that we’ve angered the Samaritans by rebuilding.”
“I’ll be happy to come,” Zechariah replied, and he felt a strange stirrin
g rustle through him, the same restless anticipation he’d felt on the night before his ordination and on the morning that he’d sounded the silver trumpet for the first time. The odd feeling continued to distract him after he reached home and washed his hands and gathered with the others to eat. Yael called his name three times before he heard her.
“What’s the matter with you, Zaki?” she asked. “You’re a million miles away.”
The people he loved sat gathered around him—his grandparents, his wife and children, young Hodaya—and he didn’t know what to say to them. They had readily accepted Haggai as God’s prophet, believing that he spoke the Almighty One’s words. But what would they think if he told them he might be called to be a prophet, too? He could scarcely believe it himself—why should they?
“Nothing’s wrong,” he finally said. “I just have too many things on my mind.” He smiled and joined the conversation. But he awoke before dawn the next morning and went out to sit alone in the courtyard to pray. He felt the same unease as when the weather was about to change and a thunderstorm was about to rumble through. He ate breakfast without tasting a bite of it, kissed his wife and children, and left with his grandfather.
The visiting men who gathered to meet in the house of assembly with the prince and the high priest later that morning revealed their concern in their restlessness and angry voices. Their spokesman, a portly man named Adin from the village of Lod, began without preamble. “Why weren’t all the family heads and local leaders consulted before the rebuilding began? You’ve put all of us in danger—our wives, our children. The construction must stop immediately until we receive proper authorization from the Persian emperor.”
“Were any of you here when we sought the Holy One in prayer for the drought?” Prince Zerubbabel asked. “Or for the Feast of Ingathering? Did you hear God’s prophet, Haggai, speak?”
“No, but we heard reports about him. Even if this man is a prophet, your decision to immediately resume building was foolhardy and premature. Samaritan settlements surround all of our villages,” he said, gesturing to the other men. “We’ve lived in peace with them these past few years because you obeyed the emperor’s edict and stopped building. But now that word of your violation has spread, we’re back to living on a knife’s edge!”
Iddo slowly stood to address the men, and Zechariah could see his barely controlled fury. “Why did you gentlemen return to this land with your families?” he asked.
“Because the land belongs to us,” Adin said. “The Almighty One gave it to our forefathers.”
“Were you afraid of the Samaritans when we first arrived and began to build?”
“Not at first. We had permission from King Cyrus to be here. Then you foolishly refused the Samaritans’ offer to help and unleashed a firestorm of trouble.”
“Did the Samaritans also cause the drought and the famine we’ve been experiencing?” Iddo asked.
“Of course not!”
“Then why do you suppose we’ve been suffering? Why have our crops and our harvests failed?”
“I don’t know! Why are you asking these foolish questions? Are you going to listen to our concerns or aren’t you?”
“I’m asking,” Iddo said, “because I’m trying to determine what the Holy One’s promises mean to you and what part you believe He plays in all of this. Did you return to the land because you wanted to walk with God the way our father Abraham did or because you were tired of living in Babylon? Because you thought you’d have a comfortable life here?”
His words were met by a storm of angry shouts and protests from the other men. When Jeshua finally calmed them down, Iddo continued. “I was an eyewitness to God’s wrath and the destruction of Jerusalem. And also an eyewitness to His miracle that allowed us to return. If the Almighty One brought us here, and if we walk in obedience to Him, then He promises to give us victory over our enemies and send rain in due season. But for the past few years we’ve wanted peace with our enemies more than we’ve wanted God.”
“How dare you!”
Iddo ignored Adin’s outrage. “God spoke through His prophet Haggai and told us it was time to rebuild. We obeyed, and the rain we desperately needed began to fall. Was that a coincidence?”
“I have no idea, but—”
“Those of us who heard Haggai believe he spoke a message from the Almighty One, and so we obeyed Him. Were we wrong to do that? What would you have done?”
“Of course we would obey if we heard God speaking to us, but we haven’t heard Him and—”
Without thinking, Zechariah shot from his seat, knocking the chair backward with a crash. “Then hear the word of the Lord Almighty!” It was his voice, and yet it wasn’t. He couldn’t have stopped the words from coming any more than he could have stopped a thunderstorm. “The Lord was very angry with our forefathers. He told me to tell you and all the people, ‘Return to me,’ declares the Lord Almighty, ‘and I will return to you,’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘Don’t be like your forefathers who heard the prophets proclaim: “Turn from your evil ways and your evil practices,” but they wouldn’t listen or pay attention to me,’ declares the Lord. ‘Where are your forefathers now? And the prophets, do they live forever? But didn’t everything my prophets warned about overtake your forefathers? Then they repented and said, “The Lord Almighty has done to us what our ways and practices deserve, just as he determined to do.”’”
Zechariah paused to catch his breath and saw a stunned look on everyone’s face. Everyone except his grandfather. Saba’s eyes were closed, his head bowed, his face wet with tears. Zechariah drew another breath. “‘Don’t be like your forefathers,’ declares the Lord Almighty. ‘Return to me, and I will return to you!’ says the Lord Almighty.”
He groped behind him for his chair, turned it upright again, and sank onto it, exhausted. Minutes passed, but no one stirred or spoke. Then the prince slowly rose to his feet. “We’ve heard the word of the Lord from two of His prophets. I believe that’s all that needs to be said, gentlemen.”
Chapter
40
Zechariah shivered on a cold winter morning as he stood beside his grandfather to inspect the progress on the temple. “You left for work awfully early this morning, Saba. The sun wasn’t up and neither was anyone else.”
“I wanted to get a head start on the work before the morning sacrifice. Today we’ll finish laying the first course of stones. The work will go faster as we become surer of ourselves, and as more people join us. Mattaniah finished planting his winter crops last week and has been an enormous help to us.”
“It looks amazing, Saba. It’s hard to believe you started building only three months ago.” He took his grandfather’s arm and gestured toward the altar, where the morning sacrifice was about to begin. “I’m not on duty as a priest today. I thought we could watch it together.” They walked across the mount and found a place to stand in the men’s court. Zechariah was aware of the shy whispers and turned heads as he passed.
He had spoken his first prophecy more than a month ago, and had worried at first that the older men he knew and respected wouldn’t take him seriously. But as the news spread throughout the community that the Holy One had anointed Zechariah son of Berekiah, son of Iddo to be His prophet, the opposite had been true. The other men looked at him with respect and even deference. Unaccustomed to such treatment, he found their reaction unsettling.
“I feel a growing distance between the other priests and me,” he told Saba as they waited. “As if they’re afraid of me or something.”
“They’re in awe of you.”
“They should be in awe of the Almighty One, not me.”
“But He has made you His spokesman. They recognize that. Our forefathers refused to listen to the prophets that He sent us, remember? And they were punished for it. These men don’t want to make the same mistake.”
“Even Yael seems . . . well, shy with me. So does Safta. And you’ve acted a little differently around me, too.”
“
We’re all amazed by you, Zechariah. You became a man of God when we weren’t looking. And a man of His Word. That’s why He chose you. We were all too close to you to notice the gradual change in you, but we recognize it now, and we’re amazed.”
As the priests performed the morning sacrifice, Zechariah looked around the courtyard and noticed Haggai standing with the other men. He watched the prophet closely, and his heart surged with anticipation when the service ended and Haggai stepped forward to speak. Everyone quieted to listen.
“This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘Now give careful thought to this and consider how things were before you began rebuilding the Lord’s temple. When you looked for a heap of twenty measures there were only ten. When you went to your wine vat to draw fifty measures, there were only twenty. I struck all the work of your hands with blight, mildew and hail,’ declares the Lord, ‘yet you did not turn to me. But, from this day on, from this twenty-fourth day of the ninth month, give careful thought to the day when the foundation of the Lord’s temple was laid. Give careful thought: Is there yet any seed left in the barn? Until now, the vine and the fig tree, the pomegranate and the olive tree have not borne fruit. But from this day on I will bless you.’”
“That was a warning to us not to quit again,” Saba whispered.
“He must have heard about our meeting with Adin and the other village leaders.”
“Oh, I’m certain he has.”
Once again, the worshipers turned to leave the temple mount and begin the day’s work. But a procession of men ascending the stairs to the mount hindered their progress, forcing everyone to move aside to allow them to pass. The delegation of government officials carried the standards of the Persian emperor and were escorted by a small cadre of Persian soldiers. They approached the governor’s platform where Zerubbabel had been preparing to leave. Zechariah and his grandfather followed them, arriving in time to hear the regal-looking man in a richly embroidered robe being introduced as Governor Tattenai of the Trans-Euphrates Province, along with Shethar-Bozenai and their associates.