HAGGAI & ZECHARIAH: PROPHETS FOR THE END OF DAYS – PART 3

FULL MEETING WITH MIDRASH HERE

NOTE: THE TRANSCRIPT IS NOT THE SAME AS THE RECORDING.

HAGGAI’S SECOND PROPHECY: THE GLORY OF YHVH’S HOUSE. BUT WHICH HOUSE?

Now comes Haggai’s second prophecy.

PROPHECY #2: MORE ENCOURAGEMENT

Haggai will now preach another message that is not quite a prophecy but more of an encouragement since they Jews had gone back to work on the temple. They needed the further encouragement because as soon as they started, they probably began to be harassed again.

Haggai 2:1  In the seventh month, in the twenty-first day of the month, Yahweh’s word came by Haggai the prophet, saying, 

Haggai’s previous prophecy came on 1 Elul, the 6th month. His next one came in the 7th month of Tishri, the month of the Feasts of Trumpets, Yom Kippur and Sukkot. But not in the beginning of the month. The prophecy came on the last day of Sukkot, the 21st day of the month because YHVH’s Feasts and His glory are tied together, and Haggai’s prophecy was about the glory of A coming temple.

After the Jews went back to work on the 24th of Elul, there was only a week until the Feasts and then work was restricted for the first day of Yom Teruah, Yom Kippur and the first and last days of Sukkot, and of course, the Sabbaths in between, too.

YHVH gave them a good prophecy on the last day of all the celebrations except that there was one more day after Sukkot ended. That was Shemini Atzeret, the day when YHVH asks His people to spend just one more day with Him!

The Jews had been having these Feasts and operating the altar from the time they arrived in Jerusalem, 16 years earlier, in 536 BC. They had built the altar in time for the Fall Feasts, the 70th year from when the exile began. For 16 years, they were worshiping at the altar without providing YHVH His proper and due House. So now, YHVH will have a question for them.

Haggai 2:2  “Speak now to Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and to the remnant of the people, saying, 
Haggai 2:3  ‘Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory? How do you see it now? Isn’t it in your eyes as nothing? 

It has now been 86 years since the start of the Babylonian exile in 605 BC. If there were any who were alive at the start of the exile, they were very old at this point. YHVH’s House was as nothing because they had not worked on it faithfully. So YHVH said to them:

Haggai 2:4  Yet now be strong, Zerubbabel [put your leadership on],’ says Yahweh. ‘Be strong, Joshua, son of Jehozadak, the high priest [lead the people in righteousness as you work]. Be strong, all you people of the land [take back the land the way you did when Joshua took you across the Jordan river 1,000 years ago. Have that kind of courage!],’ says Yahweh, ‘and work, for I am with you,’ says Yahweh of Armies. 

YHVH said these words, “for I am with you”, to this Joshua the same as what He had said to the former Joshua in Joshua 1:6, 7 and 9 when the righteous second wilderness generation crossed the Jordan river. But this Joshua was now the High Priest and that Joshua had been Moses’ replacement.

This generation of Jews was being equated with that earlier one because YHVH is repeating pattern of taking the land, whether for the first time 1,000 years earlier or for the second time in 520 BC. Here in Haggai, YHVH repeated this exhortation twice because something repeated twice is something that is sure. YHVH will be with you! They could count on Him being with them the way He was with Joshua and that former generation that had crossed the river.

And now, YHVH goes even further back in history to show them how they fit another pattern proving to them that they were, indeed, His people. This one has to do with Sukkot because Sukkot in 520 BC was a reminder of Israel coming out of Egypt (Haggai 2:5) because one of their camping places was named “Sukkot” 1,000 years earlier. That camping site was on the way to Mount Sinai where YHVH made Israel “His set apart people”. This is a hint that YHVH is about to renew the Mount Sinai covenant.

Haggai 2:5  This is the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, and my Spirit lived among you. ‘Don’t be afraid.’ 

They were to see themselves as if they had experienced the coming out of Egypt. This is the reason for the instructions to repeat the Exodus story every year at Passover. It is meant for us to so identify with that first generation that we literally become part of that account and we actually came out of Egypt with them.

He is telling them “don’t be afraid” because this is what he told the first generation in the wilderness  in Exodus 14:13-14 as Pharaoh was coming up behind them. Through the Torah from Exodus 20 to the end of Joshua He tells them to not be afraid and to be courageous in the face of all their difficulties.

A FURTHER PROPHECY

Now, YHVH will give Haggai an actual prophecy for the end of days. Whereas Haggai’s first and second “prophecies” were simply a word of rebuke followed by and encouragement, now he will receive from YHVH the central reason, the objective, for the reconstruction.

The next 4 scriptures, starting at verse 6, are critical for us to understand Haggai’s message because it sets up Zechariah’s more numerous unique and precise prophecies. For this, YHVH will give a prophecy that abruptly springs ahead 2500 years! This is where Haggai will now be allowed to introduce end times prophecies that Zechariah can springboard from.

Haggai 2:6  For this is what Yahweh of Armies says: ‘Yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens, the earth, the sea, and the dry land; 
Haggai 2:7  and I will shake all nations. The precious things of all nations will come, and I will fill this house with glory, says Yahweh of Armies. 

The phrase “it is a little while” is an idiom for “now not being the time”. The time will be at the end of the age. And it has to do with when YHVH will fill His House with His glory. That won’t be until after everything is shaken: the whole earth and the nations. YHVH will shake everything at that time (an idiomatic reference to the end of the age) and this temple they were now rebuilding was a central piece in the process of getting to the end of the age. But what they probably didn’t understand was that the temple they were building would be devoid of His glory (Ezra 3:12). This is why He is giving them the hint that His glory will one day fill His temple again, but it would be far into the future.

Why did YHVH withhold His glory from the rebuilt so-called second temple? Because all Israel had broken the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants and they refused to repent, a national repentance! The remnant always repents but Israel is a nation and national sins require national repentance.

YHVH could no longer give them His glory, His stamp of approval, by filling the rebuilt House at its dedication in 516 BC even though, as we shall see, Zechariah said they repented. Rather, YHVH’s nation had to bear the consequences of the sins of their forebears. To receive His glory, they would have to wait another 500 years until God Himself came and took human form and walked in His own temple and had His own people not even recognize Him! And after He left, it would be another 2,000+ years before He and His glory would return to earth.

It won’t be until the end of the age, after the shaking of the earth and the nations, that YHVH’s temple complete with His glory and His people back in the land in the assigned territories as Ezekiel prophesied, that all the nations will come to Him at His House which He will build.

Haggai 2:8  The silver is mine, and the gold is mine,’ says Yahweh of Armies. 

The redemption and the glory, silver and gold, are YHVH’s. The earth is full of these 2 metals signifying that He redeems the whole earth and His glory will fill the whole earth one day as it says in Numbers 14:21, Isaiah 6:3, Psalm 72:19 and Habakkuk 2:14.

It seems obvious to us that YHVH should say the silver and the gold are His, but what we might not remember is how His own people made images and covered them with silver and gold and then worshipped them. And they also made idols (not just images of things in creation but images of gods) like those from the surrounding nations and covered them with His silver and gold.

What does that mean in spiritual terms? Those images made or covered in silver were saying Israel’s salvation came from that image! With images covered in gold, they were saying that image was the god whose glory would fill the earth and was the authority on earth instead of YHVH!

YHVH declares that the silver and gold with which they had made their images and idols belonged to Him and He neither can nor will He be replaced by an image or an idol! No image or idol will be found in His “latter house”.

Haggai 2:9  ‘The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former,’ says Yahweh of Armies; ‘and in this place I will give peace,’ says Yahweh of Armies.” 

Verse 9 was a consolation that the “latter” temple will exceed the glory of the former one built by Solomon which Babylon destroyed because of image worship and idolatry. YHVH was telling them, though they likely did not understand it yet, that the House they were building would not have His glory; that it would not be until much later that His glory would come to His House and that the glory of it would be much greater than the glory of the first House. And also, it will be in “this place”, Jerusalem, which they have been neglecting, that YHVH will finally give peace to the whole world. They just needed to know they were part of His plan.

Think about this for a moment. In 520 BC, Haggai was urging the Jews to get busy again and then he explained that this temple, the one YHVH was urging them to get busy rebuilding again, was going to have effects far into the future but no glory for now. And it would be that 520 BC generation who was instrumental in bringing His glory sometime around 2500 years into the future because they got to work building the structure that would bring about the central and most pivotal event in all of history: Yeshua’s crucifixion. But they don’t know any of that yet.

Haggai did not prophesy about the mechanism that would make all of that happen. That would be for Zechariah who would prophesy about “the Branch”, the Messiah, as he began to prophesy of the rebuilding of the Jews as YHVH’s righteous people.

So, verse 9 prophesies to the furthest fulfillment, over 2,500 years later, jumping from 520 BC to whenever Yeshua returns after which His temple and His city will be filled with His glory.

Let me just give you a spoiler alert for this verse in Haggai. Zechariah 4:10 will tell the Jews to not “despise the small beginnings” (we will read about that) because Zechariah will have understood what Haggai was saying in Haggai 2:9.

Haggai 2:9 which ends this prophecy is what religious-political Zionists hang onto regarding the construction of the coming Jewish temple. They believe they are doing the same work as the 520 BC Jews and that rebuilding the temple for the third time will bring their Messiah. But the Haggai 2:9 prophecy does not pertain to the temple they want to build. Haggai 2:9 pertains to the temple Messiah Yeshua will build which Zechariah will prophesy about.

And Haggai 2:9 prophesies of a lasting peace which will be mimicked by the son of perdition, the Jewish Antichrist.

A CALL TO RETURN TO YHVH

Now, Haggai has received 2 prophecies: one in the 6th month and one in the 7th month. Zechariah, as yet, has not received any. He probably knew Haggai or at least would have known about these 2 prophecies because Haggai delivered them to Zerubbabel, the Governor, and Joshua, the soon-to-be High Priest, and all the Jews immediately responded. Zechariah was one of them.

Let’s now turn our attention to Zechariah’s first prophecy which came in the 8th month so that we now have prophecies in order in the 6th, 7th and 8th months. And we will see how Zechariah’s prophecies dovetail with Haggai’s about building the stone temple and Zechariah’s being about building a “temple made without hands”. Hang on because I’m going to explain that.

Zechariah 1:1  In the eighth month [Cheshvan], in the second year of Darius [520 BC], Yahweh’s word came to Zechariah the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, the prophet, saying, 

Who was Zechariah?

His name means “Yah has remembered”.

H2148
זְכַרְיָהוּ    זְכַרְיָה
zekaryâh    zekaryâhû
zek-ar-yaw’, zek-ar-yaw’-hoo

From H2142 and H3050; Yah has remembered; Zecaryah, the name of twenty nine Israelites: – Zachariah, Zechariah.

You can see the abbreviated name of YHVH became “Yah” in Zechariah’s name.

He was the son of Berechiah. We will discuss this and his fate in more detail toward the end of this series.

There are 2 famous Zechariahs in scripture out of the 30 or so men named Zechariah. And there are 5 Iddos, 2 of which were men who received words from YHVH for Israel to hear. So when we speak of these men, we must make sure we get the right ones.

The earliest Iddo was a seer during the reigns of Solomon, Rehoboam and Abijah, about 350 to 400 years before Zechariah’s grandfather, Iddo the prophet. The seer, Iddo, was not called a prophet in scripture. He was called “seer”.

We have no words from Iddo the seer who preached regarding Jeroboam and who stood at Jeroboam’s altar denouncing it, according to 2 Chronicles 9:29; and regarding Rehoboam, according to 2 Chronicles 12:15; and regarding Abijah, according to 2 Chronicles 13:22.

Iddo the seer is said to be the unnamed prophet of 1 Kings 13 who spoke against the altar of King Jeroboam in Bethel and who disobeyed YHVH by going back to Jerusalem on the way YHVH explicitly told him not to go. He was torn apart by a lion (1 King 13:11-34) as punishment. This is according to Josephus and the Talmud. 

Iddo, the grandfather of Zechariah, was called “prophet” in scripture. He went into Babylonian exile with everyone else. We also have no recorded prophecies from him, either. However, he seems to have been highly regarded in both Jerusalem and Babylon which is why the scripture mentions so many times that Zechariah was his grandson. It seemed important for Zechariah to make that connection to his grandfather to lend credibility to himself even though he was a priest in the line of Aaron as appears in the Aaronic lineage of Nehemiah 12:16. 

The difference between the 2 words “seer” (‘ra’ah’ (Strong’s H7200 and ‘chozeh’ (Strong’s H2374) and “prophet” (‘nabiy’ (Strong’s H5030) has to do with their function. You can see these 2 words together in 2 Kings 17:13. A “seer” was more of a perceiver and preacher of spiritual truths while a prophet was a proclaimer of YHVH’s actual words given through visions, dreams or direct hearing of God’s voice. Most people who call themselves prophets today are actually seers, if they preach correct doctrine, and if they don’t preach correct doctrine then they are simply spouting their religious nonsense. I don’t know of any prophets today, people who receive and communicate YHVH’s direct word but there sure are a lot of false prophets out there!

Zechariah 1:2  “Yahweh was very displeased with your fathers. 

YHVH was not as displeased with the Jews in 520 BC as He had been with that first “golden calf” generation whose progeny continued in sin for over 1,000 years until He sent them into Babylonian exile. They would have understood the reference of YHVH being displeased with their faither and that He did not want them to reach their depth of depravity. YHVH was, though, implying that they might become like their fathers unless they:

Zechariah 1:3  Therefore tell them: Yahweh of Armies says: ‘Return to me,’ says Yahweh of Armies, ‘and I will return to you,’ says Yahweh of Armies. 
Zechariah 1:4  Don’t you be like your fathers, to whom the former prophets proclaimed, saying: Yahweh of Armies says, ‘Return now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings;’ but they didn’t hear, nor listen to me, says Yahweh. 

“Don’t be like your fathers”… Well, they already started down that path. But YHVH was asking them to return to HIS ways and reject the ways of all their forefathers from 1,000 years earlier. YHVH wanted to start over with this generation in a covenant renewal. The entire people, including Zerubbabel and Joshua, would be made clean and righteous before Him because of His mercy.

Zechariah 1:5  Your fathers, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever? 

They had all died. Death, eternal death, for sin is a certainty. Life, eternal life, for committing ourselves to YHVH is a certainty, as well. We only need to make the choice.

Zechariah 1:6  But my words and my decrees, which I commanded my servants the prophets, didn’t they overtake your fathers? “Then they repented and said, ‘Just as Yahweh of Armies determined to do to us, according to our ways, and according to our practices, so he has dealt with us.’” 

Yes, YHVH’s Word and His decrees, His Law(s) which contain the curses for disobedience, overtook them. It took 1,000 years for His Word to take effect. That’s the way of curses. They come when they decide to, and it can take a long time until you actually forget what you did to be cursed. But blessings… They start right away the moment we start to obey His decrees, His Laws.

And then, suddenly, the Jews of 520 BC had found themselves suffering for their sins starting from 536 BC. The wonderful thing, though, is that the 520 BC Jews repented! And they acknowledged that YHVH had rightly rewarded them according to their practices.

Haggai didn’t tell us this but Zechariah did. I mentioned this last week’s teaching of the Book of Haggai where nothing is said about the Jews repenting in the month of Elul, but Zechariah now confirms the Jews’ repentance. And their repentance did not happen only after Zechariah’s first prophecy. No! They had repented in the month of Elul without having to be coaxed and cajoled and now Zechariah has acknowledged that they repented.

Notice that Zechariah’s first words were, like Haggai’s, not prophecy at all. Zechariah’s first message was the same as Haggai’s: a rebuke with a plea from YHVH. Whereas Haggai’s message was to go to work, Zechariah’s will be one of repentance, returning to YHVH with their hearts to build a “temple made without hands”. This is important. A stone temple is just a building without the people whose hearts are dedicated to YHVH fully.

The Jews of 520 BC became a righteous generation in time to build and rededicate YHVH’s temple. This is an encouragement for the rest of the world for all time. No matter how far away from righteousness we have gone, YHVH will forgive us and make us His people if we will turn from Satan’s perverse ways to YHVH’s righteous ways.

THE TWO TEMPLES OF STONE & PEOPLE

Here ends Zechariah’s first words to the 520 BC Jews, but what does it mean that the Jews repented? And what do those words mean for understanding New Testament scripture and for us who await two temples filled with glory at the end of the age? And why are there 2 temples, anyway?

Haggai and Zechariah prophesied about 2 different versions of the temple in YHVH’s temple system. Most people don’t know that YHVH’s temple is not just one physical structure. Rather, it is a system of administration and structures made with and without hands that I taught about in 2022. You can click that link to listen to that teaching.

It isn’t that Haggai did not prophesy about the coming Messiah. He did in Haggai 2:6-9, the reference of the glory of the latter house being all about Yeshua’s second coming, and again in his last prophecy. But that was only part of what YHVH wanted His people to understand about the temple and the objective, the reason for, having it rebuilt.

It was Zechariah who was called by YHVH to call for the rebuilding of the other version of the temple, “the temple made without hands”. Thus, Haggai was the “stone temple” prophet and Zechariah was the prophet who prophesied to “the temple made without hands”.

What do I mean by this? Zechariah’s prophecies began to restore the theme of YHVH having not only a stone structure for His people to worship Him. He also needed a people who were dedicated to Him and who would uphold His righteousness and justice system found in the Law of Moses. Two temples in the same temple system: one made of stone; the other made of hearts of flesh.

The Jews had metaphorically journeyed through Sukkot in 520 BC when YHVH gave Zechariah the 3rd prophecy to the Jews, and now metaphorically, they stood at “the mountain” again becoming YHVH’s set apart people to be rebuilt into His “temple made without hands” again.

The phrase, “temple made without hands” is an idiom of the New Testament period for a congregation filled with people who have “hearts of flesh”. And some people in the Old Testament did have hearts of flesh or there could not have been any righteous Israelites. Remember, and I will repeat, that there are many words for YHVH’s people: “elect”, “Body of Messiah”, “remnant”, His “sheep”. Different words; same people. And there are other words, too, like “peculiar” and “chosen”.

Let’s go to the New Testament scriptures that use this phrase.

Mark 14:58  “We heard him say, ‘I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and in three days I will build another made without hands.’”

Just because Yeshua coined the idea of a temple made without hands does not mean such a temple did not exist before His birth.

Acts 7:48  However, the Most High doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands, as the prophet says,
Acts 7:49  ‘heaven is my throne, and the earth a footstool for my feet. What kind of house will you build me?’ says the Lord. ‘Or what is the place of my rest?

Quoted from Isaiah 66:1. YHVH had asked Isaiah the question be He was referencing another kind of temple: the one “made without hands”. So you see, this concept is not new in the New Testament. It’s just that most of us have not been taught this because Christianity does not teach the consistency of the entire Bible; that its doctrine agrees and remains the same from Genesis to Revelation.

YHVH will now have Zechariah to reintroduce the idea of a set apart people who are set apart for a specific purpose because these are the people who have come out of Babylon after having endured the punishment due to all Israel for the last 1,000 years for not having continued to be YHVH’s “elect”, “Body of Messiah”, “remnant”, His “sheep” and “temple made without hands”. And Zechariah’s prophecies speak to us to today because they were for all the generations to come.

At Mount Sinai, YHVH created His “temple made without hands” out of the 2 to 3 million people who stood at the base of the mountain. And then, He asked them to make the physical structure. There is need for both “the temple made with hands” and “the temple made without hands” but the latter one came first – “the temple made without hands” was first because the tabernacle would not be built until there was YHVH’s “temple made without hands”. What would have been the point? The physical structure points to the people, YHVH’s people, “the temple made without hands”. YHVH prophesied through both temples, the stone one and the one “made without hands, and to both temples, the stone one and the one “made without hands. Both versions of YHVH’s temple system on earth are necessary to His mission and objective on earth.

And, let me repeat: Haggai and Zechariah, together, reveal YHVH’s temple system. This is why I am presenting their prophecies in the order in which they were given, not first Haggai and then Zechariah. YHVH’s temple system is a complete one with stone structure and with human hearts of flesh. By the way, this system did not pass away with Yeshua on the Cross.

Acts 17:24  The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands,
Acts 17:25  neither is he served by men’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things.

First of all, let’s get clear about the fact that YHVH’s glory did dwell in His temple on earth and will again. But there is more to YHVH than just His glory because while His glory is filling His earthly temple, His full being is filling His Heavenly temple. It will be His glory that fills His earthly temple. And that glory is His Son, Yeshua.

John 17:1  Jesus said these things, and lifting up his eyes to heaven, he said, “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may also glorify you;
John 17:2  even as you gave him authority over all flesh, so he will give eternal life to all whom you have given him.

It has always been the people with stony hearts who call themselves by YHVH’s name who have failed the temple system which is the reason why it was them, the stony-hearted people, who passed away in Hebrews 8:13; not YHVH’s magnificent temple system! YHVH’s stone temple is to be made of stone. YHVH’s people are to have hearts made of flesh.

SUMMARY

Haggai’s prophecies set the prophetic stage for Zechariah’s numerous unique and precise prophecies about the One who will build “the temple made without hands”, called “the Branch”, at His first coming and who will rebuild the physical structure at His second coming. The principle is first “the temple made without hands” and then the temple made with hands. It was that way at Mount Sinai and in 520 BC because they repented and became YHVH’s “temple made without hands”. It is that way now as YHVH has spent 2,000 years gathering believers in Yeshua as His 3rd “temple made without hands” which will be followed by His end times Millennial temple.

Haggai was all about getting the stone temple built because it was a step in the process of returning the whole earth back to YHVH. Zechariah was all about rebuilding the “temple made without hands” and arming them to understand their place in the near and far future.

I hope our journey through the Book of Zechariah will open up the prophecies of all the prophets in a mighty way.