Zechariah 14 - An Introduction

What began as a short blog article, snow-balled into a lengthy commentary of book form of some 230 pages long, including the endnotes. As such, it was just not feasible for me to enter all of that information here in this blog. And, believe me, I tried. Even if I were to have put parts of it here in this blog, it would have disrupted the continuity of thought somewhere else; for I often say something in one place that is to be elaborated upon in another place, and I was not able to always remember where I had elaborated upon such things, and so I was concerned about having said something at a previous point and then not explaining it later due to having inadvertently cutting it out. So what I have done here is to give you parts of the introduction of the book that lead into this topic that is about to take place in the 10 chapters that follow. Ten parts in a blog, plus the introduction, was just untenable. So I have decided just to introduce you to what I have to say on this important subject regarding the Church and New Jerusalem, the true and spiritual Israel of God, and not with regards to natural Israel according to the flesh at all.

As you can tell, I wrote this commentary from a spiritual perspective about the Church, and not from a literal or natural perspective about natural Israel. And in almost the fifty years that I have been a Christian, I have never come across a commentary on Zechariah 14 as extensive as you will find in these pages written from a spiritual perspective. I don’t even know of any written from a literal perspective that are very comprehensive, and even all of those which are written are based upon conjecture and speculation, rather than using the Scriptures as their sole interpreter and guide. Nothing of what I have to say concerning Zechariah 14 is based upon speculation or conjecture, which troubles me to no end with regards those who either understand a lot of this figuratively or literally.

Anything said about Zechariah 14, whether understood figuratively or literally, has to be supported by the Scriptures. We cannot just throw our thoughts or ideas out there in the hopes that they will stick. We are all much smarter than that. So, you will find no private or subjective interpretations here. For example, God has more to say about our flesh consuming away while we are still standing on our feet, our eyes consuming away in our sockets, and our tongues consuming away in our mouths than those who try to speculate what this is all about. As I said, God’s own word actually tells us what all of this means, if we will only let His word be the last word on all of this. The problem for many is that they haven’t studied God’s word enough to know any better, so they begin to imagine or speculate what this is all about and how it will all work out, rather than actually knowing what this is all about. And both Jews and Christians alike have put a bent on all of these passages in Zechariah 14, and even on the words of many of the prophets, that do not bear up under a closer scrutiny of the Scriptures. To the law and to the testimony we must go, and not to the imaginations of our own hearts and minds. Everything needs to be grounded in God’s Word, the Holy Bible.

The Church direly needs such a commentary as this today. Many of the older commentators have attempted to explain the spiritual significance of Zechariah 14 concerning the Church, only to fall short somewhere along the line in their explanations; or to just throw up their hands like Martin Luther and just leave it unexplained altogether. But I believe a fresh light has dawned, and knowledge is being increased.

Clearly, what we have here in Zechariah 14 is a parable from the Lord. In other words, the Lord is telling us a story of what will happen in the latter days (our days from Christ’s first coming to His second coming) with literal events, concepts and ideas taken from Israel’s history that, as we should all well know by now, indirectly depict spiritual truths and ideas that were to come.

Now since Christ is the spiritual fulfillment of all of the feasts of Israel (including the Feast of Tabernacles), and the Holy Spirit is the actual Living Water that flows out of God’s spiritual temple and heavenly city (or the Church) called New Jerusalem from above (Gal. 4:26; Heb. 11:10; 12:22; Rev. 21:2, 9; 22:1-2, 17), then it stands to reason that we must seek a non-literal explanation of these events. To interpret these things literally is an exercise in futility and absurdity that is not in accordance with the apostles’ doctrine, giving heed to Jewish myths and fables of a Messiah of one’s own making whom the Jews both then and now believe was to set up a physical earthly kingdom. But Jesus argued otherwise (Lke. 17:20-23; Jhn. 18:36). And He told Pilate that if His kingdom was indeed to be on the earth, like all of the other kingdoms of this world, then “My servants [His disciples] would fight to prevent My arrest by the Jews” (ibid). This alone proves to us that what Christ came to offer was NOT a natural kingdom on the earth for those Jews, but a spiritual kingdom from heaven for all of His faithful followers; and even a kingdom that Christ said was against these Jews, mind you, not for them! It is a kingdom that is to be seen and witnessed from “within” according to Luke 17:21[1], and not a kingdom to be viewed from without with physical observation. Unless a man “is born-again,” Christ claimed, “he cannot SEE the kingdom of God” (Jhn. 3:3). This alone tells the story that Christ’s kingdom isn’t to be observed with the natural eye, per se, but with spiritual eyes. Even the entrance into this kingdom Jesus says in Jhn. 3:5 isn’t a physical entrance through physical gates into a physical city in a physical land, but a spiritual entrance into His holy city and land comprised of the Church, who are now referred to as “Jerusalem from above” (Gal. 4:26; Rev. 21:2) or a city of people who are “born from above” (lit. trans. of Jhn. 3:3, 7). And he who enters through this “gate” (or door) into this city “will go in and out and find pasture” (cf. Jhn. 10:9). Again, are we talking about a literal gate and pasture lands for literal animals to graze on? Of course not. Even “gates” and “lands” for “animals” to pasture or graze on take on a whole new meaning in Christ’s spiritual kingdom.

No doubt Jesus profusely used parables depicting literal events or ideas to convey spiritual truths or ideas. And the truths to be conveyed by these literal events used for illustrative purposes was not in the literalness of the objects or events themselves, but in the spiritual truth that was to be conveyed behind them. Underneath them all lay a hidden meaning or truth, and thus the reason why Christ referred to them as “mysteries,” not so apparent to the natural thinking and reasoning mind.

Jesus said that He spoke to the people in parables so that in seeing they would NOT see, and in hearing they would NOT hear; and that only those to whom He revealed the meaning to would understand them (cf. Mat. 13:10-17). Jesus also said if one cannot understand one parable, then how are they to understand all the rest? The key to understanding any parable in the Bible is found “hidden” in the revelation of God’s words in the Bible. His word alone, as illuminated to us by the Holy Spirit, is the sole interpreter and guide to our understanding any of this. His Scriptures will interpret His Scriptures for us, if we will only let them do so. Anyone reading Zechariah, and a lot of what the prophets have to say, with natural thinking and reasoning minds, will inevitably come to no other conclusion than what seems to be so “literally” or “naturally” apparent to them. As such, anyone with no insight from the Lord can pretty much say what many supposed bible scholars and teachers are saying today and come to the same conclusions that they do. Just read Zechariah 14 literally, and there is no need for any revelation or spiritual insight from the Lord. For these people it is all self-explanatory, with a big emphasis on the word “self.” One person said on the internet that God’s Word is “written in simple language that any ten year old can understand.” Really? Most of us are much older than that, and even we are still having trouble trying to decipher the Lord’s parables and dark sayings, even when attempted to be understood literally. I guess we will all just need to go to some “ten year old” and ask them. And if we did, we would probably be surprised at what they would tell us. Another person on the internet said that as long as we as believers have physical eyes to read and physical ears to hear we can all “plainly” understand what the Lord is saying. But just tell that to Christ’s disciples before receiving the Spirit. And if anything was understood by them before receiving the Spirit at Pentecost, it was only because flesh and blood had not revealed it to them, but Christ’s Father in heaven (cp. Mat. 16:17). What is the purpose of Christ sending to us the Holy Spirit to teach us all things, if it is pretty much all just “self-evident” to us? The problem isn’t with the Holy Spirit; the problem is with us in getting our natural thinking and reasoning minds out of the way. And until we do that, we will only remain as a stick in the mud going nowhere fast. A. W. Tozer has rightly said somewhere: “The bible is a supernatural book, and can be understood only by supernatural aid.” Who, being a true believer, wouldn’t agree with that? The Jews in Christ’s day had natural ears to hear and natural eyes to read, and look where that got them! They were as blind as bats, and they didn’t even know it! And the same still holds true today. The Lord has said through Isaiah to those who attempt to understand what the Lord is talking about that "the entire vision will be to you like the words of a sealed book," and that both the "literate" and "illiterate" alike will not be able to comprehend what the Lord is saying (29:11-12, NASB); but that one day the blind will see and the deaf will hear (v. 18) and that those who "err in mind will know the truth, and those who criticize will accept instruction" (v. 24). Clearly, "supernatural aid," as Tozer noted, is the reason for this insight.

So what I am about to tell you in my book is not my interpretation, but the Lord’s. And I am sure that there are others out there who also have seen some of the same things that I am about to declare to you, but they have either been silent about it, or their writings have disappeared into oblivion. Additionally, a lot of what I will be talking about is not necessarily new; for many in the past (especially a lot of the older commentators) have seen some of the very same things as well. Albert Barnes, Matthew Poole, Matthew Henry, John Gill, Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Keil and Delitzsch, and Adam Clarke are just a few of these commentators. And so if I seem to see something more than others, it is partly due to the fact that I have sat on the shoulders of these former giants of the faith. So, it is my sincere hope and desire that I can now add to what many of my predecessors have had only dim glimpses of, and thus give a better sense and meaning to some very difficult passages of Scripture. A “sense” in which many have only mistakenly comprehended using their natural intellect of what they believe is to literally occur in the future, rather than from an enlightened intellect that only comes from God to truly understand what He is saying to us by using such imagery and wording. God means what He says and says what He means, if we will only allow Him to give us the true meaning of what He is actually saying to us. As Adam Clarke succinctly notes with regards to all of this in Zechariah 14: “The great increase and prosperity of the Christian Church, the New Jerusalem, is then described in terms accommodated to Jewish ideas.” That is so true! And the reason for this is that the Church of Christ is essentially still “Jewish” and still “Israel” in nature, not in a “natural” sense but in a “spiritual” sense. It is the Israel of God according to the Spirit no less that God is referring to in Zechariah and throughout the prophets that He saves, not Israel according to the flesh that He judges. That this is seen demonstrated by Christ and His apostles throughout the New Testament, there can be no denying. That which was first was not spiritual, but that which was natural; and after that, that which is spiritual. If we do not catch on to the import of this concept or idea, all of this will only continue to remain a mystery―an enigma―forcing us to come up with a literal interpretation of these things for the future rather than a spiritual one, not allowing our “senses” to be exercised to start thinking otherwise.

The city of Jerusalem, the towers, the gates, the walls, Mount Zion, Israel, the twelve tribes, the temple (and even the stones of the temple), the tabernacle of Moses, the sacrifices, the festivals, the Sabbath, the Levitical priesthood, circumcision or what have you―all take on a whole new meaning now that the spiritual reality of these things in Christ has come. Everything has become spiritualized. And I mean, EVERYTHING! And this even extends to all plant life, animal life, insects, rivers, streams, the sun, moon and all the stars―to name just a few. Everything is used to symbolically portray something else besides what is often thought by many to be only literally interpreted or understood. So it stands to reason, as Adam Clarke had stated earlier, that what God was going to do with the Jews would be “described in terms accommodated to Jewish ideas,” because, as I said, the Church is still in a sense “Jewish” (for we are the true Jews whose circumcision is of the heart, as opposed to Jews only according to the flesh that Christ said were not “Jews” at all in Rev. 2:9; 3:9). All of us Gentiles have been grafted into the natural Jewish olive tree (of whom some of these Jews have themselves become spiritual Jews) and we have taken on the likeness of them, and not they of us (cp. Rom. 11:24). We “surname” ourselves with their blessed name, according to Isaiah 44:5 (KJV), by the fact that we are no longer foreigners but FELLOW-CITIZENS with Israel (cf. Eph. 2:12, 19). The Church has never replaced the true and spiritual Israel of God. The Israel according to the Spirit has become inclusive of God’s remnant out of the Gentiles, not to the exclusion of God’s remnant out of the Jews. “What, then, does this mean?” says Paul, “It means that Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking, but the selected group [or, literally, ‘the elect’] obtained it while the rest were hardened” (Rom. 11:7, ISV). There’s your answer to all of this from the apostle Paul. A "selected group" or remnant from the Jews have obtained the status of becoming God’s “children of promise,” as laid out for us in Rom. 9:8; while the rest are left to themselves only to remain hardened. And the same is now true for all Gentiles as well: A "selected group" or remnant from them have also obtained the same status of becoming God’s “children of promise,” just like Isaac according to Gal. 4:28, while the rest are likewise left to themselves only to remain hardened. There is no respect of persons here of Gentiles over Jews, or Jews over Gentiles. And except for all who are chosen to be God's elect "children of promise," there is no inclusiveness of some to the exclusion of others. All of God’s chosen people who are His "children of promise" (whether Jews or Gentiles) are the spiritual Israel of God according to Gal. 6:16.[2]

I know that many reading this commentary on Zechariah 14 (and even this introduction) are going to balk and laugh at what I say. But it was no different in Christ’s day. When He spoke about spiritual ideas and concepts using literal things to convey those ideas with, many just scratched their heads in disbelief. The literalists, without the mind of Christ on the matter, will always inevitably see things from a literal perspective and give false prophetical utterances and teachings about the future that will just not transpire. And just as there were many false prophets and teachers in Israel’s midst in the past, so too are there many false prophets and teachers in the midst of the Church today. “From your own selves,” said Paul, “shall men arise and distort the truth...So be on your guard!” (Acts 20:30). Be on your guard against those who would rise up in our midst turning their ears from the truth and giving heed to Jewish myths and fables (cf. 1Tim. 1:4; 2Tim. 4:4; Tit. 1:14), for “these have not the Spirit of Christ,” says Paul. Professing themselves to be wise (or scholars), they have become fools following after the carnal desires and things of men rather than after the things of God. Peter likewise had declared that just as there were false prophets in Israel’s days in the past, there would also be false teachers in our midst as well who will be, “secretly introducing destructive heresies” (2Pet. 2:1). Many church leaders will not openly proclaim what they believe in their congregation’s statement of faith about all of this, because they know that if they really stated what they believed, then people would not follow them and their pernicious ways. So they “secretly” introduce them later, along with some actual truth peppered in with their teachings along the way, just like all of the false cults and religions of the day. Sadly, many “will follow their shameful ways and will bring the way of truth into disrepute” (v. 2). Such is exactly the case with regards to a literal interpretation of Zechariah 14 and with many other sayings of the prophets. Like Israel’s false prophets of old, similar men and women in our day “have made men to hope that the word would be confirmed” (Ezk. 13:6, ASV), when in fact it won’t be! Their words will fall to the ground. For like Paul, Christ is not going to “rebuild what I [and no less Christ] have destroyed” (Gal. 2:18).

The following translation that I will be using for Zechariah 14 is taken from the American Standard Version (ASV), with some slight alterations to be noted along the way as we move along. The Lord through His prophet Zechariah declares:

Behold, a day of Jehovah cometh, when thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee. For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city. Then shall Jehovah go forth, and fight against those nations, as when He fought in the day of battle. And His feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east; and the mount of Olives shall be cleft in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south. And ye shall flee by the valley of My mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azel; yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah; and Jehovah my God shall come, and all the holy ones with thee. And it shall come to pass in that day, that there shall not be light; the bright ones shall withdraw themselves: but it shall be one day which is known unto Jehovah; not day, and not night; but it shall come to pass, that at evening time there shall be light. And it shall come to pass in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the eastern sea, and half of them toward the western sea: in summer and in winter shall it be. And Jehovah shall be King over all the earth: in that day shall Jehovah be one, and His name one. All the land shall be made like the Arabah, from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem; and she shall be lifted up, and shall dwell in her place, from Benjamin's gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananel unto the king's wine-presses. And men shall dwell therein, and there shall be no more curse; but Jerusalem shall dwell safely. And this shall be the plague wherewith Jehovah will smite all the peoples that have warred against Jerusalem: their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their sockets, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth. And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great tumult from Jehovah shall be among them; and they shall lay hold every one on the hand of his neighbor, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbor. And Judah also shall fight at Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the nations round about shall be gathered together, gold, and silver, and apparel, in great abundance. And so shall be the plague of the horse, of the mule, of the camel, and of the ass, and of all the beasts that shall be in those camps, as that plague. And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, Jehovah of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles. And it shall be, that whoso of all the families of the earth goeth not up unto Jerusalem to worship the King, Jehovah of hosts, upon them there shall be no rain. And if the family of Egypt go not up, and come not, neither shall it be upon them; there shall be the plague wherewith Jehovah will smite the nations that go not up to keep the feast of tabernacles. This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all the nations that go not up to keep the feast of tabernacles. In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses, HOLY UNTO JEHOVAH; and the pots in Jehovah’s house shall be like the bowls before the altar. Yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be HOLY UNTO JEHOVAH of hosts; and all they that sacrifice shall come and take of them, and boil therein: and in that day there shall be no more a Canaanite in the house of Jehovah of hosts.

The chapter outline of Zechariah 14 will be as follows:

Chapter 1: The Great Assault on God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 2: The Deliverance of God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 3: The Means of Deliverance of God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 4: The Absence of Darkness Among God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 5: The Living Water of God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 6: The King of God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 7: The City of God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 8: The Judgment of All Who Attack God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 9: The Judgment Upon All Who Don't Join God’s Chosen People.

Chapter 10: The Holiness of God’s Chosen People.

In short, it is evident that no events have literally occurred in history to which this prophecy is applicable, and this includes the first two verses which many have said either refers to the time of the Maccabees in 167 BC, or of the Romans in 70 AD. And so it seems most natural to interpret the first verses of this chapter in the same way that we would interpret the rest. As one writer has well said, “It seems arbitrary to espouse a literal interpretation at first, but then to switch to a symbolical one later.”[3] With that said, in context, the Jerusalem described in the first portion of these verses is actually the New Jerusalem described for us also later in this very same chapter in verse 8: “in that day living waters shall go out from Jerusalem.” This isn’t literal waters bubbling up from within the literal city of Jerusalem in the future. This city is what St. John referred to in Revelation as the bride or church of Christ (Rev. 21:2, 9) through whom this water of life flows (Jhn. 7:38; Rev. 22:1-2, 17). Ezekiel likewise pictured this water that gives life as gushing forth from out of the threshold of a future temple of God, unlike any other temple in previous times; and a temple in which the apostles and Christ have now said we are. Where was such a “spiritual” temple and city predicted in the Old Testament? Why, in these natural types and shadows, of course. Where else do you think Christ and His apostles garnered such spiritual ideas from? From the Law and the Prophets! Hidden in ages past, but now revealed to the apostles, and to us, by God’s Holy Spirit.

Another important “key” to understanding the meaning behind these words that God is using here in Zechariah 14, is in the fact that the Feast of Tabernacles is said to be observed as a prerequisite for all who would be allowed to enter into God’s holy City. Again, this cannot be taken literally without it contradicting the teachings of Christ and His apostles of the passing away and the temporary nature of those natural and carnal ordinances and ceremonies. When Paul said, “Let no man judge you with regards to a festival, a new moon, or Sabbath days” (Col. 2:16), he and the apostles were not just saying this with regards to one’s justification for salvation, but even after we are saved as well. This is clearly made evident in the Jerusalem council in Acts 15 with regards to keeping circumcision. If all they meant was that someone did not have to be circumcised in order to be saved, then they would have mandated that circumcision should have still been observed afterward. What was physically required under the Abrahamic and Mosaic covenants, is no longer required of us today; nor will it ever be hereafter. This is the tragic mistake of all dispensationalists and false teachers in the Church today. They, in agreement with all natural thinking Jews, still believe that these things will continue to be in force for all natural Jews (and even for Gentiles) in a future earthly millennium, while the Church will be in her own city in heaven and not required to do any of these things at all. This is just simply remarkable to me. We have brethren in our midst that are acting and believing more like natural Jews without the Spirit, than the new creatures in Christ that they are suppose to be. Paul and all the apostles encountered the very same dilemma; only in their case it was coming more from “Jewish” brethren in the faith that were still trying to hold out that all of those carnal ordinances and ceremonies were still to be observed by believers under the New Covenant. Today we have supposed believers who are supporting, and teaching, the same Jewish philosophies, myths and ideologies; but now only reserved for the Jews in the future, apart from what the Church has to observe. What we have here is no different than what Paul encountered with Peter when he as a Jew separated himself from the Gentiles while eating. It’s hypocrisy. What is hypocrisy? It is telling others what they have to do, while you yourself do not do it. You do not practice what you are telling others that they must do. Paul couldn’t be anymore clearer to us here. Very bluntly he tells us: “If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker” (Gal. 2:18). In other words, Paul is saying that if we no longer do what was previously mandated for us to do, but then begin to do it again (and even tell others that they are to do it as well), then we are saying by our actions (and even by our words) that those old commandments and ordinances still stand (whether now or later), and we are thus affirming to ourselves and to others that we are lawbreakers for our non-compliance. Do you see what these so-called “brethren” in our midst today are holding out to all natural Jews in the future? They are “rebuilding” and holding out for them in the future what Christ and the apostles have “destroyed.” All of those former shadows were exactly that―a dim shadow of the actual reality and body of Christ. God’s Word Translation couldn’t say what Paul is telling us in Col. 3:17 any better: “These are a shadow of the things to come, but the body [that casts the shadow] belongs to Christ.” (words in brackets theirs). Do you see that? The types and shadows were a very vague and dim image (even a “mystery”) of the true and very real image of the spiritual realities found in Christ. The shadows have passed, and we now stand directly in the face of the light of the Lord Jesus Christ. We no longer see and observe shadows, we now see and observe Christ! Do we keep the Feast of Tabernacles in Christ? Sure we do! We are tabernacled with Him as we sojourn here on earth on our way to our heavenly promised land. Do we observe the Feast of Passover? Sure we do, Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us (1Cor. 5:7); and we are told by Paul to “keep the festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (v. 8). We are to “keep the Feast of Tabernacles” no differently in Zechariah than how we are told by Paul to “keep the feast” of Passover. How so? Spiritually speaking of course―and with spiritual sacrifices at that! (Rom. 12:1). No longer with carnal animal sacrifices, but now with the spiritual sacrifices of our own bodies of which those carnal ceremonies were but a type. All of these things that we are to now observe, we are to observe them spiritually and not literally. Again, are we observing the Feast of Pentecost? You bet we are, by the fact that everyone of us are Christ’s firstfruits as depicted in that ceremony and have been identified as such by receiving His blessing of being baptized, anointed and sealed by His Holy Spirit where He now dwells within the tabernacle of our bodies (cp. 2Ths. 2:13).

There are no more further covenants with the Jews that will change all of this back to the way it was before, with some minor alterations. The New Covenant is the last and final covenant which speaks of “better” things than all of those worldly carnal things could ever hope to do. We are not taking one step forward and then two steps backwards. The days of the observance of all of those old types and shadows are over with brethren. A new day has dawned. The darkness is past. And we do well to take heed, as unto a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arises in our hearts.

For those who say that the Jews will again in the future, under Christ’s rule and reign, offer literal bloody animal sacrifices that Ezekiel also says are to make “atonement” for sins (43:20, 26; 45:15, 17 20), are grossly mistaken. And for them to say that they will not expiate sin, but just be offered as a “memorial” is also a misnomer; for now it is they who are the ones who are not taking Ezekiel’s words literally, because now it doesn’t fit within the confines of their strict literal hermeneutic that these animals will literally atone for sin, since Christ has already done that for us once and for all. But either these sacrifices literally make “atonement” for sin, or they are a story (or vision) given by God to Ezekiel to explain to us in typological form what God in Christ was going to do for His people. Clearly, the latter is to be preferred. Do we understand all of the details of Ezekiel’s vision? Of course not. But neither do we understand all of the details of the Tabernacle of Moses or of the Temple of Solomon. But no one would argue that all of those things do not point somehow or in someway to Christ and His Church. And since Christ as the reality of all of those former shadows has appeared on the scene, then it stands to reason that anything that seems to allude to us that they will once again be literally observed in the future―just because we cannot contemplate such ethereal language in our own minds as being anything but literally understood―must not be understood in that manner. Like I said earlier, Christ often spoke in terms that were interpreted literally by others, but were not to be understood as referring to literal things at all. This wasn’t something new that just came in with Christ; God had been doing this all along in the Old Testament as well. Jesus (or God) was just following His own protocol. We of necessity must look for the essential meaning of the Old Testament symbols in the New Testament truths to which all of those symbols so mysteriously pointed to―every single one of them, right down to the smallest of details! And if we do this with Zechariah 14, then all of us in the Church will become the better for it. What is the children’s bread has been cast to the dogs (Isa. 56:10-11; Php. 3:2; Rev. 22:15). What is a rich and spiritual nourishment for the spiritual Israel of God, has been handed over to those to whom it should not be handed over to.

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Footnotes:

[1] Some believe that when Jesus said “within” that He was referring to Himself within their midst. But if that were so, it would go against what He had just said about the kingdom of God coming NOT with any physical observation. Christ’s kingdom is a kingdom that was NOT to be witnessed with physical eyes, but with spiritual eyes.
[2] For more on this, see my article: Jesus and His People are Israel.
[3] Zechariah 14: A Dialogue With the History of Interpretation by Al Wolters (2002). Accessed online 7/2/18 at: http://www.midamerica.edu/uploads/files/pdf/journal/13-wolters.pdf.