and said unto him, Run, speak to this young man, saying, Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls for the multitude of men and cattle therein;
Zechariah watches a man go out with a measuring line to measure a half-ruined Jerusalem. Before the measuring begins, a second angel sends the first running back to the prophet with news of a city too crowded for walls.
The word goes to a young man, not to the elders. One writer draws out what that says about serving God early.
The elderly and the elders have their place in the sphere of divine interests. But this word is, "Run, say to that young man." It is a wonderful thing to take up divine interests with energy and exercise while we are young! God would have us growing up in these things. He would have us interested in the divine circle from the very moment we are born into it spiritually.
Commentators differ over who this young man is.
It is the prophet Zechariah, and we learn this personal detail about him in passing. Some take the words to mean only a servant, whatever his age, but that seems unnatural to me.
Verse 4 explains why the man of verse 1 is measuring.
Measuring here comes before taking possession for blessing. It is an action directed by God just before He comes in once more to re-establish His dwelling place and to own His people. It is so in Zechariah. Jerusalem had been trodden down by the Gentiles and made desolate for her sins, as she still is today. But the eye and the heart of God were always on her.
The state of the city raised a real question.
Will God take an interest in a city that largely consists of "stones,... dust" (Ps. 102:14) and ruins? The man with the measuring line (v. 1) gives the answer. He is going to "measure Jerusalem," that is, take possession of it. The angel's message confirms it. One day so great a multitude will live in Jerusalem that it can have no walls — except the wall of fire, which is Jehovah Himself.
The reason for the open, unwalled settlements is sheer numbers. The promise takes in the livestock too.
The population would increase and break out on every side, beyond every limit that could hold it in. The cattle would share in this boundless blessing. Such prosperity speaks loudly of full blessing on earth under the peaceful rule of Immanuel.
A city without walls has no enemy left to fear. That test dates the prophecy.
This can only be future. Jerusalem has never yet been so free from danger that she needed no "walls," no protection from raiding enemies. It looks beyond the day of "Jacob's trouble," the great tribulation, to the thousand-year reign of the Lord Jesus. The size of Jerusalem will be greatly increased, since "villages" include not only many people, but domestic animals.
So which Jerusalem is this? Not any that has stood so far.
This future city is not the city of Nehemiah. It is not the Jerusalem that rejected its Messiah and King. It is not even the Jerusalem where the Jews will live after their return to Palestine, when they will become the people of the antichrist.
What replaces the missing walls is not better engineering but a change of ruler.
We look ahead to the day when the multitude of her inhabitants will break all bounds. Then, instead of living under Persian or Greek or Roman masters, they will have Jehovah Himself as their fortress and wall of defence.
The people who first heard this still had to live in the ruins.
In her present ruin, Jerusalem could attract the people of God only if they saw her with the eyes of faith, from the viewpoint of her future glory. Going to Jerusalem meant leaving everything else. That took a decision which faith alone could give and hope alone could sustain.
God's own method with discouraged people is worth noticing.
The Lord saw the hearts of His people — their fears, their lack of faith, their despair — and He sent them the blessed encouragement of the future. He unveiled before their eyes the glory of Messiah's presence. We would do well to heed this divine method. The cure for all discouragement over the weakness and confusion of the church today lies in looking at the future. That is where we draw our strength and hope.
- Ruins measured. The measuring line is not a damage report but a claim of ownership. God surveys Jerusalem just before He takes possession of her.
- Message rushed. The news is urgent: an angel must run with it, and it goes to a young man rather than to the elders.
- Multitude overflowing. The city has no walls because it has no room for them: people and livestock press out beyond every limit.
- Protection replaced. The city loses its stone walls and gains God Himself, the fortress and defence of an open city.
- Fulfilment future. No Jerusalem yet has matched this — not Nehemiah's, not the one that rejected its Messiah. It waits for the reign of Christ. Until then, faith holds it by hope.
and I, saith Jehovah, I will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.
Zechariah sees this vision in a wrecked city, where the walls were down and the temple foundations were only just laid. Into that ruin an angel runs with a promise of safety outside and glory inside — and it is God Himself, not a wall of stone.
The measuring line of chapter 2 runs over a city with almost nothing left to measure:
At the time of this vision, the city of Jerusalem lay in ruins and its walls were torn down. Only the foundations of the temple had been laid. Yet the angel said: "I'm going to measure Jerusalem"! ... The future Jerusalem will reach far beyond anything it has ever been. So it will be much larger than the city the returned exiles rebuilt. It will overflow with people and cattle dwelling in it. ... This future city is not the city of Nehemiah, nor the Jerusalem that rejected its Messiah and King.
Verse 4 promises a city that lives without walls. Verse 5 explains why that is safe: a better defender takes their place.
Walls will be unnecessary, for the Lord Himself will be a wall of fire encircling the city as well as being "the glory in her midst." This will be true when Israel is finally broken down in repentance and faith, and receives the Messiah they had despised and rejected. Then they will depend in simple, unquestioning faith on their blessed Redeemer. He has proved faithful and cannot fail them. Their walls, gates and bars will go (Ezek. 38:10-11): the Lord alone will defend them.
The verse joins two promises. God's nearness blesses His people, and the same nearness shields them.
But the secret of it all is found in the next verse. The Lord Himself will be a wall of fire all around her. That is a sure protection from her foes. He will also be the glory in the midst of her. It is always so. The Lord's presence has always been the source of all blessing for His earthly people. In the same way, His presence is now among those who are gathered to His name. His presence is the source of blessing, and it is also protection. The wall of fire and the glory always go together (compare Exodus 14:24-25; Isaiah 4:5).
Commentators are agreed that the words outrun anything Jerusalem has yet known. The returned exiles lived under one foreign master after another; the promise describes the opposite.
Nothing so far has met the terms of this prophecy at all. We look on to the day when the crowds who live in her will break all bounds. Instead of being subjects of Persian or Greek or Roman masters, they will have Jehovah Himself as their fortress and wall of defence.
And it will not stop at the city:
Glory and defence were not combined in the restored Jerusalem after the captivity. It is altogether future. What a glory it will be when every eye sees Him! His visible glory will be set up in the land once more. From there the knowledge of it will spread over the earth till it covers all, as the waters cover the deep (Habakkuk 2:14).
"The glory in her midst" is not only a shining cloud like the one that filled the first temple. Writers connect it with the coming of Christ Himself.
Then it will not simply be, as in the first temple, the presence of the glory, but the Lord Himself with them in Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
That day is also the day Israel recognises Him, like the disciple Thomas:
Messiah will be known by her then. She will have returned to Him. Like Thomas, they will own Him as their Lord and their God when they see Him.
The message runs to "this young man," and it lands on a small, weak community:
Nehemiah did build the wall later, but that wall could be broken down, and in the end it was broken down again. God in all His glory, and in all His majesty, is committed to its protection. In Nehemiah chapter 11 we see that the people had to cast lots, so that one in every ten should go and live in Jerusalem. They were few and they were feeble. Yet God said in effect, I will take care of you. ... Always remember that the outer walls were there to preserve the glory of God inside.
- Ruin measured. God gives this promise to a city with its walls torn down. The Jerusalem He measures out is far larger than anything the exiles rebuilt.
- Walls replaced. Gates and bars go, because the Lord alone becomes the defence. Safety rests on His faithfulness, not on stone.
- Fire and glory together. Protection outside and glory inside are one gift. Both are His presence, and you never get one without the other.
- Still ahead. Nothing since the captivity has matched these terms. The fulfilment waits for the day His glory is seen in the land and its knowledge fills the earth.
- A Person. The glory in her midst is the Lord Himself with them, and His people will own Him at last, as Thomas did when he saw Him.
Ho, ho! flee from the land of the north, saith Jehovah; for I have scattered you abroad as the four winds of the heavens, saith Jehovah.
The vision before this showed Jerusalem too full for walls, with the Lord Himself as its guard. Now the prophecy turns and shouts at the people who are not there yet — the exiles still living in the empire that carried them off. Two questions follow. Why is Babylon called "the land of the north"? And how far did God's own scattering reach?
The first word is not a threat. It is the sound a herald makes to turn a crowd's head.
There is little doubt that the first word should be a call to attention, like "Ho," rather than a cry of sorrow. Most often the word carries the force of "Woe."
Babylon lay to the east of Israel. So the direction looks wrong — until you remember which road its armies took.
Verse 6 calls the Jews to flee from the land of the north, and verse 7 shows this means Babylon. So many from Judah had settled down there in captivity. By this time the Medes and Persians had subdued Babylon, and the Jews were free to return to their own land. But many had grown wealthy and did not want to be uprooted again. Babylon is east of Israel. Yet Scripture calls it the land of the north, because Nebuchadnezzar came by way of the north when he attacked Israel. Since then Israel has also been scattered further north, so the north gets special mention in many prophecies about Israel's regathering. Yet in verse 6 the Lord also speaks of spreading Israel abroad like the four winds of heaven — in every direction away from their land.
The call follows straight on from the promise of a restored city, and it carries two edges at once.
In the prophetic vision Jerusalem is restored and lived in once more, and is again the dwelling-place of Jehovah. On that basis an appeal goes out to those who had not yet returned — a summons to come and share in the blessing. And not only this: it is also a warning to escape the judgments about to fall on those who were holding them captive at that time. The land of the north is therefore Chaldea, the Babylonian empire, where the Jews were scattered — "spread abroad as the four winds of heaven." In this way God sounds the trumpet-call to gather His outcast people.
One phrase in this passage settles the timing: "after the glory."
Notice the words "after the glory." No blessing before Christ came could fulfil Zechariah's words. More than that: when Christ presented Himself, that moment did not fulfil these words. Instead came a further sin and a fresh dispersion. So God's dealings after the first coming and the crucifixion pushed this prophecy further off than ever. They brought fresh grounds for a new punishment of Israel, not the fulfilment of the prophecy. This will be "after the glory." Christ must first appear in glory.
The scattering sets the measure for the gathering. Jesus takes up the prophet's own words to say so.
The prophet had also foretold a "great trumpet" as the instrument for gathering the scattered chosen people home to the land (Isaiah 27:12-13). Much of the Lord's own language about that gathering seems taken from the prophet Zechariah. Moses and the prophets had spoken of Israel's dispersion for their sins into all parts of the earth, or to the four winds. So it is natural that Jesus should speak of their restoration in the same, matching terms.
Long after the city of Babylon fell, the same summons still sounds. Babylon is a set of principles, not only a place.
Someone could argue that these prophecies came true when Babylon fell for good under the successors of Alexander. Yet many years after that disaster, we hear the same cry in the New Testament: "Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing" (2 Corinthians 6:17). And in Revelation 18:4, "Come out of her, My people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues." What do these words mean? In the last days the city of Babel will exist as little as it does now. But the godless principles that marked her will take the form of hostility to Christ. A system will rise in politics, business, and religion under the name "Great Babylon" (Revelation 17-18). Faithful believers must flee out of that "Babylon."
- Shout — the verse opens with a herald's cry for attention, not the "Woe" it is often taken for.
- North — Babylon lay east, but its name comes from the road its armies took. God spread the exiles in every direction, "as the four winds."
- Two edges — one cry with two purposes. It invites the scattered to share Jerusalem's blessing. It warns them to get clear of the judgment falling on their captors.
- After the glory — the prophecy's own timing marker reaches past the return from Babylon and past Christ's first coming. Christ must appear in glory first.
- Symmetry — scattered to the four winds, gathered from the four winds at the great trumpet. The cry to leave Babylon still stands wherever her principles do.