Welcome to EBible Fellowship's Bible study in the Book of Revelation. This will be study #26 of Revelation, chapter 1, and we are presently reading in verse 7:

Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.

And, as we have been looking at this verse for some time, we have been led back to the Book of Zechariah, the next to the last Book of the Old Testament, in chapter 12. I want to read these verses, beginning in verse 9:

And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn. In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon.

In this study we are going to try and take a closer look at these verses to see more how it fits into our verse in Revelation 1, verse 7, and also with the verse in Matthew 24, verse 30, that is very similar.

Let us begin with Zechariah 12:9:

And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

And the question for us to try to understand is what is "in that day" referring to, or when will this period of time come to pass? Is God speaking of the cross? Is He referring to judgment day itself? What is "in that day" referring to?

Well, let us continue reading there in Zechariah 12:9:

...in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

That type of language should be very familiar to us by now, to those of us that have been learning about the end of the church age for quite a number of years, because it is the language that we find, for instance, in Zechariah 14:1:

Behold, the day of JEHOVAH cometh, and 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.

This is really unusual, if we did not understand what God had done, it would be a little perplexing. First, God says that He "will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle," and then He concludes this little passage by saying, and "then shall JEHOVAH go forth, and fight against those nations."

Now why would God do that? Why would God raise up nations to come against Jerusalem, and then fight against those very same nations? And, again, if we did not understand what God had done at the time of the great tribulation, this would not make any sense to us. But, He did this, historically, when He raised up the Babylonians to come against His people, Judah, which would include Jerusalem. And the Babylonians accomplished God's purpose; God even called Nebuchadnezzar, "my servant," as Nebuchadnezzar and his nation of Babylon destroyed Judah and destroyed Jerusalem, and took many of the Jewish people into captivity, and slew many others.

This was all in accordance with the will of God. It was God's purpose to raise Babylon against His own people, due to their unfaithfulness, to their constant idolatry, and tendency to stray from the commandments of God.

And, yet, what happened following God giving up His people? Well, after a seventy year period, God came against that nation, Babylon, via the Medes and the Persians. The Lord raised up another mighty army in the secular realm, the Medes and the Persians, with King Cyrus, who came against Babylon and took it in one night.

King Cyrus was a type of Christ, typifying the Lord Jesus Christ's victory over Satan and his kingdom at the end of the great tribulation and the beginning of judgment day.

So, it was God's plan (and has been) to raise up an enemy to come against His people to punish them, and this prefigures the great tribulation when the Lord loosed Satan, and Satan came with his emissaries to assault the New Testament churches and congregations of the world. Remember what it says in Revelation 20:7:

And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,

Who loosed him? God loosed him. For what reason? To accomplish God's purpose in judging His own people that inhabited the churches of the world. And, why? For the identical reason that He judged Israel of old and Judah of old - due to their unfaithfulness. Now the Lord would use Satan as an instrument of judgment, and, in that sense, Satan would perform God's bidding; he would be accomplishing God's purpose, and, so, the Lord looses him and judgment begins at the house of God. It goes on to say in Revelation 20:8, after Satan has been loosed:

And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.

God loosed Satan. Satan gathers the nations against Jerusalem. Satan is very good at destroying, and he wreaks havoc in the church world; the church becomes a mockery; there is no truth any more in the land; the truth of the Gospel is trodden underfoot in church after church. And this all is in performance of the doing of the will of God, as God loosed Satan to bring this destruction in the world.

But, following that, does God give Satan an attaboy, and say, "You have done the job well." Well done, and now some kind of blessing? No, no, Satan was just doing evil and wickedness, and that is why he was able to do it, because it was in his line of work, and God just used his sinful nature and tendencies, and his destructive being, to perform the will of God. And following that, God turns around and judges him and those nations (or Satan's emissaries), and this is how God has dealt with those that He used to destroy the New Testament church, during the period of the great tribulation we just witnessed, that twenty three years from May 21, 1988 until May 21, 2011.

And, so, Zechariah 12: 9 says: "And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem," and this would have to be at the end of the great tribulation; God does not destroy them during the great tribulation because they are doing His bidding at that time; He waits; He bides His time, and, finally, at the end of the period, the twenty three year great tribulation, then God destroys them (and we learned much about that) with a spiritual judgment: Satan was put down; he was dethroned; his rule as the beast in the congregations came to and end.

He still exists and he is still going about in the world; the Bible does not say he is dead, in that sense, but as far as authority to rule in the churches, that was given (to Satan) by God for a limited period of time, the duration of the great tribulation. And, following that, well, then Babylon is conquered. God raised up the Babylonians, he raised up Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, and they destroy Jerusalem and Judah, but, finally, at the end of seventy years, Babylon itself is destroyed, and King Cyrus (typifying the Lord Jesus) and the Medes and the Persians (typifying the kingdom of God) as they are triumphant and conquer Satan and his emissaries, *Gog and Magog*, are destroyed in the day of judgment, which occurred on May 21, 2011.

So that makes this passage a little more interesting, as it goes on to say in verse 10 of Zechariah 12 (as verse 9 now has set the context for the day the Lord will destroy those nations that He Himself brought against Jerusalem), and it says in Zechariah 12:10:

And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications...

And we saw how this is identifying the ones that being spoken of as God's elect. David is a name of Christ, and we are of the house of David; we are the inhabitants of Jerusalem (Jerusalem above), and God has poured upon His elect people "the spirit of grace and of supplications." He gives us the desire to pray to Him and supplicate before Him, and it goes on to say in the middle of verse 10:

... and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced...

We discussed this, how this is referring to the elect who pierced Christ, in the sense that He died for us. It was as a result of His bearing our sin and, therefore, we caused His death, and we brought about His punishment; we are the ones, in a sense, that thrust a spear into Him, and we are the ones that brought the wrath of God upon Him.

...and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.

Now we have two words here that identify with the Lord Jesus Christ, and that is "only son," (the word "only," as *son* is in italics), and this word identifies with Christ. It is Strong's number 3173. It is used a few times, once in Psalm 22, a Messianic Psalm; one time in Genesis 22, and I will read this verse because this will show how this really does identify with Christ pretty quickly. In Genesis 22:2:

And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.

And this was God's command to Abraham, to take his only son Isaac, and Isaac, here, is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ, and Abraham, the father, who lifts up his hand to slay his 'only son' is a beautiful picture of God the Father who does slay His only son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

And the reference to "firstborn," also, in Zechariah 12:10, points to Christ as He is the firstborn from the dead.

But let us look at a couple of verses where this word *only* is found. It will help in understanding what is going on in our verse in Zechariah. In Proverbs 4:2-3:

For I give you good doctrine, forsake ye not my law. For I was my father's son, tender and only beloved in the sight of my mother.

And, again, who is the one who gives us "good doctrine," but Christ Himself? He is the Word made flesh. We are to abide in the doctrine of Christ, and He is His "father's son, tender and only beloved," again, that same Hebrew word.

It is also found in Jeremiah, chapter 6. Now, here, the context of verse 22 speaks of the Babylonians. It says in Jeremiah 6:22:

Thus saith JEHOVAH, Behold, a people cometh from the north country, and a great nation shall be raised from the sides of the earth. They shall lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their voice roareth like the sea; and they ride upon horses, set in array as men for war against thee, O daughter of Zion. We have heard the fame thereof: our hands wax feeble: anguish hath taken hold of us, and pain, as of a woman in travail. Go not forth into the field, nor walk by the way; for the sword of the enemy and fear is on every side. O daughter of my people, gird thee with sackcloth, and wallow thyself in ashes: make thee mourning, as for an only son, most bitter lamentation: for the spoiler shall suddenly come upon us.

These verses are describing the assault of Babylon against God's people, Judah, and that, in turn, is picturing the assault of Satan against the churches and congregations of our modern day, and this has ended; the great tribulation is over; it concluded May 21 of 2011, after a full twenty three years, an exact 8,400 days.

Yet, God is using this language of making *mourning*, as in sorrow, "as for an only son, most bitter lamentation." And, so, that is the language of Zechariah 12, verse 10, that, again, "they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son." Well, this shows us that this *mourning* and *bitter lamentation* does not necessarily have to identify exclusively with the cross, but it is also identifying with the judgment of Judah of old and, as a result, spiritually, with the judgment of the church, as God began the judgment process on the house of God: "Judgment begins at the house of God," 1Peter 4:17 tells us. And this "make thee mourning, as for an only son, most bitter lamentation," could be a reference to the fact that the Lord Jesus has departed from the church, just as God departed from Israel, and turned against them, and began to punish them for their transgressions.

But let us look at another place. We want to look at everything. In Amos, chapter 8, again, we are going to find similar language in verses Amos 8: 9-10:

And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord JEHOVAH, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day: And I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; and I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins, and baldness upon every head; and I will make it as the mourning of an only son, and the end thereof as a bitter day.

Well, we could look at these verses a couple of different ways. One is to look at it historically, where it says, "I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day," because it was at the sixth hour, we read in Luke, chapter 23, that Jesus was on the cross, and it says in verse 44:

And it was about the sixth hour...

And the "sixth hour" would be noon, as the day starts at 6:00 A.M., and the third hour would 9:00 A.M., and the "sixth hour" is noon, and the ninth hour is 3:00 P.M., and so on.

And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour.

Noon until 3:00, and, here, Christ is on the cross, and then notice in verse Luke 23:45:

And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst.

So, here, there was a physical and literal darkening of the sun. God darkened the Earth at that time, it says, and He darkened it for three hours. Notice, also, that the Lord joins together "the sun was darkened," in verse 45, and "the veil of the temple was rent in the midst." So, yes, there was a physical darkness that came upon the land, but also God is identifying this darkening of the sun with a spiritual darkness that came upon national Israel, because up until this time (despite all of their many failings, and the many times God had raised up adversaries and enemies to oppress Israel down through the centuries), they still were the people of God until they brought forth the firstfruit, the Lord Jesus Christ, who had to accomplish the mission, the task, that the Father had given Him, of going to the cross and demonstrating the things He had done before the foundation of the world.

So up until the time that Christ went to the cross, Israel still, corporately or outwardly, was a representation of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. But, once Christ accomplished the job that the Father had given for Him to do, and had gone to the cross, and had completed the tableau of that demonstration (in showing forth the things he had already done in paying for sins before the foundation of the world), then the "veil of the temple was rent in the midst," or "in twain," as it says in another Gospel account, and Israel no longer was the people of God.

And this "veil of the temple" indicated the presence of God, as it was inside the Holy of holies, and that veil concealed the figure of the Spirit of God. It was there that God was to be visited by the high priest once a year, with the blood of others, for the sins of the nation, to typify what Christ had done.

But, now, Jesus Himself had come, and there would be no more need to offer sacrifices; and now the Father was departing from Israel, JEHVOAH was forsaking Israel; they no longer would they be the holy people; no longer would God bless the teaching of Israel, the synagogues, or the temple, or the religious services of Israel, ever again. So He joins together "the darkening of the sun" with the ripping of the "veil of the temple," to illustrate this truth.

And, of course, that will help us later when we read Revelation, chapter 8, and we see the "third part of the sun was darkened;" God did it again, there, only spiritually, as He removed the Gospel light from the churches and congregations, typified by the language of the "third part."

And then immediately after the tribulation, the "sun is darkened," once again, in Matthew 24:29, as God instructs us, "This is the removal of the Gospel from the entire Earth, from the whole world. Now there is no Gospel in Israel, there is no Gospel in the New Testament church, and I had been working outside of the church (sending forth the latter rain, saving a great multitude), but now there is no Gospel in the world."

There is no Gospel anywhere to be found, anywhere in the earth, in any religion, in any previous corporate body, or outside of the corporate body, or in the regions of the world. The Gospel is finished, as far as ongoing salvation; there will be no more becoming saved. The day of judgment has arrived. It is time for the wrath of God.