"And He showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of Jehovah, and Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary." Zech. 3: 1.
Out of Babylon to Zion. By Prof. Lucas A. Reed
THE high priest stood as the representative of all God's people. On the Day of Atonement once every year he made atonement for all the sins of the people as well as his own. The high priest therefore represents in his condition the condition of the people of God. In the accusations made against the priest, are summed up all Satan's accusations against the chosen ones. Therefore the charge of Satan is against all Israel. Whatever happens to the priest happens to all the people. And consequently this vision is a picture of God's dealings with all His children.
"Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and was standing before the angel." Zech. 3: 3.
The dirty dress of the prophet is the familiar symbol of sin; and he wears it just as he wore his priestly garment, to represent the nation. He stands therefore before the judgment-seat bearing not alone his own, but his people's sins.
"And Jehovah said unto Satan, Jehovah rebuke thee, O Satan; yea, Jehovah that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire? . . . And He answered and spake unto those that stood before Him, saying, Take the filthy garments from off him. And unto him He said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with rich apparel. And I said, Let them set a clean miter upon his head. So they set a clean miter upon his head, and clothed him with garments; and the angel of Jehovah was standing by." Zech. 3: 2, 4, 5.
In the divine answer there are given to the accuser two reasons why God's people shall not be rejected. First, the Lord had chosen Jerusalem. This was the purpose of God; and that great purpose, the fruit of His undeserved mercy, is not to be frustrated by the sins of men. As the prophet Jeremiah gives it: "If heaven above can be measured, . . . then will I also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith Jehovah." Jer. 31: 37.
God Saves Even the Burning Brand
And the second reason given was that Joshua, representing the people of God, was a brand plucked from the burning. That is, he had just been brought unconsumed from the furnace of affliction, the furnace of the Babylonian captivity. God's past mercies are a reason or a motive for continuing His mercy. Having punished, He will now show mercy, even tho perfection of character may not be manifested at once. Man often grows weary over what he has done, and his mercy in time becomes exhausted. He says: "I can not do more, because I have already done so much;" but not so with God. What He has done accumulates as an earnest or covenant of what He yet will do. "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not also with Him freely give us all things?" Rom. 8: 32. Having done so much, how shall He refrain from doing more? Thus the more God does, the more argument we have that God will do. God never comes to the end of His long-suffering.
Altho Joshua and his people had sinned, and that, too, since the restoration, and Satan had a good argument in pointing to these transgressions, God does not say, "All right, I will put back the half-burned brand into the fire again, since the evil is not burned out of it," but He pities this half-burned fragment, and forgives again, because He has forgiven before.
But this forgiveness does not suffer the sin to continue. Joshua's filthy garments, the sins of the people of God, are taken away, and he is clothed with a change of raiment, even with the glorious garment of the righteousness of Christ. In addition to this they set upon his head the fair miter, and that fair miter makes him the anointed high priest of God. Ex. 29: 6.
The Condition of God's Mercy
"And the angel of Jehovah was standing by. And the angel of Jehovah protested unto Joshua, saying, Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts: If thou wilt walk in My ways, and if thou wilt keep My charge, then thou also shalt judge My house, and shalt also keep My courts, and I will give thee a place of access among these that stand by." Zech. 3: 5-7.
But the high priest is not to escape without a warning; and as he stands for all God's people, he being the high priest, their representative, what is said to him is therefore said to all God's chosen to the end of time. We are admonished to walk in God's ways, to keep God's charge, and then He will give us place to walk among "these that stand by," that is, the angels. See verse 5.
"Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, thou and thy fellows that sit before thee; for they are men that are a sign: for, behold, I will bring forth My Servant the Branch. For, behold, the stone that I have set before Joshua; upon one stone are seven eyes: behold, I will engrave the graving thereof, saith Jehovah of Hosts, and I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day. In that day, saith Jehovah of Hosts, shall ye invite every man his neighbor under the vine and under the fig-tree." Zech. 3: 8-10.
In this eighth verse is given the reason why God could exchange garments with Joshua the high priest and therefore with all His children. They are men wondered at. Satan thought he had an argument; but God has a way out, and a means by which guilty sinners, wicked men, may be made innocent before Him, clothed with holiness, made like to Christ. It can not be explained by the reasonings of this world; and as the change in character is viewed, such men are wondered at. And the day was coming, so the Lord promised, when His Servant the Branch should appear, and He of all men would indeed be wondered at. He is the stone set before Joshua, the one stone having the seven eyes, or complete ministration of the Spirit, and so the full exercise of the wisdom and power of God.
The Purposes of God
All the work that Joshua was doing was to be interwoven with the purposes of God. The seven eyes represent God's complete knowledge; His oversight of all the earth and of all its doings through the Spirit of God. The seven eyes marked on the stone assure us at once of God's knowledge, and also of the pattern that lies in the mind of the great Director. They were marked on the stone as a mason marks the rock for his cutting. They were graven with the gravings of God. Christ is the corner-stone. He is the pattern. He is the personalization to man of the character of God. He bears the marks of divinity, and He stands in perfect unity in thought and act with God.
The plummet that Zerubbabel held (Zech. 4: 10) in order to true all the buildings of Jerusalem and the temple, had these same seven eyes, the eyes of the Lord which run to and fro throughout the whole earth. That plummet, then, is Christ. He is the law drawn out into life by which all God's temple is to be trued and built. Christ is to be set to your life and mine. He is the standard. God was engraving the gravings. In all His work He sets the pattern; He brings up the whole thing to the grand ideal. As in the building of the sanctuary, it must all be made in accordance with the pattern shown in the mount. So in the days of Zechariah, and so now, as in every age, the Lord's work is in accordance with His plans. It is all shot through with His knowledge. It is all to be made after the similitude of His own divine character; and at last it shall be complete, and in one final stroke He will remove all the iniquity that curses the earth.
The one day in which God removed that iniquity was the day of Golgotha, when in one day atonement was made for the sins of the people. But the full results of that atonement will not be seen until we reach the new earth state. In that day no man shall have an enemy anywhere; there shall be no foreigners, no walls of partition, nothing to separate between man and man; for ye shall "call every man his neighbor under the vine and under the fig-tree."
