Thus saith the LORD my God; Feed the flock of the slaughter;
The later chapters of the book, chapters 9 through 14, stand apart from the earlier chapters in historical setting and style, and their general tenor is prediction of Christ's kingdom, the great day of the Lord, and the punishment of the wicked, looking beyond the restoration from Babylon to the final restoration at Christ's coming. At this verse a prophetic picture begins in which Zechariah acts as a shepherd representing Christ's ministry to the Jews. The flock of the slaughter is God's people facing destruction, marked for slaughter and needing to be fed, pictured as starving and scattered and slain by its possessors.
The command to feed is the work entrusted to Israel's spiritual leaders, where feeding means both leading and feeding. Israel's teachers proved utterly unfit for that leading and feeding, and Jesus's teaching on leading and feeding fits their failure exactly. The broken staff Beauty signifies that Christ's protection of Jerusalem would be withdrawn when the Jews rejected him as their king at his entrance into the city, since that promised protection depended on their receiving him.
God assures the slaughter-facing flock that he will feed them, and in later application the united church of Jewish and Gentile believers becomes his second staff through which the world is fed with the truth of his Word amid the confusion that follows the withdrawal of his Spirit. Chapter 11 is the source of the prophecy quoted in Matthew 27:9, although Matthew names Jeremiah. The verse applies to Christ's people under slavery, who are sold while their sellers claim God's blessing because they have grown rich and their shepherds show them no pity.
The verse applies its charge to feed the slaughter-marked flock to those who go out to seek scattered believers and nurture them with care. The verse is a plea for the Lord to provide care and nourishment for the starving flock.
The later chapters of the book, chapters 9 through 14, stand apart from the earlier chapters in historical setting and style, and their general tenor is prediction of Christ's kingdom, the great day of the Lord, and the punishment of the wicked, looking beyond the restoration from Babylon to the final restoration at Christ's coming. At this verse a prophetic picture begins in which Zechariah acts as a shepherd representing Christ's ministry to the Jews. The flock of the slaughter is God's people facing destruction, marked for slaughter and needing to be fed, pictured as starving and scattered and slain by its possessors.
The command to feed is the work entrusted to Israel's spiritual leaders, where feeding means both leading and feeding. Israel's teachers proved utterly unfit for that leading and feeding, and Jesus's teaching on leading and feeding fits their failure exactly. The broken staff Beauty signifies that Christ's protection of Jerusalem would be withdrawn when the Jews rejected him as their king at his entrance into the city, since that promised protection depended on their receiving him.
God assures the slaughter-facing flock that he will feed them, and in later application the united church of Jewish and Gentile believers becomes his second staff through which the world is fed with the truth of his Word amid the confusion that follows the withdrawal of his Spirit. Chapter 11 is the source of the prophecy quoted in Matthew 27:9, although Matthew names Jeremiah. The verse applies to Christ's people under slavery, who are sold while their sellers claim God's blessing because they have grown rich and their shepherds show them no pity.
The verse applies its charge to feed the slaughter-marked flock to those who go out to seek scattered believers and nurture them with care. The verse is a plea for the Lord to provide care and nourishment for the starving flock.