A Double Wow! in Zechariah

At the end of May I wrote a post about something a brother said about Zechariah 11. You can read that here. A short time later, I decided that when I finished reading Luke I would read Zechariah. And I did. And I got to tell ya, Zechariah opens with a bang!

First Wow
1:1 In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, came the word of the LORD unto Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo the prophet, saying,
2 The LORD hath been sore displeased with your fathers.
3 Therefore say thou unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Turn ye unto me, saith the LORD of hosts, and I will turn unto you, saith the LORD of hosts.

Verse 3 is a ‘Wow!’ verse. What a sweet promise! Turn to me and I will turn to you.

As I marveled at the amazing grace displayed in this verse, I began to think, “What did it mean for them to turn to the Lord? and what did the Lord mean by He would turn to them? It seems simple enough to me. For them, to turn to the Lord meant first, in their hearts they would turn to Him, look to Him, seek and call upon Him to save and restore them (after all, they were in Babylonian captivity), and second, they would frame their doings to please Him, that is, they would begin to obey His Word and follow His ways. God says that if they do that He will then turn to them, meaning, as He had been against them to send them into captivity, He would now be for them, bless them, restore them to their land and His presence and promises and purposes. I believe that’s a fair summary and I think the rest of the book bears this out. God is saying, “I want to bless and restore you, I want to be for you and not against you, turn to me and I will do this.” Amazing promise! Every time I read these words and think about this, I get excited. I wish someone had put this to music! I wish I could make a song out of this!

Second Wow
As I meditated further on this wonderful verse, I got to wondering about the relationship of turn to me and I will turn to you and the Gospel, specifically repentance. Does this describe or illustrate repentance? Since I can get around in Greek a whole lot better than Hebrew, I examined it in the LXX (Greek translation of the OT). And, this will probably not surprise anyone who knows me, I looked at every occurrence in both the Old Testament and the New and had another Wow! moment.

Let me just summarize what I discovered:

† The word ‘turn’ occurs often in both Testaments. The basic and literal meaning is to change directions, and it carries this into it’s use in a spiritual sense.

† It is not a synonym for repent. It is something additional, something more. In fact, it is used with repent, as in

Acts 3:19 Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out… [be converted sounds passive, but this is an active imperative, just like repent ye]

Acts 11:21 …and a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord.

† It is a more comprehensive term than repent, it includes repentance and faith, but also more.

† This is the word used to describe people coming to Christ, ‘they turned to the Lord.’

What’s the wow in all this? Just this, so often we reduce becoming a Christian to a simple matter or moment of faith – “Repeat this prayer after me” or, in the extreme easy believism of our day, “If you want to be a Christian, raise your hand. I see that hand – you’re in!” But the prophets and the apostles talked about ‘turning to the Lord.’ Turning your heart to believe in and call upon the Lord, of course, but also a determination to follow Jesus. Turning to God and away from idols and sin. In other words, that old fashioned and more robust word conversion.

Acts 14:15 And saying, Sirs, why do ye these things? We also are men of like passions with you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein:

Acts 26:20 But shewed first unto them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem, and throughout all the coasts of Judaea, and then to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, and do works meet for repentance.

1 Thessalonians 1:9 For they themselves shew of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God;

That was the Wow!

What an awesome promise:

Turn ye unto me, saith the LORD of hosts, 

and I will turn unto you, saith the LORD of hosts.