Sat.’s Devo - God Remembers Us

Read: Zechariah 1:1-21; Revelation 12:1-13:1a; Psalm 140;1-13; Proverbs 30:17
Zechariah means “God Remembers”. Zechariah saw his first vision only months after Haggai’s last prophecy. They spoke to the same people trying to encourage them to come finish the job they had started. Work on the temple had been stopped for 12 years because of discouragement and opposition. The people had become distracted with their own lives and had strayed from their love of God. Zechariah was from the tribe of Levite who father was a priest.
Zechariah’s first words of his prophecy were, “Return to Me.” Three months later he had a vision of a man riding a red horse among the myrtle trees. Behind the man on the red horse were other horses: red, speckled, and white. When asked who these were, the angel said that they were the ones that went to and fro throughout the earth gaining information for the Lord. They found that the earth was peaceful. He was there to bring mercy to Jerusalem and make sure the temple was rebuilt. The seventy years were over and it was time to restore Jerusalem and punish the four horns or nations that had oppressed and destroyed Israel. These four nations, at the time, were the Assyrian, Chaldean, and Samaritan on the north; Egypt and Arabia on the south; Philistia on the west; Ammon and Moab on the east.
He saw the same riders that John saw in Revelation. First he saw a rider on a red horse with a speckled horse behind him. He also saw the four horns in Revelation which stand for the four kingdoms of the earth that opposed Jerusalem. They are Persia. Assyria, Greece and Rome. The last kingdom will be the kingdom of Christ. God will send carpenters to terrify the four horns. How interesting that Jesus came as a carpenter to teach others his trade of creating beauty from ashes.
To understand Revelation, you have to understand that God uses all creation to speak his mysteries. Chapter 12 is demonstrated in the heavens. On September 23 of 2017 the constellations told this story of Revelation 12. The Jewish calendar starts in September with Virgo, the virgin and ends Leo, the lion. Jesus came born of a virgin and will rise a lion. In September of 2017 the constellation Virgo showed four planets aligned with Jupiter in the womb of Virgo where they would stay for nine months. There were five stars on her head and the moon was under her feet.
God speaks in the sky so everyone can see. He has always used the sky to draw his pictures. He used the sky to point the astrologers of the day to the place where Jesus was born. He used the sky to sing to the shepherds in the field. He sketches his plans on the wall of heaven so everyone has a chance to see if they are looking up.
This is also a depiction of Satan being hurled to earth when he tried to usurp God’s throne in heaven before time. One thing is for sure: “He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short.”
Satan is after everyone who bears Christ in their inmost being. The Church is the woman who is rescued by the eagle of the Holy Spirit when the persecution gets too much.
Lord, the heavens declare your glory!