Zechariah 8 - "Let Your Hands Be Strong" - Brent Stephens / April 21, 2024

Twice in our passage, God reminds the people of the destruction He brought on them because of their

disobedience. In verse 10, God calls attention to the economic and social state of things under the curse. When a society is under a curse from Almighty God, it is not difficult to look around and see the effects of that curse. God used the Babylonians to utterly destroy Judah and its capital city, Jerusalem. He again reminds those who returned from their exile that He “purposed to bring disaster to you when your fathers provoked Me to wrath, and I did not relent” (v. 14). When God purposes to do something, there is nothing that will stop Him from accomplishing it. Even after King Josiah’s reforms in 2 Kings 23, God still was not dissuaded from the destruction of the people of Judah and Jerusalem.