Today's Word Radio

Brett Meador: There are people who say all these Bible prophecies have been fulfilled in 70 AD. There is a very clear biblical order of events, and we take the Bible very literally. That is one thing we do.

Guest (Male): Pastor Brett Meador, in considering the whole counsel of the Word of God.

Brett Meador: You should not look at the book of Zechariah simply historically, but prophetically. God places His words right there in the tribulation, the seven-year period that is coming. Zechariah is talking about that period. Thousands of years ago, he is talking about that period that is still yet to come.

Guest (Male): The various visions of the prophet Zechariah all gave meaning to current events of the time. But as Pastor Brett Meador has pointed out, the dreams offered a window into the future as well. Some events have occurred since, but prophecy of the last days has yet to be fulfilled. Returning to Zechariah chapter five in today's word, here is Pastor Brett to share more.

Brett Meador: We are in the middle of all these dreams of Zechariah, or visions as they are called. Some of these have gotten a little out there. Zechariah says some wild things, and you think he is a little on the crazy side, except for this: his prophecies match up with so many of the other prophecies of the Bible, and you start to see them make more sense. I love that about Zechariah.

There is a lot to learn from these visions, both on a historical level and a prophetic level. We have seen him talk about the tribulation period and the millennial kingdom, and he is going to get into more of that stuff the deeper we get into the book. Just to review a little bit of the visions we have covered: we saw vision number one, the rider and the myrtle trees. We saw the four horns with the craftsmen or the demolition men. Those four horns are these authorities and powers that have been over Israel, and God is going to send the hammer to come and crush these nations.

We saw the measuring line vision. We saw God’s courtroom with Joshua the high priest standing before the throne of God. We saw vision number five, the olive trees and the candlesticks. I left us off with that strange vision, but we figured out who those two olive trees are. The olive trees represented three possible options. Maybe all of them are true.

The first thing we saw was Jesus and the Holy Spirit as a personal application. The Holy Spirit is always pictured by the oil. The oil was continually flowing from the olive trees through the pipes into the candles, which were supposed to be like Jesus, the light of the world. So the oil fills the light of the world, and we talked about how personally and symbolically, it is Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Another one we floated is the two historical figures of this story: Joshua and Zerubbabel. Joshua the high priest and Zerubbabel, who would be the one building the temple. They needed a fresh filling of the Spirit, and we talked about how historically these two trees could mean that those two guys are going to be filled with the Spirit to do the job of rebuilding and restoring worship in Jerusalem.

Those are the ones that are possible, but the one that is for sure is the one that seems most unlikely. I think it is the two witnesses of the book of Revelation. The only reason we said that is in Revelation chapter 11, it says the two olive trees of Zechariah were the two witnesses. So that is for sure. This is one of the proof positives that Zechariah is to be taken prophetically in futuristic terms.

There are so many people who say all of prophecy has been fulfilled, which fulfills prophecy in and of itself. In an hour when you think not, that is when the Lord is coming. Also, those who mock and say, "Where is the promise of His coming? It has always been the same." Well, that is another promise that we are in the last days. I love this little thing about the olive trees because of our text in Revelation 11. It says those two olive trees are the two witnesses of the tribulation period. That is in the future; that is yet to happen.

Those two prophets from the Old Testament are going to be there in the tribulation period, and fire comes out of their mouth. It is going to be an amazing part of the tribulation period. But that gives us license to look at the book of Zechariah and not just say it has all been. There are people who say all these Bible prophecies have been fulfilled in 70 AD. There is a very clear biblical order of events, and we take the Bible very literally. That is one thing we do.

We have license to see in the book of Zechariah future events in prophecy because of this very clear line with the two olive trees being the two witnesses. That is important as we proceed. It gives us a hint that we should not look at the book of Zechariah simply historically, but prophetically. That places his words right there in the tribulation period, the seven-year period that is coming. Zechariah is talking about that period thousands of years ago. He is talking about that period that is still yet to come.

Vision number seven: the vision of the ephah and a talent. What is an ephah? An ephah is a unit of measure. It is the largest dry unit of commercial measurement at the time. It was measured in units of baskets. Often they called the ephah measurement a basket, and it was a basket they made of a specific size that would carry a certain unit of measure. They recently found one of these at Qumran, which is where they found the Dead Sea Scrolls. In one of the caves of the Qumran, they recently found an ephah basket that was a measuring unit where you could measure certain grains, wheats, and barleys. If you got an ephah, you knew how much you were supposed to pay for, and you would put that on your donkey and head home.

What is he going to see here? He is going to see an ephah and a talent. What is a talent? It is a unit of weight. There is big debate on how heavy a talent is. Minimally, it is 75 pounds. Some scholars believe it is 97 pounds; others say it is 100 pounds. They have found counterweights for large scales where they would weigh things, and most of them are around 75-pound counterweights called a talent. That is interesting when you read the story about David when he became king. Do you remember how heavy his crown was? A talent. Can you imagine the neck compression when they stuck that crown on his head? That was a heavy crown, but remember, he had gold in those hills in Judah.

You have the ephah, which is a basket, and you have a talent, which is a weight. That is going to help you with the vision of an ephah and a talent. Let's read verse five: "Then the angel that talked with me went forth and said unto me, Lift up now thine eyes and see what is this that goeth forth. And I said, What is it? And he said, This is an ephah that goeth forth. He said moreover, This is their resemblance through all the earth. And behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead."

The lid was made of lead, and it was a talent in weight, a 100-pound lid over a basket. Does that sound like a pleasant situation? Lifting a 100-pound lid off of a basket just doesn't work. That sounds sketchy to me, especially when you find out what's in it. They lift up the lid and it says, "Behold, the lifted talent of lead, and this is a woman that sits in the midst of the ephah." We have a basket case inside this. I am not joking.

Verse eight: "And he said, This is wickedness. And he cast it into the midst of the ephah, and he cast the weight of the lead upon the mouth thereof." There is a woman in there, and he says this is wickedness and throws the lid back on the top. Verse nine: "Then lifted up mine eyes and looked, and behold, there came out two women, and the wind was in their wings; for they had wings like the wings of a stork. And they lifted up the ephah between the earth and heaven."

Have you ever noticed how much the world is into this whole goddess thing? Be careful, ladies, because there is this sort of allure about talking about the goddess within you. It is this whole thing of wings, and everybody gets their pictures with wings and stuff. There is actually a New Age origin of that, and that is why Portland and some of the weirder places around the planet have the wing thing. I am just telling you girls to be careful because it is a very subtle thing in trying to celebrate womanhood in a carnal, godless way.

There is some imagery there you should be aware of. Now, you say, "But these are women with wings; this must be good, right?" Well, it is not good. There are things here that make these wings not a beautiful thing. You picture the painting on the wall or you can get your picture with beautiful wings; these are storks' wings. Does anybody know, to a Jew, what would be the first thing they think of when they hear about the word stork?

Guest (Male): Babies?

Brett Meador: See, that is what an American would think. The stork brings the babies. No, that is not what the Jews would have thought. What would they have thought?

Guest (Male): Unclean.

Brett Meador: Unclean! That is what the Jew would have seen. They wouldn't have seen a baby with a diaper and all that. They would have said, "That's an unclean bird. You don't even go near that bird. You don't touch that bird. That's an evil, dirty bird." You have to understand that because of the Levitical law. The stork was an unclean bird. You have these women carrying this basket with a woman inside of it with a lead lid on top. This Zechariah vision is getting weirder and weirder.

The basket gets lifted up by these two women with stork wings between heaven and earth. Verse 10: "Then said I to the angel that talked with me, Whither do these bear the ephah?" In other words, why are these two women flying away with this basket? Verse 11: "And he said to me, To build it an house in the land of Shinar; and it shall be established and set there upon her own base." Anybody know another name for Shinar?

Guest (Male): Babylon.

Brett Meador: Yes, Babylon. Now you have some hints if you know your other Bible prophecy. If we are talking about a woman in Babylon, does anybody remember where you read stuff about that?

Guest (Male): Revelation 17.

Brett Meador: Revelation 17. This is where Zechariah and Revelation again are going to match up perfectly. In fact, why don't you flip over there real quick, Revelation 17. There is another image, and I believe it is the same woman as the one in the basket. Notice this woman was being taken for a ride. She is in a basket and she is being taken for a ride by some evil. These women are probably demonic entities or even fallen angels with these stork wings. We know it is evil because of the connotation of the storks. It is a bad scene. You have a basket with a lead lid. Everything is ugly, just like the imagery here of Revelation.

Even as this woman in Zechariah 5 is being taken for a ride, this woman is riding a beast here in chapter 17. But we are going to notice she thinks she is riding the beast, but she is actually being taken for a ride. Revelation 17:1: "There came one of the seven angels which had seven vials and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will show you the great judgments of the great whore that sits upon many waters." Anybody remember what "many waters" is?

Guest (Male): Nations.

Brett Meador: Nations. We know that for sure from chapter 17, by the way, right there in verse 15: "He saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest where the whore sits are the people and multitudes and nations and tongues." So there is a self-interpretation right there in the chapter. We are talking about this great whore that is riding this beast and that sits upon all the nations.

I am just going to fast-forward and tell you what this is all about. We are talking about religious Babylon. Shinar is the word in Zechariah, and in chapter 17, it is religious Babylon. Chapter 18 talks about economic Babylon or financial Babylon. It is the end times during the tribulation period when the mark of the beast is going to be engaged and there is a religious system in place. This religious system is represented by Mystery Babylon and this whore that is riding this beast.

Can you imagine when the rapture of the church happens, what is going to be left behind with religion? There is going to be a lot left. There is going to be wealth and money. There are entire denominations that are worth billions and billions of dollars that I think a lot of those people probably won't even be raptured because they think they are believers but they are not. Anything that is not raptured, there is going to be an ecumenicalism or a syncretism of a melding of a religious system together. As it turns out, the antichrist is going to play around with that and even tolerate and use that religious system for a while.

That is what this is talking about, this religious Babylon that is going to happen during the tribulation period. Verse two says the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication. "So he carried me away in the spirit in the wilderness, and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication."

We could talk about the history of the church and we will see all these images part of the religious system that is left after the rapture of the church. Verse five: "And upon her forehead was the name written, MYSTERY BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. And I saw the woman drunk with the blood of the saints, with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration."

The word "admiration" is an unfortunate translation there; the idea is astonishment because of the whoredoms and the horrible things she is going to do. How is she going to kill the saints, the martyrs? Remember, there are tribulation saints that are going to be beheaded during that time. People who didn't get raptured that accept Christ are going to be called the tribulation saints. She is going to be the very one part of the killing of those people.

By the way, do you guys sense a hostility that we have never seen in our lifetime toward Christianity today? This whole abortion argument right now, we are seeing people basically saying Christians are the problem. It is an amazing thing. You can almost get this sense that they want to throw us back into the gladiator arena or throw us to the lions again. They would be perfectly content to do that. Don't be surprised as that ramps up because that will happen in the tribulation period.

There will be a hatred for people who love Jesus, the tribulation saints who get saved after we are raptured, and they are going to be beheaded for the cause of Christ during that time. That is this woman drunk with the blood of the martyrs. Now, I am confused. What's this woman about? Well, it sounds like Zechariah in the sense that we have this woman, and it's the same woman basically. Two different dreams or visions. The scarlet beast in verse three is the antichrist, and all that's left after this woman and false religious system, everyone will be under this political religious tone of the woman who rides the beast.

This woman who is riding the beast, she actually is being taken for a ride and she ends up getting eaten up by the beast. The beast devours her and eats her up, which is going to happen when the abomination of desolation happens—whole other story. But all that to say, what is the correlation here? We have the description of the destruction of Babylon and Shinar, as it is called there. Babylon is going down, religious and economic Babylon.

Here is the thing, and this has caused quite a few questions and concerns. When we talk about Babylon in the end times, are we talking about literal rebuilding of Babylon, or are we talking about the notion that was behind Babylon, which starts with Nimrod, the Tower of Babel, Semiramis, Tammuz, the false religious system that came out of that? Which one is it? Is it literal Babylon or figurative? The answer: I don't know. There are people that debate, and good people that debate one way or the other on that one.

If the Lord should tarry—in other words, if the rapture of the church doesn't happen in the next 10, 20, 30, 50, 100 years—I think He will come; I think the rapture could happen tomorrow. It is possible. But if it doesn't, I could see a scenario where more of a literal Babylon is rebuilt, and there is actually a thing stirring about that. It is that part of Iraq, like 50 or 60 miles outside of Baghdad, which was ancient Babylon. Some of our Athey Creek military had served in Iraq and were right there, and they sent me pictures of the Babylonian palaces.

Some people think that Babylon is New York City. I could see that. Or Portland; I could see an argument for that. Or maybe it is more of the notion behind the religious and economic Babylon that started in ancient Shinar. But if the Lord tarries, the reason why is because all throughout the Bible, there are actually pairs in the Bible that talk about the destruction of Babylon. Isaiah 13 and Isaiah 14 is a pair of the destruction of Babylon. Write it down in your notes, but if you read Isaiah 13, it talks about the total utter destruction of Babylon.

Jeremiah 50 and 51, the destruction of Babylon. Revelation 17 and 18, the destruction of Babylon. It sounds very literal to me, honestly, when you read it. Was the Babylonian Empire destroyed back in 539 when the Medes and the Persians came? The answer is no. Was Babylon destroyed? Not in the way Isaiah, Revelation, and Jeremiah talk. In fact, Isaiah talks about how it will be destroyed even as Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed, where it was just like a smoldering heap, nothing to be there.

Is that what happened when the Medes and the Persians destroyed Babylon? They didn't destroy it. Do you remember the Babylonians didn't even know the Medes and Persians took over for over a month? Do you remember why? Because all the leaders of Babylon were in a party, and the Medes and Persians snuck in in the water system, came up, and killed all the leaders of Babylon in the party and did a quiet hostile takeover of the city. People were going about their lives and like, "What happened to our leaders?" "Well, I am your new leader." "Who are you?" "I am Cyrus, Darius the Persian." "Okay, whatever."

That is kind of how that went down historically. The city almost didn't even notice they were taken over. I don't see any time in history where Babylon was destroyed at the level the Bible says it was going to be destroyed. So that is an interesting thing for you to chew on and think about. What does the Bible mean when it talks about Babylon? Is it a literal Babylon or more of a figurative? I'm not saying I'm solid on one way or the other on that one. But we've not really seen the full total destruction of Babylon.

Back to the vision of the ephah and the talent. The woman in a basket is being flown to Shinar, Babylon. Two ugly, unclean bird angels, probably demonic, are carrying this woman like the beast is carrying the woman in Revelation 17. Antichrist will be playing along with this religious system and political movement, ultimately swallowing up that religious movement at the abomination of desolation. It is going to be a brutal and bloody scene.

This whole ecumenical movement that we are seeing right now is setting the stage for the tribulation period. Have you seen this Abrahamic Family House? There is a bunch of these going up around the world as far as ecumenicalism. It is basically a place, one house for Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. They are trying to bring all the faiths together and they have this glorious vision to bring the world together. But this is all what the antichrist is going to use.

He is going to use this system and this kind of ecumenicalism that we are seeing. Some of the evangelical church pastors are even starting to talk in an ecumenical way: "Our brothers, the Muslims," and treating them like they are just the same. "That great religion, Islam." That's interesting. Zechariah's visions are getting more and more powerful and speaking of the last days. These are the visions, and vision number eight is the next one that we are going to read about here in chapter six.

Guest (Male): Pastor Brett Meador closing another interesting study into Zechariah chapter five, reflecting on prophecies yet to be fulfilled in the coming last days. And you are listening to Today's Word Radio. Pastor Brett will be back to close our time together with a word of prayer in just a moment, so I hope you will stick around for that.

But first, Today's Word is the radio ministry of Athey Creek Church in the Portland, Oregon area where Pastor Brett Meador is the senior pastor. We invite you to find out more about Pastor Brett and Athey Creek Church by going to todayswordradio.com. If you missed any portion of this study, you will find all of his messages online at todayswordradio.com. Before we go, here again is Pastor Brett Meador leading us in prayer to close our study today.

Brett Meador: Lord, we are impressed by how Your word is so congruent. All the books of the Bible speaking of the same things in visions and dreams. Lord, we see how You locked these parts of prophecy throughout history. Even as Daniel was told to seal up the words of this book until the time of the end. But Lord, we're seeing an unsealing of these books. We are seeing the truths unfold; we are seeing the stage being set for these last days that Zechariah speaks of.

I pray, Lord, that You would give us as Christians today the right mindset. We know we are strangers in a strange land. We feel that more and more every day. We see the stage being set for the tribulation and for persecution of Christians. We see that that could even happen maybe even before the tribulation starts. Lord, would You just equip us with Your word to know what we are to do as Christian people?

We know what the world demands of us; we know what even other Christians demand. But I pray that Your word would be the compass to show us which way is right and what to do. Lord, I pray that we would live as Christians with salt and light like Your word says. That we wouldn't just be secret, closet Christians hiding away trying to keep ourselves safe, but You told us to go out into all the world and preach the gospel.

Lord, these are risky times for us. We see it starting to become more dangerous in our days to do that. But give us a boldness, Lord. I pray that we would let our light shine before all men, even if it costs us. I pray that we would be ready to do that. So give us that boldness, bless these Your people. I pray that they would just sense Your presence in their lives and the hope of heaven that we have in front of us. Give us that joy, that peace that passes understanding. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Guest (Male): Amen. Pastor Brett Meador on today's word. Well, that's all the time we have. Next time, Pastor Brett will continue our verse-by-verse study in the book of Zechariah. Today's Word with Pastor Brett Meador is an outreach of Athey Creek Church in West Linn, Oregon.