The Vision and Method of God

UV 553/10,000 The Vision and the Method of God Zechariah 4 v 6 Then he answered and spake unto me, saying, This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts. I have heard even a well placed believer taking pride in the fact that he is working directly under one of the ten richest men on the planet and that what an impact it would have if his boss would be touched by God. But, the Lord says, “ it is not my might.” It is not by might of wealth or worldly influence that the Lord accomplishes His purpose. It is not by human wisdom or valour or force or the power of standing armies that He will execute His will in the lives of people. While God can and does use people in position and power to accomplish His will, it is not His principal modus operandi or way of doing things. Zerubbabel was a descendant of King David and he was a governor in the Babylonian empire. His name means “ born in Babylon”. We too are descendants of David by faith. Zerubbabel thought that the Lord would intervene with His right hand of power to deliver the Jews from the Babylonian captivity. The right hand of God is a symbol of direct physical manifestation and deliverance even as the Israelites experienced in being freed from Egyptian bondage. But, the Lord through an angelic revelation tells him that this time round it will be by the move of the Holy Spirit that His will would be executed all over the earth. We too might be living in a kind of Babylonian captivity and longing for freedom and release. Zerubbabel sees the vision of a golden candle stand with a bowl of oil on top providing oil to seven lamps and two olive trees on the right and left of it with their branches dipping into the oil. The golden candle stand with seven lamps is the global church, the bowl on top is full of the blood of the Lamb that fuels the faith of the global church. The two olive trees stand for individual believers like us who are constantly walking in the anointing of the Spirit. The vision implied that the Lord will establish His will and His Kingdom through the Spirit moving in the world-wide church and through faithful blood-washed and Spirit- anointed believers. Prateep V Philip