Commentary - Zechariah 7:1-7

Bird's-eye view

In this section of Zechariah, we pivot from the apocalyptic visions of the first six chapters to the didactic, or teaching, portion of the book. The exiles have returned, the foundation of the temple is laid, and a question arises that cuts to the very heart of their worship. A delegation comes from Bethel to ask about the propriety of continuing a fast that was instituted to commemorate the destruction of the first temple. This question provides the Lord with an occasion, through His prophet Zechariah, to address the enormous difference between external religious observance and true, heartfelt obedience. God is not interested in the calendars of our piety if our hearts are far from Him. He uses this question to peel back the layers of their religious performance and expose the self-centeredness beneath. The core issue is this: was their mourning for themselves, or was it a genuine mourning over sin directed toward God? This is a timeless diagnostic question for the people of God in any age.

The Lord’s response is a sharp reminder of why they were sent into exile in the first place. He points them back to the messages of the "former prophets," whose words were ignored when Jerusalem was prosperous and comfortable. The sin that led to the destruction they were mourning was precisely this sin of honoring God with their lips, their fasts, and their festivals, while their hearts were calloused and their hands were full of injustice. God is teaching them, and us, that true worship is not found in the performance of rituals, but in a life of justice, mercy, and faithfulness that flows from a heart renewed by grace. He is setting the stage to turn their fasts into feasts, but not before they understand what true godliness actually is.

Outline

Context In Zechariah

Zechariah 7 marks a significant shift in the book. The first six chapters are filled with a series of eight night visions, culminating in the symbolic crowning of Joshua the high priest. Those visions were primarily about encouragement, divine promises, and the assurance that God was with His people to rebuild His house and reestablish His kingdom under the messianic figure of "the Branch." Now, with the work on the temple underway, the prophetic word turns from what God will do to what His people must do. The visions have laid the theological groundwork, and now the practical application begins.

This section (chapters 7-8) functions as a prophetic sermon, or a collection of oracles, prompted by a very practical question. It serves as a crucial hinge in the book, connecting the glorious promises of the first half with the more distant prophetic oracles of the second half (chapters 9-14). Before God reveals the future triumphs and sufferings of the Shepherd-King, He must first address the character of the people who would live under His rule. The issue is covenant faithfulness. God is making it plain that the restored community cannot simply be a repeat of the pre-exilic community. The old patterns of externalism and hypocrisy led to ruin, and if this new chapter is to be different, the people's hearts must be different. Their worship must be genuine.

Key Issues

Verse by Verse Commentary

1 Now it happened that in the fourth year of King Darius, the word of Yahweh came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, which is Chislev.

The prophecy is anchored in human history with meticulous detail. This is not a fairy tale; it is a record of God breaking into our time and space. The date is specific: the fourth year of Darius, the fourth day of the ninth month. This is about two years after the prophecies of Haggai and the initial visions of Zechariah began. The work on the temple is proceeding. This historical precision reminds us that God's Word is not a collection of abstract principles. It is always addressed to real people in real situations. The God of the Bible is the God who acts in history, and His prophets speak into that history with authority.

2 And the town of Bethel sent Sharezer and Regemmelech and their men to entreat the favor of Yahweh,

A delegation arrives. They come from Bethel, a place with a checkered history, to say the least. Bethel was one of the centers of Jeroboam's idolatrous calf-worship, a symbol of Israel's apostasy in the north. Now, men from a reconstituted Bethel are coming to the temple site in Jerusalem. Their names, Sharezer and Regemmelech, are Babylonian, which tells you something about where they have been. They are children of the exile. They come "to entreat the favor of Yahweh," which literally means to "stroke the face" of Yahweh, to appease or seek His goodwill. On the surface, this is a pious act. They are coming to the right place to ask their question.

3 speaking to the priests, who belong to the house of Yahweh of hosts, and to the prophets, saying, “Shall I weep in the fifth month and abstain, as I have done these many years?”

Here is the presenting issue. They direct their question to the official representatives of God's Word and worship: the priests and the prophets. The question itself concerns a religious tradition. For seventy years, during the exile, the Jews had established fasts to commemorate the great tragedies of their nation's fall. The fast of the fifth month specifically mourned the destruction of Solomon's temple by Nebuchadnezzar. Their question is simple: now that we are back and the temple is being rebuilt, should we keep this up? It seems like a reasonable, even a spiritually sensitive, question. They are asking, "Is it time to stop mourning?" But notice the pronoun: "Shall I weep?" The question is framed around their activity, their feelings, their tradition.

4 Then the word of Yahweh of hosts came to me, saying,

God answers. But He does not answer the delegation directly. The Word comes to Zechariah, and it is a word for a much broader audience. This is not just about a liturgical question from a few men from Bethel. God is going to use this occasion to speak to the entire nation. The formula "the word of Yahweh of hosts came to me" establishes the divine authority of what follows. This is not Zechariah's opinion on fasting; this is the verdict of the Commander of Heaven's Armies.

5 “Speak to all the people of the land and to the priests, saying, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months these seventy years, was it actually for Me that you fasted?

God bypasses their specific question about the future and goes straight to the heart of their past actions. He broadens the scope from the fast of the fifth month to include the fast of the seventh month (mourning the assassination of Gedaliah). And He asks a devastatingly simple question: "Who was this for?" He asks, "was it actually for Me that you fasted?" The implied answer is a thunderous "No." For seventy years they had been performing this ritual of sorrow, but God says it never once registered in Heaven as being for Him. Their grief was self-referential. They were mourning their loss, their pain, their exile. They were not mourning their sin against a holy God. This is the essence of false religion. It is man-centered, even when it uses God-language.

6 And when you eat and when you drink, are you not eating for yourselves and are you not drinking for yourselves?

God presses the point by putting their fasting and their feasting on the same level. Whether you fast or you feast, it's all about you. Your sorrow is for you, and your joy is for you. When you eat and drink, you are not doing it with gratitude to the Giver, for His glory. You are simply satisfying your own appetites. God is exposing a deep-seated spiritual autonomy. Their entire lives, the sacred and the secular, the times of abstinence and the times of indulgence, were all oriented around themselves. This is a radical critique. God is not just correcting their fasting technique; He is indicting their entire way of life. True worship consecrates everything, eating and drinking included, to the glory of God. Theirs consecrated nothing.

7 Are not these the words which Yahweh called out by the hand of the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and at ease along with its cities around it, and the Negev and the Shephelah were inhabited?’ ”

And here is the final blow. God tells them that this is not a new message. This is exactly what the "former prophets", Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos, Micah, were saying before the exile. When Jerusalem was fat and happy, when the land was prosperous and secure, the prophets were sent to warn them that their sacrifices were a stench, their festivals were a sham, and their worship was an abomination because it was disconnected from justice, mercy, and a true heart for God. The very sin that God is confronting in Zechariah's day is the very sin that led to the destruction they were supposedly mourning with their fasts. They had learned nothing. They were weeping over the consequences of a disease they were still happily cultivating in their own hearts. God is calling them to break the cycle, to listen now to the words their fathers ignored, and to understand that God desires obedience from the heart, not just the performance of religious duties.

Application

The message of this passage is a bucket of ice water for any church that has become comfortable in its religious routines. The central question God asks is one we must constantly ask ourselves: "Who is this for?" When we gather for worship, when we give our tithes, when we pray, when we engage in acts of service or piety, is it for Him? Or is it for us? Is it to be seen by others? Is it to feel better about ourselves? Is it to maintain a tradition that has lost its heart?

God is not impressed by the longevity of our traditions. These Jews had been fasting for seventy years, but seventy years of self-pity is still just self-pity. True fasting, and by extension all true worship, is God-centered. It flows from a broken and contrite heart over our sin, and it results in a life of active obedience. As Isaiah says, the fast that God chooses is to "loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free" (Isaiah 58:6). It is about justice, mercy, and love for our neighbor.

This passage calls us to examine the motivation behind our religious activities. It is entirely possible to be busy with all sorts of "church work" and have it all be for ourselves. The solution is not to abandon the forms of worship, but to beg God for a new heart. The gospel is the only power that can transform our self-centered worship into God-centered worship. When we see the magnitude of our sin and the even greater magnitude of Christ's sacrifice for us, our hearts are broken out of their self-absorption. We stop mourning our circumstances and begin to truly mourn our sin. And that kind of godly sorrow leads to a repentance that turns our fasting into feasting, and our rituals into righteousness, all for the glory of God.