Zechariah 13:1 - Meaning and Application

Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, the sin of the church. This was why the Son of God was revealed, to take away our sin (John 3:5). He removes the guilt of sin by the blood of his cross (Zechariah 13:1). “In that day,” that is, in the gospel age, “there shall be a fountain opened.” God has made full provision for cleansing all who truly repent and grieve over their sins.

When the Spirit of grace is poured out and people are brought to mourn over their sins, they do not mourn as those without hope. They are forgiven, and they can feel the comfort of that forgiveness in their hearts. Their consciences are made clean and quiet by the blood of Christ, which cleanses from all sin (John 1:7). Christ is exalted to give both repentance and forgiveness of sins, and where he gives one, he surely gives the other.

This opened fountain is the pierced side of Jesus Christ, mentioned just before (Zechariah 12:10). From that side came blood and water, both for cleansing. Those who look on Christ, pierced for their sins, and mourn because their sins pierced him may also look again and rejoice in him. It pleased the Lord to strike that rock so it could become a fountain of living water for us.

See here how we are defiled. We all are. We have sinned, and sin is uncleanness. It stains the mind and conscience, makes us hateful to God, and leaves us uneasy within ourselves. It also makes us unfit for God’s service and for close fellowship with him, just as ceremonially unclean people were shut out of the sanctuary. The house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem are under sin, and sin is uncleanness. In truth, we are all like something unclean, and we deserve the place of the unclean.

See also how we may be cleansed. A fountain is opened for us to wash in, and streams flow to us from that fountain. If we are not made clean, the fault is ours. The blood of Christ, and God’s forgiving mercy in that blood as revealed in the new covenant, are a fountain because they hold endless fullness. There is enough mercy in God, and enough merit in Christ, to forgive the greatest sins and sinners who come on gospel terms. “Such were some of you, but you were washed” (1 Corinthians 6:11). Under the law there were a bronze basin and a bronze sea for washing, but those were only containers. We have a fountain of our own, overflowing and always flowing.

It is also an opened fountain, because anyone who will may come and receive its benefit. It is opened, not only to the house of David, but to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to the poor as well as the rich, the humble as well as the honored. Or it is opened to all believers, who, as the spiritual children of Christ, belong to the house of David, and, as living members of the church, are inhabitants of Jerusalem. Through Christ all who believe are justified, that is, counted right with God, and washed from their sins in his blood, so that they may become “kings and priests” to God (Revelation 1:5, 6).

He also takes away the power of sin by the strength of his grace, even our cherished sins. This always goes with the first work. Those who are washed in the opened fountain are not only justified, they are also sanctified, that is, made holy. The water came with the blood from the pierced side of Christ.

In that day, idolatry will be completely put away, and the Jewish people will be effectively healed of their pull toward it (Zechariah 13:2). God says, “I will cut off the names of the idols out of the land.” The worship of the idols of their fathers will be so fully rooted out that, within one or two generations, people will scarcely remember such idols ever existed among them. They will either not be named at all, or not with any respect. This fulfills the promise, “I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth” (Hosea 2:17).

This was fulfilled in the deep hatred for idols that the Jews had after the captivity, and still have to this day. It was also fulfilled in the ready conversion of many to Christ, by which they were turned away from making an idol of the ceremonial law, as unbelieving Jews did. It is still being fulfilled whenever souls are turned away from the world and the flesh, those two great idols, so that they cling to God alone.

False prophecy will also come to an end. God says, “I will remove the prophets and the unclean spirit from the land.” The devil is an unclean spirit. Sin and impurity come from him, and he has his own prophets, who serve his purpose and receive their messages from him. If the unclean spirit were taken away, the prophets would not keep deceiving people as they do. If the false prophets, who claim false authority, were removed, the unclean spirit could not do the harm he does.

When God means to silence false prophets, he drives out the unclean spirit that worked in them and competed with him for rule in the heart. When the Jewish church was devoted to idols, it also greatly admired false prophets, who comforted people in their sins with promises of safety and peace. But here God promises a blessed change: they would grow strongly against false prophets and work to clear the land of them. They did so after the captivity, until, in their blind zeal against false prophets, they put Christ to death under that charge. After that, many false Christs and false prophets arose and deceived many (Matthew 24:11).

It is foretold here that false prophets, instead of being tolerated and favored, would be brought to deserved punishment, even by their own closest relatives. That would be one of the clearest signs of strong zeal against deceivers (Zechariah 13:3). When anyone rose up as a prophet and spoke lies in the name of the Lord, preaching what would draw people away from God and strengthen them in sin, even his own parents would be the first and most ready to bring him to justice, according to the law (Deuteronomy 13:6-11). They would show their outrage and stop him from leading others further astray.

We should learn to feel deep hatred and fear toward anything that would lead us out of the path of duty into crooked ways, as those who cannot stand evil (Revelation 2:2). Holy zeal for God and for godliness will make us hate sin and fear temptation most where we naturally love most, and where we are closest to the danger. That is where the danger often lies, as with Adam through Eve and Job through his wife. That is also where it is most praiseworthy to show zeal, as Levi did, who, in God’s cause, did not spare his own family ties (Deuteronomy 33:9). In this way, we must hate and leave even our nearest relations when they come into conflict with our duty to God (Luke 14:26). Natural affection, even the strongest, must be ruled by holy love.

The false prophets will also be convinced of their sin and foolishness, and they will drop their claims (Zechariah 13:4). “The prophets will be ashamed of every vision they claimed. They will no longer repeat it or stand by it. They will want it forgotten, and they will be willing to admit it was a fraud.”

This will happen because God, in his grace, awakens their consciences and shows them their mistake. Or it may be because events prove their words false and expose them as liars. It may also be because people no longer receive their prophecies kindly. Instead, they are despised and disliked. When they see others ashamed of them, they begin to feel ashamed of themselves. So they will no longer wear the rough robe, or garment of hair, that true prophets used to wear in the spirit of Elijah, as a sign of self-denial and seriousness.

These impostors had dressed like true prophets, but once their folly is exposed, they will put that dress aside. They will no longer try to deceive careless people by outward appearance. A plain, modest dress is a good thing when it truly shows a humble heart and helps teach others. But it is a bad thing when it hides a proud and ambitious heart and is meant to deceive. Let people be as good as they appear to be, but not only appear better than they really are.

This pretender, like a true penitent, will first undo the harm he has done. He will say, “I am not a prophet, as I claimed. I was never chosen for that work, never trained for it, and never counted among the sons of the prophets.” He will then say, “I am a farmer, and that was my trade. I was never taught by God to prophesy, but by men to keep livestock” (Amos 7:14, 15). Amos was also a farmer before God called him to be a prophet, but this deceiver never had such a call. Those who truly grieve over having deceived others will be quick to confess their sin, and they will do what they can to correct the mistakes they caused.

Such a man will also return to the work that properly belongs to him. “I will be a farmer,” the sense may be, “I will go back to my calling and stop meddling in things that are not mine. I learned to keep cattle from my youth, and I will keep cattle again. I will never set myself up as a preacher any more.” When we become convinced that we have left the path of duty, we must show that our repentance is real by returning to it, even if it feels very humbling.

He will also admit that those who corrected him harshly were his friends, because they helped bring him to the truth (Zechariah 13:6). When a man who had confidently claimed to be a prophet suddenly says, “I am not a prophet,” everyone will be surprised. Some will ask, “What are these wounds on your hands? How did you get them? Were you examined by beating? Was that what brought you to your senses?” Suffering often sharpens understanding. “Were you beaten until you admitted the truth?” “Was it rod and correction that taught you wisdom?” And he will answer, “Yes. These are the wounds I received in the house of my friends, who bound me and treated me roughly, as if I were out of my mind, and so brought me back to my senses.”

This shows that the parents who struck through the false prophet (Zechariah 13:3) did not do it until they had first tried to correct him. He would not listen, so they could not reclaim him. That fits the law about a stubborn son, whose parents had to discipline him without success before they could bring him out to be stoned (Deuteronomy 21:18, 19). Here, another man was brought to repentance by beating, and so escaped the death penalty. He honestly admitted that those who wounded him were his real friends, because they were trying to restore him. “Faithful are the wounds of a friend” (Proverbs 27:6).

Some good interpreters notice that this comes so soon after the mention of Christ being pierced, and think these words belong to that great Prophet, not to the false prophet just spoken of. Christ was wounded in his hands when they were nailed to the cross, and after his resurrection he still had the marks of those wounds. In this view, he explains how he received them. He received them as one treated like a false prophet, because the chief priests called him a deceiver and, on that charge, wanted him crucified. Yet he says he received them in the house of his friends, the Jews, who should have been his friends. He came to his own people, and though they were his enemies, he still called them his friends, as he did Judas, “Friend, why have you come?” because they helped bring about his suffering. In the same way, he called Peter “Satan,” meaning an adversary, because Peter tried to turn him away from that suffering.