Zechariah 14:8 - Meaning and Application

Here are the blessings promised to Jerusalem, the gospel Jerusalem, in the Messiah’s day, and to the whole earth through the blessings poured out on Jerusalem, especially on the land of Israel.

Jerusalem will be like a spring of living water for the world. This was fulfilled when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the apostles, and from there the word of the Lord spread to the nations around (Zechariah 14:8). Living waters will flow out from Jerusalem, because that is where they began, and from there those who were sent to preach repentance and forgiveness of sins to all nations went out (Luke 24:47). Where the gospel goes, and where God’s Spirit goes with it, there living waters go too. Those streams that make God’s city glad also make the surrounding country glad, and they make it like paradise, like the well-watered garden of the Lord.

It was Jerusalem’s honor that the word of the Lord went out from there (Isaiah 2:3). Even in its worst and most corrupted days, it was made a blessing for old acquaintance’s sake, and to be a blessing is itself a blessing. Half of these waters go toward the former sea and half toward the latter sea, as rivers flow in different directions to the sea. In the same way, the gospel will spread to all parts of the world, to some people far from Jerusalem in one direction and to others far away in another. The Redeemer’s rule must extend from sea to sea (Psalm 72:8), and the earth must be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.

This knowledge of God will spread everywhere and continue every day. These living waters will produce both eastern churches and western churches, and each in its turn will be glorious. They will also keep flowing in summer and winter. Those who work to spread the gospel may find work both in summer and in winter, and they must serve the Lord at all times (Acts 20:18). God’s power goes with these living waters so that they will not dry up, and nothing will stop their course, whether drought in summer or frost in winter.

The kingdom of God among people will also be a kingdom that is both universal and united (Zechariah 14:9). It will be universal because the Lord will be King over all the earth. He is, and always has been, King by right, and his providence rules over all things. No one is outside his authority. But here it is promised that he will be acknowledged as King by everyone in every place. His rule will be owned, obeyed, and honored. This will be fulfilled in the word, “The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ” (Revelation 11:15).

It will also be a united kingdom. There will be one Lord, and his name will be one. All will worship one God alone, not idols, and they will be united in that worship. All false gods will be left behind, and all false ways of worship will be done away with. God himself will be the center of their unity, the one in whom they all meet, and Scripture will be the rule of that unity, the path they all follow.

The land of Judah and Jerusalem, its mother city, will also be repaired, filled up again, and taken under special heavenly protection (Zechariah 14:10, 14:11). Some think this points to special favor for the Jewish people, and to their conversion and restoration in later days. But it is better understood in a figurative sense of the gospel church, pictured by Judah and Jerusalem. It shows the rich grace with which the church will be crowned, the fruitfulness of its members, and their great numbers.

The church will be like a fruitful country, full of the rich products of the soil. The whole land of Judah, though naturally uneven and hilly, will be turned into a plain, a smooth valley, from Geba, or Gibeah, at the far north border, to Rimmon, south of Jerusalem at the far south border of Judah. When the gospel of Christ comes in power, it levels the ground. Mountains and hills are brought low so that the Lord alone may be exalted.

The church will also be like a crowded city. As the holy land is made level, the holy city will be filled with people. Jerusalem will be lifted up from its low condition and raised from its ruins. When the land is turned into a plain, and not only the Mount of Olives removed (Zechariah 14:4) but other mountains as well, then Jerusalem will stand out more clearly. She will be inhabited in her own place, even in Jerusalem (Zechariah 12:6). The whole city, within its full borders, will be occupied, with no part left desolate.

The farthest boundaries of the city are named here, and there will be no wasted ground between them. All of it will be built on, from Benjamin’s Gate in the northeast to the Corner Gate in the northwest, and from the Tower of Hananel in the south to the king’s winepresses in the north. When Christ’s churches in every place are filled with many holy, humble, serious Christians, and many more are added each day, then this promise is being fulfilled.

This country and this city will both be safe, both the food in the country and the people in the city. Those who live there will live securely, and no one will make them afraid. There will be no more complete ruin that has laid both town and country waste, no more curse, no more cutting off, no more separation from God into evil, and no more such destroying judgments as they had been suffering under. Jerusalem will be safely inhabited. There will be no danger, or even fear of danger. Neither friends nor enemies will be able to disturb its peace. Christ’s promise explains this, that the gates of hell will not prevail against the church. The same security is shown in the holy calm and confidence believers have when they trust in God’s protection.

Then there are judgments threatened against the enemies of the church, those who have fought, or are fighting, against Jerusalem. These threats are given so that the church may be kept safe. When people read and hear of these judgments, they will be afraid to fight against Jerusalem. And when these threats are carried out in some, others will hear and fear. Those who fight against God’s city and people are found fighting against God, and no one has ever hardened himself against him and prospered (Zechariah 14:12). This will be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the peoples who have fought against Jerusalem. Whoever they are, God will punish them for the insult done to him, and he will avenge Jerusalem on them.

They shall waste away under severe, lingering disease. Their flesh will rot away and they will become painfully thin, even while they are still standing, like walking skeletons, with nothing left but skin and bones. The flesh they once fed and indulged, when they were full of the wealth taken from God’s people, will now disappear from sight, and the bones that were hidden will stick out (Job 33:21). They will keep their feet and try to hold their ground, crawling on as long as they can, but in the end they must give way.

Their eyes, the outlets through which sin often entered, will waste away in their sockets. They will sink into their heads, or perhaps bulge out of them. These same eyes, which were proud, hateful, and lustful, and which had so often taken pleasure in scenes of misery, will be ruined. This will make their faces ghastly and their lives miserable. Their tongue, another outlet for sin, will rot away in their mouth. God will deal with them for all their blasphemies against himself and their angry words against his people. In this way, their own tongues will fall on them, and their punishment will match their sin, as it did for the man whose tongue was tormented in the flames. In this way, Antiochus and Herod wasted away.

They shall also be crushed and turned against one another (Zechariah 14:13). There will be a great panic from the Lord among them. But how can panic be from the Lord, when he is a God of order and not of confusion? When people stir up trouble, that trouble is their own sin, from the wicked one and from their own desires. But when that trouble becomes their punishment, it is from the Lord, who carries out his purpose through the sins, follies, and restless spirits of men. They bite and devour one another out of their own evil hearts, but the righteous Judge uses that to bring about their ruin (Galatians 5:15). Just as Ahab was misled by a lying spirit from the Lord, so Abimelech and the men of Shechem were divided and destroyed by an evil spirit from the Lord (Judges 9:23).

Those who join together against the church will justly be split apart and set against each other. The troubles they raise against God will be answered by troubles among themselves. They will seize their neighbors to keep them from striking, or to bind them as prisoners. Yet even then, one man’s hand will rise against his neighbor’s hand, to strike and wound him. Those who aim to destroy the church are often made to destroy one another. The sword of each man is sometimes turned against his fellow by the very one whose sword they all were.

Some think this was fulfilled in the factions and divisions among the Jews when the Romans were destroying them. They had fought against the spiritual Jerusalem, the gospel church, and Zechariah 14:14 fits that well enough: “Judah also shall fight at Jerusalem.” The Jewish nation would be ruined by itself, dying by its own hands. The city and the country would be at war with each other, and both would be destroyed. Even Rome, in its own strength, was driven into ruin by that strength.

The plunder from their camp will greatly enrich God’s people, or it will be the spoil taken from their country (Zechariah 14:14). One learned interpreter reads it as, “Judah also shall eat at Jerusalem.” People will come from every side to share in the spoil. As after Sennacherib’s army was defeated before Jerusalem, there was a great amount of spoil to divide (Isaiah 33:23), so it will be here. The wealth of all the nations around, which had stripped Jerusalem, will be gathered together, gold, silver, and clothing in great abundance, so that an equal share may be given to all who have a right to it. The wealth of sinners is often stored up for the righteous, and the Israel of God is enriched with the spoil of the Egyptians.

Even the cattle will share in the plague by which the enemies of God’s church are cut off, as happened in several of the plagues of Egypt (Zechariah 14:15). All the animals in the tents of these wicked men, when God comes to judge them, will perish with them, not only animals used in war, like horses, but also those used for travel or farming, like mules, camels, and donkeys. Lower creatures often suffer because of human sin and in human disasters. In this way, God shows his anger against sin, and the creation that was made subject to decay will one day be set free into the glorious freedom of the children of God (Romans 8:21-22).