The Lord promises to bless Jerusalem with good crops
“The seed will grow well, the vine will yield its fruit, the ground will produce its crops, and the heavens will drop their dew. I will give all these things as an inheritance to the remnant of this people. 13 As you have been an object of cursing among the nations, O Judah and Israel, so will I save you, and you will be a blessing. Do not be afraid, but let your hands be strong.”
Verses 12 and 13 show in a beautiful picture the mercy of God. The picture is couched in agricultural terms. The people of Zechariah’s day were farmers. They understood. The best picture a farmer could imagine was good weather and good crops. This was his success and prosperity. This was life in the seven years of abundance in Pharaoh’s dream.
Perhaps today we lose sight of this fact. We have always had an abundance of food. It comes to us wrapped in plastic, encased in brightly-colored cardboard. It stands many rows deep on crowded grocery-store shelves. But our food does not come from the supermarket. It comes from the ground. And it still comes to us because the Lord causes the rain and dew to fall from heaven and because he makes the seed germinate.
Food is a blessing. Food is life. In our portly society, food almost has become something we look upon as a curse. But verse 13 points out that the curse comes when there is famine in the land. (Among the Bantu of southern Africa, where famine is common and food remains precious, a common greeting is, “What are you eating these days?”)
The heathen world curses God’s people as the bully Goliath cursed the shepherd-boy David. But enough of it! God will save, and he will make his people a blessing and a cause for blessing. They will be the salt and light of the earth.
Let our hands be strong!