“Not by Might, nor by Power”

I wonder if any of you here today have ever been faced with what seems like a mountain of opposition to what you know is a really good plan. I’d wager that most of you have at one point or another been in a situation just like that. Somewhere along the way you’ve set out full of energy and excitement to accomplish some good thing only to run straight into a brick wall. Perhaps it was the small-minded thinking of others who simply could not listen to reason. Or maybe you were caught in the infinite loop of bureaucratic red tape and delay after delay after delay. Or perhaps you up against the wall of outright hostility to you and any ideas you might have. In other words, you know the kind of frustration and disillusionment a person can suffer when he’s faced with what seems like an insurmountable hurdle to the achievement of his good plans and intentions… especially when he knows they are God’s plans and intentions.

There was a man in the Bible who had a God-given plan, but was faced with a mountain of opposition so imposing that, in order to keep him from falling into disillusionment and despair, God had to send two of his best prophets to encourage him: the prophets Haggai and Zachariah. In fact, this man was faced with every one of the hurdles I’ve just mentioned: the small-minded thinking of his own people, the red-tape of a massive bureaucracy, and the outright hostility of the neighbors. His was a three-peaked mountain of opposition. The man’s name was Zerubbabel.

Now we’re not all that familiar with this man with the funny name. He isn’t one of the more well-known characters in the Bible. Nor, in fact, are we all that familiar with the period in Israel’s history in which he was a major player. It was the period called “The Restoration”, the time when God was bringing his people back from their Babylonian exile to reestablish them in the land of Palestine. The year was 484 BC, and Zerubbabel had been commissioned by God to rebuild the temple which had lain in ruins for over one-hundred years. But after sixteen years all that he’d been able to accomplish was to lay the foundation.

For a little more background, let’s turn to the book of Ezra, chapter 3 beginning at verse 8. (Read 3:8-4:5)

“Now in the second month of the second year of their coming to the house of God at Jerusalem, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and the rest of their brethren the priests and the Levites, and all those who had come out of the captivity to Jerusalem, began work and appointed the Levites from twenty years old and above to oversee the work of the house of the Lord. … 10 When the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests stood in their apparel with trumpets, and the Levites, the sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise the Lord, according to the ordinance of David king of Israel. And they sang responsively, praising and giving thanks to the Lord:

‘For He is good,

‘For His mercy endures forever towards Israel.’

Then all the people shouted with a great shout, when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. But many of the priest and Levites and heads of the fathers’ houses, old men who had seen the first temple, wept with a loud voice when the foundation of this temple was laid before their eyes. Yet many shouted aloud for joy, so that the people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping of the people, for the people shouted with a loud shout, and the shout was heard afar off.

“Now when the adversaries [lit. ‘enemies’] of Judah and Benjamin heard that the descendants of the captivity were building the temple of the Lord God of Israel, they came to Zerubbabel and the heads of the fathers’ houses, and said to them, ‘Let us build with you, for we seek your God as you do; and we have sacrificed to Him since the days of Esarhaddon king of Assyria, who brought us here” [Samaritans]. But Zerubbabel and Jeshua and the rest of the heads of the fathers’ houses of Israel said to them, ‘You may do nothing with us to build a house for our God; but we alone will build to the Lord God of Israel, as King Cyrus the king of Persia has commanded us.” Then the people of the land tried to discourage the people of Judah. They troubled them in building, and hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia.

So, get the picture? For sixteen years they couldn’t move forward with the work because of Samaritan opposition. (You wonder where Jewish hatred of the Samaritans came from?) For sixteen years all they’d been able to accomplish was merely to lay the foundation, and even when that was accomplished the old people wept with disappointment because they could see that this new temple would pail in comparison to the old one. For sixteen years whenever they thought they could move forward with their plans they were immediately shot down by local government.

So put yourself into the shoes of Zerubbabel. How many of us would stay with a construction project if we had to suffer a delay of sixteen years just to get the permits to raise the walls. How many of us would stay with it for a year? Add to it a bunch of old folks constantly whining that it’s never going to be good enough, and the neighbors picketing your property around the clock and blocking the way from construction materials arriving on site, and you have the recipe for a serious bout of disillusionment. And yet don’t think that this wouldn’t be exactly the kind of thing we’d have to suffer when we get to the point that we’d like to build our new sanctuary. But imagine having only a foundation for sixteen years. Would we stick with the project?

It might be at that point that we would begin seriously to be tempted to fight our battles by worldly means—to fight fire with fire, and force with force. We can imagine that Zerubbabel was tempted that same way. “If we could just mobilize our people into and army, or make an alliance with one of our militarily strong neighbors…” But it is precisely at this point, after sixteen years of waiting and being discouraged, that God sends his prophet Zechariah to Zerubbabel to tell him to wait just a little longer. “Don’t exchange your trust in the Lord for reliance on any worldly means.” For the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel is: “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit” says the Lord.

If we were going to read it a little more literally, it would say, “Not by armies, nor by strength, but by My Spirit,” says the Lord. In other words, God says to Zerubbabel, “It’s not going to be by the collective might of an army of fighting men, nor by the heroic strength of any one individual that you’re going to build my house. But it will be by my sovereign Spirit.”

“No king is saved by the multitude on an army. A might man is not delivered by great strength… [But] behold the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him, on those who hope in His mercy” (Ps. 33:16, 18).

You see, the House of God will never be built upon its Great Foundation by crusades or pogroms or inquisitions, nor even by an army of Christians assembled at the polls. The House of God, the Church, will never be built up on its One Foundation, Jesus Christ her Lord, by heroic efforts of kings or princes, or even by electing a Christian President. The house of God is built up by ordinary people who fight their battles by the Spirit of God, who pray and worship in the Spirit, who trust that the Spirit of God makes powerful their witness to the gospel to the tearing down of the kingdom of Satan, and to the building up of the kingdom of Christ. And if we have the Spirit of God on our side, there is no insurmountable barrier to accomplishing His purposes, no mountain of opposition that will finally frustrate His plans, if we but wait on Him. Isaiah writes,

“[The Lord] gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall, but those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and no faint” (Is. 40:29-31).

God says through Zechariah, “Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel [and before the Church] you shall become a plain!”… even if it takes sixteen years. “For who has despised the day of small things?” Who despises small beginnings, if those beginnings were made in the Lord? God will accomplish what He’s started out to do.

So how did the Spirit of God turn the mountain of opposition into a plain for Zerubbabel? Like He’d done so many times before, He made the opposition defeat themselves. The Persian governor wrote to King Darius to get him to put a stop to the temple project once and for all, and what happened? Not only did King Darius judge that it was legal for the Jews to continue their work, but He decided to flip the bill as well! Isn’t that great! That’s the way the Lord rewards those who wait on him, even through years of frustrating opposition to His plans.

We’ve existed as a church now for almost sixteen years, and we’ve had a very small beginning. In reality we’ve only been able to lay the foundation. But “who hath despised the day of small things?” The word of the Lord to us is, ‘‘Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the Lord.” Truly, unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it.” But if by the Spirit of God we have laid the foundation, He will finish the work… if we wait on Him. Sixteen years is a long time to wait. But if Zerubbabel could wait a little longer, maybe we can too. Great plans take great perseverance.

Wait on the Lord, and see mountains of opposition become plains of opportunity. Wait on the Lord, and see small beginnings become great works of God. “Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord.” +