Repentance that makes a difference (Zech 1:1-6)
Zech 1:1-6
As a teenager, I was taught by the church that we are all so mired in sin that our case is hopeless without God and therefore we need to repent of all our wrongdoing. While the principle made sense to me, I struggled to see my sins as particularly black. In fact, I felt guilty for not feeling more guilty! The truth was, I came from a rather sheltered home and could not think of very serious sins in my life. I wondered what constitutes true repentance and what exactly do we need to repent of? All cultures consider some behaviours and actions wrong and approve of others, and we often take our cue from this wider context as to what we should or should not do. The more a society’s norms diverge from God’s, however, the harder it is for us to adjust our thinking to God’s as revealed in Scripture. Given how much secular Western societies have redefined what is considered wrongdoing, it is increasingly difficult to feel the weight of sin in areas where our culture approves of something or at least considers it neutral. What then can Zechariah teach us about the true nature of repentance?
Repentance as turning
The prophecy that the book opens with came about two months (or less) after Haggai’s indictment (Hag 1:1-11).[1] While Haggai focuses on the people’s wrong priorities in very practical terms, Zechariah gives the big picture to explain what went wrong with the temple building and sets it parallel to Israel’s history leading to the exile. The issue turns on repentance. As the pre-exilic generation, this one is called to repent, a word that in Hebrew literally means ‘to turn’ or ‘return’ (shuv), understood either physically (e.g. to return home) or metaphorically. Significantly, repentance should be a ‘return to Me’ (Zech 1:3). In other words, it is about the restoration of relationship with God that is disrupted by sin. Thus, turning away from ‘evil ways and deeds’ (Zech 1:4) matters because it stands in the way of a full and restored relationship with the Lord. This focus is firmly in view when God says that the pre-exilic fathers did not ‘give heed to Me’ (v.4) with the result that God’s judgment pronounced through the prophets came on them (Zech 1:6).
God’s response to repentance
Implicit in the parallel is the warning that unless the exiles repent (of their lack of faith in God’s power – Ezra 4:4, and/or their wrong priorities – Hag 1:2-4), they cannot expect God’s help. He will return to them when they return to Him (Zech 1:3). Although there is some debate over who ‘they’ are who eventually repented (Zech 1:6), I take it as a reference to the exiles who experienced God’s judgment and acknowledged that they indeed deserved it. This was an important point because pre-exile, Judah refused to submit to God’s judgment brought through the Babylonians (Jeremiah keeps urging people to surrender, i.e. submit to God’s discipline, but they refuse to do so; e.g. Jer 38:17-23). By implication, repentance in exile led to the way being opened for the Jews to return home.[2] Now Zechariah is encouraging the returned people to turn back to God again because then He will surely turn back to them.
Repentance that makes a difference
To return to my own story, the ‘repentance’ that changed everything in my life was when I finally acknowledged that I lived without God before and that from now on I wanted to live with Him. We can tinker at the edges repenting of and cutting out various habits or actions from our lives that we consider wrong, but unless our fundamental orientation to God changes, we are still our own masters and without God. As in Zechariah’s message, repentance is a return to the Lord and the relationship with Him, whether for the first time or, as a Christian, again and again. Whether we feel remorse or guilt is less important than the act of recognising that whatever we have done, said or thought hurts our relationship with the Lord. It is when we care for that relationship above all else and see sin as what destroys it, that true transformation can happen in our lives.
[1] This may not have been the only prophecy Zechariah spoke to the people, nor even the first. As the gospels, which are selective about what they record from Jesus’ life and teaching, so prophetic books are likewise organised to make an impact for later readers rather than cite everything a prophet said or even record utterances in the order the prophets delivered them to their first audience.
[2] There are a few alternatives to the identity of the people who repented. One is that it refers the returnees who heard Zechariah’s message. Since Hebrew does not have quotation marks, the second half of v.6 may not be what the prophet said, but an explanation of how the returnees responded with repentance. This eliminates the potential tension that the fathers are implied to be dead (Zech 1:5) and therefore cannot repent. However, the prophet’s primary message is that judgment indeed overtook them. Some fell in the siege of Jerusalem, to be sure, and most of that generation would have died eventually in exile, but having experienced God’s discipline, those in Babylon may have come to their senses and repented. If so, then it explains why the return from exile could happen and underlines the principle mentioned in v.3 that when we return to Him, He returns to us. If those who repented are Zechariah’s audience, then the initial return from exile (without repentance) remains unexplained and undermines the above principle.
Another alternative is that the ones who repented are the fathers before the exile happened, but they did so too late. All they could do is to acknowledge God’s judgment on them, but they could not avert the disaster. In this case, the message is rather a stark warning for the returnees to repent or it may be too late. Given that Zechariah came to encourage the people and the rest of these visions in the first half of the book are largely positive, such an opening seems unduly severe and gloomy. It also undermines once again the reciprocity principle that when we respond to God, He responds to us. To say that some repentance comes too late and achieves nothing would considerably weaken the overall argument in this passage.
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