Zechariah chapter 12

One day, everyone will know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Not just Christians, but all unbelievers, they too will come to realise just what they have been turning their backs on all this time. But by then, it will be too late for many of them as their hearts will have become so hardened. I worry about my family, because they do not know Jesus, and yet it is all in God's hands, in His timing and I am trusting in Him that one day they will believe. After all, if a day is as a thousand years to the Lord, then ten years is only quarter of an hour (well 14.4 minutes to be exact!), so there is plenty of time….

But just read these words about a pouring out of the Holy Spirit. I read these and am reminded of Lakeland, Dudley, Wales, all that is happening in the world around us as there is real move of the Holy Spirit, if only we have the eyes to see. We are seeing bible prophecy being fulfilled before our very eyes and there are things happening now, like the plans to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem, that will only happen in the End Times.

But verse 10 here I think is full of such promise, with the outpouring of the Spirit, but such sorrow, when the Jews, the house of David and Jerusalem, look on Jesus and realise what really happened 2,000 years ago. When they look on the one they pierced, Jesus, they will mourn as if for an only child and grieve bitterly. How sorrowful that day will be - imagine looking the scars on Jesus' hands, his feet, and knowing that your ancestors were the ones that actually put the scars there. And yes, I know that we are each responsible for the scars because it is our sins, my sins, the sins of each one of us, that led to this, but the other aspect to this is how the Jews will feel when they acknowledge Jesus. Imagine knowing how you would feel, knowing that someone actually died because your ancestors refused to recognise who he was and deliberately plotted and schemed to kill him. I'm not for one minute saying the Jews are worse than anyone else, that this is all their fault. After all, it is because of all the mean and horrible things I have done that Jesus died, that he now carries those scars. But this is like last year, when people apologised for the slave trade and the harm that our ancestors did to those in Africa and other nations.

Like it says in verse 10, they will grieve bitterly as one grieves for a firstborn son.