Timeless

The angel who was talking with me answered, “I will show you what they are.” Then the man standing among the myrtle trees explained (Zechariah 1:9-10)

An odd little exchange here: the angel speaks, promising to 'show' him, but it is the man in the vision that explains. The whole event is interactive, with the agents in the vision responding to Zechariah's question in real time. This is not just a meaningful dream, like Pharaoh or Nebuchadnezzar, but something much more - more like John's vision in revelation - more like a waking dream, but one in which God (through his messengers) is the agent. God breaks the normal boundaries of time and space to reveal truth to his prophet.

One of the questions that keeps returning about prophecy is whether it is forth-telling (to the people at the time) or fore-telling (about the future). The traditional view was that it is both, but some scholars are rather uncomfortable with that idea and wish to nail the words back into their own time. Leave aside for a moment that Jesus refers to it as fore-telling (which for most of us is a slam-dunk on the question), it does rather miss the point. Either the prophet is lying or he is having a divinely inspired vision. Now if the first, why read it at all except as a psychologist analysing a form of insanity. However if the second, then it is God speaking so to limit it to the time of the writer is to deny the reality of God completely. In other words it is either nonsense or timeless. Nothing in between makes any sense at all. And timeless means it may speak to today and now just as much as to the time it is written. 



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