{"id":7786,"date":"2021-09-09T06:37:05","date_gmt":"2021-09-09T11:37:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/?p=7786"},"modified":"2021-08-23T14:18:58","modified_gmt":"2021-08-23T19:18:58","slug":"devotional-on-zechariah-20","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-zechariah-20\/","title":{"rendered":"Devotional on Zechariah"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><figure id=\"attachment_15546\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-15546\" style=\"width: 960px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788-1024x765.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"717\" class=\"size-large wp-image-15546\" srcset=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788-1024x765.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788-300x224.jpg 300w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788-768x574.jpg 768w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788-1536x1148.jpg 1536w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/IMG_1788.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-15546\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">2013 &#8211; Tombigbee State Park &#8211; Tupelo, MS &#8211; road to the park<\/figcaption><\/figure><br \/>\nNot acting like a bully<br \/>\nZechariah 1: &#8230;Godless nations that act as if they own the whole world.<br \/>\nAbout half of this book of Zechariah contains descriptions of visions the prophet is given.  In the first vision the Lord tells Zechariah that he\u2019s angry with \u201cgodless nations that act as if they own the whole world.\u201d  Not only is the Lord angry, he\u2019s about to do something about it.  The Lord had given the mega-powers of the region authority over Israel but they went too far, crushing that tiny nation without any show of mercy.  The Lord says he was angry with Israel, but now he&#8217;s very angry with these nations that acted without mercy.  The vision is intended to condemn those world powers while comforting powerless Israel.  I\u2019m reminded as I read these words that I live in a nation that is a world power.  We have the economic and military might to dominate others.  The vision of the prophet speaks to me, not as one of the oppressed but instead, as one of the powerful.  God has a history of looking out for the needs of the powerless and of holding the powerful accountable.  We aren\u2019t to go around the world flexing our muscles like a bully who always has to get his own way.  The truth is that we don\u2019t own the whole world and we had better remember who does!<br \/>\nTake Away: It\u2019s God\u2019s world and we\u2019re accountable to him for how we live in his world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Not acting like a bully Zechariah 1: &#8230;Godless nations that act as if they own the whole world. About half of this book of Zechariah contains descriptions of visions the prophet is given. In the first vision the Lord tells Zechariah that he\u2019s angry with \u201cgodless nations that act as if they own the whole [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1532,6,7],"tags":[21,67,151,871],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7786"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7786"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7786\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15547,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7786\/revisions\/15547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}