What God Does with Sin

Notes from Minister Scott Sutton's message on Zechariah 5:

Have you ever been speeding or driving with an expired registration and you pass a police officer? You know that feeling of dread, like, all of the sudden you take on the persona of a fugitive… Oh no, it’s the law! Try to look normal! I’m not going back to prison!

It’s funny because you were not concerned about your law breaking at all until you got caught.

This feeling is similar to what Zechariah must have felt when he saw this vision of a giant scroll.

“A scroll likely caused Zechariah’s heart to skip a beat. As a prophet representing a generation returning from exile in judgement, a symbol of God’s chastisement must have been most alarming.” - Richard D. Phillips

On Sunday, Scott gave the example of what it might feel like if a random person handed you a piece of paper with all of your sins written on it. How would that make you feel?

Then imagine, if like the scroll in Zechariah’s vision, that piece of paper is 30 feet by 15 feet (a billboard!) that floats above your head as a curse. The curse represented here is the law. In the passage, the curse goes out over the WHOLE land for EVERYONE who has transgressed the law. It paints this picture where there is no pocket of righteous people anywhere in the land. There is no remnant that has somehow managed to do the right thing and live in perfect righteousness.

This passage reminds us that…

All sin is seen by God.

Recall the aforementioned billboard illustration. Imagine that all of your sins are spelled out on this billboard for all to see. Imagine then that this billboard hovers over you and makes your sins known wherever you go.

Eventually you think, “I need to go home. I can’t have my sins known by others.” So, you go home, but this 30 x 15” billboard follows you into your house!

Zechariah 5:4 says, “I will send it out, declares the Lord of hosts, and it shall enter the house of the thief, and the house of him who swears falsely by my name. And it shall remain in his house and consume it, both timber and stones.”

All sin is judged and punished by God.

God, in His infinite wisdom and holiness, is telling Zechariah that this sin problem will come into the homes of people and consume them. This is a picture of God’s wrath!

Thankfully the story does not end there, verse 5 says, “then the angel who talked with me came forward and said to me, ‘Lift your eyes and see what this is that is going out...’”

You can see the tenderness and mercy of the Lord saying that there’s more to see than just the giant billboard of sin.

Verses 6-8 continue, “...And I said, “What is it?” He said, “This is the basket that is going out.” And he said, “This is their iniquity in all the land.” And behold, the leaden cover was lifted, and there was a woman sitting in the basket! And he said, “This is Wickedness.” And he thrust her back into the basket, and thrust down the leaden weight on its opening.”

The woman of wickedness here represents all evil in the world. 

What does God do with evil?

Verses 9-11 explain, “Then I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, two women coming forward! The wind was in their wings. They had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the basket between earth and heaven. Then I said to the angel who talked with me, “Where are they taking the basket?” He said to me, “To the land of Shinar, to build a house for it. And when this is prepared, they will set the basket down there on its base.”

This illustrates that all sin will ultimately be removed by God!

In this vision, evil is taken out by two stork ladies taking the basket of evil to Shinar. This same prophetic imagery is picked up again in Revelation 17, where (in verse 4) a woman “arrayed in purple and scarlet, adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her sexual immoralities. And on her forehead was written a name of mystery: ‘Babylon the great, mother of prostitutes and earth’s abominations.’"

Babylon/Shinar is where sin was taken and set up in a house, far away from God’s realm. It goes on in the next chapters to say of her, “Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit…” And another voice from heaven said, “Come out of her my people, lest  you take part in her sins… for she will be consumed by fire and the smoke of her will go up forever and ever.”

The important question here is, how do we come out of Babylon? How do we come out of this reality of eternal punishment and step into the reality of eternal blessing in a place free from evil in the presence of our Heavenly Father?

Answer: not by works, but by faith!

"Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us - for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree" - so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith." - Galatians 3:13-14

Your penalty for your sin will be paid by you, or by Jesus.

Consider that flying scroll, like a billboard of sin, being snatched (like a bill) by Jesus and taken out of the sky.

Jesus paid it all.