Zechariah 4:7

Zechariah 4:7

I. Prophecy in the long reach of its onward flight stoops again and again to many fulfilments. There is the historical fulfilment, and there is the evangelical fulfilment, the spiritual fulfilment, the practical fulfilment, and the final and glorious fulfilment. There was a "headstone brought out with shoutings" when Zerubbabel's temple was finished, and the old men wept and the young men cried aloud for joy. There was a headstone brought forth with shoutings "when the Lord Jesus Christ," the firstborn of every creature, the top-stone of God's creation, was unveiled to human view at Bethelehem. There will be a "headstone brought out with shoutings" when the whole Church stands in its completeness, and its song of victory goes up, while God inhabits the praises of Israel.

II. There are two stones to which Christ is compared in the Bible the "foundation-stone," and the "head" or corner-stone. Christ is both. (1) First, He is the beginning of every good thing on which it rests as its basis. "Other foundation can no man lay than is laid, which is Christ Jesus." (2) And then afterwards, in due time, He is the "head" or "corner-stone," into which everything gathers itself up as all its aim and all its object, its glory and its last attainment, and in the sameness of those two stones lies the comfort the Alpha is the Omega, in Christ we begin, in Christ we end, we lay all upon His death, and we bring out all unto His glory. And therefore, because He is the beginning and the ending, the "foundation stone" and "top-stone," therefore we cry, "Grace, grace unto it."

III. And what is it we mean when we use that word "grace" in its double emphasis? We mean that it is all free favour, God's own pure mercy. Whatever good thing we have, it was purchased for us by Christ's blood. Whatever good thing we do, it was wrought in us by Christ's Spirit.

J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons,8th series, p. 253.