Would you turn to your Bibles, please? Zechariah chapter 13. It's just a few pages after the book of Matthew, the first book in your New Testament. Zechariah spoke 500 years before Christ. He spoke to the people who had returned from the Babylonian captivity and were rebuilding the temple. These were the very faithful Jews who had given up the comforts of Babylon, where they had actually become rather comfortable and built a new home under the mercies of the Persians. And it was a great sacrifice to come back to the heap of rubble and Judah and Jerusalem and clean it up and rebuild this temple. So this is very faithful people that he's talking to. It says in Zechariah. Chapter 13 and verse seven. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against the man who is my companion, says the Lord of hosts, strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered. In the Jewish expectations of the glorious Messiah, conquering Cain, did they expect a shepherd? They should have. Christ was the son of David. And how did David start his kingship? before he took the throne. He was a shepherd. How fitting then, our Lord would start his ministry as a shepherd. As what we know, the good shepherd. If you turn in your Bibles to Matthew chapter 26, we read the fulfillment of these verses we just read from the prophet. Matthew 26 and verse 31. And this is when Jesus is in the garden of Gethsemane. Or before he's in the garden, it's when he's breaking up after the Passover feast that he had shared with his disciples, and then Jesus said to them, all of you will be made to stumble because of me this night, for it is written, I will strike the shepherd and the sheep of the flock will be scattered. His disciples were confused and amazed when some hours after they had. Heard these words spoken and verified, confessed that they would never deny him. From that time, they went into the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus poured out his agony before the great mission that was before him and something of which his disciples were totally unaware. And then when, of course, when he was betrayed in the garden by a band of ruffians, his disciples were confused and amazed at what had happened that evening. Suddenly, when this band of rough men with sticks and swords, led by the priests and the chief priests, when they came upon him, suddenly they took Jesus and arrested him. And it was like he just gave up. He didn't fight. Here was the man who had always been in control. He had always been the one to win the arguments. He had always been the one to somehow get out of trouble. He had always scolded the Pharisees and the scribes. And even in times of great personal dangers, when they wanted to stone him and thrown him, he somehow slipped through the hostile crowds. And now, but on this night, it all appeared to collapse. He surrendered to this mob without a fight. And suddenly, the man that the disciples thought they knew for three years became a stranger to them. Confused, they fled. Lest they, too, also get into trouble with these authorities. And all of this happened to fulfill the very prophecy that we just read. It says in Matthew chapter 26 and verse 56. But this was done that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled, then all his disciples forsook him and fled. The prophet that is spoken of here in verse 56 with Zechariah. And he said this some 500 years before this actually happened. Now, critics of the Bible will say that some of the prophetic writings were written after the time the prophet actually prophesied, so that the prophecies were not prophecies at all, but they were just mere history. The later chapters of Isaiah received this charge. How could Isaiah have ever known that the Assyrians would conquer the northern kingdom of Israel? Or that Babylon, a nation hardly on the map at the time of Isaiah, would rise to great power and later conquer Judah. Critics change that the later chapters of Isaiah were written by someone else who lived a long time after Isaiah. And the Bible has a name for these critics. They're called scoffers, scorners, unbelievers, lost men. If the scoffers want to deny the claims of Isaiah, then let them account for the prophecies here in Zechariah. If even as the critics charge, the later chapters of Zechariah were written by someone else, even that someone lived a long time before the Lord Jesus came to the earth. And yet look at the wonderful predictions in this chapter. As we just read in verse one, last time we're here. In that day, a fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and uncleanness, clearly referring to the death of Christ on the cross. And then in verse seven before us today, this prophecy that when the shepherd was struck, the sheep would be scattered. And that indeed happened that night. Strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered. Let me say that as sure as this prophecy was fulfilled that grim night in the Garden of Gethsemane, it has marvelously been fulfilled in a much greater way in the salvation of God's people in every age. And the first thing we need to note about this is it was necessary. That our good shepherd be said. That divine justice might be satisfied. Our God is a just judge. A fair and impartial judge, no bribe or outside influence can ever steer his judgment in any matter. In no way could God be persuaded to alter his just decisions in the favor of any man. So this presents us with a problem. If he is just and holy and he rewards men according to their merits, How can any man or woman escape the penalty of sin? We know we all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, and what is the just penalty for sin? Well, who committed the first sin and what happened to them? It was Adam and Eve. They sinned and they died. And when I talk about death today, I'm not just talking about physical death. Because Adam and Eve did not die physically at that very instant, but their soul died. They lost that fellowship with God. They were separated from God. And so when we speak about death throughout the rest of this message, I want to be understood that we're talking about eternal death. We all know that our bodies are going to die and nobody, very few people have escaped that. But we're talking about the death of the soul, because death is the separation of body and soul. And when our soul leaves our body, our body stays in the ground and decays and rots. But our soul goes to be with one who made us. And there we stand before God. And we either enjoy him in his presence forever or we endure his internal wrath for the rest of eternity. And so that's what I'm speaking about when we talk about death here. There's physical death, but then there's that spiritual death of the soul. Now, Adam and Eve died for only one sin. They had broken the only command that God had given them in the Garden of Eden. And he's given the rest of us at least 10 commands since that time. And we have somehow broken every one of them. So if God is a just judge and the penalty for sin is death, that is the eternal death of our souls, how can any of his creatures escape the eternal death penalty? Well, you might say that all God has to do is forgive the sins of people. Well, this is a noble idea, but it presents a problem for justice. Divine law has been broken. We break the laws of men and human justice sends us to jail. But if man's law demands justice, how much more divine law? You see, if God merely shrugs his shoulders and says, I forgive you, what does that do for his holy law? The law becomes weak and meaningless. If we could speed in our cars or steal goods from stores and we get caught and are brought before a human judge, we have to pay a penalty. We might lose a driver's license or even go to jail. Now, what if the human judge said the law forgives you? Just don't do it again and go your way. And we call that forgiveness. The human judge may have forgiven you because you were a first time offender. Or you were young and you were made a mistake, or maybe you came from a poor family. He could be swayed by your circumstances, and so he relaxed the law for your benefit. But a perfect judge and a perfect law can't do this. Let's put it another way. Let's call sin a debt. Every time we sin, we get fined $10. Well, as you go through life, you start to build up a large sum of money that we owe the judge. It becomes a sum so great that we can't pay for it. Now, if the judge forgives us of that debt, who's going to pay the money that we couldn't pay? The debt is still there. Let's say that Hannah gets her driver's license and she wants to buy a car. The car costs $10,000. And she doesn't have that kind of money, so she borrows it from her dad. And she's able to repay her father for a while, and then she loses her job. Her dad says, that's OK, honey, I'll just forgive your debt. You don't owe me anything, just enjoy your car. And that's a noble idea. But who's going to pay the rest of the $10,000? Hannah might be forgiven, but the debt is still there. Dad or someone else still has to come up with the money. So here's our problem. God is suggesting a holy judge. His law demands that eternal death is a penalty for sin. If the judge merely says to the sinner, I forgive you, his holy law is broken. The law demands that the penalty is eternal death. If the judge forgives or excuses the penalty, he is not just because he has allowed his holy law to be broken. The penalty has not been paid. Divine justice demands a payment. Someone has to pay. Either the sinner or someone else has to pay the death penalty. And each one of us stands in need of such a payment. We all have sinned. We all deserve to die eternal death of our souls. And we can't pay the debt. Now, what if some noble and wonderful friend came along and said, I will die in your place. I will pay your debt death penalty for you. You rightly deserve to die. But I will die in your place. Wilson's noble friend would need to be morally perfect. If he is not morally perfect, then his death would be merely paying for his own sins and not yours at all. He would have no merit to pay for anyone else's sins except his own. But suppose a morally perfect man did exist and he offered to die for you. His death would not be needed to pay for his own sins, and the payment would truly be made for yours. But such payment would only be one of a one for one exchange. You were a sinner. He is righteous. He died instead of you to truly pay for your penalty. Divine justice has been satisfied, but for one and only one person, you, and indeed a very fortunate person. Has anyone in the history of mankind ever been morally perfect? So righteous as to never sin, never to break any of God's holy laws. We know the answer. Yes, he was the very son of God. He came to us to earth and human flesh to live a perfect life before his father. And because he was perfect, he would live forever. Eternal death could never claim him. He would never have to face the wrath of God for his own sins, because he didn't have any. He was the perfect son of God. God did not send his son into the world so that he could flaunt his moral perfection. He didn't stick his tongue out and say to us, too bad you aren't righteous. Look at me. See perfect righteousness. No, no. God sent his son to dwell on this earth on the greatest mercy mission ever. God had seen the misery of the human condition. He had seen the degrading effect of sin on the human race. What started in Eden, the Garden of Eden, as disobedience against one rule had grown. In just a few generations into murders, wars, adulteries, rapes, sodomy, brutality, and idolatry. The violence in the world had grown so great at one time that God wiped out the whole human race with a flood, all except for one family. But you know something? After that great flood and that great catastrophic disaster, it did not stop the advance of sin. The moral law, the Ten Commandments, the system of sacrifices, none of these prevailed against the universal advance of sin and ruin to the creatures originally made in the image of God. It was futile for a man to solve the problem of human sin. Our gracious God stepped into the course of human history to provide the only solution to man's sin problem. He sent his son, the very image of his own righteous person, to dwell on the earth in human flesh. Jesus was the son of God, but also the son of man. He didn't come to this earth gliding down to earth in a parachute. He was born as a baby to a human mother who conceived him by the Holy Spirit without the help of a human father. He experienced every stage of human life from infancy to childhood, to adolescence, to adulthood, and yet without sin. And while he walked on the earth, he gave himself completely and unselfishly to the aid and the needs of others like no other man. He healed diseases of all kinds. He fed the hungry. He taught the truth. He raised the dead. He cast out demons. He brought great benefit to many people who had followed him while he lived. He was fully man and perfect man. And then his greatest and final act as the son of God was to experience human death. This was something that he did not have to do. He could have been carried back to heaven by his angels at any time. As perfect man, he could return to his father as the perfect son of God. And he agonized over this thought in the Garden of Gethsemane the night before he was crucified. Three times he went to the Lord in prayer and he asked, Lord, if this cup can pass from me, would you take it? Did he really have to die? Was there some other possible way? The physical punishments of men he knew he could take. When we read of all the brutality that the Romans did to him before he was even put on the cross, the beatings, the scourging, the lashing with the whips. He could endure all that. The punishments of men, even the pain and the agony, the physical pain and the agony of the cross. He could endure that. But how could he take the wrath of God's holy wrath against him on his own son? Out of his great grace and mercy, he did not skip death for himself. To do that, he would have abandoned the problem of human sin and left it to destroy mankind. Instead, he himself chose to pay and to die and to pay the penalty for sin. Not for just one man, but millions of men and women. He could do that because he was that righteous. And because he alone could endure the wrath of God for such a multitude. Imagine that, the sins of not only one person, which in my case would cause tremendous agony all by itself, but millions of people. Millions of people who had been born before and come after. The holy wrath of God against their sins as well. And he bore all of that. The penalty for sin is to experience the wrath of God for all eternity. And God had to pour all of that wrath out on his only son. And he died under that wrath for the sake of his people. Jesus is the good shepherd. Smite the shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep. The good shepherd was smitten by his own beloved father to pay for our sins. And that's what Zechariah 13, 7 says, Awake, O sword against my shepherd, the man who is my companion. Yes, this was fulfilled, of course, when his disciples fled him. But it was also. Had a deeper meaning, the meaning that we just read in that lovely hymn we sang before this. The stroke of divine justice is what really smoked the shepherd that night. The sword of divine justice moved the good shepherd, the very beloved son of God. Think of it, a perfect man dying and suffering the wrath of his father to pay the death penalty for multitudes of sinners. It was the only way that perfect justice could be satisfied. It was the only way that God could be just and the justifier of sinners. The penalty for our sins has been paid and only the holy law of God, which we have broken. Has been satisfied. The holy law of God has not been sacrificed. But justice has been done. And we have been redeemed. I've left out just one element in this story. Faith. Faith is the way sheep are connected to their shepherd. They believe in him, they trust him, they know he will guide them, protect them, even lay down his life for them. They believe they need him and they can't really live without him. They depend on him. Take away the shepherd and the sheep will go astray. They don't know where to feed, where is water and where is the danger from predators. Now, let me ask you some questions. First, do you believe that you even need the good shepherd? Do you believe that the great judgment that will come someday when you will stand before God, that you will need somebody to stand in your place? Or are you good enough in your own righteousness to say, yeah, I'm a pretty good guy. I can stand on my own merits. I've done a few bad things. Made a few bad decisions, but overall, I'm a good fellow. And God is love. He will forgive me. If you feel that way, prepare yourself for a great shock. It's hard to imagine what it'll be like to stand before a righteous and holy God. I don't know how you're going to get me there. You probably have to carry me in a bed. I don't think I'll be able to stand my own two feet. Consider Saul of Tarsus, one of the holiest men really that ever lived. When you think of all he did. As far as keeping the outward obedience to God's law and living the life that man should. Saul of Tarsus was really a holy man. One glimpse of the Lord, the God from heaven for just a short period of time, one glimpse. And he's blind for three days. Isaiah, one of the holiest prophets who ever lived, had a vision of the glory of the Lord filling the temple. And from that vision, he said, woe is me. I'm undone. I'm a man of unclean lips. He couldn't stand it. And then another righteous man. Think of Job. And God even called him righteous in the earlier chapters of Job. But when Job had these tremendous trials put upon him and he sought God's audience, finally at the end of Job, at the end of the book of Job, we read that he got God's audience. He was able to stand before God. And when he saw God, what did this holy man say? He said, I have borne myself and I repent in dust and ashes. He was just overwhelmed. The book of Revelation tells us that God, when He comes down from heaven to judge the earth, men will cry that rocks fall on them to crush them so they don't have to face their eternal judge. No, it's a fearful thing to fall in the hands of a living God. So if you believe that you're OK, that God's a God of love and He'll just forgive you, you better think again. But if you believe that you are a sinner and cannot stand before a holy God at the judgment, are you concerned about your state? Yeah, you may mentally say, OK, I am a sinner. But how seriously do you take your sins? Are you sorry for them? Or are you just sorry for the consequences of your sins? You got caught. Embarrassed before your friends and family. Or maybe you've ruined part of your body or mind for the rest of your life. You may regret these acts, but are you sorry to God? Sorry that you have offended Him? Do you take sin as seriously as God does? He allowed His only Son to be sacrificed for sin. Now, if He did this to Jesus, what would He do with mere sinners? Of the human race. Do you feel the need to be reconciled to God? Not just at the judgment seat, but even now. Will guilt over your sin continue to pile up in your heart, or would you like to know forgiveness? Would you like to know God as a friend? Jesus came to this earth not only to free men from the penalty of sin, that's eternal death, but also free them from the power of sin. Do you know that forgiveness? Do you want to experience God's grace, not his wrath? Jesus came to do this for us, not just in eternity after death, but even now. Eternal life begins right now. the very hour you believe that Jesus is the Son of God who died for our sins. If you believe that Jesus is the only solution to your sin problem and that He was smitten by God for your sins, He will save you from the wrath of God for eternity. And even now you can be reconciled to God. That means enemies make friends. Because if you were a friend of Jesus, you were a friend of God. And Jesus came to make us friends of God and enjoy him forever. But if you don't need Jesus as your savior, then you will not only be judged for your sins and for your careless pride, but you will be judged for rejecting the only possible way to be righteous before God. To reject Jesus as Savior is a slap in the face of a holy God. And this goes for any other hope of salvation. If you believe in Buddha or Mohammed or that some other deities and other nations can save you, that's a slap in the face to the one true God. How would you like it? If you have sacrificed your son and caused him that great death and that agony for your sins and some other prophet comes along and says, well, you can get to heaven my way. After all that God has done for men and some prophet says this. Just slap God in the face. You're saying that Christ's agony and sufferings were not necessary after all. Heed the warning of Jesus himself. He that believes in the Son of God has everlasting life. He does not believe in the Son of God shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on you. Let's continue now in Zechariah chapter 13 and verse seven, if you're still got your hands there. Let's look at this text again. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, against my companion. He was not only our shepherd, but he was God's close companion. He was his eternal friend. Does this not tell us of the rich fellowship between father and son for all eternity? You don't have to turn there, but I'm going to read you a section in Proverbs, speaking of the delight that the son was to the father. This is from Proverbs chapter eight, starting in verse twenty seven. And this is the son speaking. When he, that is, God prepared the heavens, I was there when he drew the circle on the face of the deep. When he established the clouds above, when he strengthened the fountains of the deep, when he assigned to the sea its limits so that the waters would not transgress his command. When he marked out the foundations of the earth, we're talking about creation here, folks, then I was with him as a master craftsman. I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him, rejoicing in his inhabited world. And my delight was with the sons of men whom God had created. There was a rich fellowship between the father and the son for all eternity, his companion, We read even in the book of Genesis in the very chapter one, let us make God in our own image. Let us make man in our own image. Well, who was the us? It was the Lord. It was Jesus. We know this from the book of Hebrews and we know this from the book of John. It was the Lord Jesus. He was with his father, even after creation. He's the eternal son. And so Zechariah here. One of the last prophets to speak before the Lord Jesus came on the earth. Continues this great line of thought, it was his companion, his beloved son, that had to endure the wrath, that had to be smitten for our sins. Smite the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered. This verse was filled the night of Jesus betrayal on the last night of his life, when his disciples abandoned him in the Garden of Gethsemane. Just like he said they would do. And just like they had said earlier to him that evening, they would never do. But I think this has been fulfilled many times afterward in church history. That the shepherd has been smitten and the sheep are scattered. where the church has been smitten and the sheep have been scattered. And this starts in Jerusalem with a great persecution that was unleashed shortly after the death of the martyr Stephen. And I'll just read you a first few verses from Acts, chapter eight, which is right after this event, after the stoning of Stephen. Acts, chapter eight and verse one, now Saul was consenting to his that is Stephen's death. At that time, a great persecution arose against the church, which was at Jerusalem, and they were all scattered through all the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles who stayed in Judea. And devout men carried Stephen to his burial and made a great lamentation over him. As for Saul, he made a great havoc of the church, entering every house and dragging off men and women, committing them to prison. And therefore, those who were scattered went everywhere. Preaching the word. It's ironic that one of the ways that the Lord used to spread the gospel in the early days and even in our present day. His persecution. Smiting the church, smiting the shepherd and were scattered, and what do we do when we're scattered? We preach the gospel. The church throughout the ages, since that beginning in Acts, has had a nomadic existence. They have had to move from place to place due to persecution, due to the sword. Persecution sometimes by the state, persecution even by the official church. And Jesus said, if they persecute you in one city, move on to the next. The Apostle Paul surely knew the meaning of this. In his first missionary journey, Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe, a mob started at Antioch and had followed him and hounded him and trailed him through these other cities, even though they were many miles away. And when he was persecuted in one city, he left and he went on to the next and preached the gospel. Think of the origin of our own country. The pilgrims who came over on the Mayflower. They came here out of persecution. The Church of England would not let them worship the way the word of God said and the way their conscience is demanded. And so in 1620, they sailed to New England to establish this great country. where they could worship rightly and they could be stepping stones for the spread of the gospel in this land. Strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered and strike the church. And the sheep will be scattered. And then I will turn my hand against the little ones, it says in verse seven of Zechariah 13. I will turn my hands against the little ones. It seems that The Lord, in his divine providences, sometimes has to turn his hand. It would seem that he's turned his hand against us, but it's all for his good purpose, as we'll see later on in this chapter. As we come to verse eight, it would seem to me that the fulfillment of this is directly a result of the smiting of the shepherd. We read in this verse, Two fractions, two thirds and one third. It says in verse eight, it shall come to pass that in all the land, says the Lord, that two thirds in it shall be cut off and die, but one third shall be left in it. And I will bring that one third through the fire and refine them as silver is refined. Two thirds and one third. The old King James, I think, has it two parts and one part. These two fractions should have had a familiar ring to the hearers of Zechariah. They had been captives in Babylon, and while they were in Babylon, the prophet Ezekiel prophesied to them. The Babylonian captivity started in stages. And through a number of raids, Nebuchadnezzar carried off certain people at certain times. And so the city had not yet collapsed. This was before 586 BC. And so the people dwelling in Babylon as captives had this great hope that Jerusalem would be rescued and then they could go back to their homeland. But the problem was the prophets weren't saying this at all. Jeremiah wasn't saying that in Jerusalem and Ezekiel wasn't saying that in Babylon, where they were captive. In fact, he just threw cold water over everything they'd hoped for. And he had to set his face like a flint against them. He had to harden, literally harden his head against the insults of the people that didn't like his prophecies. He wasn't preaching to them smooth words. And this is some of the words that Ezekiel said were going to happen. This is Ezekiel, and I'm reading from chapter five and verse twelve. And this is his prophecy to the people who still dwelled in Jerusalem. One third of you shall die by the pestilence and be consumed with famine in your midst, and one third shall fall by the sword around you, and I will scatter another third to all the winds and I draw out a sword after them. And so two thirds of the people were going to die. And here we see the two thirds in this prophecy before us. We see that two thirds shall be cut off and die and the other third that shall be left in it. I will bring that third through the fire. The Lord is going to send a sword after them because these are a righteous group of people and I will refine them as silver is refined. It's my thought that this was fulfilled by The invasion of the Roman General Titus in 70 A.D. when he struck Jerusalem. The commentator Matthew Poole says this. This verse may be a prediction of the great slaughter Titus made among the Jews and also an emblem of the multitudes of them that perish and the paucity or the scarceness of them that are saved. Two parts, two thirds. Not precisely to, but more largely the greater part by far shall be cut off and die a temporal death by the sword of Titus or an eternal death under unbelief and rejecting of Christ. But the one third, that is the remnant, the lesser part, yet as many as are chosen, shall escape and be preserved and saved. It's said that when Titus invaded the city, that a number of Christian believers, a great number, heeded the words that he had said to them at the Olivet Discourse when they saw the desolation of this army surrounding Jerusalem, and they got out and they escaped and fled to the city of Pella just on the east side of the Jordan and thereby preserved their lives. Those are possible interpretations of this verse, but the idea is that The holy people were delivered and they were saved and they were saved for a purpose that God could refine them. His silver is refined. William Henderson points out that this verse brings out the longtime principle of the remnant. A remnant is what's left over from a roll of cloth or a roll of carpet after the cloth or carpet has been taken off. Think of it. The main part of the roll, the main body of the Jews. Never did get the message of their prophets. Only the tail end, the least part. Caught the true message. The remnant principle runs throughout scripture, especially the minor prophets. And it illustrates our savior's words. Narrow is the gate and difficult is the way and few there be that find it. In fact, throughout history, only the remnant have found it. And our Lord illustrated this many times in the parables. All of them were designed. To sort out the true believers from their professors, that is the play actors, the hypocrites, those who use religion for their own conveniences, but could not be counted on in the day of trial or even in the time of duty. One third of the Christian company or one third of the company here and given in Zechariah appears to be a remnant. That's a pretty generous number. In Isaiah's time, just shortly after he saw that great vision of the temple, he prophesied that one tenth of Israel would hear him and remain faithful. And Jesus, in his parable, used a number of different numbers at different times to point out different truths. But one thing was always certain. Not all who named the name of Jesus on their lips possessed genuine faith. In the parable of the sower, only one of those four seeds proved to be a true, fruitful Christian. In the parable of the marriage feast, I say, well, half of those did. Yeah, but think of the company. These were the participants of the wedding. These were the higher class of people, if you please. And only five of those ten were actually true believers. At that level of spiritual maturity, only half of those women were actually proved to be true. The remnant. Consider the seven churches of Revelation. How many of those churches actually drew the Lord's approval? Just two out of those seven. That's not even a third. Only Smyrna and Philadelphia. We're commended by the Lord for their service. The remnant principle runs throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament. Every company of Christians is a mixed company. There are wheat and tares, there are sheep and goats, believers and mere professors. In my Christian life, I've seen many shipwrecks, even in the Calvinistic community. People who I once admired and looked up to in the faith have stumbled and taken fatal faults. Some the world drew away. Some strange women led them astray. One thing is certain, the Lord knows who are his. And that faithful remnant are refined. It says, and I will bring that one third, that faithful remnant through the fire, and I will refine them as silver is refined and test them as gold is tested. That's verse nine of Zechariah, chapter 13, to refine means to take the impurities out of the substance, so the substance is more pure. In the refining of silver, I understand that the pot that holds the silver ore is put over the fire, and as the fire heats up the silver, the impurities rise to the top, the tin and the dross, and the refiner draws these out, and the metal that's left in the pot becomes more pure. And it's said that when the silversmith can actually see his own reflection in the mirror, then he knows it's pure. And perhaps that's the way the Lord refines us. He's looking for his own image. He's looking to make us more like himself. That's what the refining process is all about. Isaiah, chapter 48 and verse 10 says, I have refined you, I have tested you in the furnace of affliction for my own sake, for my own sake, I will do it. How should my name be profaned? I will not give my glory to another. And so the refining process. Is that which is designed to. Make people more like God and to bring glory to him on the face of this earth. And a refiner's fire is that fire is not often comfortable, as we have all experienced. Because fire in the Christian's life usually comes in the form of affliction. An affliction sometimes means a loss of health, a loss of job, a loss of a family member, a loss of friends, loss of an ability. We might lose money we've saved for a long time. Loss of comforts. Whatever these afflictions, we know that the true Christian shall come forth as gold because we are kept by the power of God. through faith for salvation, ready to be revealed at the last time. It's in first Peter. It says in the closing verses then of Zechariah chapter 13. To those who have been refined and those who have been tested. They will call on my name. And I will answer them. And I will say this is my people. And each one will say the Lord is my God. He will call upon his God and God will answer him that this is my people. And all of this is possible because we have a shepherd who loves his sheep. He calls it by name and he was smitten as he gave his life for them. Heavenly Father, we thank you. For the great shepherd, the good shepherd. Shepherd of our souls. your eternal friend, your divine companion, in all that he's done to bring us to himself and to pay for our sins and our iniquities. We pray, Father, we might be refined for your honor and glory and that we might live for him as he lived for us. And we pray in his name. Amen.