“A Purified People” (Zechariah Chapter 13:8-9)
Introduction:
A Time of Increasing Terror
As we see the close of this present age rapidly approaching we also see the main focus of the secular media globally zooming in on Israel. Almost every day now there are Islamic terrorist attacks on Jewish soil such as bombings, stabbings, running innocent people down and the shooting of civilians and IDF personnel.
The IDF are waging a constant war with Palestinian Arab terrorists in Judea and Samaria. Palestinian terror groups are expanding their capabilities and increasing their firepower, undeterred by Israel. Israel is constantly under threat from Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon being supplied with weapons from Iran. There are also rumblings coming from the International communities of the United Nations, the European Union and the United States of America over the expansion of Jewish settlements being built in Judea and Samaria, the heartland of Israel as they are called in God’s Word the Bible.
According to a report on 4.7.2023 in the Online Edition of the Gatestone Institute publication it stated; “The League of Arab States (LAS), which represents 22 member countries, has spent several decades issuing statements of condemnation against Israel. Each time Israel launches a counterterrorism operation in response to Palestinian terrorism, including rockets fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel and shooting, stabbing and car-ramming attacks, it is denounced.
The same League of Arab States, however, has no problem embracing an Arab president whose regime has killed hundreds of thousands of Arabs, including Palestinians and Syrians, since the beginning of the civil war in Syria in 2011. The League of Arab States has effectively whitewashed Syrian President Bashar Assad’s atrocities against his own people and Palestinians.
Assad, in his speech before the Arab heads of state, ironically expressed hope that the summit would mark “the beginning of a new phase of Arab action for solidarity among us, for peace in our region, development and prosperity instead of war and destruction.” Here is an Arab leader, responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Arabs and the displacement of millions more, preaching about “peace, development and prosperity.”
Saudi Arabia played a significant role in welcoming the Assad regime back to the League of Arab States. The Saudis have shown that they prefer to make peace with Assad than normalize their relations with Israel. Drastically cooling years of diplomatic efforts, the Saudis insist that until a Palestinian state has been established, the kingdom will not normalize ties with Israel. If the Saudis are so concerned about the Palestinians, why are they rushing to embrace an Arab dictator whose regime has killed thousands of Palestinians?
With no apparent preconditions for Assad, the League of Arab States is turning its back on more than 500,000 dead Syrians, nearly seven million Syrian refugees, and 13 million displaced Syrians.”(End of extract)
The Islamic Arab nations it seems are gathering together to attack Israel sometime in the near future (Psalm 83:1-4). Added to all of this, the push by global governments for that “two-state solution from hell” is still on their agenda. Israel’s implacable enemies on all sides are upping the ante on their militancy against Israel. Having said this God still has everything under control! As Job declares at the end of his suffering concerning the LORD; “I know You can do all things; no plan of Yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2).
And again the LORD says through the prophet Isaiah; “Remember the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things which have not been done, Saying, ‘My purpose will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’” (Isaiah 46:9-10).
Two Reasons
There are two reasons as to why Israel’s enemies on all sides are upping the ante on their implacable, militancy against the Jewish people.
Firstly, Satan hates Israel because he experienced his defeat by the Jewish Messiah our Lord Jesus at the cross, who, by His shed blood, atoned for the sins of the whole world to bring salvation and for Israel’s salvation, having cancelled the debt ascribed to all of us in the decrees that stood against us. The Messiah took it away, nailing it to the cross! And having disarmed the powers and authorities (Satan and his cronies in the unseen spiritual realm), He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross (Colossians 2:14-15). When anyone Jew or Gentile repents of their unbelief in Messiah Jesus with a willingness to turn from all that is displeasing to God in their life and believes on Him who atoned for all of our sins and rebellion by shedding His pure and untainted blood on the cross to redeem us from Satan’s power and from the grip of sin, receives forgiveness and cleansing and eternal life through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:7) (1 John 1:9) (Isaiah 55:6-8) (John 3:16) (Acts 2:37-39) (Ephesians 1:13).
From the Garden of Eden Satan knew that he would be defeated by the future Messiah (Genesis 3:15). After this pronouncement by God to Satan that he would be defeated Satan came to know that the one prophesied to destroy his empire and ultimately cast him into the lake of fire would be the Messiah who would be Jewish and so because of this Satan set his will to destroy Israel Our Lord Jesus the Messiah was a Jew, not a Gentile and is the rightful Messianic King of the Jews.
We see Satan seeking to stop this from happening when Pharaoh of Egypt, a type of the Antichrist to come, ordered the death of Israel’s first born babies and in the attempt of King Herod, another type of the Antichrist to come, who gave an order to kill all the baby boys in Bethlehem and in the surrounding area who were two years old or younger.
Satan then knows his time is now short as in a rage he works his murder and mayhem on earth primarily targeting Israel because he knows that God’s prophetic purpose for Israel, for the Body of Messiah and for the whole world depends on the survival of Israel. Satan in his warped and twisted thinking assumes if he can destroy Israel then he can prevent the Second Coming of the King of the Jews because if Israel is gone then there is no Jewish kingdom for the Messiah our Lord Jesus to come back to. Satan hates God who pronounced his eternal doom back in the Garden of Eden after the fall of man. Satan is no match for the awesome divinity and power of our eternal Triune God!
However, we know that Israel will never be destroyed as a nation and as the apple of God’s eye because at the cross, God drew a line in the sand with the blood of His dear Jewish Son our Lord Jesus and said to Satan concerning Israel “you cannot cross that line ever again!” Added to this, in His Word our Triune God by the Messiah’s shed blood of the New Covenant has settled the matter of the ultimate spiritual and national restoration of Israel as a nation under the reign of the Messiah in His Millennial Messianic Kingdom on earth in the age to come. The everlasting covenant cut in the Messiah’s blood transcends time and will continue through all of eternity!
Secondly; God is refining His people Israel to bring them back to the Messiah and to the foot of that old rugged cross, the altar of sacrifice, where His pure, untainted blood fully atoned for sin once and for all time! (Hebrews 7:27; 9:12, 24-28; 10:10-12, 18). The Lord Jesus’ passionate desire is to be reunited with His wayward Jewish brothers and sisters whom He loves dearly.
Right through the Old Testament we see God sending prophets to turn His spiritually backslidden people back to Himself and using applied pressure from Israel’s enemies to turn them back to repentance and faith, and with a willingness to divest themselves of their idols and from the pagan lifestyles pursuits, pleasures and pastimes infiltrating the ranks of His people.
God is a Holy, righteous and just God and has to deal with sin decisively and He did this when He laid our sins upon His one and only begotten Son, the Messiah our Lord Jesus! (Isaiah 53:4-6) (2 Corinthians 5:19). A rejection of Him and of the salvation found only in Him will always bring down the judgement of God. Our Lord Jesus is God’s final word to the world and especially to Israel who as a nation by and large are still to this day aliens and strangers to their own covenants of promise. These are the promises from God’s Word that have been fully ratified, guaranteed and sealed forever by the blood of the Messiah our Lord Jesus by which He established the New Everlasting Covenant.
In rejecting the Messiah our Lord Jesus Israelis are rejecting their only hope of salvation from their enemies and from the hand of all who hate them! (Luke 1:7). When we review Israel’s long and troubled history we have seen terrible judgements come upon them when they rejected God’s Word through the prophets. These judgements were at the hands of the Assyrians in 722 BC, then at the hands of the Babylonians in 586 BC and then at the hands of Rome in 70AD. The final judgement came with the Holocaust because of the rejection of the Messiah our Lord Jesus who is Jewish and not a Gentile.
As it is written; “How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation?” And again it is written; “Today if you hear His voice do not harden your hearts as they did in the wilderness.” When the Israelites left Egypt under the leadership of Moses because of their unbelief they failed to enter into all that God had prepared for them. Out of the original generation that came out of Egypt and witnessed the awesome deliverance God gave them at the Red Sea only two, being Joshua and Caleb of that generation, entered into the Promised Land because of their faith in God’s Word.
These two entered into the rest of faith! They believed God despite the obstacles to faith they saw in the Land they were to inherit. We who belong to the Messiah our Lord Jesus also need to keep on trusting God everyday labouring to enter into that rest of faith in God and in His unchanging Word (Hebrews 4:9-11). The same kind of expectant faith that Joshua and Caleb had will give us the victory over the world, the flesh and the devil and with the spiritual weapons and armour God supplies pull down spiritual strongholds in our lives and in the lives of others! (2 Corinthians 10:4).
The rest of faith is that rest from trying to do things our way instead of God’s way! It is continuing to trust God in all of the changing situations and circumstances we all face every day as New Covenant believers. This faith is developed and grows in us by hearing the Word of God with the ears of our heart accompanied by a willingness to obey it (Romans 10:17). If we continue to walk by faith in, and obedience to the Word of God, then we will be building our lives upon the rock, being the Messiah our Lord Jesus, the living word of God who was made flesh, and not building on sand and when the storms of life assail us we will stand and not buckle over at the knees! (Matthew 7:24-27).
At this point I need to say very clearly that I love Israel, I love the Jewish people and believe in their ultimate spiritual and national restoration Biblically. I am totally against replacement theology. The Body of Messiah owes a great debt to Israel having been spiritually grafted into the Commonwealth of Israel and become partakers of the blessings of Abraham and of that New Covenant cut with the House of Israel and with the House of Judah by the Messiah’s blood, who Himself was Jewish. This is the true Israel of God! (Romans 9:4-5) (Jeremiah 31:31-34) (Romans 11:17-18) (Ephesians 2:11-22).
As Rabbi the apostle Paul writes; “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God” (Romans 2:28-29).
It also needs to be said that when a Jewish person becomes a New Covenant believer in the Messiah our Lord Jesus they do not cease to be Jewish or have to reject their Jewish identity. God forbid! In fact when they encounter the Messiah they realise fully what it means to be a son or daughter of Abraham! For them it becomes “Life from the dead!” (Romans 11:15).
Their Partial Hardness of Heart Removed, the Veil over their Eyes Lifted
Now the Holocaust was a terrible, horrific and tragic ordeal for the Jewish people and one cannot fully or even imagine or begin to comprehend or enter in to the horror they faced and suffered in the Nazi death camps, especially the little children. We know that 6 million Jewish people died at the hands of the Nazis. It is also a fact that multitudes of Messianic Jewish believers in the Messiah our Lord Jesus went into the death camps and gave a good witness as they shared the fate of their Jewish family.
A time is coming again when God will allow Israel to experience a situation that will cause even the strongest of Israelis to grab their stomachs in fear as a woman experiencing labour pains, but a surviving remnant in Israel will be saved when they see the Messiah our Lord Jesus coming in the clouds of heaven with glorious power and splendour for all still living on earth to see (Jeremiah 30:1-10) (Zechariah 12:10-13:1) (Revelation 1:7).
In that day when the last Gentile New Covenant believer is added to the Body of the Jewish Messiah our Lord Jesus every Jew still living on earth will be saved! Their partial hardness of heart will be lifted and the veil over the eyes of their hearts removed because the deliverer the Messiah our Lord Jesus at His Second Coming will come from the heavens to earth, to banish ungodliness from Israel and to take away all of their sins from them experientially because God’s gifts and His call are irrevocable (Romans 11: 25-29).
An Ultimate Crisis
In Zechariah Chapter 13: 8-9 we have prophesied a future crisis for Israel more severe than the ones they faced in the past as a nation. (Daniel 12:1-3) (Matthew 24:21-22). What the people of Israel experienced in 722BC, in 586BC in 70AD and in the Holocaust were foreshadows of what will happen to the nation at the very end of this present age when the Islamic nations and others surround Jerusalem once again and the City is ransacked and many exiled into Muslim countries. However, through this coming ordeal God will purify His remnant and be reconciled with His people Israel when the Messiah our Lord Jesus returns to destroy all opposition and to reign as the King of the Jews in His Messianic Millennial kingdom! (Psalm 2) Let’s now look at these verses in Zechariah 13:8-9.
Zechariah Chapter 13:8-9
Exposition:
(Zechariah 13:8-9) “It will come about in all the land,” Declares the Lord, “That two parts in it will be cut off and perish; But the third will be left in it. “And I will bring the third part through the fire, Refine them as silver is refined, And test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, And I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are My people,’ And they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’”
Let’s briefly look at these verses…
“It will come about in all the land,” Declares the Lord,
Clearly this is the Land of Israel. When God makes a declaration it will happen just as He has described. He always watches over His Word to perform it and achieves the purpose for which He sent it and His Word never returns back to Him without having accomplished the purpose for which it was sent (Jeremiah 1:12) (Isaiah 55:11). As He says through the prophet Isaiah; ““Remember the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things which have not been done, Saying, ‘My purpose will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’” (Isaiah 46:9-10). And then we read…
“That two parts in it will be cut off and perish;”
It is going to take another Holocaust to bring Israel back to the Messiah which will see two thirds of Israel’s population killed and many exiled (Zechariah 14:1-2). Having said this Israel will never be destroyed because the LORD will rescue the city and unleash His vengeance on all those Islamic armies and those of the nations that have invaded His Real Estate and persecuted His people. It will be the return of the Messiah our Lord Jesus that will accomplish this (Zechariah 14:3-5) (2 Thessalonians 1:6-10; 2:8) .
The curse of the law is still active and mandatory. God has not changed His Law. Having said this it needs to be added that at the cross the Messiah our Lord Jesus broke that curse by becoming a curse, or bearing upon Himself the curse of the law being death even though He was without sin as the pure and spotless sacrificial Passover lamb of God (1 Corinthians 5:7).
As it is also written; “Messiah redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.” He redeemed us in order that the blessing promised to Abraham would come to the Gentiles in Messiah Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit” (Galatians 3:13-14). When any Jewish man woman or boy or girl receives the Lord Jesus as their personal saviour and Lord and as their Messiah the curse of the law hanging over their heads is removed by the power of the Messiah’s blood, the perfect Passover Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world! This also applies equally to any Gentile who believes.
Whether we are Jew or Gentile all of us have sinned and fallen short of God’s righteous standards revealed in His Word and are also under the curse of the law because of our sin and sentenced to the Lake of Fire, but through repentance and faith in Jesus to save us and by His cleansing blood we can have that curse over our lives and its sentence removed! It is the same for both Jew and Gentile! (Romans 3:21-30).
When a holocaust comes to Israel those in the world will also not escape that time of God’s judgement on a Messiah hating, Messiah rejecting Gentile world when through a third world war a third of mankind will be killed most likely by nuclear detonations (Revelation 9:18).
By and large today Israel as a nation is far removed from the Messiah. Most Israelis are living secular humanistic lifestyles the same as the pagans are living in the world that do not know God or care about His commandments or the ramifications of eternity. There are Messianic New Covenant Jewish and Gentile believers evangelising the Jews in Israel and many Jews are coming to a saving faith in the Messiah our Lord Jesus more than at any other time in history. Having said this, there are many religious Jews who do not believe that Jesus is the Messiah and are opposing those who confess Jesus as their Messiah, saviour and Lord. This is what was occurring in the time of the Lord Jesus, the apostles and the early assemblies of Messianic New Covenant believers.
Having said this, Israel’s leaders are divided with factions with infighting with each other and looking to the nations for support especially America that in the end will prove to be a splintered reed that will pierce the hand of all who seek to lean on that nation for support especially Israel. Many well-meaning believers, especially in America are becoming enamoured with all things Jewish and are not telling the Jewish people what is coming upon Israel and that the most vital loving thing to do for the Jewish people is to tell them the truth concerning the salvation only found in the Messiah Jesus who has already come to the Jewish people as the Messiah over 2,000 years ago and that they must make themselves ready to meet Him on His return!
The Jewish religious leaders may well rebuild the Temple but it will not save them anymore than the temple could save them in 586BC or in 70AD from the Roman scourge. Temple sacrifices to atone for sin are futile in light of the once and for all time sacrifice of the Passover Lamb whose blood takes away the sin of the world and cleanses all who repent and return to the LORD to be saved from both the power and the penalty of sin. Rabbi Paul the apostle understood this truth when he declared that God plays on a level playing field and does not show partiality where sin is concerned.
Rabbi Paul the apostle writes; “God ‘will repay each person according to what they have done.’ To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honour and immortality, he will give eternal life but for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; but glory, honour and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For God does not show favouritism” (Romans 2:6-11).
It needs to be said that in the Messianic Kingdom in the age to come after this one is over that there will be sacrifices and offerings in the Millennial Temple standing on the site of the original Mt Zion, but the sacrifices will be memorial ones reminding the nations of that Everlasting Covenant the Messiah cut with His blood in the previous age (Isaiah 2:1-5) (Zechariah 14:20-21). Now let’s read on…
“But the third will be left in it.”
Down through Israel’s’ history in the Bible God has always had a faithful chosen remnant within Israel. Both the prophet Isaiah and the apostle Paul wrote about this. As it is written; “Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites is like the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved” for the Lord will carry out his sentence upon the earth fully and without delay.” And as Isaiah predicted, “If the Lord of hosts had not left us offspring, we would have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah” (Romans 9:27-29). Many of this remnant are coming to saving faith in Messiah today in Israel but many more are as yet to come and will come during the time of the Big Trouble.
In those days when the remnant of Israel find themselves in the wilderness it will only be the New Covenant believers, the faithful Body of Messiah still on earth at this time who will stand alongside them in their hour of affliction and preach the gospel of the Kingdom to them while meeting their physical needs (Isaiah 40:1-2). (See the study on our website titled “Tenderness in the Wilderness”). And then we read…
“And I will bring the third part through the fire, Refine them as silver is refined, And test them as gold is tested.”
God’s fire purifies but does not destroy but removes spiritual dross from the lives of the people He has redeemed. The purifying process is activated through times of affliction. However, just as the pre-incarnate Messiah was with the three Hebrews in the furnace, so the Messiah our Lord Jesus will be with His faithful remnant in their furnace of affliction during the time when for three and a half years the beast empire of the man of sin will actively persecute faithful New Covenant believers and seek to destroy Israel but in the end he will not destroy either (Matthew 16:18).
Satan’s forces may kill the body of a New Covenant Messianic believer in the Messiah our Lord Jesus but not the soul and the spirit which will live for eternity and receive their resurrected and glorified bodies when the Messiah returns to earth immediately after the time of Great Tribulation (Matthew 24:21-22, 29-32) (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18). The third part, being the remnant, these God will bring through the fire but they will not be destroyed by it because God has ordained this situation out of which they will be delivered after they have experienced deliverance in it and through it, as the three Hebrews experienced in that fiery furnace in the time of King Nebuchadnezzar.
Their testimony to King Nebuchadnezzar was this; “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give you an answer concerning this matter. If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up” (Daniel 3:15-18).
As the prophet Malachi writes; “But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He will be like a refiner’s fire, like a launderer’s soap. And He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; He will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver. Then they will present offerings to the LORD in righteousness. Then the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will please the LORD, as in days of old and years gone by” (Malachi 3:2-4).
In times of affliction, tests, and trials, which are hard to be born in many cases and even when prolonged, our faith is strengthened in and through them as we learn to commit our souls to our faithful creator, especially in times of persecution that are within the will of God for us to experience ( 1 Peter 4:19). God puts us through certain tests, not to afflict us, but that we might pass them. Sometimes if we keep failing He will keep bringing the same tests in differing circumstances and in differing ways, not to see us failing because He wants us as His blood redeemed family to pass with flying colours of His immense grace, but also that through the comfort of the scriptures in the test we might have hope and be empowered to comfort others with the same comfort we ourselves have received from the LORD.
As Rabbi Paul the apostle also writes; “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Messiah, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4). And again Paul writes; “For whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, so that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Romans 15:4).
When the refiner is refining gold in the cauldron with the fire underneath all of the dross comes to the surface and when the refining process has been completed the refiner scrapes the dross off from the surface of the gold so that he can see his reflection in the gold. This is why God refines us in the furnace of affliction because He wants us to be conformed to the image of his Son to which every born again blood redeemed child of the Living God has been predestined even from before the very foundation of the world (Romans 8:29). It needs also to be said that once we have passed one of God’s tests He will give us a time of rest to reflect and to become more thankful for what He has been doing in our life and to reassure us that in everything that happens to us whether good or not so good, He still has everything under His control, and He does you know! (Romans 8:28).
This same spiritual principle God will use and is using to bring forth a faithful Jewish and Gentile remnant of New Covenant believers to co-reign with the Messiah in His Messianic Millennial kingdom on earth in the age to come! In that day there will only be one flock and one shepherd (John 10:16). In that day His sheep will be one new man in Him co-reigning with Him! The Messiah has only one bride being the restored Israel of God! And then finally we read…
“They will call on My name, And I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are My people,’ And they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’”
What a day of great joy in Israel this will be much the same as Joseph, the suffering servant experienced when He was reconciled with his wayward brothers who had sold him into slavery in Egypt. In that day when Israel cries out to the Lord for deliverance He will answer them speedily, send back the Messiah our Lord Jesus, and by this awesome event declaring to the surviving nations concerning Israel “They are My people!” and the response of His people Israel will resound around the earth; “ The Lord is My God!”
As we also read in the prophet Zechariah; ““Thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘It will yet be that peoples will come, even the inhabitants of many cities. The inhabitants of one will go to another, saying, “Let us go at once to entreat the favour of the Lord, and to seek the Lord of hosts; I will also go.” So many peoples and mighty nations will come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and to entreat the favour of the Lord.’ Thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘In those days ten men from all the nations will grasp the [d]garment of a Jew, saying, “Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you”’” (Zechariah 8:20-23).
Indeed in that day as Rabbi Paul the apostle declares concerning his Jewish brethren: “For if their rejection (of the Messiah) is the reconciliation of the world (Gentiles), what will their acceptance be (of the Messiah) but life from the dead? If the first part of the dough is holy, so is the whole batch; if the root is holy, so are the branches” (Romans 11:15). The “root of Jesse” the Messiah our Lord Jesus is the true vine and the one who supports the Olive Tree (Israel) and spiritually nourishes both the natural and engrafted branches (believing Jews and Gentiles) with the divine sap of His Holy Spirit!
Indeed the prophet Zechariah also declares what God will do for His remnant; “And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on Me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for Him as one grieves for a firstborn son. On that day the weeping in Jerusalem will be as great… “On that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and impurity. “On that day, I will banish the names of the idols from the land, and they will be remembered no more,” declares the Lord Almighty. “I will remove both the prophets and the spirit of impurity from the land” (Zechariah 12:10-11; 13:1-2). This is Israel’s glorious future! In that day they will indeed be “A Purified People!”
