On that day HOLY TO THE LORD will be inscribed on the bells of the horses, and the cooking pots in the LORD’s house will be like the sacred bowls in front of the altar. Every pot in Jerusalem and Judah will be holy to the LORD Almighty, and all who come to sacrifice will take some of the pots and cook in them.
-Zechariah 14:20-21 (NIV)
At the end of Zechariah’s prophetic book, he closes with a peculiar comment about some seemingly random objects. Zechariah begins by saying that there will be a day where the Lord alone reigns over the entire world. And on that day, horse bells will be engraved with the phrase “Holy to the Lord,” and cooking pots will become sacred instruments.
While that make not make any sense to us, to the culture of Zechariah’s time this was a radical, revolutionary idea.
First of all, “Holy to the Lord” was a prestigious phrase. These words were inscribed on a plate which was put on the turban worn by the high priest. This showed that both he and his service to God were entirely holy.
For sacrifices, there were bowls at the altar that would catch the blood of the slaughtered animal. Because of their esteemed function, these utensils were thought to be more sacred than the others. Sure, there were other pots used to boil the meat or collect the ashes. But those altar bowls were special.
So God tells us in Zechariah that the specific verbiage normally reserved for priests will now be allowed on animals… That pots that typically contain ashes can now collect sacrificial blood. So do you see the weight of what is happening here? God is taking simple, common bells and pots and lifting them up into sacred items. It doesn’t matter what it is, everything can be redeemed… Everything can be made new… Everything can be sanctified!
But isn’t that what happens when Jesus enters the scene? Regular water is turned into wine. The unclean and untouchable are healed. Uneducated fishermen become hardcore, flip-the-world-upside-down evangelists. Suddenly, holiness is everywhere!
Way too many people today feel as if they are nothing more than a everyday, run-of-the-mill horse bell or cooking pot. They have the attitude of average. “I’m nothing special, God would never use someone like me,” they love to proclaim. To put it bluntly, that point of view couldn’t be more wrong!
It doesn’t matter how ordinary or generic you think you are. Our God specializes in turning the natural into the supernatural. When God intervenes, everything changes. Nothing is normal anymore. Everything is holy to the Lord, yourself included.
Just like those sacred cooking pots.
