God’s Loving Visitation Shepherds us and Strengthens us to Walk in His Name

In Zechariah 10 and 11 we see how God in Christ comes to encourage us and shepherd us for the rebuilding of God’s temple.

We are being encouraged to ask God for more rain, more blessings, even as He is happy with us. God is willing to bless us and shepherd us – let us just ask Him! He wants to visit us and come to us as a Shepherd, and He will make us His horse of majesty in battle (Zech. 10:3). His loving visitation is all that we need – He cares for us and shepherds us, and even the weakest sheep becomes His horse of majesty.

Even more, He comes to us especially in the morning and whistles to us in a mild and gentle way, like a turtledove, drawing us to spend time with Him and enjoy Him (Zech. 10:8). As we enjoy God’s shepherding and tender care for us, we are being strengthened by Him to walk about in His name.

His shepherding and care strengthens us to be one with God in all our daily walk, and we will have our whole being in Him.

Lord, visit us today. Give us showers of blessings. Give us more of God, more of the Spirit, more of Christ! Come to us as the real Shepherd, the One who takes care of us and transforms us. Lord, appear to us and come to us, gathering us to Yourself. How we love Your strengthening within, which causes us to walk in Your name. Lord Jesus, God with us, we love You!

Christ Comes to Us as a Shepherd

In Zech. 11:7 we see that God comes to us in Christ as a Shepherd, and He shepherds us in Favor (which is grace) and Bonds (which is binding).

Christ came to us full of grace and reality (John 1:14) that we may enjoy Him as grace for our being mingled with God! Also, Christ came to us as the real Shepherd to bind us into oneness, to make us one with God and one with the other believers in Christ (John 21:15-17).

As we see in Zech. 10:3, God visits His flock, He deals with the false shepherds, and He makes His sheep like His horse of majesty in battle. God graciously comes to us in the Lord Jesus as a man to shepherd us, deal with any other false shepherds, and make us from weak sheep into horses of majesty!

We are shepherding-deficit – we need shepherding! Many times the Lord meets us in our backslidden situation and instead of rebuking us, He shepherds us and feeds us. He restores our soul, He leads us into good pastures, He causes us to lie down and rest, and He feeds us with Himself. After being visited by the Lord Jesus as the good Shepherd, every weak sheep among God’s people becomes His horse of majesty (see Zech. 10:3; cf. 9:13, 16; Dan. 11:32b).

Even though we may feel that we are weak, and we become like the Shulammite toward the end of the Song of Songs, leaning on our beloved…. but when we are weak, that’s when we are strong (2 Cor. 12:10). God’s strength is manifested in our weakness, and whenever we lean on Him as our dear Shepherd, we are strong and majestic!

Ask God for More Rain, More Blessing

In Zech. 10:1 God encourages us to ask rain of Jehovah at the time of spring rain, and He will give us showers of rain. When we see that the Lord is favorable to us, we need to “be greedy for God’s blessing”. Ask Him for more rain, more blessing! Don’t feel shy asking God to send you more favor, more grace, more rain, more of the Spirit!

What an encouraging word! The Lord is so wonderful, so good toward us, and He is smiling to us. While He’s smiling to us, we need to take the opportunity and ask Him for more favor, more blessing, and He will give us showers of blessing (Ezek. 34:26).

These blessings are nothing else but God Himself, who went through a long process to become the life-giving Spirit, the blessing of the nations promised to Abraham and given to all of God’s people (Gal. 3:14).

The Lord Strengthens Us to Walk in His Name

In Zech. 10:8 we see that the Lord whistles to us to gather us to Him. Especially during our morning time with the Lord, He is whistling to us in a mild and gentle way, like the singing of a bird… He calls us in the morning to wake us up, draw us to His Word, and gather us to Himself. He is like a turtledove, singing love songs to us to make us happy and cherish us.

Also, He strengthens us in Himself that we may walk about in His name (Zech. 10:12). All His shepherding and cherishing is a strengthening to us, so that we may live and walk and have our being in God (Col. 3:17). He wants us to be in His name, in His very person, and and here we would walk and live and have our being.

God’s loving visitation is Christ’s coming to us and His continual shepherding us, which not only lifts us up from our degraded and low situation but also strengthens us to walk in His name and do all things in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

We need God’s loving visitation. His shepherding changes us, encourages us, strengthens us, and causes us to be His mighty horses in battle. As He whistles to us to draw us to Himself, He strengthens us in Himself to walk in His name and express Him.

The conclusion is that “Jehovah will be King over all the earth, and in that day Jehovah will be the one God and His name the one name” (Zech. 14:9). Hallelujah!

Lord Jesus, we treasure Your loving visitation and Your daily shepherding  As You are showing us favor, Lord, give us more grace, more rain, more of the Spirit. We want to enjoy You more. Thank You for calling us to Yourself by whistling to us in a mild and gentle way. Lord, we don’t want to resist You – we give in to You, we depend on You, we love You, we lean on You, and we take You as our good Shepherd. Strengthen us in Yourself that we may walk in You and have our being in You.

References and Further Reading

• Sharing inspired from brother Andrew Yu’s sharing in this message and portions in, Life-study of Zechariah (msg. 10), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on Crystallization-Study of Daniel and Zechariah, week 10 (entitled, A Word concerning the Human Spirit and Aspects of Christ Unveiled in Zechariah for His Move on Earth).
• Buy this morning revival book online via Living Stream Ministry.
• Similar sharing on the same topic:
  # A Fresh Appreciation for Psalm 23: “The Organic Shepherding of the Pneumatic Christ” (via, holdingtotruth.com).
  # Psalm 23: from failure to shepherding (via, lifeandbuilding.com).
  # For His shepherding we need to be forever hungry and forever satisfied (via, achristianoncampus.wordpress.com).
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Rain on me; rain on me; / Let Your mercy rain on me; / It is not by willing or by running, Lord; / Let Your mercy rain on me.
  # Showers of blessing, / Showers of blessing we need; / Mercy-drops round us are falling, / But for the showers we plead.
  # Let others stretch their arms like seas, / And grasp in all the shore; / Grant me the visits of Thy grace, / And I desire no more.
• Pictures credit: the first here, the second here, and the third here.