Zechariah 12:10
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. (NIV)
Today’s Reading: Zechariah 12:10-14
Sometimes overlooked but also very present in Zechariah 12:10 is the prophecy that Jesus will be the firstborn Son of God. Jesus was called by others or called himself the Son of God or Son of Man about 100 times in the four gospels. Every time he used this name, he claimed to be the one spoken about in the Scriptures:
“‘But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.’ So he said to the paralyzed man, ‘Get up, take your mat and go home’” (Matt 9:6).
“For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath” (Matt 12:8).
“For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done” (Matt 16:27).
“Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you’” (John 6:53).
We also know that God spoke from heaven and called Jesus His Son at his baptism by John the Baptist:
“And a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased’” (Matt 3:17, Mark 1:11, Luke 3:22).
Lastly, the angel Gabriel told Mary that Jesus would be called the Son of God:
“But the angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.’
“’How will this be,’ Mary asked the angel, ‘since I am a virgin?’
“The angel answered, ‘The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God’” (Luke 1:30-35).
So in Zechariah, we see the people mourning as one mourns an only child or a firstborn son. This was also prophesied specifically by Jeremiah and Amos:
“Put on sackcloth, my people,
and roll in ashes;
mourn with bitter wailing
as for an only son,
for suddenly the destroyer
will come upon us” (Jer 6:26).
“I will turn your religious festivals into mourning
and all your singing into weeping.
I will make all of you wear sackcloth
and shave your heads.
I will make that time like mourning for an only son
and the end of it like a bitter day” (Amos 8:10).
The prophecy is describing a double dose of grief in losing not only your only child but the firstborn son. The preservation of the family was of utmost importance to the Jews of that time period. All of the family’s possessions would be passed down through the firstborn son. If there was no son to carry on the family name, the family would become extinct. This would bring great shame on the family because this was culturally regarded as a curse from God. The family had evidently done something sinful to be punished in this manner. So losing your only son would be devastating blow.
I find it interesting that Luke recorded two particular miracles of Jesus involving a firstborn son. Jesus took compassion on a great number of people but you have to think there was a special connection when Jesus saw these two parents grieving over their firstborn sons:
“As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out—the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her. When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, ‘Don’t cry’” (Luke 7:12-13).
“The next day, when they came down from the mountain, a large crowd met him. A man in the crowd called out, ‘Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child. A spirit seizes him and he suddenly screams; it throws him into convulsions so that he foams at the mouth. It scarcely ever leaves him and is destroying him…’ But Jesus rebuked the impure spirit, healed the boy and gave him back to his father” (Luke 9:37-39, 42).
Jesus fulfilled the prophecy simply by presenting himself as the Son of God when he began his ministry. He is God in the flesh. He came to show us what God was really like. When he returns to lift the spiritual veil from Israel, they will see him as their Messiah and they will mourn because they will realize that he was God’s only son who died for their sins. And only Jesus could die for the sins of the world because he was God in the flesh – the Son of God.
“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).
“The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (Col 1:15-17).
Christ in the Old Testament 
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