In Simply Jesus, N.T. Wright places Zechariah, one of three post-exilic minor prophets, with Isaiah and Daniel as the three books most important for Jesus as he worked out his vocation. Zechariah is the source of the oracle about a king arriving on a donkey (9:9-10) that Jesus enacted during the triumphal entry; that oracle is followed by a promise of the Lord coming to save his people (9:11-17) and warnings about false teachers.

“Putting together this strange, apparently jerky and disjointed set of oracles, we begin to see a pattern emerging,” writes Wright. “Israel’s exile is to be reversed under the rule of the anointed king, who will end up ruling the world world. The pagan nations will do their worst, but God himself will come to fight against them, but he will be king over all the earth.”

The passages discussed by Wright are all from the second half of the book. The first half contains a series of visions, many of which Naomi used in her drawing. These include the man among the myrtle trees (1:7-17), the man with the measuring line (2:1-13), clean garments for Joshua the high priest (3:1-10), the gold lampstand and two olive trees (4:1-14), the flying scroll (5:1-11), and the four horses—red, black, white and dappled (6:1-8). These are mostly hopeful messages for the remnant living in Palestine.

The drawing is unfinished; I believe the space in the upper left was reserved for the prophet himself. As with all the other drawings in this series, Naomi drew it during our hour-long Sunday school class with input from class members.

This is the eighth (and penultimate) post of Naomi’s art from our Minor Prophets Sunday school class. Previous posts were on Jonah, Amos, Hosea, Zephaniah and Nahum & Obadiah, Habakkuk and Haggai. Naomi’s professional art is available at naomifriend.com.