Zerubabbel son of who?

The Bible throws up all sorts of characters who might at first glance seem pretty insignificant. Take for example all those guys mentioned in Luke’s genealogy of Jesus. Half of the list mentions men who you've probably never heard of. The bit from Adam to David is full of well known Bible characters like Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, even Boaz. But then after King David Luke takes us off, via one of David’s sons called Nathan, through a list of men that just don’t appear anywhere else on the pages of the Bible. This list goes on through the unknowns, over hundreds of years, all the way down to Jesus, great David’s greater son. As far as I’m aware, what I’ve just stated is entirely true. Apart that is from one notable exception - Zerubabbel. So who on earth was Zerubabbel, and why do I say that he is the exception in Luke’s post David list?

You can read about Zerubabbel in the Old Testament books written around the time of the Jews return from exile in Babylon/Persia. What you find out is that he was the governor of Judah at this time. Do a bit more digging and you discover that he was also descended from royalty. His grandfather was Jechoniah, and Jechoniah was the last king of Judah before the Babylonian invasion, the invasion and resulting exile that was God’s judgement on a people who had turned their back on him. So Zerubabbel was a direct descendant of King David. He wasn’t a king himself, but he was in the line of kings.

Another thing about Zerubabbel is that he’s given a wonderful promise by God. At the end of Haggai God promises Zerubabbel that a day is coming when he will overthrow his enemies, he will overthrow evil, he will show who’s really king. In other words God will show that he himself is King. And God also says that on that day he will make Zerubabbel like a signet ring.

Now what’s a signet ring got to do with anything?

Roughly seventy years earlier, just before Judah and their king Jechoniah (that’s Zerubabbel’s granddad remember) were taken off in to exile, God said this to Jechoniah, “As I live, declares the LORD, though Jechoniah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, were the signet ring on my right hand, yet I would tear you off”,(Jer. 22:24). A signet ring was a symbol of a King’s authority and it was given to someone by the King to show that they had been entrusted with the King’s authority. Such was the case with the kings of Israel/Judah. They were to rule both under, and with, God’s authority. That rule and authority had been taken away though during the time of Jechoniah. God had ripped away the authority of the Jewish king, due to his misuse of that authority. He ripped it away by sending the Babylonian empire to crush the land and take the people and their monarch into exile. This was a huge blow to the Jewish people on many levels, but one particular way in which it was a blow was that it seemingly extinguished the possibility of God’s promise of a Messiah King being fulfilled.

The promise of the Messiah King was given way back during the reign of King David. God had promised that one of David’s offspring would reign over a Kingdom that would have no end (2 Sam. 7). He would be God’s ultimate King, the one, it could be said, from whom the signet ring would never be removed. With the exile that seemed like a dashed hope, no chance of a great Messiah King now. But then God says to Zerubabbel, “When I show who’s really King, when I decisively defeat my enemies, when I overthrow the powers of evil, I will make you like a signet ring. I will give you rule and authority.”

So what became of Zerubabbel? Did he become a glorious King? No, he never became a king, he was only ever governor of Judah. But God’s promise to him showed that God had not forgotten his earlier promise to King David. He would send a King who would establish an everlasting throne and Kingdom, who would defeat the powers of evil, and who would reign forevermore. God’s promise to King David and governor Zerubabbel is fulfilled in Jesus. By putting Zerubabbel in his list of Jesus’ ancestors, by putting him amongst that list of unknowns, Luke is showing us that God does not forget his promises.

The King did arrive as promised from the line of David and Zrubabbel. He defeated the powers of evil on the cross (Col. 2:15), he rose again, and now he reigns, having been given all authority in heaven and on earth (Matt. 28:18). Christ is the longed for King!