Zephaniah

[Alive]

Zeph. 1:1 (NKJVS)   The word of the LORD which came to Zephaniah the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah. The Great Day of the Lord

²  “I will utterly consume everything  From the face of the land,”  Says the LORD;

³  “I will consume man and beast;  I will consume the birds of the heavens,  The fish of the sea,  And the stumbling blocks along with the wicked.  I will cut off man from the face of the land,”  Says the LORD.

⁴  “I will stretch out My hand against Judah,  And against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem.  I will cut off every trace of Baal from this place,  The names of the idolatrous priests with the pagan priests—

⁵  Those who worship the host of heaven on the housetops;  Those who worship and swear oaths by the LORD,  But who also swear by Milcom;

⁶  Those who have turned back from following the LORD,  And have not sought the LORD, nor inquired of Him.”

⁷  Be silent in the presence of the Lord GOD;  For the day of the LORD is at hand,  For the LORD has prepared a sacrifice;  He has invited His guests.

⁸  “And it shall be,  In the day of the LORD’S sacrifice,  That I will punish the princes and the king’s children,  And all such as are clothed with foreign apparel.

⁹  In the same day I will punish  All those who leap over the threshold,  Who fill their masters’ houses with violence and deceit.

¹⁰  “And there shall be on that day,” says the LORD,  “The sound of a mournful cry from the Fish Gate,  A wailing from the Second Quarter,  And a loud crashing from the hills.

¹¹  Wail, you inhabitants of Maktesh!  For all the merchant people are cut down;  All those who handle money are cut off.

¹²  “And it shall come to pass at that time  That I will search Jerusalem with lamps,  And punish the men  Who are settled in complacency,  Who say in their heart,  ‘The LORD will not do good,  Nor will He do evil.’

¹³  Therefore their goods shall become booty,  And their houses a desolation;  They shall build houses, but not inhabit them;  They shall plant vineyards, but not drink their wine.”

¹⁴  The great day of the LORD is near;  It is near and hastens quickly.  The noise of the day of the LORD is bitter;  There the mighty men shall cry out.

¹⁵  That day is a day of wrath,  A day of trouble and distress,  A day of devastation and desolation,  A day of darkness and gloominess,  A day of clouds and thick darkness,

¹⁶  A day of trumpet and alarm  Against the fortified cities  And against the high towers.

¹⁷  “I will bring distress upon men,  And they shall walk like blind men,  Because they have sinned against the LORD;  Their blood shall be poured out like dust,  And their flesh like refuse.”

¹⁸  Neither their silver nor their gold  Shall be able to deliver them  In the day of the LORD’S wrath;  But the whole land shall be devoured  By the fire of His jealousy,  For He will make speedy riddance  Of all those who dwell in the land.

A Call to Repentance

¹ Gather yourselves together, yes, gather together,  O undesirable nation,

²  Before the decree is issued,  Or the day passes like chaff,  Before the LORD’S fierce anger comes upon you,  Before the day of the LORD’S anger comes upon you!

³  Seek the LORD, all you meek of the earth,  Who have upheld His justice.  Seek righteousness, seek humility.  It may be that you will be hidden  In the day of the LORD’S anger.

Judgment on Nations

⁴  For Gaza shall be forsaken,  And Ashkelon desolate;  They shall drive out Ashdod at noonday,  And Ekron shall be uprooted.

⁵  Woe to the inhabitants of the seacoast,  The nation of the Cherethites!  The word of the LORD is against you,  O Canaan, land of the Philistines:  “I will destroy you;  So there shall be no inhabitant.”

⁶  The seacoast shall be pastures,  With shelters for shepherds and folds for flocks.

⁷  The coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah;  They shall feed their flocks there;  In the houses of Ashkelon they shall lie down at evening.  For the LORD their God will intervene for them,  And return their captives.

⁸  “I have heard the reproach of Moab,  And the insults of the people of Ammon,  With which they have reproached My people,  And made arrogant threats against their borders.

⁹  Therefore, as I live,”  Says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel,  “Surely Moab shall be like Sodom,  And the people of Ammon like Gomorrah—  Overrun with weeds and saltpits,  And a perpetual desolation.  The residue of My people shall plunder them,  And the remnant of My people shall possess them.”

¹⁰  This they shall have for their pride,  Because they have reproached and made arrogant threats  Against the people of the LORD of hosts.

¹¹  The LORD will be awesome to them,  For He will reduce to nothing all the gods of the earth;  People shall worship Him,  Each one from his place,  Indeed all the shores of the nations.

¹²  “You Ethiopians also,  You shall be slain by My sword.”

¹³  And He will stretch out His hand against the north,  Destroy Assyria,  And make Nineveh a desolation,  As dry as the wilderness.

¹⁴  The herds shall lie down in her midst,  Every beast of the nation.  Both the pelican and the bittern  Shall lodge on the capitals of her pillars;  Their voice shall sing in the windows;  Desolation shall be at the threshold;  For He will lay bare the cedar work.

¹⁵  This is the rejoicing city  That dwelt securely,  That said in her heart,  “I am it, and there is none besides me.”  How has she become a desolation,  A place for beasts to lie down!  Everyone who passes by her  Shall hiss and shake his fist.

The Wickedness of Jerusalem

¹ Woe to her who is rebellious and polluted,  To the oppressing city!

²  She has not obeyed His voice,  She has not received correction;  She has not trusted in the LORD,  She has not drawn near to her God.

³  Her princes in her midst are roaring lions;  Her judges are evening wolves  That leave not a bone till morning.

⁴  Her prophets are insolent, treacherous people;  Her priests have polluted the sanctuary,  They have done violence to the law.

⁵  The LORD is righteous in her midst,  He will do no unrighteousness.  Every morning He brings His justice to light;  He never fails,  But the unjust knows no shame.

⁶  “I have cut off nations,  Their fortresses are devastated;  I have made their streets desolate,  With none passing by.  Their cities are destroyed;  There is no one, no inhabitant.

⁷  I said, “Surely you will fear Me,  You will receive instruction’—  So that her dwelling would not be cut off,  Despite everything for which I punished her.  But they rose early and corrupted all their deeds.

A Faithful Remnant

⁸  “Therefore wait for Me,” says the LORD,  “Until the day I rise up for plunder;  My determination is to gather the nations  To My assembly of kingdoms,  To pour on them My indignation,  All My fierce anger;  All the earth shall be devoured  With the fire of My jealousy.

⁹  “For then I will restore to the peoples a pure language,  That they all may call on the name of the LORD,  To serve Him with one accord.

¹⁰  From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia  My worshipers,  The daughter of My dispersed ones,  Shall bring My offering.

¹¹  In that day you shall not be shamed for any of your deeds  In which you transgress against Me;  For then I will take away from your midst  Those who rejoice in your pride,  And you shall no longer be haughty  In My holy mountain.

¹²  I will leave in your midst  A meek and humble people,  And they shall trust in the name of the LORD.

¹³  The remnant of Israel shall do no unrighteousness  And speak no lies,  Nor shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth;  For they shall feed their flocks and lie down,  And no one shall make them afraid.”

Joy in God’s Faithfulness

¹⁴  Sing, O daughter of Zion!  Shout, O Israel!  Be glad and rejoice with all your heart,  O daughter of Jerusalem!

¹⁵  The LORD has taken away your judgments,  He has cast out your enemy.  The King of Israel, the LORD, is in your midst;  You shall see disaster no more.

¹⁶  In that day it shall be said to Jerusalem:  “Do not fear;  Zion, let not your hands be weak.

¹⁷  The LORD your God in your midst,  The Mighty One, will save;  He will rejoice over you with gladness,  He will quiet you with His love,  He will rejoice over you with singing.”

¹⁸  “I will gather those who sorrow over the appointed assembly,  Who are among you,  To whom its reproach is a burden.

¹⁹  Behold, at that time  I will deal with all who afflict you;  I will save the lame,  And gather those who were driven out;  I will appoint them for praise and fame  In every land where they were put to shame.

²⁰  At that time I will bring you back,  Even at the time I gather you;  For I will give you fame and praise  Among all the peoples of the earth,  When I return your captives before your eyes,”  Says the LORD.

[Alive]

Are these words to be taken literally?

When do these things happen or have they happened or is it-- both have already and will happen.

 

[Keras]

ZEPHANIAH: THE DAY OF THE LORD'S WRATH

It was Zephaniah's lot to speak on the most unpleasant subject in the Bible -- the judgment of God. This is not the only place where this theme occurs, of course, but it is the most concentrated treatment of the judgment of God as the whole book is devoted to this one theme.

There are many people who would like to rule this subject of judgment out of the Bible entirely. There are those who tell us that the God of the New Testament, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, is the kind of a God who can never move in judgment. His heart is so tender, his love is so gracious, his patience is so infinite that there never will be a time when God will move in vengeance. It should be noted though, that in the New Testament the Lord Jesus spoke very frequently about the judgment of God. In the fourth chapter of Luke we are told that the Lord came back to his home town after preaching in Judea for many months. He had done many miracles and the word of his miracles had preceded him, so all the folks in Nazareth were very anxious to see him. He had not behaved like this when he was a boy growing up, and they were keen to see if he was going to do some mighty work when he came home.

Luke tells us that Jesus went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and he was given the book of the prophecy of Isaiah to read. Opening the scroll he found the place in Isaiah 61:1-2a; The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. Luke 4:10 Then he stopped right in the middle of a sentence, right at a comma, and his last word was that he had come to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. But Isaiah goes on to say, and the day of vengeance of our God.  Isaiah 61:2b  Jesus did not read that because it was not the time for the Day of vengeance of God. It is this day particularly, that Zephaniah is talking about.

Zephaniah means "hidden of the Lord" and the prophet is speaking as if he were a representative of the remnant of faith -- those relatively few people who will remain true to God and be faithful to Him, through this disaster that is to come upon the earth. They will be hidden, as it were, by God himself among the nations of the earth and God will watch over them to keep them in faith during this time. And it is about these people that the book of Zephaniah is written, and especially of that coming day, the Day of the Lord’s vengeance and wrath, which is vividly described by the prophet.

In chapter 1, Zephaniah gives us the character of God's vengeance. It is not a pleasant passage.

"I will utterly sweep away everything
from the face of the land, says the Lord.
I will sweep away man and beast;
I will sweep away the birds of the air
and the fish of the sea.
I will overthrow the wicked;
I will cut off mankind
from the face of the earth," says the Lord.
"I will stretch out my hand against Judah,
and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem,
and I will cut off from this place the remnant of Baal [the false god of the peoples around Israel]
and the name of the idolatrous priests;
those who bow down on the roofs to the host of heavens; [the star worshipers]
those who bow down and swear to the Lord
and yet swear by Milcom; [one of the other gods the surrounding nations]
those who have turned back from following the Lord,
who do not seek the Lord or inquire of him.

Be silent before the Lord God!
For the day of the Lord is at hand.

The day of the Lord is the day of the manifestation of God's hand directly in human affairs. Notice the personal pronoun all through that passage: "I will sweep away everything." I will sweep away man and beast." "I will cut off mankind." God is working through events in history, working through nations and armies and calamities of various sorts. But as He did in Noah’s day, He will use His creation to once again reset civilization, this time with fire, as over 70 prophesies tell us.

The Apostle Paul also uses the term "the Day of the Lord." In 1 Thessalonians 5:1-6 he says:

But as to the times and seasons, brethren, you have no need to have anything written to you. [Why not? Well, because they already had it in the Old Testament.] For you yourselves know well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. When people say, "There is peace and security," then sudden destruction will come upon them as travail comes upon a woman with child, and there will be no escape. But you are not in darkness, brethren, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all sons of light and sons of the day; we are not of the night or of darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.

There are many other passages that also refer to the Day of the Lord and they all agree that in the time when men are proclaiming peace, but preparing for war; in a time when they are holding to a form of godliness but denying the powers thereof; in a time when they are declaring that the problems of life are being solved. but when actually they are in greater danger than they have ever been before, then the Day of the Lord will come.

Now let us return to Zephaniah and see what he has to say about this (chapter 1. verses 7-9):

Be silent before the Lord God!
For the day of the Lord is at hand;
the Lord has prepared a sacrifice
and consecrated his guests.
And on the day of the Lord's sacrifice --
"I will punish the officials and the king's sons
and all who array themselves in foreign attire ...
every one who leaps over the threshold,
and those who fill their master's house
with violence and fraud.

How can this be? How can the God of love -- the God of the New Testament -- do a thing like this? How can God, who loves mercy and is slow to anger, ever come to this place?  

It is this kind of reasoning that suggests we should go through our Bibles and tear out every part that does not agree with our concepts of God. But what we have left, of course, is nothing more than what we like, what we think God ought to be like.

You can see how such an argument defeats itself. The very book that tells us that God is a God of love also says he is a God of vengeance. And anyone who thinks carefully about himself and about love will understand why a God of love has to be a God of vengeance. For if we love someone, we hate everything that injures that person. We are against whatever threatens or destroys what we love. And the very love that moves the heart of God to pour himself out over the centuries in an unceasing effort to awaken man to his need and to hear the call of grace, is the same love that at last prompts him to eliminate those who refuse all the province of his grace, and identify themselves with that which is opposed to his will and to his work among men. Then he has nothing left to do but to destroy them. And that is why the prophet speaks so plainly about this.

Continuing in Zephaniah 1:14-18:

The great day of the Lord is near,
near and hastening fast;
the sound of the day of the Lord is bitter,
the mighty man cries aloud there.
A day of wrath is that day,
a day of distress and anguish,
a day of ruin and devastation,
a day of darkness and gloom,
a day of clouds and thick darkness,
a day of trumpet blast and battle cry
against the fortified cities
and against the lofty battlements.

And God says in stark frankness,

I will bring distress on men,
so that they shall walk like the blind,
because they have sinned against the Lord;
their blood shall be poured out like dust,
and their flesh like dung.
Neither their silver nor their gold
shall be able to deliver them
on the Day of the wrath of the Lord.

Now it is not easy for God to speak this way. He himself says that he takes no delight in the death of men. He says that he does not delight in judgment. Judgment, the prophet says, is his strange work. His heart delights in mercy. But eventually, if his will is to be done, if earth at last is to break out into the glorious freedom of the promises of the prophets concerning man, if the dreams that lie hidden away in the hearts of men of a warless world, a time of prosperity. a time when joy floods the earth, when men live together in glorious harmony, when even the animals lose their enmity toward one another and peace shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea -- if that is ever to come, then God must deal with the entrenched evil of men. This is why the coming of the day of vengeance of our God is absolutely certain. The prophets warn of this and the word speaks very clearly. all through the New Testament as well, that when God's grace is turned aside, God's judgment awaits.

In Zephaniah  2:8-9  we trace the extent of God's vengeance. Certain nations are named;

"I have heard the taunts of Moab
and the revilings of the Ammonites, "Moab shall become like Sodom,
and the Ammonites like Gomorrah,

The Ethiopians are mentioned in verse 12 and the Assyrians in verse 13. The interesting thing is that although all these nations are long since lost in the dust of history, the promise of this day of the Lord is in the future. How can this be? Why are these nations mentioned here when they have long been buried in antiquity? How can they yet be destroyed in a day to come?

The answer is, of course, that these nations are used symbolically throughout the Scriptures as well as literally. They were literally destroyed in the course of history, but they are used symbolically with reference to the full and final meaning of the day of the Lord. Moab, for instance, is always a picture of the flesh of man -- his dependence upon his own resources. The Ammonites picture the same thing. Ethiopia is a picture of the stubbornness, or the intransigence of man. "Can the Ethiopian change his color?" the Scriptures say. And Assyria is man in his arrogance and his pride. Now God says he is against all these things, and as he moves at last in judgment on the human race, these are to be eliminated. In chapter 3 you will notice how extensive God's wrath is;

Woe to her that is rebellious and defiled,
the oppressing city!
She listens to no voice,
she accepts no correction.
She does not trust in the Lord,
she does not draw near to her God.

This could be said of almost all the cities of the earth. As you read on you see that this is a world-wide matter;

"Therefore wait for me," says the Lord,
"for the day when I arise as a witness.
For my decision is to gather nations,
to assemble kingdoms,
to pour out upon them my indignation,
all the heat of my anger;
for in the fire of my jealous wrath
all the earth shall be consumed."

What for? What is God after? Is he just interested in getting even, wreaking his vengeance at last upon the stubbornness and willfulness of men? Is he visiting the earth with this terrible hurricane of destruction in order to leave it nothing but a smoking ruin, barren and desolate, without inhabitants? No, that is what men would do if there were another world war. We would leave the earth desolate, but God will never leave it that way.

After you read the description of all the darkness, gloom, and slaughter -- after the desolation and the destruction, what is the next word? Verse 14:

Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion;
shout, O Israel!
Rejoice and exult with all your heart,
O daughter of Jerusalem!

Why? You see, this is the new order that is to follow. This is why God is dealing with men, so that he might bring out songs instead of sorrow, service instead of selfishness, security instead of slavery. This will be the consequence of God's judgment. And we are told that the Lord God is in the midst of the people, not for judgment;

The Lord within her is righteous,
he does no wrong; ... The Lord, your God, is in your midst,
a warrior who gives victory;
he will rejoice over you with gladness,
he will renew you in his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing
as on a day of festival.

"I will remove disaster from you, ...
deal with all your oppressors.
And I will save the lame
and gather the outcasts,
... change their shame into praise
and renown in all the earth.  
At that time I will bring you home,

What a picture this is! Specifically, of course, it has to do with the remnant of Israel, but it is a picture of God's loving care during any time of despair or darkness., God calls back the remnant of Israel, plus all the people grafted in, to Himself and they will at last break out into the song of the redeemed. Now the singing here is led by the Lord himself in a marvellous, glorious melody of joy. It reminds me of that beautiful passage in the Song of Songs:

For lo, the winter is past,
the rain is over and gone.
The flowers appear on the earth,
the time of singing has come. Song of songs 2:11-12a

That is what follows the time of judgment. But no one but the redeemed can join in that song. That is what Zephaniah tells us about. Although it is a painful scene, one that begins in darkness and gloom, it ends in joy and gladness and singing.

Ref: Ray Steadman