Day 218 (Zephaniah 1-3) - Year 8

**Tara-Leigh Cobble** (0:01)
Hey Bible Readers, I'm Tara-Leigh Cobble, and I'm your host for The Bible Recap.
Today we finished our 24th book of the Bible. It's written by a minor prophet, Zephaniah, who is the great-great-grandson of Judah's King Hezekiah. And because he's a descendant of the king, that actually makes him a distant relative of King Josiah, who is the king during the time that Zephaniah is writing this book. You may remember King Josiah from yesterday. He's the king who sought God in his ways and turned the places of idol worship into graveyards. If there's one thing we can say about Zephaniah, it's that he does not hold back. Right out of the gate in chapter 1 verse 2, he starts out with destruction. He warns Judah about God's coming judgment in much the same way Isaiah did. He calls them out for the ways they've mingled their worship of Yahweh with the worship of gods. Anytime they felt God wasn't coming through for them, they didn't actually seek him or pray about things. They sought help from idols instead. Zephaniah warns them that the day of God's judgment is coming. God promises to punish not only those who are blatantly wicked and idolaters, but according to 1-12, he promises judgment on the complacent too, those who are inattentive and inactive. Interestingly, it seems like their passivity stems from a belief that God is passive. They think God won't really do anything about their actions, so they carelessly live their lukewarm lives. If you know someone who is a deist, this is a lot like what they believe. They believe a creator exists, but after he kind of set everything in motion, he just left it alone and moved on to other stuff. They believe he's distant and doesn't interact with mankind. But here, the one true God who is speaking and interacting with mankind says he will judge the complacent. And for the few things they do put their efforts into, building houses and planning vineyards, they'll be laboring in vain. They won't get to live in the houses or drink the wine. It doesn't matter how high their walls or how deep their pockets, they won't be able to stand against God and His wrath. In chapter 2, he does provide a potential solution though. Any ideas what it might be? You guessed it, repentance. In 2-3, he says, Seek the Lord, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands. Seek righteousness, seek humility. Perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the Lord.
Then Zephaniah begins warning all the nations around Judah too, because they don't follow Yahweh either, and their sin has to be judged too. And in the midst of all this destruction and judgment, he offers a sweet reminder that there will be a remnant of his people when it's all said and done. More on that in a minute.
In chapter 3, God describes the rebellious people of Jerusalem as proud, stubborn, faithless, and autonomous. The description of the city in verse 2 says, she listens to no one. She accepts no correction. She does not trust in the Lord. She does not draw near to her God. The fact that you're here today in the Word, listening to this podcast, it serves as evidence that your heart is not pointed in the direction verse 2 describes. You are seeking God. You're here to listen to his voice, to receive his correction, to grow in trust of him, to draw near to him. Humility, teachability, faith, and nearness to God go hand in hand.
The people of Jerusalem aren't doing any of that though. But God is still there and he's still acting righteously. Verse 4 talks about Jerusalem's wicked leaders, but then verse 5 says, The Lord within her is righteous, he does no injustice. God continues to give them chance after chance to learn their lesson, but they refuse. So God promises judgment. He says it will consume the whole earth. And you may wonder if this burning fire, if his anger and jealousy in verse 8 is literal or figurative or both, and I do too. But there are a lot of references in other scriptures to earth 2 being consumed with fire. So I tend to lean literal on this one. We'll see.
Per usual, Zephaniah wraps up the book with the same two promises we see in most prophetic books. The first promise is that God will save people from among all nations. We see this here in 3.9 where he says he will change the speech of the peoples to a pure speech. When I was a kid, I thought this verse meant that people wouldn't cuss anymore. But now I know it's referring to the Tower of Babel, where God divided the tongues or the languages of people. He's going to reunite those languages again someday. Strong chance it's not going to be English though. My best guess is Hebrew. And he says all these people from all these nations with all these languages will serve him together in peace. And despite all the sins of his people, God says there will be no shame for them. They don't know this yet, but he's got a plan to pay for their sins once and for all time. The second promise Zephaniah points to that we find in most books of prophecy is that God has preserved and will restore a remnant from among Israel as well. Israel has been through a lot, and I love hearing how God speaks to the remnant. He says, the king of Israel, the Lord is in your midst. You shall never again fear evil.