Bible Study - Zephaniah - Part 3

Last week, we started into the section of Zephaniah 1:4-13, where the Lord said that He would bring judgment against the Southern Kingdom, the Land of Judah, and the people of Jerusalem that remained in Israel. This would happen because many of the people had “turned back from following the Lord” and were following false gods or just not seeking the Lord and His will (Zephaniah 1:4-6).

In 1:7, Zephaniah tells His people to “be silent” before the Lord because “the day of the Lord is near” for them. He describes it as “a sacrifice being prepared,” but in this case, it is not a sacrifice of animals, but a “sacrifice” of many of God’s own people. The “guests” invited to participate and make the sacrifice are another nation, the rising, powerful people of Babylon. This is a very unusual description, because in the Old Testament, animal sacrifices were the means by which atonement was made for the souls of God’s people, and they were forgiven. (See Leviticus 17:11. These sacrifices were a preparation for the “once-for-all” sacrifice of Jesus on the cross to pay for and forgive the sin of the world. See Hebrews 10:5-10.) In this case, though, the picture of a sacrifice is the opposite, the execution of God’s judgment against His own people. Foreign powers will be employed by God to punish His people.

In Zephaniah 1:9, the Lord says He will punish the officials and even sons of the king, who loved “foreign clothing” and apparently, the evil ways of these foreign nations, too. (This did not include Josiah, who was just a young child at this time, with little real responsibility as King.) Also to be punished was “everyone who leaps over the threshold.” This may be a reference again to pagan practices with worship of false gods. (See the Philistines in 1 Samuel 5:1-5 as an example.) This might also be a reference to people in Judah who would break into the homes of others through the threshold and steal and take things in a fraudulent way and by violence. (We hear many stories about people today, too, in high crime areas, breaking into businesses and homes, with violence and theft and great harm. Squatters take over homes and property, too.) Punishment will come to such people.

In Zephaniah 1:12, we hear of people who are “complacent” about what is going on and say to themselves, "God does not care about us. He is doing nothing. He will not do good, nor will He do ill about anything going on. Why should we care about Him and what He says and wants?" They go their own way, against the Lord and His will. But eventually, punishment will come. (The image of the Lord “searching Jerusalem with lamps” is a way of saying that nothing can be hidden from Him. He knows the evil, as well as the good. See the story Jesus tells of the woman who searches with a lamp until she finds her lost coin in Luke 15:8-10. In this case, there is also hope, for one who is lost in evil can be found. We will see more of this hope next week.)

For Judah and Jerusalem, though, there will be cries and wails and loud crashes from various places in Jerusalem (Zephaniah 1:10). Enemies will come against the cities of Judah and even against Jerusalem with its “fortifications and lofty battlements“ (Zephaniah 1:16). Trade will stop (1:11). “Goods will be plundered and houses laid waste. People will no longer be able to “inhabit houses they have built” or “drink the fruit of their vineyards” (1:13).

This is all a prophecy from the Lord, through Zephaniah, of what would come eventually, as the Lord used the Babylonian armies to conquer Judah and Jerusalem and carry many of their people away into captivity in Babylon because of their sin and rebellion. Zephaniah piles up the words about how terrible this “great day of the Lord’s judgment” will be. It is “near and hastening fast.” Even mighty men will “cry out” in agony (1:14). It is described as “a day of wrath,” a “bitter day,” with “distress and anguish, ruin and devastation, darkness and gloom, clouds and thick darkness” (1:14-1:15).

God goes on to say through Zephaniah again that the kind of judgment and wrath coming upon Judah and Jerusalem is a warning of such judgment upon the whole unbelieving world at the end “because they have sinned against the Lord." This will be “distress on mankind” (1:17). “Silver and gold” or anything else they have will not “be able to deliver them.” “All the earth shall be consumed” and there will be “a full and sudden end” for “all inhabitants of the earth” who are without faith in the Lord and His forgiveness (1:17-18).

That warning continues into the New Testament. “Heaven and earth will pass away,” Jesus said (Mark 13:31). In His description of Judgment Day, Jesus warned that unbelievers “will go away into eternal punishment” (Matthew 25:41,46). But Jesus also said, “My Words will not pass away.” He has words of hope, that people can be changed and brought to repentance and trust in Him and escape that ultimate day of wrath. We will finally begin to hear more about that in Chapter 2 and especially in Chapter 3 of Zephaniah. (You can also hear that Good News in my sermon from 11/26/23 (you can listen or read it here: https://lutheransermons.podbean.com/e/new-sermon-for-the-last-sunday-of-the-church-year-november-26-2023), reflecting on the Day of Judgment for believers: “Come, Blessed Ones, Inherit the Kingdom.”)