Zephaniah

 

Zephaniah 1

Zephaniah 1:1 A member of the royal family, a great-great-grandson of King Hezekiah. The genealogy makes him a second cousin of the king, since Amariah was their great-grandfather.  This prophecy seems to be fire and brimstone preaching. Not designed to be popular with the masses.

Zephaniah 1:2-13 The prophet enumerates the various ways people go astray, intermixed with the punishment that God will mete out.

• Zephaniah 1:2 In verses 2 and 18, the universality of destruction sounds very much like a description of the end times. Perhaps we should consider how our actions at any point in history could merit this kind of cataclysmic judgment.
• Zephaniah 1:3-5 Idolatry and worship of demons such as Baal and Moloch, and worship of the starry host, will be swept away, and along with destroying the physical means of such worship, the worshippers will also experience God’s hand. It will be a painful spanking.
• Zephaniah 1:6-7 Those who neglect the Lord and don’t bother to seek Him will be silent. The sacrifice the Lord has prepared refers, most likely, to Jesus’ crucifixion, in which He will set apart those who respond to His invitation.  
• Zephaniah 1:8 Rulers get distracted by their power, and forget who they are before God and their responsibility to Him for what they do in their position. Instead they focus on either exercising power or living it up.
• Zephaniah 1:9 Characteristics of those who neglect the worship of the Lord and turn to false Gods include violence and deceit. They will reap what they sow.
• Zephaniah 1:10-11  Those who focus solely on their careers will cry aloud with pain at the loss of their life-focus, be they fisherman, entrepreneurs, farmers, merchants, or bankers. If the Lord is not in their lives, when He comes they won’t be able to deal with Him and His ways.
• Zephaniah 1:12 Those who think and act as though God is dead, or is a remote, detached God who doesn’t intervene in human affairs of this life, will find out they were wrong the hard way.
• Zephaniah 1:13 The wealthy who trust in their earthly riches will lose them. 

Zephaniah 1:14-18 The great day of the Lord, the day of wrath, sounds apocalyptic, since the whole earth will be consumed. Jesus, the Mighty Warrior, shouts His call. Trouble and distress, darkness and gloom, will prevail. Blood and body innards will be poured out, and neither pricy offerings to God nor expensive medical treatments will save. It will be too late! The whole earth will be covered in this judgment, leaving no place to flee.

Zephaniah 2

Zephaniah 2:1-3 A prophecy for Judah. Three urges to seek, so that perhaps they will be sheltered on the day of wrath. 

• Seek the Lord, those who do what He commands;
• Seek righteousness, evidently for those who don’t do what He commands;
• Seek humility, which is one of three things the Lord requires, along with justice and mercy.  (Micah 6:8)

Zephaniah 2:4-7 The land of the Philistines will be destroyed. The Philistines’ origin can be traced back to being the descendants of Egypt, the son of Ham. (Genesis 10:6 & 14). The Israelites were supposed to have wiped them out in conquering the promised land, but fell short.  This prophecy is that that will be completed. The remnant of the Jews will possess the land. We see dynamics of this unfolding in our day as the Jews continue to try to control the land of Gaza. 

Zephaniah 2:8-11 The Moabites and the Ammonites will be judged. Ironically, these descendants of Lot (Genesis 19:36-38) will experience the judgment that Lot fled from when he left Sodom and Gomorrah. (Genesis 19:24-25) But this judgment is for pride, and for mocking and insulting God’s people. Their land will be a place of weeds and tar pits which will then be given to the Jewish remnant. Distant nations will bow down to Him, when they see Him destroy all the (false) gods of the earth.

Zephaniah 2:12 The Cushites, descendants of Ham (Genesis 10:6) living south of Egypt, will be slain by the Lord’s sword.

Zephaniah 2:13-15 Assyria will be destroyed, and its capital Nineveh will be a desert, as Nahum also warned. (Nahum 1:14) The phrase “I am the one and there is none like me” recurs, with variations, periodically in the mouths of the proud, and is generally cited just before God’s judgment is announced. For example, Babylon at the end of the ages. (Isaiah 47:8; Revelation 18:7) In this case it is Nineveh, which was destroyed by the historical Babylon. As Solomon wrote, “Prides goes before a fall.…” (Proverbs 16:18)

Zephaniah 3

Zephaniah 3:1-5 Alas! Jerusalem! The rulers of the city of peace are unrighteous, the religious leaders do not serve the Lord. Yet He is that He is righteous and just - that is His nature and character. What follows is how He will make things right.

 

Zephaniah 3:6-8 He made an example of other nations by utterly destroying some of them, as described in chapter 2. But the remaining ones had no fear, even Jerusalem continued to act corruptly. Therefore the whole world will be judged (at a place called Armageddon). (Revelation 16:16-21)

Zephaniah 3:9-20 After this judgment, Israel’s remnant will be restored. This is 5counterpoint to the punishment of the wicked earlier. (1:2-13)

• Zephaniah 3:9 They will call on the names of the Lord: YHWH ABBA, Yeshua HaMashiach, and Ruach HaKodesh.
• Zephaniah 3:10-11 His people, around the world, will be purified from pride, on a hill called Calvary, meaning the place of the skull. (Luke 23:33)
• Zephaniah 3:12 They will be meek and humble. (Matthew 5:3,5)
• Zephaniah 3:13 They will speak truth. (John 14:6)
• Zephaniah 3:14 They will worship with Pentecostal enthusiasm. (Psalm 100:1; Acts 2:9-11)
• Zephaniah 3:15 He has taken away their punishment.  (Isaiah 53:5-6)
• Zephaniah 3:16-17 He is a Yeshua, the Mighty Warrior who saves. (Revelation 19:11-16) He will overlook their sins because of His love. (John 17:23-26)
• Zephaniah 3:18 He will remove those who mourn the loss of religious burdens. (Matthew 23:4; Revelation 21:8)
• Zephaniah 3:19-20 He will gather His people from around the world, bring them home, and give them honor among and above all the other people of the earth. (Revelation 21:2-3)